My Dad loved to greet the first flowers of spring, so carefully and hopefully set down in the loamy soil the previous autumn. On that morning that they all begin to make the move skyward, (always around the same time every spring, but still a surprise) he would be there, ready to greet the hardy, bright and short-lived ladies with an exclamation of
"hello girls!"
I plant pansies every year and think of dad’s “girls” whenever I see them!