Incoming is here

So this is what they really look like! Not bad, I say, having received many shipments of live plants where are least one or two were broken, rotten, or just plain dead. I asked for an earlier delivery of these than I should have, because I've found that's necessary when ordering from higher zones (in this case, Connecticut). Better to keep them inside for a few days than receive them when they've been in their pots a bit too long. I might even plant the ones that go into containers now, and place them outside when it's time.

They sent a freebie: columbine leprechaun gold (aquilegia vulgaris vervaeneana), called that not for its purple flowers but for its variegated foliage. Otherwise, all the plants are as ordered, and in very good shape.

The season has officially started: plenty of perennials are coming up, and a few early tulips. Sunday, a beautiful day, we drove along a rural route lined with cobblestone houses from the mid-19th century, the roadside ablaze with forsythia, most of which was mercifully unshaped into boxes or whatever. I would never have this shrub myself, but I admire it elsewhere.

And we saw this carved tree stump along the way.