While the Cat's Away . . . .

 . . . and by cat I of course mean my husband.

I was off work on Friday and Chris was not, so I took the opportunity to expand one of my flowerbeds. Ok, for the sake of full disclosure I've been talking about doing this for about a year, so I was maybe not so sneaky about it. Still, I felt a bit scandalous killing his beautiful grass with mulch while he wasn't there to object, groan, whine, etc.

I was so excited about the task at hand that I completely forgot to take a before photo, but to be honest you're not missing much. When we moved in the flowerbed ran a straight line about 15" out from the house, which left not nearly enough space for interesting or dramatic planting. So I dug the border bricks out and moved them.

And somehow when I moved the bricks from the straight line to this wide-arcing curvy line, all the while worrying about where I would find additional bricks to make up for the larger space I was covering, I ended up using three fewer bricks than the original configuration! We're calling them the Hannukah bricks. It's basically a miracle.

So, at this point I've move the bricks (and boy are my arms/legs/back sore), smothered the grass with mulch and planted the following:

1 sky pencil holly. This guy will grow in a great vertical column, approximately 2 feet wide and 8-10 feet tall when it's all said and done. It is a rather delicate plant, so it will require a lot of attention at first and it may look worse for the wear for a year or two while it gets established. Hopefully, though, if all goes well it will start springing up soon and give a nice vertical accent to the corner.

1 yellow twig dogwood. I usually think as dogwoods as the flowering trees, but this little shrub is a small-growing garden accent. It will flower like the trees, and then in the winter when the greenery dies back it will display bright yellow/orange branches. It should get no taller than about three feet though.

and a few perennials. I also placed an order at a good cheap online retailer I've used a few times before for a rose bush and a few additional perennials and prairie grasses to begin filling in my new space.

Over the next month or so I'll keep on planting. My hope is that by the end of the summer, when you approach our house from the south, you'll be greeted by a lush flowering little oasis. That's not to much to ask, is it?

And speaking of oasis, spring has officially begun to bloom at our house. In addition to crocus, we have daffodils and hyacinth blooming, as well as buds and sprouts all over. And . . . I spent today prepping the veggie beds for planting. I should hopefully have more to report on that tomorrow. 

Burlap and Balloons

Things have been crazy around our house for the past few weeks. I'm actually writing today from St. Louis, where I've been all week for work. I'm taking tomorrow off though, and have some big yard plans.

I was perusing some of my favorite blogs today, and found this great guide to what can be composted. (Thus the title). Quite a few of the items listed are pretty common sense, but there were a few surprises to me as well. Here's the list (via networx)

1. Dryer lint
2. “Dust bunnies”
3. The insides of a vacuum bag (just empty the bag into the compost bin)
4. The contents of your dustpan (just use discretion)
5. Coffee grounds
6. Coffee filters
7. Tea bags/loose leaf tea
8. Soy/rice/almond/etc milk
9. Nut shells (but not walnut, which may be toxic to plants)
10. Pumpkin/sunflower/sesame seeds (chop them to ensure they won’t grow)
11. Avocado pits (chop them up so they won’t sprout)
12. Pickles
13. Stale tortilla chips/potato chips
14. Stale crackers
15. Crumbs (bread or other baked goods)
16. Old breakfast cereal
17. Bran (wheat or oat, etc)
18. Seaweed/nori/kelp
19. Tofu/tempeh
20. Frozen fruits and vegetables
21. Expired jam or jelly
22. Egg shells
23. Old, moldy "soy dairy" and other dairy substitutes
24. Stale Halloween candy and old nutrition/protein bars
25. Popcorn kernels (post-popping, the ones that didn’t make it)
26. Old herbs and spices 
27. Cooked rice
28. Cooked Pasta
29. Oatmeal
30. Peanut shells
31. Booze (beer and wine)
32. Wine corks
33. Egg cartons (not Styrofoam)
34. Toothpicks
35. Q-tips (not the plastic ones)
36. Bamboo Skewers
37. Matches
38. Sawdust
39. Pencil shavings
40. Fireplace ash (fully extinguished and cooled)
41. Burlap sacks
42. Cotton or wool clothes, cut into strips
43. Paper towels
44. Paper napkins
45. Paper table cloths
46. Paper plates (non wax- or plastic-coated)
47. Crepe paper streamers
48. Holiday wreaths
49. Balloons (latex only)
50. Raffia fibers (wrapping or decoration)
51. Excelsior (wood wool) 
52. Old potpourri
53. Dried flowers
54. Fresh flowers
55. Dead houseplants (or their dropped leaves)
56. Human hair (from a home haircut or saved from the barber shop)
57. Toenail clippings
58. Trimmings from an electric razor
59. Pet hair
60. Domestic bird and bunny droppings
61. Feathers
62. Fish food
63. Aquatic plants (from aquariums)
64. Dog food
65. Rawhide dog chews
66. Ratty old rope
67. The dead flies on the windowsill
68. Pizza boxes and cereal boxes (shredded first)
69. Toilet paper and paper towel rolls (shredded first)
70. Paper muffin/cupcake cups
71. Cellophane bags (real cellophane, not regular clear plastic)
72. Kleenex (including used)
73. Latex
74. Old loofas (real, not synthetic)
75. Cotton balls
76. Newspaper 
77. Junk mail 
78. Old business cards (not the glossy ones)
79. Old masking tape
80. White glue/plain paste.

Greening Up

We spent the morning going through the local nursery, and I'm feeling especially inspired for the summer ahead. In addition to our regular vegetable garden, I have some big flowerbed plans for this year. A nursery employee walked around with us this morning and helped me sort through some ideas. Long story short, there are exciting things ahead. Here's some eye candy.

