Flower seeds - too early?

[ListenLinda]

Hi all, novice here but i’m really getting enjoyment out of tidying up my garden.

I got a bit carried away at my garden centre this morning and bought some containers, compost, packets of flower seeds and watering can. Reading the packets it says sow outdoors/in pots now.

But is it too early to put them outside? We had a frost yesterday morning and i’m worried that if I plant them in the containers now and leave them outside, they’ll perish before flowering.
Can anyone shed any advice?

I can't, but I'm placemarking because I did exactly the same as you after a small success with one of the little garden pots from M+S. We dont have a greenhouse so I've put a few different things on the windowsill in hope that they'll sprout in the warmth then I can move them outside.

It depends what type of plant it is.
Hardy annuals generally can be sow directly into the soil from about March/April and half hardy annuals are sown indoors and then hardened off later and planted out after the frosts have gone.
If you are a novice, it's worth spending some time learning about different groups of plants and start small and easy.
I'm not sure in the current climate if a trip to the garden centre is an essential journey so be careful out there!

Forgot to say. Hardy = will survive a frost, half hardy = frost will kill

It was the B&M that is inside my local Sainsburys, I was getting some food items and just picked them up while I was there @abstractzebra

The packets say they are hardy annuals, I think I need to google what that means!

I also looked on Thompson & Morgan and picked them from the list they gave of top 10 flowers for beginners. Small and steady, no grand designs from me haha

just looking to add a splash of colour in the summer

So hardy annuals will be ok to go outside and can cope with frost.
If you do sow outside, make sure you've got decent weed free soil as when the seeds start to grow, so do the weeds and it's hard to know what to leave and what to pull up.
I'm an experienced gardener and I start everything off indoors. You can design better like this and space everything out properly.

I’m putting them into containers I think @abstractzebra. I do have a patch of soil I was looking at putting some california poppies in but it needs going through and weeding properly first.