Roots continue to grow even though the rest of the plant is dormant, so these plants will be more ready when the stresses of summer. If you have favorite tender plants you'd like to include in your garden next year, then carefully dig them out of the flower bed, plant them in a well-drained potting mix, and keep in a bright, humid room. They may look terrible during the winter, but if they survive, you can replant them in the garden as soon as the soil begins to warm. Or, take cuttings and root them in a well-drained potting mix. Now that summer is over, and so are summer flowers, it's time to replace them with winter-hardy flowers for color.
Pansies are the number one choice for blooming bedding plants.
They're hardy, will bloom over a long season, and come in a wide array of colors. You can get anything from bold orange, yellow and red, to pale pastels. Miniature pansies are also becoming popular, as well as the old fashioned viola and Johnny Jump-Ups. Some spring wildflowers, can still be sown from seed in early November, including bluebonnets, Drummond phlox, rudbeckia and coreopis. Sow into a bare, prepared soil, very lightly cover and water immediately to initiate germination.