What's Bloomin'! and May Day

Surely there should be more in bloom this week, right? Well, there are a few things. But first, a funny story. Maybe you know what May Day is all about: you give flowers and/or small gifts to neighbors and friends to celebrate spring. I've loved this holiday ever since I can remember. When I was little, I would take scissors out to my mother's garden (with permission, hopefully, though I don't really remember), cut a few blooms and take them to the neighbors.

Last week, I surprised a few people with flowers. Doug and the kids even went with me for some of them. There were two people who had actually heard of May Day (one was even preparing baskets!), but mostly, no one understood why I was bringing them flowers. One guy exultantly shouted to Doug: "Hey, your wife is bringing me flowers!". Another said, "Why would you bring me flowers?!?" And I got a lot of confused looks  when I said "Happy May Day!" It was great - I spent most of the evening laughing over the responses we received. So, if you want a good laugh, try it next year.

Anyway, on to the flowers in my yard - maybe next year I'll have enough to use scissors in my own garden!

First, the verbascum...which really didn't thrill me last year. I meant to take it out, but the dark purple flowers are really lovely this year. Although small, and so difficult to see in the picture. They may actually get to stay.

Chives! Edible flowers are exciting - although I've yet to actually use them in a salad. In SC, we had garlic chives, which have a nice white flower, but I don't like them as much for cooking and they attract flies. Yuck. So for my current garden, we have just normal chives with a purple pom-pom flower.

And finally, lily-of-the-valley. You may remember them looking like this after planting last year:

I honestly thought they were goners. But this last week saw no less than 19 shoots, complete with flowers, come up! They made my day. These also smell just heavenly.

There are plenty of things that are about to flower, so hopefully next week will be a little more exciting. But still! My lilies survived! There's not much that could be more exciting than that, speaking in gardening terms. Have a happy week!