Mid-winter, still pretty

We're approaching the time when the garden starts changing pretty quickly (wishful thoughts of Spring?) so I thought I better post what things looked like on January 19th. I went out there intending to take photos of the bamboo for comparison with the "before" photos taken earlier.

I did get a few of those, but instead I was distracted by how pretty things were, in a relative way. The browns of the winter garden really make the other colors pop, and the blue, blue sky doesn't hurt. I love the pergola shadows in that first photo!

***

There is green left in the bamboos, and the maypop vines are holding a rich, golden color:

Good thing I'm a bit lazy and just let those cedar pergola boards weather naturally instead of staining them again (as I've intended to do for at least the last two years).

You can see that some of the bamboo leaves do look a bit strange, sort of greyish:

Those will eventually be turning brown, then will fall to add to the carpet of bamboo leaves already on the ground. I like how bamboos create their own color contrasts!

I'm a big fan of brown winter grasses...

...which look even better when some greenery is nearby! (I could not solve the shadow issues in that photo -- sorry!)

Speaking of bamboo contrast, those dark green culms really stand out when the leaves are freeze-dried nearly white:

Almost all of the bamboos have a frosting of those whitish leaves, but they were still hanging on to their green tint:

At least on January 19th that is.

(He says, hinting at what might be to come...)

.