January flowers

My goal is flowers all year round, or as a new book title says, a flower for every day.  So what blooms in January?  

Helleborus orientalis just beginning to bloom.  These will last into hot weather, and the plant is evergreen, a foundation plant for my shade garden.

Violets begin blooming around Thanksgiving and continue into February or March.  The plants are evergreen, and so lovely in winter, but they are aggressive spreaders.

This new penstemon sulked all summer but decided to get happy and bloom once we got into freezy weather.  Again, the evergreen foliage is a plus. 

Wintersweet is a large shrub with an amazing scent.  The flowers begin opening in November, while the leaves are still on the shrub and bloom through the fog season.  The leaves turn yellow, and just came down in this week's storm.  The shrub sweetly scents the yard when it is foggy.  I am not always crazy about it, but every winter we end up deciding it earns its keep.