Spring Surprises!

Well, the very last bit of snow left my yard two days ago.  It took that long for the snow pile in front of my kitchen window to finally melt away.  That was where much of the snow that landed on my driveway was deposited by the plow.  The bulk of the rest of the snow was completely gone last week, thank heavens!  Finally, I could see grass and my flower beds, as disheveled as they may have been.  To my amazement, sprouting out of the ground were some bulb flowers I was hoping to see this spring but, not at all sure I would.

I am not very good about planting bulbs in the fall.  For some reason, I never get around to it and when spring finally arrives, I am very upset with myself for my neglect especially when I see beautiful daffodils and tulips blooming in other yards in the neighborhood.

However, look what showed its pretty face in my garden this spring!

Hyacinths!  

These purple/blue hyacinths and the little white hyacinths were given to me as gifts last year during the winter and early spring months.  I decided to forego conventional wisdom (I've read where forced bulbs will not bloom again.) and planted them in my garden anyway... just to see what would happen.

To my amazement, the hyacinths lived through the winter and were even blooming again!  There may be some mini daffodils in there, as well.  I'm not sure yet.  It's too early to tell.

Do you remember these beauties from my post on March 11, 2015?  

 

Well, I saved the plants from that design
and placed them in the garage for safe-
keeping.
                                                                                  My friend, Joni, had given me this hyacinth in
                                                                                  January for my birthday.  When it was done
                                                                                  blooming, I put it in the garage also, hoping to
                                                                                  remember to plant it in the spring when the
                                                                                  ground was workable again.

So here they are.  I dug a hole deep enough to cover all of the bulb and some of the greenery.  I think bulbs need to be planted deeper than the depth of a typical plastic flower pot. Next, of course, I filled in the hole with dirt.  I did not cut off the greenery.  Evidently, it is very important to the strength of the bulb and its future productivity.  The greenery does look messy but, usually other plants will fill in around the browned greens and cover them up as the summer progresses.

 

Here, I have planted two hyacinths and three mini daffodil bulbs.  Maybe I will be lucky again and they will bloom next spring!

Ok, back to my hyacinth garden.  Even though I loved that the hyacinths had made an appearance among my daffodils, (I somehow had managed to get them in the ground one fall a few years ago.) I realized the garden needed some more color.  So, I purchased some pansies, the perfect early spring flower, to fill in among the bulbs.

I loved these large pansies I found at Market Basket, of all places!

The blue of the hyacinths pairs well with the yellow pansy.

I had to go back to Market Basket to get one more flat of the large pansies.  I had underestimated how many I would need.

 

I think I was right.  More was definitely better when it came to pansies in the garden!

 

Hopefully, my experience will give you incentive to plant the spring bulbs you receive as gifts at Easter and other spring occasions.  Oh, that reminds me...I still have two Easter Lilies that need to be planted.

Maybe tomorrow...

 

Side note:  While I was preparing this post it actually snowed overnight in areas of Massachusetts, not in my area (Yay!!) but I'm thinking I will hold off planting my Easter Lilies for another week.  The hyacinths and daffodils I planted already should be fine; they are pretty hardy!!