It’s been a very blowy, wet, and sometimes stormy couple of weeks here. Everything outside has had quite a thrashing from the wind, so I’m grateful that the early flowers have somehow managed to survive.
Last autumn I planted a shallow pot with the yellow crocus ‘fuscotinctus’ and dwarf reticulata irises ‘Cantab’ (the paler blue) and ‘Harmony’. Their pot sits at the front door and gets a lot of sunshine and a little bit of shelter from the wind. It has been a delight to see the colour gradually appearing as these flowers opened.
Despite that bit of shelter, it was a challenge to take photographs without too much blur as the upper petals of the irises fluttered in the wind. Sometimes flower photography means that you just have to hope to be able to snatch a shot right when there’s a slight drop in the breeze!
Every year I’ve said to myself that I must try to photograph all the flowers in the garden, starting with the early bulbs…and not managed it. Something would always get in the way – maybe something garden related, like sowing seeds and clearing weeds from borders, or a family responsibility that needed my time.
This blog has changed that and given some structure to my photography. It has created the need for me to take photographs every week and has put both my garden and my photography at the top of my ‘to do’ list (right along with writing my weekly blog post).
Now I can pay more attention to the gradual arrival of spring here and the changes it brings to the garden. That makes me very happy and full of anticipation of the gardening year ahead. It’s a bit of a luxury really, but these days my time is more my own and I can spend it being the real me – obsessed gardener and photographer! (Happy days!)
Ann Mackay: Inspired by Nature 
That’s a splendid show of vibrant blooms, guaranteed to warm the heart. Well done!
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Thanks Liz! It’s encouraging to see a bit of colour after the wild weather recently!
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A nice splash of colour on our grey, wet and stormy February.
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They are very cheerful for this time of year – just what we need! 🙂
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I love these photos, Ann – beautiful colors!
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Thank you! They’re very cheerful to see whenever we go through the front door – that yellow is so sunny! 🙂
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Delightful spring colours, Ann! Cheerful pictures!
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Thank you Indira! The yellow makes me think of sunshine – it’s such a blaze of colour for so early in the year. (And blue is my favourite colour.) 🙂
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Lovely images Ann, these first irises are so beautiful. It’s true that committing to writing and indeed illustrating a blog can add structure to your life and actually make you do the work, work that you do want to do, as you say, but sometimes gets pushed to the back of the queue.
I love it when I read that someone is doing something they love, and have more time for themselves; and we can all benefit from following the changes in your garden over the coming year. I’m just off into mine to tidy up and make a little bog garden; actually the whole garden is bog-like at the moment, being heavy soil.
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Thanks Stephanie! Being able to share what I get up to and chat to others about it is one of the best things about blogging. I enjoy it and it does help to keep me focused (Erm, sorry about the pun, hehe!). 🙂
I can imagine that the recent weather will have made your garden even boggier – ours was like that when we lived in Scotland. We were able to grow a totally different range of plants to here in Suffolk, where it gets very dry.
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Our native irises are beginning to bloom in the ditches now. I’m hoping that the creamy yellow I found two years ago will reappear, so I can get some better photos. I was late that year, and they all were rather raggedy. The insects seem to favor them as much as we do!
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How lovely to have native irises around you. 🙂 Sadly, hungry critters – slugs especially – can do an amazing amount of damage. Last summer I was very sad to see that they had been chewing through the stems of some bearded irises, totally destroying the flowers. This year I’ll spread some gritty sand around the irises in the hope that the slugs won’t crawl through it.
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Beautiful spring flowers, Ann! Very cheerful colours!
I had commented on this earlier…not seeing it here 😦
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It’s here but later than usual because we’ve been outside working in the garden for much of the day. Feels wonderful to be able to do that in February! 🙂
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Hi Ann – your flower images are terrific – the color is incredible in them! I know what you mean about blogging. That is exactly how I started blogging – keeps me sharp with my Photoshop skills and gets me out photographing too. Looking forward to seeing your garden flowers this Spring!
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Thanks Syd! I love seeing the colour appear at this time of year and I’m really ready for it now…but trying not to be too impatient.
Your blogging is also helping my Photoshop skills, hehe! 🙂
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Happy almost spring, Ann. So nice to see all this color you photographed. We won’t see our irises for a little while but the leaves have begun developing so at least we get to see some fresh green.
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And happy almost spring to you too, Steve! I’m looking at leaves of other plants coming up and getting very hopeful… 🙂 I love it when the fresh green appears!
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Happy day and a lovely seasonal combination too.
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Oops… days
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🙂
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Thank you! They make me feel cheerful when I see them – glad you enjoyed them too!
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Thank you! Made me smile this morning, at a time when other things are getting very worrying… 🙂
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