Hinting at Spring

Hi!  I had a nice quiet weekend here with Mo.
It was warm:

But alternating fog ---

and rain.

This is the weekend---after the holiday things are sadly, carefully, tucked away for another year and the house is again blue and white and calm and normal---this is when I like to start my indoor spring bulbs.

If you forgot to buy bulbs in the fall I noticed this year there are two other fun options: there's a lot of boxed ''gift packed'' bulbs on sale, in groceries' floral departments. Good prices!

And the preplanted bulbs are in extra early:

I had to have the daffodils in the delft pot. It was 11.99 and I can use the planter again for years to come.

I tried to resist buying the big pot and first I got a purple hyacinth. 2.99. How can I say no?

It grew really fast on my sunny table.

I rescued these daffodils from my friend's garden, he of the tropical garden. The squirrel was digging up the bulbs. My friend didn't care for the cottage garden-y daffs last spring---we pulled most of the daffs out before they even fully bloomed, so I picked these up and brought them home, knowing he wouldn't care or want them. Mason jar and beach pebbles.

And I'm always finding branches to lug home, like this wonderfully gnarly crabapple branch. Look, it may get leaves?

On Sunday I started my paper white narcissus.

You can see they are sprouting, they're ready to go! To grow.

I gathered my clean faux beach glass ...

and after a lot of dithering I decided to use my favorite spongeware bowl for the planter. It's usually my knitting bowl and I do hope the water doesn't damage it.

Two kinds of bulbs---6 from the flower nursery, rather $$$ at I think 3.oo each. Supposedly unscented.

And a box of sale narcissus. 10 total.

Nestle the bulbs into the bed of pebbles then put a bit more around to steady them.
Add water to touch the bottoms of the bulbs. Keep an eye on the water level.
In dry winter the water evaporates daily sometimes. On the other hand don't drown the bulbs or they'll rot.

Some people add rubbing alcohol or vodka to the water. It supposedly keeps the daffs from being leggy /weedy. I always forget.

They should bloom in about 10 days and will last maybe a week. We'll see!
If you buy the box of gift daffs, save the little pot and disk of starter soil. You can use it in a couple months to start some herbs or Easter grass.

Mo enjoys my projects. He finds his human's antics fascinating. I notice that if I let him watch from a chair he is less likely to jump up on the table to investigate up close.

Have a great week. I hope it's not too too cold? I loved everyone's staying-warm ideas! I'm going to make potato leek soup this week. Mmmmm.

love

lizzy

gone to the beach...