I am looking forward to seeing the results of all the new stuff that got planted last year......some things, like daylilies bought bareroot, won't bloom until the next year so you have a long time to wait to see if the plant lives up to your expectations.

One bed that turned out to be a surprise was the planting of purple Louisiana Iris at the base of a Mrs. B.R. Cant (who is on a slightly raised bed). There was a barren spot at the base of the bed where all the water would run down so I put the Irises there - mostly just to put something there that likes it wet. Well, they are both starting to bloom right now and it is really pretty. A somewhat unexpected surprise!

I also cannot wait to see the blooms of all the roses that I bought this year, particularly the bands. They are all doing well and I think most of them have buds on them - SO exciting! I walk out there and look several times a day to see if anything has happened since the last time I was out!

Ripples opened and was very pretty......the little band of Magenta has a bunch of fat buds on it....Old Port has a bud or two as does Cymbaline. Marquise Bocella has a few blooms and they are gorgeous!

Heck, even the Hippolyte has a bud or two! Probably the only blooms I will get from the four Gallica's I am trying(Charles de Mills, Cardinal de Richelieu, La Belle Sultane and Hippolyte) :)

The little band of Spanish Rhapsody has bloomed and it is very very pretty....more so than I thought when I ordered it.

The only plant that is a bit of a "disappointment" is Reve D'Or........I bought it last year and it is finally blooming this year and the blooms are ok. The plant is big and healthy and there are lots of blooms but so far they aren't my favorite. I can't really tell what the color is trying to be.

I also look forward to the tomatoes that are growing so nicely out there......oops, that's another forum!

I am looking forward to see the new roses grow!
I have bought a mix of 8 knockout (single/double, pink/red) and I have high expectations on them, can't wait to see their first flowers. Plus a dozen new rugosas (a mix of alba and rubra, so I still do not know who will bloom in white and who in red).

Last year some small roses suffered a lot under a tree, now I have cut some boughes and want to see if they are happy about that...

And I definitely must take some good snapshots of my 'old blush' in full bloom !!

I am looking forward to seeing the results of all the new stuff that got planted last year......some things, like daylilies bought bareroot, won't bloom until the next year so you have a long time to wait to see if the plant lives up to your expectations.

One bed that turned out to be a surprise was the planting of purple Louisiana Iris at the base of a Mrs. B.R. Cant (who is on a slightly raised bed). There was a barren spot at the base of the bed where all the water would run down so I put the Irises there - mostly just to put something there that likes it wet. Well, they are both starting to bloom right now and it is really pretty. A somewhat unexpected surprise!

I also cannot wait to see the blooms of all the roses that I bought this year, particularly the bands. They are all doing well and I think most of them have buds on them - SO exciting! I walk out there and look several times a day to see if anything has happened since the last time I was out!

Ripples opened and was very pretty......the little band of Magenta has a bunch of fat buds on it....Old Port has a bud or two as does Cymbaline. Marquise Bocella has a few blooms and they are gorgeous!

Heck, even the Hippolyte has a bud or two! Probably the only blooms I will get from the four Gallica's I am trying(Charles de Mills, Cardinal de Richelieu, La Belle Sultane and Hippolyte) :)

The little band of Spanish Rhapsody has bloomed and it is very very pretty....more so than I thought when I ordered it.

The only plant that is a bit of a "disappointment" is Reve D'Or........I bought it last year and it is finally blooming this year and the blooms are ok. The plant is big and healthy and there are lots of blooms but so far they aren't my favorite. I can't really tell what the color is trying to be.

I also look forward to the tomatoes that are growing so nicely out there......oops, that's another forum!

Sorry - not trying to hog the string! Not sure why my message got posted twice - must have accidentally hit a button on this confounded keyboard.

Feel free to read it twice but honestly it's not THAT interesting, lol.

This is a small, simple thing, but I'm looking forward to seeing a fairly large 'Provence' lavender plant growing next to the English rose, 'Pretty Jessica', this year. I know, it doesn't take much to make me happy :-)

Randy

Just hoping my husband does not have the gardener take every single living thing out of the garden.

