spring in the yard

Yesterday I started doing some spring weeding and checking on the yard plants- and thinking what I could do to add to their numbers. My yard has too many bare spots, not enough plants! So here's the main cheer: forsythia.

It's such a small clump in the back corner of the yard I was starting to wonder if it was alive- glancing out the window I never saw a spot of yellow or even green, while bright sunny color is bursting in spots all over the neighborhood. I tromped back there and looked close.

Yes, I finally have forsythia blooms.

I'm delighted to see that my little lilac bush is putting out new buds- the leaves looked sickly in the fall so I wasn't sure if it was healthy, worried it had got some pest or disease...

Clearing away weeds from the small planting I have in the backyard revealed how large the salvia has grown out already. It looks great.

The hellebores (lenten rose) have gotten so much bigger! And I'm so pleased with this plant- they stay green all winter, which is nice.

The bunch of them looked crowded, so I dug out the three biggest ones and put them into their own spaces.

That left seven smaller plants still grouped together.

I also really like these plants in the daisy family- they stay green all winter as well. I need to find the plant label I saved somewhere among my empty pots, and find what it is so I can get more of them (in other colors, I'm not too fond of white flowers).

And I think they might have naturalized in my yard? Nearby I found several small bunches of plant that look like the same leaf shape, only much smaller. I plucked a leaf off the parent plant to compare. Will let these grow and see if it matures into the same thing- and what color the flowers might be...

There's other little plants I paused over when weeding- some of them look rather attractive, though I'm sure these are just weeds.

This one I left alone- it has red tint undersides and I wonder what it is- might be something nice or useful? I will let it grow a little bigger and see. Maybe it's an opportunistic tree seedling...

And these soft-leaved pale plants I find here and there in the lawn. I think they are lambs ears. I want to transplant them but not sure where to. Lamb's ears are a plant I always think look kind of out-of-place, not sure where they can go to be a nice contrast instead of an oddity (in my opinion).