Garden Inspiration

Good Morning!

I'm actually getting to blog in the A.M. instead of the P.M. today. Sawyer is actually doing his school work with self motivation. When that happens, it makes for a very productive day for me.

Yipee!


This morning I'm talking about gardening.
To me, gardening is a four letter word because I'm that terrible at it. Josh says that I'd be good at it if I actually watered the plants, but it's been my experience that when I water the plants, I over water them.

 You can see how this situation would be problematic for a family that's attempting to have an urban homestead.

Well, this year, we're researching not only the foods that we want to grow, but the proper way to actually grow them. I've also been looking at Pinterest for pretty gardens. I don't just want food growing. I want a whimsical garden as well. So, we'll be incorporating herbs and other pretties I hope.

Here's some of my inspiration for making our yard and garden area pretty...

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A hammock over lavender.

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A natural fence to keep neighborhood pets out.

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Natural shade for a sitting area.

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A pretty walkway from the garden area to our shed. This one would take a lot of work because there's nothing there currently.

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I can't feasibly do this in my yard, but it would be a pretty fake creek in a country yard.

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Of course every garden fence need a gate. 

This would be so amazing at an entrance to a walking trail.

 

 

Then, of course, we have the actual garden planning...

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 This one is for a fairly large garden. My dad is planting a pretty large garden, so I'm going to print this one out for him.

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If you use pallets, make sure that they haven't been treated with chemicals, please!

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Such pretty rows!

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Here's a great use of rain gutters.

I like to call this picture The Salad Bar.

Thanks for letting me share some of my Pinspirations with you!

If you'd like to see more of my pin boards that I puled these off of, feel free to visit my boards,  How Does Your Garden Grow and Wonderland!

Happy Tuesday!

-Heather

Weekend Recap

Hello, friends! Happy Monday!

I hope you guys had a great weekend! We mostly just bummed around the house for the most part.

Saturday was Yard Day. Yard Day is the first day in Spring when we clean up the yard from the prep that wasn't done during the Fall.

Let me explain, what we're supposed to do around our yard in the Fall is:

• Rake leaves and mulch them, then toss in garden to compost over winter.
• Rake remaining leaves to the curb for city pickup.
• Sort through broken/outgrown yard toys and dispose of/donate
• Mow one last time so snow will be pretty when it falls
• Fall clean the shed to make holiday decorating easy
• Sweep roof at the end of Fall to mak sure we don't have tree litter on the roof.

Okay, those are some of the things that I would like to get accomlished before we're cooped up for the winter.
However, what usually gets accomplished is the mowing and the leaf mulching.

So we spent our Saturday raking leaves and going through  yard toys.

While raking, we saw our first snake of the season. It kind of surprised me, but it definitely didn't scare me, since it's just a little garter snake.

Hey, there, little guy!

After the kids finished their hard work of picking up sticks, Josh made them a shooting target out of the back of an old chair. Unfortunately, the material was too thick for a BB to go through, but it was an awesome idea!

The rest of the weekend was captured in short shots here and there,

like....

Josh getting our garden tilled

 

Our first fire pit use of the year

My family's inability to all pose for a picture at once.

 

Like... Ever.

My discovery that wet chalk works better.

Therefore, I had to chalk everything that was chalkable in the house.

This happened to be one side of Josh's tool cabinet in the back. I painted it with chalkboard paint so he could write measurements down on it. 

 

Now he can never have it back.

 

I've been daffodil crazy for the last two weeks. It's added such a fresh feeling to the house. 

I love Spring.

 

 

 

 

 

Then I woke up this morning and did this. Yes, it's certainly homemade looking, but I didn't have any tacks or stencils around, so I improvised...

...because I'm impatient.

No, this isn't my picture. Here's the link to the pin.

We had potluck this Sunday at church. Usually I don't attempt recipes that I haven't tested yet when other people will be eating it, but I lucked out this time.

They were good.

So, this was my weekend wrap up. How did your weekend go? Hope it was great!

Happy Monday!

-Heather

 

The Doomed Herbs Pt. 2

So, do you guys remember my post a few months ago about how I had planted some herbs and the were doomed because I can't keep plants alive?

Well, here they are. 

Yes, you're seeing this correctly. There are only two plants left. 

One is basil, and I'm pretty sure that that thing growing in my dill container is in fact   NOT dill. 

Oh, well. I tried. 

Also, do you guys remember how I mentioned that I almost killed my aloe plants. 

Well, one did die. 

I really need to get a grasp on this whole gardening thing if I want my tea business to make a profit. 

Well, we're off to enjoy "free day, Friday" in our homeschool plan today. Who knows what trouble we'll get into. 

Have a happy weekend, friends!

The Doomed Herbs

Yep, I planted some herbs on a whim yesterday. I call them "doomed" because I have a tendency to kill plants.

I literally almost killed our aloe plants. Those are hard to kill, y'all. 

I'm so tired of not having fresh herbs on hand and I like to dry my own herbs in the kitchen. It makes me feel like I have the kitchen out of The Good Witch movies. 

If you haven't watched The Good Witch movies on the Hallmark Channel, please do so. I LOVE them and are a requirement to start my Fall. 