I think what I look forward to the most is watching my many tea roses get larger and produce more and hopefully more perfect blooms. I want to look at a sea of color out there this spring, which is a little optimistic, since my oldest rose is not much more than two. The one rose I'm most interested now is Grandmother's Hat (oh, how I dislike that name, I wish they had named it Barbara Worl) which worried me because it didn't bloom right away as expected, but it now has quite a few buds and open blooms, and I'm so looking forward to the appearance and the fragrance. It's one of the most sumptuous-looking roses I have and I'm expecting great things once it grows up.

I am looking forward to an unidentified roses to bloom! I acquired it at a plant lotto last November and I have NO idea what it is, so I have kept it in a 3-gallon pot while I watch its growth habit, etc. It now has a bud on it and that will go a long way to ID of this rose.
I also added many, many daylilies to my garden last year and since a lot of them have lost their labels (or never had an ID) I have no idea what expect, but I know I won't be disappointed.
Molly

I'm especially looking forward to first blooms from Charles de Mills and Alchymist. Jude the Obscure is getting bigger so I hope for a good bloom on him. I want to see if my color combinations are working, having moved a few things around. I am hoping that pegging some plants to other plants instead of pruning them will not result in a mess but will create fountains of blooms..particularly on Frederick Mistral, which is large. I am hoping for things from the $1 clearance clematis plants I bought last year. One is a pagoda looking one. I am hoping my wildflower seeds are going to come up. I hope to make room for some vegetables since I've got seedlings up.
will be happy to see the blooms on new bands from last year. Also, my new picket fence has a row of climbers along it..I am hoping they'll come up and over it. Can't wait to see Elie Beauvillain and Paul Transon. SO much to look forward to! I stuck some iris plants along the outside of my new fence..I hope they like the gravely soil there.
Linda

I look forward to watching a whole pack of new Old Europeans bloom for the first time. I just hope the mini-winter (complete with a little snow!) we had yesterday and today will not spoil the blooms. Most everything had leafed out in the warm 70-80 degree days we have been having.

I can't wait to see everything bloom and grow!!

Well, of course I'm looking forward to first blooms on Caramella and Jude the Obscure. I'm looking forward to finally getting Lamarque in the ground with a nice support-- she deserves it. And all the bargain end-of-season perennials, can't wait to see how they look among the roses-- Tradencantia, alyssum saxatile, helianthemum, nepeta mussini, balloon flower. Hoping the chinas Louis Philippe and Archduke Charles will start to really take off--, yes and the trio of Gay Hill Chinas. Hoping all the wonderful things I'm growing from seed make it in the garden-- valerian, Swan River Daisy, talinum limon 'Jewel of Opar', plectranthus. And I'm really looking forward to seeing what Darlow's Enigma and Vanity will do this year.

Texaslyn, what a good idea to put La iris in a spot that catches moisture runoff. I can identify with all of your excitement about new roses. I hope Reve d'Or evens out for you and starts producing what you were expecting. I hope your gallicas do well and produce some wonderful fragrance for you.

scardan, be sure and post your pictures of old blush when you take those snap shots. I hope everything blooms beautifully for you and you like all the surprises.

Randy, I could tell from other postings how excited you were to get Pretty Jessica and how much you like that lavender. It will be beautiful together, I'll bet.

Patricia, if your gardener and dh take everything out, this only means that they'll get to put new stuff in. Whatever you wind up doing, I know it will be lovely. I really admire your tenacity through all the trying times you've talked here about a little.

Ingrid, you can call GH Barbara Worl - it's listed as a synonym on hmf and it's how I first saw it listed when I looked at the catalog of Countryside Roses. I look forward to seeing some pictures of your garden again this year. I loved the color combinations I saw.

Molly, lol about the surprise daylilies. Whereas I can remember a rose name, I can't ever remember what daylily went where so my few are always a surprise too. I really like them, just can't remember their names. I would be on pins and needles to have a lotto surprise rose, too.

LInda, how wonderful to have a new fence to put climbers on. I can relate to everything you've said, especially the part about moving things around. I do that too, way too much. For me, it's because I don't know the plant and don't really know where it's best suited to go and how the colors really are.

greybird, I've read the postings about your new Europeans. Please keep us posted this year as to how they do and pictures, pictures, pictures!

Barbara, I'm growing things from seed this year too, but I don't recognize the plants you mentioned; I'll have to look them up. I look at my caramella every day wondering what it is going to be when it's grown up, lol. I can relate to everything you've said.

