It's All About Convenience

You know, we gardeners are not ones to boast and "show off" but instead are very generous in sharing information and telling other gardeners what beautiful gardens they have. It isn't a competition with us but I am afraid I am going to have to break the rules here for a moment and do a little bragging.

I am very lucky to have a handy guy around who doesn't complain (most of the time) to help me out with those jobs that I would make a real big mess at trying to do myself. I now have an outdoor sink! He doesn't understand why I am soooo happy about this and hopes it gets used after the effort of installing it. Oh baby, I will use it!

Waiting...

The tulips in our yard are scattered here and there. I always thought that some day I would gather them all together for a big spring show but maybe I should just leave them where they are?
For some reason which I haven't quite figured out, our tulips are always later than the ones I see blooming everywhere else. Is it due to the amount of sunlight they get (or don't get), a microclimate thing, the soil or maybe it is the type of tulip? Whatever the reason, they are always worth waiting for. And waiting...

Stay tuned

Plant a Smile

It's April... time to plant pansies.

My daughter and her boyfriend were away for a week so they had to leave their beloved new puppy Dexter behind. He spent most of the week with my son and the last couple of days with us. He just hung out being Dexter. He is too cute!

Sometimes, he just hung out and watched the birds.

New and Improved?

This morning I decided to make the time and learn how to change some of the elements of my blog. So if you have visited here before you will notice it looks a little different. The black background is gone, the text colour has changed and the page is wider. So this 'old dog' can be taught new tricks! I think it is an improvement and hope you like it too. Now I have to work on getting the pictures to line up where I want them - but not right now - it is a beautiful day here in Kincardine and I want to get outside.
Regards,
Shirley

First Things First

Spring is here and I find myself asking the same old question... where to start? This post comes a few days after the fact but as the nice mild weather took us outside on the weekend (both Saturday and Sunday were beautiful and we didn't retreat into the house until 7 pm each night) Craig, my honey of 15 years, knew where he was going to start. He cleared out my garden shed in preparation for the makeover I had planned in March (Magazine Stand). Okay I said, lets do it! So off he went on his first spring weekend project and I happily tagged along for the ride.

While he was playing with his power tools installing shelves, I managed to get some garden clean up done. It was the best of both worlds - I was back in the garden again after a long (aren't they always long?) winter and my shed was being fixed up so I can be a more organized gardener. Who could ask for more? That's free therapy if you ask me.

Left is how it looked before and the finished product is on the right.

First things first. Craig installed the metal reinforcement grid. Then on when the shelves. My son even got in on the project!

Then I got to do the fun stuff - putting the finishing touches on. I am going to call it a potting shed now because it has a stainless steel work table big enough to pot at and bins for holding soil, plant pots and such. There is a message board, clips to hang large garden tools, lots of hooks and clips to hold odds & sods and a magnetic strip to hold scissors and such.

The wooden cabinet with bins is from Ikea. The step-on garbage (Walmart) can has 2 sections which I will use for garbage and compostables. My twine hangs on a toilet paper roll roll holder. The large bin is full of plastic pots.

Remember this is a little shed about 6 1/2' x 3 1/2' but there's a place for everything and everything is in it's place. Gloves are stacked neatly in a pot lid holder. A lazy suzan to use when potting plants. I wonder will it always look this tidy?

Oh look, there is the Canadian Living magazine - that's where it all started.

Life is good.

Hope you had a good weekend too.
Shirley

Meet Dexter

I feel compelled to share a non-gardening moment with you. We welcomed a new addition to the family on March 31st. My daughter and her boyfriend adopted a puppy. Dexter is 3 months old. He was rescued from a puppy farm. He's part husky, lab and pointer. It's very likely you will be seeing more of Dexter on my blog - he's very photogenic and so cute.