Memorial Day weekend is almost here, but not quite.  There’s a frost warning for tonight, so I’ve moved my hanging baskets and other annuals into the garage for protection against the (hopefully) last freezing temperatures of the season.  While perennials tend to weather a frost with no permanent damage, the last one put an end to this year’s flowers on my large, deep pink azalea bush.  What should have been a week or more of beautiful flowers were gone the next morning—a sad, wilted shadow of what was.  I’m hoping my reblooming lilac fares better through tonight’s frost (or better yet, it doesn’t materialize).  Just in case, I picked a bouquet tonight so I’ll have lilacs tomorrow.

Once we reach Memorial Day, we’re highly unlikely to get any further dips in temperature that will threaten plants that aren’t cold hardy, including annual veggies and warmth lovers like tomatoes and peppers.  It also means it’s time for me to make a trip to my favorite nursery and come home with a satisfying selection of new plants.  I have a couple of tomato plants gifted from a friend, but I didn’t start any seeds this year, so it’s starter plants for the garden.  I already purchased some potting soil for those I’ll be growing in containers, and I have places selected in the garden for those I’ll be planting in the ground.  Tonight, I’ll be making a list of what I want to pick up.  Tomorrow, I’ll do some plant shopping and likely see at least a few perennials I’ll want to buy on a future trip to the nursery.  It’s always good to have a plan.

Some of my favorite perennials are in flower now in my garden:  creeping phlox, bleeding hearts, Solomon’s seal, a carpet of ajuga with their stalks of purple flowers that the bees love, the two-year-old white lilac with its first flowers, the red azalea, and the reblooming lilac.  Oh, yes, and the blueberry is in flower.  The last of the tulips are in bloom, and I’m sorry to see the flowers on the row of lilacs fading.  But the first of the rugosa rose flowers appeared yesterday, with many more to follow through the summer. 

I’m looking forward to the coming weekend.  It’s finally time to get going.  There’s a lot to do in the garden this year, including trying some new things like growing potatoes for the first time.  But that’s a subject for another day.