Because my garden is still so young, and the beds are still going in and being planned, I remind myself of a kid in a candy store. Maybe in a couple of years I won't have as many new things to be excited about.

It is nice to know though, that there are so many other excited about the first blooms you'll see on new roses, new seedlings, colors, textures.

One thing I remember from last spring that I am also excited about is when a friend came by to see the garden, as soon as she stepped into the yard she commented on how good the air smelled from the roses. I can't wait.

Thanks, everyone, it was fun to read your comments and I'm sorry my response is so long. Gean

Gean, your response was not too long but rather wonderfully encapsulated the joy and anticipation we're all feeling in regard to the coming spring blooming season. It shows that we're all united in loving our roses and the gardens we grow around them. It's a wonderful commonality of feeling. Let's call it what it is, a glorious passion.

Ingrid

Hear, hear!

We're all excited! For my part I'm looking forward to seeing the effects of the rain that started last night. Last winter we finally got abundant rain and are no longer in drought mode--this is after three years of worrying about whether we might go on water rationing. Then the rain stopped at the beginning of March, and, while the ground has stayed moist (hurray for clay soil and mulch!), the air has been very dry, not to mention dusty, and the surfaces of unmulched areas have dried and cracked. Right now it's drippy and foggy; it rained well last night, and we have several days of rain in the forecast. Spring was already going well, but when the sun comes back I anticipate unparalleled splendor. And, now that we've at last had a real winter and real rain, I'm looking forward to generous growth in the garden.

We've planted about two hundred new varieties of roses in the last three years, and, because the weather has been so dry and we don't irrigate more than the absolute minimum needed to keep young plants alive, most of the new roses have grown slowly and bloomed little; in particular we basically haven't had a fall flowering the last two years because the autumn rains waited almost until Halloween to begin. I'm looking forward to watching our young roses grow and getting to know them. I'm also looking forward to seeing the plantings fill out and the expanses of mulch begin to disappear! And this rain ought to give a boost to the rose cuttings taken in fall, so that I'll be able to tell which ones are going to live and which ones won't make it.

We've done a lot of work in the garden, and naturally I wish to see the result with the plants in full growth. And of course I want to see the roses in bloom, and everything else! But I have one special wish: to see the roses on the Rose Road grow taller than me. I want to be enveloped in roses. I think this may be the year!

Gean, it is such an intense pleasure to see a successful combination of plants or an elegant use of available conditions! You sound like you're busy in the best kind of way, and your garden will be beautiful as a result.

Happy spring, everyone!

Melissa

I'm looking forward to a "mature" rose garden. Although I've grown some roses for years, I started getting really serious about roses 3-4 years ago--bought lots and lots of them (well, not 100s like some of you--my yard isn't that big. LOL) Anyway, that means most of my roses are now 3 or more years old. That should mean some full, well-developed bushes and lots of roses, right? Oh, I hope so.

Kate

This up and coming year is probably the first in 10 that I did not get "afflicted" with spring plant acquisition mania for new roses ... the tanking of the oil price, and oil sands boom helped, plus my kids wrecking one of my vehicles. This means a very relaxed planting season instead of busting myself in some marathon of hope.

New rose are coming but are down to a reasonable dozen or so down from the usual 125 to 150.

So this year we focus and look over the garden and mulling where to go with it for next season. There has been a gradual move to more hardy roses.

Also it will be interesting to see how the back north gardens did - except for the Portland bed - as I did no protection beyond tossing 8 foot lengths of 2x4's over the bent down plants. I expected lots of winter kill, but somehow I doubt that is going to happen this year as the snow for the first time in memory came in early December and stayed. Some parts of the garden have nearly two feet which is unheard of in my garden. This means a lot of roses that are out of zone may do very well for cane survival - and potentially a good bloom come July.

Perennials and moving here there and everywhere plants are likely to be the "fun" part - yes I am serious that is the fun part to fill in the holes by losses.

Though last night I did start the dahlias and gladiolas in the basement grow room. The teas that wintered in the basement are doing fine with minimal care.

