By Sharon Cohoon, Sunset senior garden writer

Yesterday my co-blogger Jim McCausland wrote about his six favorite plants; today it's my turn:

1. French lavender (Lavandula dentata) does not have the bluest flowers; English lavender, Spanish lavender, and Canary Island lavender are all showier.  It's not the lavender that gets used for soap and perfumes; that's the L. x intermedia group.  And French lavender doesn't produce the long flower stems the craft industry likes so much; that's the English again.  But it's the first lavender I grew and the last I'll part with.

Lavandula dentata makes a great, easy care shrub in Southern California.  It is in bloom nearly year-round and seems to look especially good in winter when the rest of lavenders, especially the English varieties, look bedraggled.  (I always think they look like small dogs after they've been shampooed.) And, even though French lavender's flowers might not be the best for perfume or crafts, they still smell great to me.  I love pinching off a stem to inhale every time I pass a plant. I will never be without this plant.

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2. In coastal Southern California, pelargoniums aren't houseplants, they're landscaping plants.  They're ground covers, perennials, even shrubs.  Pelargonium crispum 'Variegated Prince Rupert' (also known as 'Crispum Variegatum' and 'French Lace') is my favorite of the ones that can be used as shrubs. 

I always describe the plant as looking like curly celery.  The way the ruffled leaves cover the stems remind me of the inner, leafed stalks of celery--only they're two-toned and smell like lemons.  The stems look really pretty in casual bouquets, too, and they're not the same old foliage filler you find at every supermarket. 

3. I only cook with Rosmarinus officinalis occasionally, but I love it as a landscaping plant.  To begin with I admire its toughness.  It can handle salt spray, alkaline soil, and blistering heat and requires little water or fertilizer.  (I've never feed mine and it seems to be doing just fine a decade later.)

I also love its glossy, dark green leaves.  I can't think of another drought-tolerant plants with leaves quite this color.  It's that near black  green of old Jaguars.

The blue flowers are pretty great, too, and they come in winter when you need a lift.  Bees like them, too.

I also like the plant's habit.  Rosemary does get woody with age, and that used to bother me.  But now that I'm getting old enough to feel a little gnarly myself, I've come to value that, too.  In fact I even prune off some of the lower foliage to reveal more of that woody, twisted base.

We all need a ilttle wabi sabi in the garden, don't you think?

4. If you want bees, African blue basil should be in your garden.  Bees seem to find this plant's purple and pink flowers absolutely intoxicating.  And I feel exactly the same way about them.  There is something about the spicy sweet scent that makes me positively giddy.

Because the plant is sterile, it just keeps pumping out flowers non-stop.  The tender perennial will make it through winter in my coastal garden, but I usually replace it every year because it is prettier when young, and it will grow from a 4-inch plant into a small, handsome shrub in no time.

African blue basil is not a pure basil; it's a cross (Ocimum kilimandscharicum x Basilicm pupureum).  I don't think it's a great choice for cooking--the leaves are somewhat fuzzy.  But, like the lemon-scented geranium I mentioned above, it's great in bouquets.  In season, there is usually a small vase of these on my kitchen sink, and often in my office, too.

5. I'm not sure I've ever encountered a Euphorbia I haven't liked.  But E. characias wulfenii the most commonly grown form in Southern California, still remains my favorite.

I love its blue-green foliage, and the plant's overall shape,  And I am absolutely crazy about the plant's chartreuse flowers.  And that shocking lime is perfect next to those cool-looking glaucuous leaves.  How could you improve on that color combo? The flowers last forever, too, and barely fade even when they're beginning to form seeds. Which means you don't deadhead them and end up with lots of volunteers.  But I like that, too.

E. c. wulfenii is one of earliest plants to flower and is one of the seasonal indicators for me.  I don't care what the calendar says, when it blooms in Southern California, it's spring.

6. Some day, as with all agaves, my Agave bracteosa will bloom and then die, and I am already dreading that day.

The foliage color of this plant just knocks me out.  It's the exact shade of green as a Granny Smith apple. Just a wonderful, wonderful color.

I love the plant's shape, too.  The way the leaves emerge from the center and spill out and curl under.

And this agave is, as they say, "unarmed."  That means no spines to stab you.  One of the kinder, friendlier agaves.

It just might be my favorite plant in my whole yard.

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If you haven't already, please take a peek at our co-Blogathon friends to see what their favorite are:

Defining Your Home Garden by Freda Cameron in Chapel Hill, NC

Digging by Pam Penick in Austin, TX

Diggin' It by Judy Lowe, Boston, MA

Fairegarden by Frances in TN

FreshDirt by Sharon Cohoon in Southern CA and Jim McCausland, near Seattle, WA

Gardening With Confidence by Helen Yoest in Raleigh, NC

Hoe & Shovel by Meems in central FL

Jim Long’s Garden by Jim Long in Blue Eye, MO

Sweet Home and Garden by Carolyn Choi in Chicago, IL

The Grumpy Gardener by Steve Bender in Hoover, AL