This is probably not what you had in mind, but I can leave them out through the winter and they last for years.
Mike

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I call the moss, 'Hibachi moss'.

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Dotty,
I'm not an expert, but love containers for their easy ways of filling space & accenting entrances. I usually pot up what I have growing around and sometimes buy some annuals for seasonal color.

I recently posted mixed perennial planters on the thread here called "want to spruce up patio with flowers and pots."

For the very reasons you mentioned my tastes are leaning more toward single plantings with one plant in a pot or accented with a groundcover or trailer. With singles you can shuffle pots to raise up or down behind or in front of others as plants move in & out of bloom. I snip & tuck the perennials in planters to move them away from each other at times. I have strawberry begonia, variegated london pride saxifraga, and primroses in individual pots for placing around as desired. Sometimes nursery pots slip into the clay pots making for easy switching around seasonal items. Fertilizing and watering as individually planted pots has worked well for years with fuchsias, zonal geraniums, rosemary, lavender, and some other herbs.

I'll be potting up these little Carex seedlings into the set of square planters. I haven't yet decided on what goes in the other pots to the sides of the bubbler pondless fountain. I've read your plants need to be 1 1/2 times height of planter, but sometimes they don't size up to the planters because they're seedlings. The birds love this bubbler fountain that replaced a birdbath this spring. We moved the birdbath only 3' away in hopes they would not mind the switch and they haven't. The hummingbirds love our fountains near the patio in the back.

more from this year:
mixed planter with bush cucumbers in middle, dahlia, pansy, lobelia, petunia, stock, & center star Salipiglossis

Stella d'Oro daylily amidst golden creeping Jenny & Alice's purple alyssum (planted in June Stella may bloom next year instead)