blooming like crazy...

There are these little bulb plants that are blooming all over the place here... and looking so spring-y!

We planted them over twenty five years ago, not long after moving into the house. They are out in the leaf mulch, under trees where I forget about them. And then suddenly - usually so early in the year I am caught by surprise, since the woods are so bare and drab, with no color anywhere: there they are - blooming like crazy. Little tiny bell shaped flowers, gently blowing in the breeze. About the size of the tip of your pinky finger, with a scalloped edge that makes them look like they have been trimmed with pinking shears. Looking very similar to Lily of the Valley, with a tiny little green dot at the point of each scallop. I've been calling them snowdrops all these years, but I am sure there is some latin name.

They came in a big trash bag full of bulbs my aunt gave me when she had a flower bed dug up to replant. She was renovating her mother's house, and doing some yard work, deciding that the flower beds needed renovating as well. So every spring, when the little snowdrops are practically the only thing blooming, promising warmer weather, I have to think about my grandmother, and the beloved aunt who gave me the bulbs.

The other thing that is showing off in my yard right now: hyacinth bulbs - dozens of them. And what is so amazing is that they were all on the way to the gallows when they took at detour and came to my house instead. I've rescued lots of plants in pots that were bloomed out and headed for the dumpster, but none have been gratifyingly successful as the hyacinth bulbs. Lots of dark purple ones (probably the name of that shade of blue is called 'hyacinth'), as well as white ones, and some pale pink, and a darker pink that is more of a dusty rose color. When they indoors, in a confined space, the aroma of a hyacinth plant in bloom can be overwhelming - kinda like too much gardenia odor - so sweet smelling it can make you queasy. But the ones I have planted out in beds around the house have recovered from being 'forced' in Canadian greenhouses and have been extraordinary this year.

When we sit down at the dining table to eat in the late afternoon and I  look out the window and see the bell-shaped blooms of the snowdrops, and the colorful spikes of hyacinths I can't help but smile. Even though the weather is windy, miserably cold and far to chilly to be out enjoying the world - seeing those determined, brightly blooming flowers, and knowing they bring the promise of warm days and sunny spring weather: I'm sitting here, right now, with a great big smile.