Idioms and phrases with 'garden' words

Just thought of listing them out with the imaginaton that it would be useful to the 20,000-odd people here. Additions would be a bonus!

pick of the basket:
the best thing available

as cabbage to cauliflower:
an inferior product to a superior one

cabbabes and kings:
wide range of topics

fig leaf:
any scanty clothing

gather ye rose buds while ye may:
make the best use of your youth while it lasts

to ginger up:
to put pep into; send spirits up

not to let the grass grow under one's feet:
not to waste time

to cut the grass from under a person's feet:
to thwart; to trip anyone up

to have green fingers/thumb:
to be a naturally good gardener

to reap the harvest:
to get the reward

make hay while the sun shines:
to seize an opportunity while it lasts

to lead up the garden path:
to lead one on insensibly; to cheat; to mislead

to take a leaf out of someone's book:
to learn from example of

to turn over a new leaf:
to reform oneself

to mow down:
to massacre

in a nutshell:
in brief

man of oak:
a man of stern but sterling character

to sow one's wild oats:
to commit youthful excesses and follies

to put an ocean in a nutshell:
to express a big idea or subject briefly

olive branch:
an emblem of peace

for greener pastures:
for better opportunities

root and branch:
completely; thoroughly

a bed of roses:
a pleasant, easy condition of life

to gather life's roses:
to seek the pleasures of life

to say it with roses/flowers:
to say with joy and honour

to sit on a hedge:
to be neutral

a snake in the grass:
a hidden enemy

to miss the wood for the trees:
to miss the main point of a subject

Culled out from a book. Dinu

wake up and smell the roses
to get with reality

Flowery speech
Said with many pretty turns of phrase

Thanks for all. "Neat." Many are familiar, a few new.

Dinu thank you-my favorite is: gather ye rose buds while ye may:
make the best use of your youth while it lasts

"come out smelling like a rose"
No matter what the bad situation, always gets turned around for the best.

"Don't let the grass grow under your feet."
Means don't waste time thinking about it get going.

Comparing apples to oranges
Making a comparison to two related yet different objects

To have your roots firmly planted
To be established

Willowy figure
Slender and graceful

Thorny issue
A subject that is touchy and may induce anger

A thorn in the side
A problem

Rose colored glasses
To see things in an optimistic way

Lonely Petunia in an onion patch
To stand out from the crowd in a pleasant way

Beanpole
A tall and skinny person

Morning Glory
An earlier riser of good disposition

Hothouse specimen
A person requiring constant attention

Clinging Vine
A lover or child that clings to you

Treated like a mushroom
Kept in the dark and fed manure

Polishing the apple
To present something in the most favorable light or to try to make a good impression

Two peas in a pod
almost identical or very close

Carrot top
a redheaded person

To go banannas
to get very excited

To go nuts
To act insane

rolling in clover
happy and doing well financially

another row to hoe
more yet to do

The last straw
can't take anymore

Whew! There really are a lot aren't there!

"shady character"
One not on the "up and up"

My little nephew often asks me questions about this and that without an end.he likes to DIG ROOTS OUT.
there are so many idioms of flowers in Chinese.I will pick up and translate into English for us to share!

This message was edited Tuesday, Oct 15th 9:11 AM

I never promised you a Rose Garden

Coming up daisies

"A rose is a rose is a rose"
Gertrude Stein

Seed money

Going to seed

A seedy ___

1st, 2nd etc. seeded

I dig it baby!

Beat swords into ploughshares

"The cut worm forgives the plough"
William Blake

He's got a burr up his .....

Cherry ripe

Hit the hay

The apple of my eye

Sow the wind, reap the whirlwind

"...for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."
Galatians 6:7

Gilding the lily

Lily white

Daisy roots
(Cockney rhyming slang for "boots")

Catcher in the Rye

Call a spade a spade

Sprouts fascist
(SoCal slang for extreme Vegan)

Fungi Jumping

For Peat's sake!

Turn over a new leaf

Put down new roots

Lettuce
(meaning "cash")

Cauliflower ear

A rolling stone gathers no moss

Lotus eaters

The salt of the earth

Hollywood and Vine

A germinal idea

Lithe as a Birch branch

Solid as an Oak

To crown with Laurel

To Pine away

Sour grapes

To grow like a weed

A ripe old age

C'mon dudes - let's jam!


