Jonquil Twinkling Yellow

The Chihuahua puppies of the garden.

I went in on a big wholesale flower bulbs order with friends this past fall, as we tried to save on shipping and pool resources to avoid the worst of the tariffs.¹ I was about to spend a Saturday planting out my bag of 100 narcissus-family bulbs when our life went pear-shaped. John was in the hospital for the next three weeks, and our Cancer Times began.

Friends of John’s from the local municipal pops band stepped in to help. In short order, a crew of volunteers planted the bulbs throughout my back garden one weekend in early November, scattered in clumps across the Kitty Garden, the Old Road Garden, and near the Dokey².

I could not remember what I had ordered or what size, only that they were in the narcissus family. I looked it up last week, finally: Twinkling Yellow, they were called. I didn’t see anything that looked like daffodils coming up in the garden, only small grassy clumps. Were those grassy bits what had been planted? They didn’t look like daffodils…

Yesterday, they started blooming. I stood in the garden and laughed with sheer joy. They’re really small. Comically, outrageously tiny.

They’re smaller than grape hyacinths.

And then I remembered: I had intended to plant them in the grass lawn. I’m glad that didn’t happen; they would have disappeared under the first mowing of the year, before they bloomed. They bloom too late to be all finished blooming before the grass needs to be mowed.

Creeping phlox in the background.

It looks like fairies were busy in my yard over the weekend, putting up tiny little yellow flowers on tall green stalks.

I think the flowers are less than an inch across. They’re shockingly fragrant, though, especially given their diminutive size.

I’m in love. I’ll buy more for next year.

A major reason to grow flowers is to cut them and bring them inside for the table. It’s free, and nobody can stop you!

They are so perfectly formed and so preciously tiny. They are the flower version of Chihuahua puppies, nearly unbelievable in their perfect miniatureness and cuteness.

The Dokey, in a previous year, with my dappled tricolor willow behind it. The paint color is called “Allium Poofs.” The garden folly was supposed to get a roof, but somehow never did. It is slowly falling apart but remains quite charming in its decrepitude.

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“Did you say ‘the Kitty Garden,’ dear Lady of the House?” I did, Whitsun. It is the little garden where your predecessor was laid to rest a few years ago. “Oh, my. I didn’t know there was a former kitty! Was she a Good Cat?” Yes, Whitsun. She was a very good cat, although I have to admit that you are probably quite a bit more clever than she was! Don’t let it go to your head. “I would never, Lady of the House. Never.”

1. People who tariff flower bulbs are the worst kinds of people, akin to those who kick puppies and don’t put shopping carts back in the cart corral.

2. The Dokey is a garden folly made of old window sashes painted “Allium Poofs” purple (It’s a Dutch Boy color) and standing near the dying crabapple tree. That it acquired the moniker “Dokey” can be blamed on autocorrect, if I recall.