This past week the Tulip Festival in downtown Hendersonville began. Every one of the many brick planters are filled with early blooming tulips in all sorts of colors. The tulips last quite a while, and are inter-planted with smaller flowers to fill in the beds.
Small violets and little marigold-like flowers bloom between velvet red tulips.
From one end of Main street to the other, luscious color! Sorry about the garden hose in this shot, I was distracted by the lovely yellow tulips with deep pink violas and didn’t notice it.
Of course, a few of these got hidden in the planters. I’m running out of rocks to paint, so I need to get another bag when I go for some plants.
A bit farther down the street, even deeper yellow tulips fill a bed.
More red ones bloom in another planter.
I do love the white ones. A bouquet of tulips would be a perfect centerpiece for your upcoming holiday dinner.
In the kitchen garden, sadly the amaryllis is not showing any sign of having a flower yet. I think that in the past, by now it was putting up a tiny bud stalk. After looking back at its blooming in past years, it didn’t bloom the fifth year. This year would be the 9th as I got it in 2013. I wonder if it just needs a rest now and then. I did fertilize it last fall before it went dormant. I guess we will just have to wait a bit longer to see what it does. I may need to repot it again.
On the orchid, it seems to still be making very slow progress. I took this photo of it a month ago. It seemed like it had one flower progressing well, with the possibility of two more just beneath. The one farther down turned brown and shriveled up.
Here it is now. It is progressing, but painfully slow! The flower is gorgeous and I hope it continues to open fully. It is a phalaenopsis stuartiana.
Outside, it seems my Meyer Lemon has survived the winter, a surprise to me. As I have had precious little time to devote to the plants on the veranda, I haven’t paid any attention to the pots until the weather gave us a warm day to linger. I didn’t expect the lemon tree to still be viable since our winters are much longer and colder than its native tropical habitat. But here it is, leafing out for spring.
Then another surprise, a lovely pansy survived the winter in its pot, and is already blooming.
And yet one more, the parsley also made it through the winter, and promises much fresh flavor for summer meals.
So, I have a lot of clean up to do. The hydrangeas need deadheading, the irises need their beds raked out to expose the rhizomes again, and the pots in the Carolina room need to be moved to the veranda. Our last frost date is April 15th, so it should be safe to get started soon. What are you doing in your garden this week?
From My Carolina Home 
Happy Easter, Carole!
I’ve been busy in my garden, discovering little flower surprises – like an Easter egg hunt – throughout the beds, making plans to transplant and actually doing a few of those while adding a few new plants.
Lucky you…..our last frost date is May 7th….. but then again….we are higher, elevation 3,250!
We don’t plant until Memorial Day, although areas closer to the Great Lake are usually safe by mid-May. My daffies & hyacinths are blooming so we’re happy with spring time. Snow showers are expected this weekend, but the official last date for accumulating snow was yesterday.
Those tulip photos are a joy to behold! We have things started under the grow lights and DH planted the onions a few weeks ago, outside. We also have garlic coming up outside, which is welcome. It has been very cold again this week, and it has been terrible dry, so nothing really happening yet outside. I am hoping we can get the potatoes out this weekend, but DH is in that ugly time where he is up in the middle of the night to neb and doesn’t get back to sleep, so with that and the cold weather we are moving slowly.
Happy Easter to Carole and all her readers. My daffs are still blooming and the tulips are coming along. What a lovely town you live in Carole. I love seeing the effects of “mass plantings”. Thanks for sharing.
What a beautiful, happy, cheerful spring post, Carole. The tulip festival looks wonderful and so many glorious colors! I love them all, even the one with the hose! I hit the garden center yesterday and the color there just blew me away. Spring is so welcome!
Have a wonderful Easter weekend, Carole!
All lovely!! Happy Easter!
How beautiful all the flowers are, but even more so how delightful to have a tulip festival. What a great way to welcome Easter. I hope you have a Happy Easter!
The tulip festival is stunning and quite a treat. Thank you for posting the lovely ohotos, A Happy Easter to you and yours.
Searching for more info on the painted rocks, I found a site for “I found a quilted heart” IFAGH.com This sounds like a similar idea of spreading joy and I’ll be making a few hearts to set about areas I visit. Thank you for sharing so many things that interest me~~quilt patterns, books to read, gardening and your yard and weekend driving pictures
Thank you! Find more info on the rocks on the FB group Hvl Rocks – https://www.facebook.com/groups/1243180469133372
Look at all those pretty tulips – what a fun place to visit! Your painted rocks are the perfect addition to those flower beds. Good luck with your orchid, too! I’ve never tried growing those.
Beautiful tulips, thanks for sharing your photos. They really are the most elegant bulbs. Imagine the surprise when someone discovers one of your gorgeous painted stones tucked away in the garden beds.
Tulips are my favourite spring bulb, and the pansy, what a glorious deep colour.One year at our other home I had pansies that flowered from the time I planted the tulips until the bulbs popped up and the blooms followed. Underplanting looked great, a delight to welcome your springtime.
The beds of tulips are breath-taking!! My Meyer lemon tree has been so abundant this year, the weight of the lemons broke two sturdy branches! I’ve given away a hundred + lemons to my neighbors, my gardeners, my exterminator, and my son’s girlfriend…and more are on the way. My apricot tree, on the other hand, has grown huge in the past two years without a single fruit. It was full of fruit the previous years. I can’t help but wonder what has happened. I still have to prune some lower branches on my fig tree. I feel so blessed.
Our last frost date is May 21-31! Love seeing your garden and previews of what we will see in a few weeks.
Happy Easter from Hanne in Norway 🐣💛
Dear Carole. Love your garden. Wishing you a blessed Easter.
The tulips are so pretty. What a lovely way to welcome Spring.
Doesn’t it sound crazy to have to go and buy rocks? We did the same earlier this week as the grandies wanted to paint them with glow in the dark paint. I must admit it was a lot of fun.
I do love tulips, especially the variety of colors. Happy Easter, Carole!
Oh how I love to see tulips………we don’t grow them here too hot…………
Thank you for sharing so many pictures of Spring flowers. It’s one of things I miss the most since moving to Florida.