For the first five or six years after we had planted the holly, the rhododendrons, the Japanese maple, the azaleas, the magnolia in our gardens, we were careful, in late fall, to wrap them in winter garden blankets to keep them safe and secure as tender perennials, not native to this country and certainly not able to normally survive our intemperate winter zone. 

We stopped doing that four years ago.  We decided it was time for them to survive on their own.  That they had grown sufficiently mature and hardy in our micro-climate, to have finally adjusted, acclimatized to harsh winters and the freeze-and-thaw cycle that is inevitable in Canada, particularly in the Ottawa Valley.

They obligingly survived.  And each spring they burst out in a riot of colour, pleasing us no end.  Each of these ornamental trees and shrubs has their season for blooming, and when they do, it's an enchanting spectacle. 

Never quite lasting long enough; their blooms seem so ephemeral and in a sense, they are.  We must appreciate them while they bloom, as long as they last, and we do.