Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day - January 2011

Welcome to Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day for January 2011! Here in central Indiana, my USDA hardiness zone 5 garden is snow-covered and cold.

I made a half-hearted attempt to look outside for something of interest by opening the door and looking outside. Brrr… it is as cold as it looks. But it’s okay, this snow is not unexpected – we usually have snow in January. In fact if we didn’t have snow, we would wonder why not.

So we just deal with it and turn our attentions inside.

In my inside garden, a passalong Christmas cactus with orange blooms started blooming a week or so ago.

It’s past its prime, but in January “a bloom is a bloom”.

Some years I have amaryllis blooms in mid-January, but this year I just have buds.

Work with me here to imagine this blooming right now.

I’m also going to force hyacinth bulbs to bloom, but they are still chilling in the refrigerator. I plan to get then out this weekend and hope they’ll be blooming in a few weeks.

In the meantime, I’m reading a few gardening books and browsing through seed catalogs, watching out for rabbit holes and imagining a garden in May when the sky is blue, the grass is green, and the garden is all new again, and filled with blooms of all colors, with bunnies playfully jumping around in the shade, while overhead the birds sing a song that lures me out to the garden early and makes me want to stay until dusk.

Oh, wait, where am I? Oh, right. January. Not the bloomingest month in the garden, but it is still worthwhile to record whatever is blooming, nonetheless.

What’s blooming in your garden on this fine January day? Join in for Garden Bloggers’ Bloom Day and show us!

It’s easy to participate. Just post on your blog about what is blooming in your garden on the 15th of the month and then come back here to leave your link in the Mister Linky widget below along with a comment to entice us to come for a virtual visit.


“We can have flowers nearly every month of the year.” – Elizabeth Lawrence