new gardener- plants or bulbs for perennials

[WhyAlwaysBoris]

Hello can anyone help me with this one. I bought some perennial plants (different old fashioned country garden type things i remember from my childhood like lupins and hollyhocks) from outside a local shop in a fit of enthusiam a few days ago.

They look like bulbs or roots, they are in some soil in plastic bags, and have to be soaked and then planted. They were cheap so i bought lots.

They say on the label plant april-may for summer flowering, but am lacking confidence that this will actually happen because i've since been to the local homebase where i noticed that they have the same sorts of flowers but bigger, as plants in pots.

Have i bought the wrong thing? Will the root/bulb things actually work, and will they work for this summer?

I've never done any gardening before, all i've done up till now is clear a completely overgrown back garden of weeds (1&1/2 skips worth!) in the last couple of weeks and it looks so bare out there. Please help!

They sound like bare roots or maybe corms with some growth.These are normally dormant plants that can be planted in early spring or winter before they start growing .Plant them as possible as they will not last long in good condition.Give them time and they will soon grow into bushy plants.The ones in the garden centre will probably have been planted last year and so have a head start.Some plants take a while to establish themselves.Iris corms for example will flower this year but peonies take a while to establish themselves and won't flower the first year.You will need to know which plants are which in order to plant at the correct depth though.

Thanks for the reply, teta.
I planted them last night, tried to plant to the right depth as written on the packet, although embarrasingly couldn't tell which way up most of them were supposed to go, so planted those horizontally, on the basis that at least if i was wrong they would only be out by 90 degrees, not 180. My DH laughed out loud at this reasoning when he got home, so i'm not that optimistic