February!

I wonder if, here in Maine, I will be able to find bunches of cut daffodils with which to grace my altar? Thus far, I have not seen any in the regular places I look for flowers -- the grocery and big box discount stores -- though they have potted and forced ones.

But then, so do I, when they grow. I bought a big bag of (unfrozen!) potting soil and dragged in the plastic throw-away pots from the berries I planted last late summer, along with the bulbs that had not got placed in the ground.

Gods help the ones I planted, by the way... I will be out there hacking away at the snow banks pushed up by the plow guy, to allow my "early spring" flowers to grow before summer. Next year we WILL BE marking the "do not disturb" areas...

I have 6 pots with an assortment of a few daffys, a few tulips and a few more crocus. Some of them were starting to push little ends out of their bulbs, even though they were stored, willy-nilly, in the back of the (uninsulated) garage.

I have never tried starting these babies in the house, so wish me luck.

I still would like to find some cut flowers. Though I am not feeling the dread of February, I do feel the call for spring flowers -- specifically daffys -- on the altar. This harks back to years ago when I first separated from my husband, was living in a tiny, mostly uninsulated cabin, with no money and not much else (I moved out in October, survived the winter with scrounged wood, my home canning that he hadn't wanted and veggies gleaned from a neighbor's market garden). Every now and then I was able to catch a ride to town to sell plasma for a few bucks for eggs or the like and on one of those trips, at this time of the year, I saw a bouquet of daffys and recalled a poem I had read: (as I somewhat badly recalled it)

When of all thy worldly goods thou art bereft,
And of thy meager store
Two loaves alone to thee are left,
Sell one, and with the dole
Buy hyacinths to feed thy soul.

But I don't like hyacinths... and when I saw the daffys, I heard that in my head as "buy daffodils to feed thy soul" and so it has been ever since.