February Daffodils Are Early This Year

My daffodils are blooming like crazy this year and it seems about a week, maybe 2, early. After all, we have had no winter this year. A few little frosts is all, maybe no more than 5 or 6.  Daffodils are my favorites, especially this time of year. O wait, I love hyacinths, and crocus, and  well, I just love flowers. But I do have a special place in my heart for daffodils. I used to pick great handfuls for my mother and grandmother for the house. There were great swaths of the old timey ones, just flowing down the hills in back of my grandmother's house, and planted around the edges of the old garden, dripping off into the road ditches. My maternal grandmother had a yard full, too. There were lots of the small early type that have several all yellow flowers in each bud and smell so sweet. These are not the narcissus  type that smell so good when you pick them, then begin to reek when you bring them into the house. Mother had hers in neat rows, for the most part. Some had been planted by her sister-in-law before Mother and Daddy moved there. As the years have passed though, they have multiplied and been pushed around by digging in the borders, till the rows have largely disappeared. Rows seem a little stuffy for daffodils anyway. They are too wild, and strong, and joyful to be constrained. These pictures were made February 10, 2013 at my home in Gold Hill.