Pansies and Garden Visitors

After reading about other people's pansies yesterday and thinking about November's GBBD, I went to a home and garden center and purchased pansies. It was painful to rip everything out of the front porch flower bed since the impatiens were still blooming and especially since I grew the coleus and most of the impatiens from seed last winter.
I'm not sure how anything was even living in this soil; there was absolutely no moisture at all. I planted the pansies and watered them well, and thankfully it also rained during the night.

I also bought a new Oat Grass, (you can see it in the corner of the picture), some iris, crocus and tulip bulbs, three mums for the front yard lightpost bed and a flame maple tree/shrub for the back yard. I also got the flame maple and mums planted. I've been itching to get outside today but didn't have a chance to. I have so much to do, maybe tomorrow.

I had a few visitors in the flower garden today. The verbena is still attracting the bees and butterflies.
Goldfinches are eating the zinnia seeds. Pam from Digging made a comment yesterday about my blooms and the power of cropping to make our gardens look better. Here you can see the difference a crop can make. My droopy lone sunflower and the ugly stems, leaves and spent flowers of the zinnia as a whole they're not very pretty, yet there are a few flowers that are stunning when seen alone.