Our little garden...

I have mentioned before that I have a small garden, but I am prepared to squeeze out every inch of usable space from it. I certainly don't have a green thumb, but it isn't black, either. I love combing the garden centers for pretty flowers to plant in my garden, and I love the planning process each spring.

While I admire those who have a meticulously planned garden, I prefer cottage style planting for my own home. I love meandering paths through a garden that seems more lovingly planted than methodically planted. I guess there are two types of gardeners: those who turn around, throw tulip bulbs over their shoulder and plant them where they land, and those who lay them out, colour-coded of course, and plant them in planned clusters. Neither is right nor wrong - but they are inherently different.

I enjoy looking out my window and seeing lush plantings of "old-school" plants: peonies, stock, astilbe, black-eyed susans, sweet william, and, of course, daisies. I love tall plants intermingled with lower ones, and I don't want my garden to look like it was planted according to a map. I think I have achieved a more relaxed garden, and I look forward to adding to it, and cultivating its "free spirit".

What kind of gardener are you?

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This is the old buggy I "stole" from the dump on my "dump date" with my hubby a while back. It was rusty and dirty, so I painted it this lovely aqua shade using spray paint, of course. I planted it with flowers, and it sits outside Sophie's playhouse. Can you see where I am going with this?

Check out this sneak peek:

What do you see in the background? You guessed it: the playhouse!! I will finally post a picture tour of it on Monday. I hope you'll come back and see it!!

The little yard that could...

photo: Rodney Smith

I am in the process of stretching my yard to the max. As I have mentioned before, we live on a 60 x 100 lot, which in these parts, constitutes 3/4 of a regular building lot...at least in suburbia. We have already erected a large deck which surrounds our pool area, and it allows for plenty of outdoor lounging. That said, there is very little room left in our back yard to do much else. Or so it would seem...

I am in the process of testing that theory. In fact, I have decided that since my yard is too small to use for much of anything, I am going to cram as much "living" into the space as I possibly can. As I have hinted at, my hard-working husband has committed to building my daughter/me a sweet, little playhouse. Now, it won't be large by any stretch, but we are rational people: no little girl needs this:

In fact, we are quite content with whatever my husband decides to create and will be thrilled down to our toes just to have such a fun place to play. I say we because I am honest; and I am as excited as she is to have another pretty place to create memories. We have big plans for the inside of it, and Sophie even has her daddy excited to see just how much "living" he can cram into the rather tiny space. We are already planning a "sleepover" in it, tea parties, and craft sessions. I have been picking up furnishings and accessories for it for awhile now, and Sophie herself has drawn up the "design" of it along with her colour choices. We'll see about those colours... photo: Baby Goes Vintage

I also finally have a clothesline of my own to assuage the guilt of using my dryer for almost two years now. We finally decided that although we didn't have the perfect spot to put it, it was going up anyway. I love a good clothesline, and it just feels wrong to use my dryer when I really don't have to. I love the whole process of hanging laundry out on a line, and nothing beats the fresh scent of the clothes as you fold them afterwards. Hanging clothes out has other benefits besides saving on electricity: your clothes are actually sanitized by the sun, and the sun works to bleach out stains naturally.

My last project to impose on our tiny backyard is a vegetable garden. Now THAT will be small indeed, but I am determined to have some semblance of one. I plan to grow potatoes like this:

...and I will grow other veggies like tomatoes, lettuces, and cucumbers in pots on my deck. Strawberries are also in order, and I will also poke around for the perfect spot to grow some yellow beans - favourites amongst our family.

photo: Decorative Country Living

So that's it...in a nutshell. If I manage to achieve all of this, I will share the photographic evidence. I will not, however, be showing any photos of me making a fool of myself, perched on a too small for me child's chair, sipping warm lemonade out of dusty, plastic teapots. Some things have to stay in the vault!!

Making Progress...

I was chatting with my sister yesterday, and we were discussing my "dreaded project", my kitchen table. I was telling her I had painted, no, primed one chair. I spray painted it with Bin spray primer and it transformed the chair! I just needed to sand it a little, spray paint it a colour and finito! That was 10 days ago... it is still sitting in my garage, primed but otherwise untouched.

I am a one day makeover kind of a gal. I like to take on personal home projects that can be completed in a day. That is why I have procrastinated with my table and chairs for the last five years! I know they are a week long project, and that is if the weather cooperates. Which it hasn't...! I am working on a kitchen reno project with a client and she is getting very discouraged with the pace of all the trades people. I totally get it!! I wish I could wave a magic wand and POOF, it would be completed and she could begin using her beautiful new kitchen. I hate to wait. That is why in my own home, I restrict the number of big jobs taken on. Of course, I guess you could consider building a house a big job!!

We are making progress with our lanscaping. The pool deck is now ~65% complete. We still have some more closing in to do, an angle has to be removed from the original deck so you can get around the pool without taking your head off, and the lattice work has to be installed. I am loving it though. It is like our own little private sanctuary and I can't wait to sit, no , lounge by the pool, sipping Diet Coke, hearing the happy noises coming from my kids and... oops, I am daydreaming again. It will definitely be great, but I had better throw in some whining and fighting and the always popular, "I know I just got in the pool and I know I'm soaking, dripping wet, but I just have to go pee!!" I have to be realistic and all!

Last night we actually completed a project that took just one evening!! What a feeling of satisfaction. We needed skirting of sorts around our front porch and since I love stone but can't afford the real thing and the exhorbitant labour costs that go along with it, I found a great vinyl product that looks like stacked stone. I'm sure all you purists out there are rolling your eyes, but if I do say so myself, it looks really good. I like it so much better than lattice and Paul did a great job installing it in just a few hours. He's such a good hubby, he seems to be able to wrap his head around any project and I am a lucky girl. Of course he's lucky, too!!! LOL Here are the before and after shots.

I am so inspired that today, I am heading out to get some flowers and shrubs to plant in the bed in front of my "stone" and I will be happily planting later today. I wonder if Paul would notice if I skipped the peat moss, manure part of it and just did the fun stuff...I'd better not, considering I can probably count that operation as a one day kind of a project!! Happy gardening!

Unfinished Business...

Well, here are some before photos of all the outdoor projects we have under way. The only problem is...there are no after photos yet. We still have lots to do before those can be taken and the weather and our schedules are not cooperating. Paul has made more progress than this photo shows - the floor of the deck is now complete and he is starting on the walls. I want the pool area to be good and private so we can pretend we are not within spitting distance of our neighbours!! The kids decided they could wait no longer and decided to have their very own "polar dip"...the water temperature was about 60 degrees, so needless to say, their dip was very brief!!

Sophie and I are tackling the flower beds but that, too, is slow going. I want to plant with the future in mind and I want it to look "cottagey"...I don't want anything looking too perfectly planned or cookie-cutter. I'll post some pictures of the progress we have made as soon as I get my mulch.

I hope you all are enjoying better weather than we are. It is still basically quite cold and rainy here. There haven't been too many occasions where the kids have had to wear shorts. It's looking like another short Maritime summer...Happy landscaping!!