Anyways...

Here the herbs are on day one. I'll do weekly updates for your comic relief to see (if they even grow) how quickly I kill them. 

Let's go on an adventure together!

And don't forget to like my page on Facebook to get new posts!

 

Catch Up

So, it' been awhile since I've posted. I didn't exactly leave on a good note. However, although it's been a hard climb, it's in the right direction. It's only up, up, up from here.

In January we had my son's 4th birthday party. It was superhero themed. I sewed capes for all the kiddos and we played some games. I had decided to go old-school comic style with the decorations and the cupcakes.

Our Super Hero Punch

He Really like them

Us in front of the picture backdrop my sister-in-law Bekka and I made.

For Valentine's Day, Josh and I had a kid-free weekend at home. It was quiet and sweet. In the past, we've gone all-out and by the time the preparations were finished, we were too tired to actually enjoy the time together. So, this was such a nice change of pace.

A few weeks ago, there was a terrible tornado outbreak all through the area. We were so blessed to not be affected in our town, but one of our neighboring cities was hit with an E-f 2 twister. I think three people lost their lives from this one tornado. It had something like a seventy mile path. The pictures of the destruction brought me to tears. It's scary to think of how everything you once held dear could be gone in seconds.

In much needed positive news, my sister-in-law Bekka and her boyfriend Sam got engaged! I can't think of a single person I would rather her marry than Sam. They've been friends for years and we all saw this day coming before they did. Her wedding will be in October. I can't wait to help with the crafting and planning. My first task was to go to the site where he proposed and get some pictures. The look-out was a good choice, Sam!

My next task will be to make an appointment with my cousin Tracy to get engagement photos done. Rachel, my other sister-in-law who lives in Nashville, will be blowing up Pinterest helping me plan Bekka's engagement luncheon/ tea. I'll definitely be doing more posts on this. I'm so excited!

We finally got our taxes back and we've been able to pay off some debts including Josh's car. We've been able to get some projects done around the house that we've been wanting to get done like painting the front porch, my swing from my Grandad's house, and making a coffee table out of an old wooden coffee table frame and an old  almost rotting door. I know, it sounds gross, but here's the finished products....

My Grandad's swing. My sister has the other one that also used to hang on the porch at our Grandparents house. I have so many great memories swinging with my Grandad, coloring pictures with my sister, and finding Easter eggs. This swing just makes me happy.

 

 

 

The coffee table for our patio. We had a shell of an old coffee table, so we just screwed the old door down on top of the shell, sanded, clear coated, and decorated with solar lamps and petunias. I'm pretty proud of this thing!

                                 

We finally got a new front door and storm door!

Our welcome rug that Josh's family got it a few Christmases ago. I love it!

This was the first "big" purchase we got as a couple after Josh came home from Iraq. It was bamboo colored, but our walls are gingerbread colored, so it blended in. I finally got to paint it black, so now it pops!

An old chair that we found in a friend's barn. Bekka and Sam repaired it for us last weekend while we were out camping.

We've dug up those nasty bushes in the front of our house. I've order dwarf burning bushes, dwarf butterfly bushes, and Snow in Summer to replace the bushes. We also have many other plants ordered. There will be another post for that.

 This last weekend was seriously one of the best I've had in a very long time. We got up on Saturday and took the kids to Lost Valley hiking trail by the Buffalo River. It was Sofia's first time there. She sat on Josh's shoulder and Sawyer was able to navigate this time without us having to hold his hand the whole time. We saw the water fall ( I was too distracted with safety to remember to take a picture. Ugh!) When we left there, we stopped at an old homestead half a mile down the road.  It was built in the 1880's and I showed Sawyer how different the homes back then were. There were huge gaps in between the boards and it looked more like a barn rather than a house.

We came home and I made meatloaf cupcakes with mashed potato icing and cheese sprinkles. I found the recipe here.

This isn't the best picture since it was taken with my phone, but here's the finished product.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

      

 

 

 

 

I also took the time to finish up the perfumes that my niece and I mad out of dried herbs and vodka. I started a new batch and I've hung some Lilac up to dry to make some perfume out of it as well. I infused some olive oils for cooking and labeled everything. (Label ALL the things!)

My Lilac Drying

Our finished perfumes. And yes, I agree that I need to make them prettier.

My infused olive oils

New batch of perfume

 Sunday morning we woke up and went straight into planting our garden. I'll admit it, I kill everything I plant. But I figured with Josh's help, the plants might not die so quickly. We mowed, hung up a clothes line (we have a dryer but clothes always just smell so awesome when they've been outside!), then Josh grilled some awesome burgers while I made potato wedges and Provencal aioli for dipping. We finished up with the family sitting around the fire-pit, visiting, and asking Isaiah (Josh's little brother who lives with us) what his plans were for college and such. It has been absolutely amazing!

And yep, I just realized I spelled Lavender wrong. I've fixed it in real life, but the picture stays.

Our Lilac bush

So, Now you've caught up with me! I'm so glad to be back, y'all! Back here and back to my old self. Life is super. 
Laters, 
Heather