Hi. I'm new to GardenBanter and pretty new to gardening - and need help.

I am throwing open house and garden at Easter for loads of family and friends and desperately want the garden to look special. But the end of April is too early for my normal bedding plants. Not too worried about by my one border. I just want to fill all my pots and window boxes with colour. I like a colour theme, like yellow/orange, red/orange, different blue hues - anything like that. Or even just foliage, as long as it looks good. But I don't like multi mixed colours.

And to make matters worse, I've already spent my bedding plant budget, so it has to be on the cheap! And has to be a display that is either short-lived, or won't mind being moved later to make room for my already ordered and carefully planned bedding plants. Pity I didn't plan for Easter earlier!

Does anyone have any brilliant ideas how to solve this problem? Thank you to anyone who takes the time to think about it!