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January - 2009? - that was fast... seems to get faster every year but that's ok as the little green shoots are already looking towards spring. The weather is uncertain - could go hot or cold in January but get outside every chance you can and look at the glories of winter.

"Hear! hear!" screamed the jay from a neighboring tree, where I had heard a tittering for some time, "winter has a concentrated and nutty kernel, if you know where to look for it."  Henry David Thoreau, 28 November 1858 journal entry

If you look closely, you will see hydrangea buds slowly forming for their spring beauty!

Winter either bites with its teeth or lashes with its tail.  Proverb

Rhododendrums are also forming buds now.

Of winter's lifeless world each tree
Now seems a perfect part;
Yet each one holds summer's secret
Deep down within its heart.
Charles G. Stater
January is named after the Roman god Janus, who was always shown as having two heads.  He looked back to the last year and forward to the new one.  The Roman New Year festival was called the Calends, and people decorated their homes and gave each other gifts. Lore of New Year's Day

For more information, contact: rose@DunwoodyGardenClub.com