A new year in the garden

Mid-way into January and it is starting to feel like we have turned the corner into a new year at last.  There is still a lot of winter to come, we have not reached what I think of as the 'snow period' yet, but in the garden the early/late winter plants are making their presence known.

The winter flowering cherry is not a sign of spring, the clue is in the name, it flowers in winter.  It is a sign of life though and the colour and the fragility of the flowers are treasured in the winter garden.

This is an early crocus making its appearance.  This part of the front garden gets the early sun (when there is sun).  These crocii were planted the first autumn I lived in this house and they always make me smile in recognition when every year they reappear.

I have been developing a love affair with hooped daffodils over recent years.  This is Narcissus bulbocodium 'Golden Bells'.   I used to think this kind of daffodil was a bit odd but now I embrace their beauty.  This one started flowering this week and I was delighted.

I have planted up a few containers this winter and this one is by the front door.  Currently there is one snowdrop showing its face but already I am happy with the viola/snowdrop contrast.  I love it when a plan comes together.....

The first aconites are also starting to flower.  This excites me beyond reason.  I struggle, or have struggled I maybe should say, with getting aconites to establish in the garden.  I ambitiously planted the Aconite Lawn in 2014 and after years of sulking and limping along, it now feels like it looks almost like I hoped.  In another fifty years or so I think it will look wonderful and as I will be haunting the garden by that point I will smile benevolently.  If someone has dug up the lawn in the intervening years, I shall be smiting, very unbenevolently.

 As I walk around the garden looking for the flowers as they emerge, I nod at the hellebores unfurling their flowers one by one, I salute the hamamelis and then I stop in wonder at this Knautia still flowering in the back garden.  This autumn/winter so far has been very wet and quite mild.  We have had a frost or two but nothing serious.  Other gardeners on Twitter commented they too have this and other plants still in flower.  They have just said on the news that the last decade has been the warmest on record (records began in 1850) and the last five years were the hottest.  Worrying, worrying.

I have roses still creating buds too.  As said above we still have much of winter to come and I do fully expect Winter to arrive.  Until then I will enjoy the colour that I have and celebrate the signs of Spring as they emerge.