Only a handful of the many thousands of daffodils which have been in bloom since mid-March remain, but there’s no reason to be sad, for that’s as it should be. Other blooms have just popped to take their turns coloring the garden.

The pink rhododendron by the front of the house began to burst at the end of last week, the many yellow, brown, and purple iris are standing tall all around the property, the bleeding hearts are showing why they got their name, and the lupins, which long before I’d ever seen an actual flower I only knew as a word in a Monty Python sketch, are showing off strong pink, yellow, red, and purple stalks.

But as much all as I love all of those (and the lupin could very well be my favorite flower), the blooms that fascinate me the most right now are those of the Allium Nectaroscordum, which are also known as Mediterranean Bells. Up until two years ago, I’d only ever known the sort of allium that looks like a purple pom-pom, but then I discovered these bulbs in a local gardening store and was attracted to their weird, delicate look. They almost seem alien, and so I picked them up immediately. Their odd bells can now be found atop three-foot stalks rising out of the beds where the daffodils had previously bloomed.

Next in line to bloom—the poppies.