 

Most of my planting so far has been perennials - flowers that die down each winter but come back in the spring. I love them and the life they give our yard through the growing season. This year, though, I'm going big. This means shrubs that will give shape all year long, and yes even another tree. It's exciting stuff.

Not that things aren't already happening. Due to the warm winter we've experienced here in KC, my spring bulbs are about a month ahead of their usual spring schedule. And I love it. It's nice to start seeing some life after a very grey and brown season. So far we've seen lots of crocuses and some daffodil buds.

 

  

Also, we came to the realization this winter that when we purchased our eight boxwoods for out front our first spring in the house, we must have accidentally purchased seven of one kind and one of a different kind. (Can you find the odd one out?)

We described the issue at the nursery today (it grows out rather than up and has a slightly more purple color to its leaves) and the nursery employee confirmed our suspicions. So, we'll be replacing the "one-of-these-things-is-not-like-the-others" shrub this summer. Maybe our little odd guy out will become part of our newly expanded garden areas after we plant his replacement.

Garden Dreaming

Any of you in the midwest know as well as we do that this has been a weird winter, if you can even call it winter. Chris and I took advantage of the unseasonably warm weather and did yard work over the weekend, and it got me into my usual springtime garden fever. I'm ready to plant.

So I spent an afternoon preparing my planting list, and mapping out my beds, with much help from Burpee seeds and the Farmer's Almanac. Planting will officially begin in the Jones home on March 1 when lettuce seeds go down outside.

But before I get into my plans, here are some ghosts of garden past to help you get as excited as I am about this:

Grape and roma tomatoes

Peppers!

Mammoth sunflower before

And after. See the boxelder bug enjoying the view?

First year in our garden. I overplanted a little.

And the ever-growing rosemary.

This year's planting will look like this:

Bed 1: Strawberries. (as always)

Bed 2: Tomatoes, grape tomatoes, bell peppers, jalapeno peppers, onions. Basically it's a salsa garden.

Bed 3: Lettuce, spinach and potatoes. The potatoes are new, but I hear they're easy to grow and extra delicious when fresh. I might try out a unique variety, like purple potatoes.

Bed 4: Beans, beats and carrots. Basically beets and friends, because wow do I love beets. I've even convinced Chris that they're worth eating. And I might throw in a few ears of corn, even though Chris told me I wasn't allowed. Just think, trying to keep this Iowa native from growing a few ears of sweet corn . . . . don't tell him.

In addition, we'll have a planter of mint, one of basil, one of rosemary (our rosemary plants from last year have actually survived the winter, so this one is good to go!), one of peas (this is new - I found a compact variety of pea plant that's perfect for small spaces) and one of parsley, oregano and sage. Each garden bed will hold marigolds to keep the critters away, and I'll have a few varieties of sunflowers - including the huge ones, of course - along the flower beds outside the garden retaining wall.

So that's it, we're on official countdown to seed day - only 10 days! I can't wait.

Happy Friday

I don't know about you, but for me this has been a long week! Something good happened though - we got an amazing new camera at work so I brought it home last night and tried it out on three of my favorite subjects. I still have a lot to learn, but so far am loving the results. Here are a few. Hope they brighten your day!

 

Vintage Doorknob Coat Hanger

With a pile of leftover oak from our remodel in my shop, I've been antsy thinking of the possibilities. Picture frames, a coaster box, and coat hangers have been on my to-make list. I also have a pile of old doorknobs from the kitchen that were saved. Some are brass, other are the glass version.

I saw a cool project once on This Old House, where they made a coat hanger out of trim and old doorknobs, and decided to make one this weekend.

Lastly, my dad got me a sweet finish nailer for Christmas, so this was an excuse to break it out and see if I could figure out how to work it.

Leftover trim moulding from the office

Glueing up the frame

The doorknobs bolts required square holes

A test run

Side view of hanger

We're Back!

Did you miss us? We've been shamefully absent for, oh, about two months now. But I figure we all could use a breath after the big remodel job. We spent the holidays enjoying our newly comfortable home and getting the rest of our house back in order following all the excitement of renovation. I think it's safe to say we're officially settled though, and loving every minute of it.

Over this past weekend, we finally got around to a few overdue final touches in our bathroom. I ordered a custom plantation shutter while we were under construction and it arrived, so we got it installed much to our (and our neighbor's, I'm sure) pleasure.

So, remember this view? Here's what we've been living with (and ducking around - houses in our neighborhood are built in true old style aka close together):

And here's what it looks like now:

And a close-up of the shutter:

It's great to have the room closed off from the outdoors, and we love the dark wood to balance out the dark door and accent the bright white bathroom. And the best part is we still get some nice light in the room. We chose a divided shutter so that we can keep the main part mostly closed and leave the top few slats open, which lets a surprising amount of light in.

And see the shower curtain?

I finally got around to replacing the "don't-let-it-touch-my-skin" polyester shower curtain we hung when the shower was installed. We realized after everything was finished that our tall shower would not work for a standard 72" shower curtain (it didn't even hit the top of the tub) and selection in 84" shower curtains was pathetic - they were all polyester and/or covered with palm trees. No thank you. So we got by with a cheapo polyester one while I figured out a plan.

So here's a photo of the gross shower curtain that catches all your hangnails:

And now, our new and improved, soft and pretty shower curtain:

The new curtain is made from a linen tablecloth that I got on sale ($12!) at Pottery Barn. I added button holes to the top and hemmed the bottom so that it would fit just right. It makes for  a great, clean look and feels great to the touch. What more could you need?