These annuals which are easily grown can be sown in the open and have flowers the same season.

Alyssum

A white variety can create a "Carpet of Snow" and is one of the annual varieties that are so valuable for bedding and edging. In bloom the entire season and into late autumn. Lift a few plants and pot them up for the indoor window garden. Masses of white blossoms on compact 4 inch plants.

CandyTurf

So delicate is its perfume, so modest its flowers. Under average soil conditions Candytuft provides a fortune in white and in pink in lavender and in rose, for a mere monetary pittance. Grow it in beds, along the walk, in the rockery and by the shrubbery. Make several sowings in a season.

Dianthus (Annual Pinks)

Growing from 10 to 14 inches high and bearing in profusion; beautifully colored flowers, either single or double, here is a group of subjects that will thrill you with their exotic brilliancy. Just a little fussy, they like a moist loam. Mass them in such soil and they will form a magical matting of curious color combination.

Marigolds

They are truly the amateur gardener's best friend and what a host of personalities. You can have tall ones, or dwarf kinds, singles or doubles, some with collars and others with blossoms that resemble great lemon colored and orange colored sponges. Carnation-like flowers, chrysanthemum-like flowers and flowers that are incurved are now common. And all are so valuable for cutting. Were you to let your imagination run wild you could have a garden of Marigolds exclusively. They can even be produced with or without incense. Keep up with the marigold trend. The seed catalogs describe many wondrous kinds.

Portulaca (Sun Plant) Grown under lights, on sunny embankments, on sunny rockeries and along sunny walks, Portulaca is astoundingly effective outdoors rather than indoors under no light. Make sure when you sow the seeds that you keep the soil moist until the seedlings commence to grow. Once established care can be confined to weeding as the plants are succulent in habit and will revel in the hottest sun under drought conditions that few other plants could survive.

Portulaca is a dwarf plant only 6 or 7 inches in height. Its colors are numerous and on sunny days dazzlingly brilliant. You can purchase in mixed packets single varieties or double varieties to suit your whims and fancies. Many interesting semi-double variations will be found in the double strains.

About the Author:
Thomas Fryd frequently contributes to http://www.plant-care.com. This time he is ready with something on grown under lights that can roll back all the confusion