Spring is somewhere out there

According to the calendar,Spring is about 8 weeks away. *groan*

A cool crisp, winter's day, greeted me early this morning, as I poked my nose out the front door to check on what the day may bring. Today, I thought to myself, will be the time to get some cleanup done in my gardens.
At eight thirty, warmly wrapped against the coolness of the morning, I started in on cleaning up the garden. As I worked on cutting back all the dead stems of plants which had gone dormant for winter, and pulling some of the weeds, the pale blue wintry sky, started to deepen into a darker shade of blue, as the sun rose higher in the heavens. The sun was so beautiful, and felt so warm on my back, after all the gray dreary days of the past few weeks, and it wasn't long before I had to remove my jacket.

The flower garden along the front of the house was the first to get my attention. There was so much trimming and pulling of weeds to be done.

A short while later, I had trimmed back all the dry dead stems of dormant plants, and in doing so, discovered on many of them, new growth just starting to make an appearance at their crowns, so I guess they weren't as dormant as I supposed.

The leaves of one of my favorite yellow tulips has poked up out of the ground.

Along the back side of the carport is a garden spot which is somewhat protected from the cold winds, where afternoon sun warms the soil. The plants in this small garden are among some of the first to bloom come spring.

Three of a particularly beautiful red tulip, have pushed up into the sunshine.

The shasta daisies have quite a lot of new growth showing.

Ranunculas, which have such beautiful bright flowers are also well on their way to setting buds.

There are plenty of nice fat buds on the lilac bush. I hope for many fragrant blooms this year.

This year I remembered to trim off all last years leaves of the Hellebore plants, so all the energy will go into forming the new flowers.

A pretty white Hellebore which has not been nibbled on by the slugs, which are rather fond of these flowers.

So for now, the garden is looking neater, and I deserve to rest for a while. My back is protesting a little, so I think a hot cup of coffee is in order. As I made my coffee, I happened to glance at my indoor/outdoor thermometer, it showed it to be 48F out side. I had actually felt it was warmer as I was busy digging over another one of the raised beds in the vegetable garden, but who wouldn't feel warm, as they pushed a spade or fork into the garden, lifting and turning the soil over, then raking it smooth?