Front Garden Ideas

Spring is here, and we've picked up the garden project again! We had four cubic yards of dirt delivered a week ago Saturday, so now all we need to do is:

• finish the retaining wall
• decide on plants
• plant plants
• mulch

I'm no gardener, so Mom's coming over on Monday to help. She's great with plants. In the meantime, I've mocked up a rough idea of what I'd like. Here it is:

I LOVE hydrangea- it's my all time favorite. Hopefully the garden will also include salvia, boxwood, allium, and some sort of mini tree to fill in the tall spot in the back. We'll see.

Some other potential outdoor projects for another summer may include:

• painting the house (gray) and trim (white)
• a new front door
• different sconces

Here's a mock up:

I'm so excited to jump into this project and get it crossed off the list!

Life Recently

I've yet to photograph some more projects. In the meantime, here's some iPhone pics of life recently.

This picture is for Mom, who thinks our house is always so clean.

It isn't.

I've been paralyzed at the thought of buying the wrong shade of blue-gray. I spent too many hours narrowing down 16 paint chips to these here, and then ended up getting a different color entirely. Charlie's input: "They all look white." Thanks.

I still love my snugly buddy. This is part of our morning ritual:

My brother is awesome and created Giant Jenga. We played this a few months back (yes, not recent, but still cool).

Daniel shows the proper posture for self protection when Giant Jenga falls:

We've also got some of this stuff going up somewhere in the house... sometime soon. Very cryptic.

That's all for now, folks.

Indoor Plants

For those of you who have a black thumb like me, never fear: I've stumbled upon a new way to keep indoor plants alive. Cover them with a cloche to make an instant terrarium!

You can buy real cloches (like here and here), use things that aren't technically cloches like cake pedestal covers and cheese domes, or find a lidded class container and use it as a terrarium. Cloches and terrariums are really popular right now and are very versatile.

In the photo above, I filled a clearance bowl from target with dirt, sprinkled in some grass seed (the type you put on your yard), and poured in a little water. The grass grew within about a week and I haven't had to water since the day I plated the seeds since the cloche keeps the moisture in.

Idiot proof plants! I must kill them by over watering. But this guy (or guys? because it's lots of blades of grass and not just one?) is going strong. He even is growing so well he needs another hair cut.

Here's another version using a glass jar as a terrarium:

I got the idea here. Plop in a plant and you're done. In the last two months, I've only watered him twice. (Apparently all plants in my house are male. Maybe if I get some with any type of flower they'll be considered female).

If I can keep these plants alive, especially the ivy, then so can you.