;)

lolol, thanks a lot Zany! Now I have that silly "I'm a lonely little petunia in an onion patch" song stuck in my head!!!! I hadn't thought about that one in YEARS (I ain't sayin' how many, neither!)

giggle, chuckle, banging my head to make it stop....

I know what you mean ! I caught myself humming it in the grocery store produce aisle shen I was looking at the green onions and leeks!

Hi Buds,open sesame!
*Life is not always made up of sunshine and flowers.
*Some people call me in jest a yellow banana.
*A person called me in an ironic tone a night-blooming Cereus in gardening.
*Who says the grass is always greener on the other side.my garden is best of all!
*Ginger everyday drives diseases away.
*Oops a daisy!that was a silly thing to do,wasn't it?
*hi,hold your horses,you Balsam.
*--X (a girl's name) is really a rose.
-- Oh, she is nothing but a plastic flower.

Oops - Jianhua reminded me:

Shrinking violet

Flower of youth

Don't beat around the bush
(get to the point)

Salad days

Days of wine and roses

Seedy dive
(unpleasant place)

A rose between two thorns

Coming up smelling of roses

Comes up like a weed

I will be Pushin Up Daisies if I keep puttin petunias on Vol's head! ;~)

No, but I might be sending you a box of freshly-picked wild onions and maybe a polecat or two, or sumthin' along those lines! (I'm grinning inanely as the song just keeps going 'round and 'round in my head...)

Well, I know what to do with the wild onions, I can put a circle of them around my Petunia pot...But I think I'd rather pass on the pole cat :~P

*My family tree says my grand-grand father was a scholar.
*He did the dirty thing,but wanna graft it on my head.no way.
*i cannot tell Jack from Jim.they are as like as two peas in a pod.
*I've tried dozens of ways to make him change his mind,but none of them have borne fruit so far.
*Little Jenny is a Mimosa.she fears to meet guests visiting their home.
*staying at home i feel i am holding an olive branch in my hands.
*My englsih is only greenhouse english.i need to make conversations with native english speakers.
*Oooopppss,Lophophora,you are a shrinking violet?yet i call you a shrinking Bonsai.how about it? ):
Once i was deely strucken by a Nihongu's gal --her rosy face with a cherry-fruit mouth and curving willow-leaf eyebrows.she is Ashin,a heroin in a Japanese film. ):




This message was edited Thursday, Oct 17th 7:35 AM

Those are some good ones Jianhua. Sood to see you are not a wallflower in this discussion!

Jinhua -

The Oshin series ended a year or two before I got here, and I've never seen it, but I hear it's popular all over the world, esp. in Egypt(!!!!?????)

BTW:

To hold out an olive branch.

Under the mistletoe.

Peachy keen.

Flaxen hair.

Sleep like a log.

To be potted (drunk).

A fertile imagination.

To nip at the bud.

Budding youth.

Busy as a bee.

To daisy-chain.

Zanymuse,
Heheheh wallflower,plastic flower and paper flower mean the same,i think.am i saying i am one of these?to be or not to be,that is a question.
Lophophora,
Gentle ladies in the land of cherry blossom are mostly orchid fragrance.Oshin is only one typical model.
There again,
After i experenced the sudden change,most of our gardeners showed great concern of me.here,frankly to tell you,everything in the garden is nice.i am a woody grass bamboo.

Jianhua A Wallflower is someone who is left on the sidelines while others have fun and a plastic flower is usually a girl who wears so much makeup and costume jewlery that you can't see the person under it all while a paper flower is someone who's beauty is fragile and must be handled gently lest they become tattered and torn.

By "Woody grass bamboo" so you mean that you are rugged and tenacious?

Zanymuse,
thanks for the concise definition of the three man-made flowers.my webster's vest pocket thesaurus does not tell me the usage.
'woody grass bamboo',you know a bamboo is very tenacious,even when meeting with a tornado,it will bear strong pressure and cannot be broken.this is the bamboo spirit.

I like that! Bamboo Spiit! Adding a new phrase to my vocabulary. Thanks!