Inspiration for a Beautiful Back Yard

My once peaceful and beautiful back yard is still in shambles, mainly since the long recovery from Hurricane Irma.  I could really relate to this article about starting over again.

Check out the article if you are in need of inspiration like me!

read more

Herbs to Grow and How to Cook With Them

Herbs are the easiest and most versatile plants to grow in your garden, at least in my experience.

There have been times I had so much basil dried and put up for at least a year and also kept friends and family supplied.  Cooking a spaghetti sauce with basil is so much tastier than store bought basil.  For me, basil is the easiest of all to grow.

Of course the climate in which you live and if you grow them indoors or outdoors has much to do with the success of individual herbs, but you won't know unless you try them out.

Click here for an excellent article on growing and cooking with herbs.

read more

Creative Container Planters

Since Hurricane Irma dropped my beloved oak tree on our house, rendering it not habitable even today and destroyed our garden beyond belief . . . we have to start all over again with containers and the garden in general.

Click here for some great ideas for container plants . . . I can't wait to put some of these projects into action when we return to our home!

read more

Tips for Growing Cubanelle Peppers

We love growing peppers and experimenting with different varieties!  Cooking with peppers that you have grown in your garden gives such a sense of accomplishment and experimenting can be so much fun.  

If you love cubanelle peppers and want to know more about growing them in your garden, click here.

Happy gardening!

read more

Leaf Casting Water Feature

This is the most awesome water feature I have seen yet!

The leaf castings are made of concrete . . . there is no tutorial to go with this photo, but it should not be too difficult to figure out how the water feature part of it could work.

Use the photo as inspiration, as well as some of the websites listed below.  These concrete leaves are used for stepping stones in the garden, bird bath, decorations and water features.  You can also do a search on Pinterest for leaf castings for additional inspiration.

Here are some articles and tutorials on making concrete leaves . . .

Concrete Leaves for Garden or Fountain

How to Make a Concrete Leaf Casting

Casting Nature

Concrete Casting How To

Make A Concrete Leaf

How to Make Concrete Garden Fountain with Rhubarb Leaves

read more

Watering The Garden

Did you know there is a proper way to water your garden?

Click here for an informative article about watering your garden from the Old World Farms blog.

read more

Redesigning Your Garden

Isn't that a beautiful garden?  

I found an article that spans several years starting with a yard full of dirt.  The transformation is amazing!

Click here to go to the article from the MiaFleur Blog that I promise will inspire you to redesign your garden, one step at a time.  Hope you enjoy the blog as much as I have!

read more

DIY Greenhouses

Greenhouses are awesome.  

Back in the late 1990's, JR, my late husband started building a greenhouse for me made out of recycled windows and sheets of thick glass.  Here is a photo . . .

He never got to finish it, but I got so much use out of it and I enjoyed it very much.  It was the perfect spot to start my seedlings, nurture my cuttings and get out of the heat to relax.  During our rare freeze nights, it was home to many tropical container plants.

It now sits in disrepair with years of falling limbs and deterioration from time and neglect.  

As I have contemplated getting my paradise back to its glory days, the "hothouse" as we called it, has been a project I think of often.  The Captain and I have had many discussions of which way to go with my sweet little hideaway.

There are many greenhouse ideas and tutorials which provide so much inspiration and guidance for anyone interested in building their own greenhouse.

The first photo comes from a gardening group and has inspired me to start looking for some fresh ideas to revamp my hothouse.  I found an excellent article on a blog, A Piece of Rainbow entitled "21 Amazing DIY Greenhouses with Great Tutorials."

Click here to go to the article.  I will be adding more links to this post in the future.

read more

Trellised Containers for Inspiration

I am so inspired by these photos of large container plantings with trellises for support and I thought I would share it here even though I don't have a photo source.

The photo was shared in a Facebook Gardening Group, A Not So Secret Garden that is packed with awesome ideas and inspiration.

What I love about these containers other than being so functional is the beauty of all the colors.  Check out the peppers!  They sure do look happy . . . so does the tomato plant.

I can't wait to put some of the containers together for our carport jungle . . . great way to start the spring season!

read more

DIY Hypertufa Plant Containers

Spring's arrival brought ideas for all types of garden projects.  

Hypertufa containers is something I never experimented with, even though I loved my concrete DIY projects.  Since my emphasis is going to be container gardening this year, this is a project I am going to try.

Click here if you would also like to get inspired to make your own containers . . . The Empress of Dirt will guide the way for you!

Click here for another article from The World of Succulents on hypertufa containers.

read more