As a gardener, it's wonderful to have weeks of warm weather in winter to get ahead of spring and ready to plant. When spring comes, it's fast and you have to be ready to go! It's also nice to have things bloom with fragrance in the air giving a lift from cold and dreary days. No need to force branches inside when they are in bloom outside. The bees come from out of nowhere and get right to work.
With days of rain in between, it makes it easy to dig up plants to transplant elsewhere. Some baby azaleas from my vintage bushes.Camellias and mahonias, all to be planted down at the farmhouse. I haven't gotten to digging up the hundreds of seedlings of Rose of Sharon. I will pot them all and give away as gifts. The large ones in the foreground will be planted up at the main house as the farmhouse has so many older bushes.All these seedlings!! Going to need bags of potting soil. I've been clearing out more down the path to the parking area and burning in the fireplace as I go. This is the area where the azaleas, camellias and mahonias will go come spring. I had planted a few in the fall, but it will take a few years before they come into bloom.Walking down the path to the right are the bushes that are in bloom, I'm clearing out underbrush and finding a lot of birds' nests.These bushes are so old they look like driftwood. I also found a rock wall that I will eventually unearth. Love rock walls.The hellebores (lenten rose) is also starting to bloom.There are thousands of hellebore seedlings that I will also have to pot, but I will take as many as I can get. They grow fast and bloom the next year and will cover a large area down at the farmhouse. A full grown hellebore costs $20, so I'm happy to do the work.
