Foliage and a Few New Blooms

Since we are experiencing an early spring for a change, there are lots of plants popping up to show for Pam's Foliage Follow-up. I decided to post some I don't think I have yet this year, ones that are special to me in some way.  I left out the natives, so I can show them later for Wildflower Wednesday.

 I love taking yard walks, and this time of year, things change so fast, that I wanted to include some blooms that were not open for GBBD.

In the curb bed, I am pleased that the reddish/pinkish blooming persicaria a friend gave me last year is coming up.  It didn't like being moved, but did bloom.  

Hyacinth blooms are so cheerful!

I just noticed the chindoxias blooming today.

In my GBBD post, I said the established pasque flowers were not blooming yet.  Well, they are starting to now!  

OK, there is something new coming up near where the trillium was last year.  Could this be trillium seedlings?  Hopefully, I will be able to tell in a few days.

More daffodils are blooming.  I forgot to get a photo of a different looking clump nearby.

The Brunnera, 'Jack Frost' that I had to move when the tree in the front had to be cut down survived the winter.

The next two bleeding hearts are also from under the tree.  This one is a pink bloomer.

This is a white bloomer.

Oh, and the lady's mantle survived the move from under the tree.  Welcome to spring, sweeties!

There is some foliage in the garden I am excited about.  There are several kale plants from last year that I can harvest until they start to bloom.  I will let at least a couple of them bloom for the insects.

Most of the "gamble garden" I planted in January and February is up, now that the soil has gotten warm enough!  There are several kinds of lettuce.

Spinach:

Now that I have larkspur going in the front, I dug out most of the ones in the vegetable garden.

The peas are up, and everything in this garden is protected from rabbits.  The same things are coming up in my garden across the street, and only the peas over there are protected.  I hope there is enough for all of us.

The asparagus I planted 2 years ago look like they won't be ready for harvest yet this year, but I may sneak a few stalks.

Every spring, the rhubarb is ready at a busy garden time, and I don't always get any used.  Every year, I say I am going to make good use of it.  Maybe this will be one of those years.

Thirteen years ago, we moved here, where Larry grew up.  His mom grew hardnecked garlic, and she had passed a number of years before Larry's dad did.  I had quite the tangle of things to clean up in the garden.  There was lots of garlic all over the place, and I had to figure out where I wanted to let it grow.  A few years ago, I figured out I had been waiting too long to harvest it, and found out how to replant some in the fall.  It is doing pretty well, and I enjoy using the scapes when they come on. There are some onions growing just beyond the garlic patch.

I let some violets grow here and there.  I like to add the leaves and blooms to my salads.

It's a thrill to be using fresh chives for cooking now!

 Some folks are well into spring, and others still have rain and/or snow, and cooler than normal temps.  Wherever you are, I hope all is well with you.  I continue to be behind, and unable to keep up with all of the blogs I like to read. 

More Blooms than Last Year for GBBD

A number of us gardeners have declared it is spring.  Here in zone 5b SE Nebraska, our temperatures have been 20 degrees above normal this week, and now, my garden has also declared it is spring.  I looked back at last year's March, and found we really are about a week ahead of last year.  In fact, some of the crocuses have finished blooming already.  This is one of them, that I got a photo of last week.

I am pleased to have more blooms than last year for this Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day, hosted by Carol, of May Dreams Gardens.  I started at the front of the house, and went around the yard.

I wish I could do a better job keeping track of tags, or just remembering the names of my plants.  There are 2 hellebores that I didn't get moved out of the south facing planter after the tree was cut down.  They both survived the summer sun, and it looks like only one of the ones I moved survived, so I will just keep these in place, and figure out what to plant that will give them some shade in the summer.

I also have a clump of daffodils on each side of the front planter.

I think this is Helleborus orientalis.

These are the pansies our 4 year old grandson picked out, based on the red one.  His almost one year old brother ended up with the first red flower in his hand while watching his big brother plant them, and I was pleased that he did not get upset.

I am pleased that several of the pasque flowers I planted last year are up and blooming.  The ones that are more established will be blooming soon, too.

I have been doing lots of yard walks, and greeting lots of plants out loud.  I was very excited to come across these little beauties a couple days ago.  I sure carried on, telling them how sweet they are.  I did have the tag near them.  They are liverleaf, Hepatica acutiloba.  So far, two of the three are up, and there are no leaves yet.

This is the last crocus clump to bloom.

This is the only hellebore that seems to have survived after being moved last spring.

I planted several hellebores in the east front yard bed.  A couple are not yet blooming. I sure like this one.

This one looks like the picture on the 'Yellow Lady' that I have next to the house, which does not look like it.

This is the 'Yellow Lady'.

There are some little buds on the Virginia Bluebells.

Next to the garbage cans, is our son's favorite of our hellebores.  I kept forgetting to move the taller dead foliage that was hiding it to see how it was doing, until our son asked about it.  I went ahead and cut the grass off of it, and cut back the other dead plants that were around it, and it looks very happy.

I love hellebores!

(Added 3/15:  I was looking at photos from last year to try to figure out what a few plants are, and came across this photo of the above hellebore.  I need to go look at last year's posts, but I'm pretty sure I had mentioned that this clump was a different color the previous year, its first year blooming.  Have you had any experience like that? Oops, the yellow photo must have been from 2010, because I went back and found a photo in a post from last year, and saw where I had said it was yellow the year before.)

Here's the photo from 2010:

Here it is last year, still lighter than this year:

I have been having so much fun raking the leaves out of the flower beds, and discovering what all is coming up!  Larry even helped me Wednesday, although, it started out a bit dicey.  He thought I should have finished cutting everything back before asking him to help rake.  He didn't like it when I asked him to be careful of a certain plant.  He pointed out to me that where I like "this stuff" and find it fun, to him it is a chore.  We smoothed things out, and he did a great job making trips to the compost pile with the leaves and such.  I even got some potatoes and onions planted.   The lettuce and such that I planted in January are coming up.  Yippee!

I hope spring comes your way soon, if it hasn't yet.  Folks at church were saying it could snow yet.  I don't think it will, and I hope I am right.

Do You Know What This Plant Is?

I had been looking, and decided the trillium a friend gave me last year was not coming up.  Today, I saw this little plant, and was hoping this was the trillium, but after looking at photos online, and of the plant last year, I'm thinking this is not it after all, unless the next leaves are going to be different.  Do you know what this is?  (Added 3/13:  I figured out this is an aster, and I have not yet decided if it is going to get to stay here.  It is in the back of the bed, and there is room for it, unless the trillium comes up very close to it.)

The photos did not turn out so well.  I used the flash on this one.

Here's the plant shortly after I planted it last year.  I am so sad it doesn't appear to be coming back.

I have been doing some clean up in the flower beds, but it is slow going because I am experiencing a recurrence of something called benign paroxysmal positional vertigo.  I had it over 13 years ago for a few weeks, and didn't know until it came back, that it sometimes does.  For me, when I bend forward, I get dizzy.  It affects others in different ways.  I have next week off, and the weather looks to be in the 60s and 70s.  I hope to get lots done.  If you drive by and see me stumble a bit, no, I am not drunk!  There are some blooms I haven't posted yet, but I am going to wait until the 15th to show them.

I plan on doing some blog visiting this week, too.  I hope you are having some hints of spring your way!