I'm cutting way back on watering in several parts of the garden due to water restrictions and our ongoing drought. I'm interested to learn which of my established roses can tolerate once-a-month watering. The roses in the front garden will continue to be watered weekly but the rest are facing tougher conditions. Lots of mulch and lighter pruning this past winter ought to help.

Rosefolly

I am looking forward to seeing tea roses for the first time in my life!
I am also hoping that my new clematis can take the summer heat. Which I have not experienced myself yet.
I am also excited about my seedlings. The first to germinate (Lavatera arborea and Arctotis acaulis) are just showing.
Daisy

Ingrid, thank you for the encouragement and I agree, it is a passion. I hope the spring and summer will prove it to be a glorious passion! I liked Riku's phrase, "marathon of hope."

Melissa, we've all read with great interest of your garden and how it's suffered through drought, all about hay mulch and have even been blessed with a few pictures. I hope that all of your labors and love are rewarded this year with air perfumed and land filled with the fruit of what you've sown and planted.

Kate, to have roses that approach maturity... I hope the roses bloom and grow and that you're well pleased this year.

Riku and Rosefolly, your postings remind me that gardening is so weather dependent. I am learning to be flexible too and embrace what helps the garden and endure what doesn't.
You are showing me how important it is to change what I do to suit my conditions to attain my goal, a garden that pleases.

Daisy, I know this is a new garden and a new place for you, so hope this summer brings hope for a garden and a home that you will love. I am growing lavender from seed also; it is so much fun to watch seeds plus dirt plus water equal plants.

Thank you all so much for your comments.

I'm looking forward to seeing if my new teas make it through my uneven care and start to take hold. I'm looking forward to getting some better companion plants in the more established rose areas to make it look less lumpy. I'm looking forward to see if my pruning this year was better or worse than last year's efforts. :)

-Greta

Greta, if this were last year I would have written exactly what you said, because that's what I thought this time last year. But everything survived and grew. I bet it will for you too. Happy spring!

I'm eager to see the Duchess of Albany bloom I got it as a band last year and each time it was getting ready to bloome either someone or some creature snipped the bud.

Old roses and new roses. Clematis I planted last year. One of my non typical lilacs is blooming and I love it, so fragrant!
Looking forward to azaleas, peonies, cherry trees too.

Carla

Joe, I remember you mentioned this rose not too long ago. It's the red/dark pink sport of La France, right? I hope you will post pictures of it when it blooms and put one on hmf - there aren't any there ...:( I hope it blooms its head off for you. La France does great for you, doesn't it? Thanks for posting. Gean

Carla, if you can grow lilacs, I'm jealous. I love that smell. What kind do you grow? I don't know what a non typical lilac is.

Our cherries are in full bloom; I love those clouds of white and pink. It's one of the things I most look forward to. You still have all that to look forward to! Happy spring, Carla! I hope you have a bountiful crop of roses and flowers this year. Gean

I'm looking forward to everything but the water bill.

As crazy as the weather is, you'll probably get steady rains every week and we'll have snow in July. If so, maybe the water dept will give you rebates. Hey, that would be something to look forward to!

Walking out on the deck and being surrounded by the scent of roses and gardenias. My new Iris, clematis and glads blooming. Harvesting herbs I planted for cooking. My dinky little Meyer Lemon tree growing. I love spring.

Not looking forward to August, japanese beetles, fried blooms, blackspot and thrips :-)

Carol

I love spring, too, Carol. Hope yours is grand and ... you said: ** Not looking forward to August, japanese beetles, fried blooms, blackspot and thrips :-)

That's where's Riku's phrase is so apt: marathon of hope: maybe this year will be different.

Gean, there are several heat tolerant lilacs but I don't know whether they can take AL heat or not. You might do a search. I think the one I bought is Miss Kim. I just moved it this afternoon to a spot in front of Crepuscule. Hope to see some first blooms on it as well..I am just happy it made it through the drought last year as it was in my "back 40" ( place where morning glorys grow.)

I am looking forward to a summer without drought...fingers crossed!
Linda

Hi Gean, I don't remember the name of my lilac but it's not a Miss Kim. Even the camelia blooms look good to me now.

Carla

I think I checked one time and none of the lilacs, incl. Miss Kim do well here, but I'll check again, maybe I'm not remembering right. I sure do like that smell. Thanks, Linda and Carla.