I've also got snowdrops blooming... it's kind of a dilemma, as according to Tom Skilling of WGN, the jet stream is supposed to buckle south about 8-9 days from now, bringing down cold air that's been trapped for weeks over Alaska (it's been 50 below in Fairbanks), so we could be due for brutal cold then... I don't know whether to let my snowdrops bloom while they may, or to try and retard them until mid-February. They'll take some cold, but the flowers won't take 20 below unprotected! Hellebores do great here without any protection... this year so far, their foliage still looks really good, though usually by spring it gets raggedy, and I partially cut it back. I've got perhaps two dozen of them, and have never lost one.

Hawki,
Thanks for the info on the hellebores. I've been checking out the hellebore forum to try to learn as much as possible before I take the plunge. Where did you get yours? Mailorder? Or did a garden center have them? I can't recall ever seeing them at any of the garden centers around where I live(near Marshalltown). They'd be in about the same area as the snowdrops so pretty sheltered. If the bitter cold does swing south I'll be throwing some old quilts over the snowdrops. I love snowdrops. They're not showy but they are so cheerful. Nothing else is earlier.

mmo

I got all my hellebores through the mail, but I'm starting to see them in nurseries here in Iowa City sometimes. Yah, snowdrops are great... isn't it strange to have flowers blooming in Iowa in January! My hellebores usually start blooming about the middle of March, and snow doesn't faze them (cyclamen coum is actually my second flower to bloom after snowdrops, last year starting to bloom about March 1st. If you want to see some of my hellebores, go to the link and check out the archives from March and April.
Don

Here is a link that might be useful: An Iowa Garden