January 28, 2012 -- daffodils!

There is some Calvinist(?)strain in me that thinks having a great gardening day in January will be punished by bad weather/unhappiness/tragedy later on, but the fact is I gardened all day in glorious weather today and.... so far no punishment. And it feels so good to have stretched those muscles that only get stretched when I am gardening. Among other things, I cut back some Mahonia aquifolium (hence, the maroon foliage I dropped into these spools), and as I hacked out lots of hard, unyielding clumps of river oats (much less enjoyable work than cutting back Mahonia), I was in the vicinity of BLOOMING DAFFODILS. The little February Gold daffodils are at their peak right now, and they won't back up and bloom in February, so, as far as I'm concerned, this is spring.