Unique Home & Garden Yard Decor

Being part of a number of local plant swap lists, I often want to see pictures and information for plants being offered before I respond. When searching online for particular plants, I found a particularly good resource. Dave’s Garden (http://davesgarden.com)

Dave’s Garden offers cultivation information for a wide variety of plants. An especially useful feature is the photo section which, for the plants I checked, showed dozens of photos of each plant submitted by readers.

Visitors can also subscribe in order to be able to ask questions and receive answers to your gardening problems. Solutions offered by a number of other gardeners can give a better and wider perspective for an answer.

The opportunity to trade with others is an additional benefit. It is possible to search the trade lists for a particular plant. Gardeners can search for others who may be seeking a plant they can offer, whether seeds, cuttings, bulbs, or the plant itself, and look at the offer lists to find something they would like to exchange their plants for. This is a great method to increase the variety of plants without having to spend large amounts of money.

It’s that time of year again … time to prepare gardens for planting. Whether you are preparing beds for flowers, vegetables, shrubs, or some combination, a tiller makes it easy to loosen the soil and will make it easier to set your plants as well as helping them to grow better.

Front tine tillers are usually suitable only for smaller gardening spaces, because a lot of effort is required to control their forward motion, push them at times, and tilt the blades into the earth. They are also the most unstable if they grab a large rock or other obstacle. They are the least expensive though, and so are popular for this reason. Varying gears make the job somewhat easier if using a front-tine.

Mid-tine tillers are more balanced, with the engine sitting over the blades. They tend, on average, to be slightly more expensive than front-tine tillers. The tines are still propelling the machine, so they still require some extra effort to control, but not so much as a front-tine. These can be a good compromise for mid-sized gardens.

Rear-tine tillers are usually the heavy-duty performers in the lot. They tend to be the most expensive, and have the most power. The user has a lot of control with this model, and can stop the forward motion and keep the tines turning, allowing the bed to be dug as deeply as desired, or in order to dig in compost or other soil amendments. These models are the easiest to steer, and are the only real choice for those with large gardens who need to save their labor as much as possible.

I have a lovely little filligree wrought-iron garden sculpture that is meant to hang on an outdoor wall as a garden decoration, but I wanted to bring it indoors and magnify its importance because I loved the lines of the design.  But because it is a lowly garden sculpture (wink), it didn’t suit interior decor. I solved the problem by taking an artist’s canvas and covering it with fabric, mounting the canvas within a wooden frame, and attaching the sculpture to the middle of the canvas. Voila’! Instant impact!

Frames add extra importance or elegance to anything placed within them. Love your children’s crayoned artwork? Frame your favorite pieces in matching simple black frames under glass and create a wall collage that makes your child look like Picasso.

The same technique works with virtually anything you love and wish to display but, by itself, lacks the  refinement needed to blend in with its planned surroundings. Be willing to experiment with different frames and blend anything you like into your decor like a professional.

Spring is the perfect time to bring the outdoors in, in terms of home decor. Most of us are tired of the dreary, cold days of winter and long for the first flowers and added burst of color that spring brings to the outdoors, so why not echo that theme in your home?

Even if it’s still too chilly at night for a planter on the front porch or bedding plants near the entrance, you can still be greeted by cheerful flowers every time you come home if you place a floral wreath on the front door. Designs that use a grapevine base, either natural or painted a solid color, woven cane, or similar material are especially appropriate because they are still a little sparse-looking, not representing the abundance that will come later in the year. Add to this base an assortment of your favorite spring flowers, perhaps violets and pansies, or bulbs such as tulips, daffodils, and hyacinths, all in your favorite spring colors for a cheery greeting.

Indoors, forced bulbs in the windowsills make everything feel fresh and new. If your home is contemporary, consider clear glass forcing vases. If your home is more country style, perhaps a twig basket would make a nice container. For traditional homes, a shiny copper catch-pot will be very attractive.

Throw pillows are an inexpensive and quick way to give a room a face lift. Again, take your cues from nature in choosing the colors of spring flowers, or perhaps select a leaf or flower motif.

Another personal favorite is birdhouses, if your home is not too contemporary. You can purchase decorated birdhouses, but they are easy to paint yourself and widely available at large craft stores. We like to paint them in sunny colors and then perhaps use rub-ons to apply vines and flowers, or glue silk flowers and leaves as though the birdhouse nestled among them. These look great on ledges, atop cabinets, and even as a smaller version affixed as finials on a drapery pole.

Speaking of draperies, another favorite technique of ours is to remove drapes from French doors and attach long twining grapevines over the top and hanging down one side. This can be used as a base, adding silk flowers sparsely to bring to mind the first flowers that are just bravely starting to show through.

In many rooms, drapes should be replaced with lighter curtains in spring. Again, choose lighter colors that invite in more light and lend a breezy feel that helps to welcome spring into your home.

There are many ways to update your home for the spring season. We hope some of these inspire you to come up with your own unique ideas!

Roses, a favorite flower of many, can be a challenge in the landscape. There are many varieties of roses, with different growth habits, that can help fulfill different needs in the landscape.

For those who love the beauty and elegance of long-stemmed roses, it is probably better to place the bush where it will not feature prominently in the landscape at all, because such rosebushes tend to be less attractive when viewed from even a few feet away. They also are among those plants that require sufficient air circulation and opportunity to dry their leaves as well as access to sunshine that being placed amidst other plants in the landscape may not offer them.

Those who have had their imagination captured by a rambling ground cover rose are much more likely to be able to incorporate their choice into a landscape with other plants and achieve good results. These bushes are shorter, spreading, and intended for landscape use. They are usually fuller as well, providing a better result. Although the flowers themselves are less showy, they are more abundant and bloom for longer periods, again to good effect. Another benefit is the disease resistance of many new varieties.

Another choice often overlooked but that can provide very pleasing results are some of the miniature varieties. Miniature roses, although they are usually tiny when sold, do not generally remain small plants … only the size of the flowers and leaves themselves remain small while the bush may spread to several feet high and and a couple of feet wide. These varieties are often more tolerant of being included amongst other plants, and tend not to be so fussy. As a result, they are more likely to be full and beautiful rather than showing a lot of bare cane. Blooming is often profuse and extended and, in our opinion, miniatures often represent the “best of both worlds” as compared to the hybrid types and shrub types.

Another good compromise can be some of the old-fashioned types that are more disease resistant and less “fussy” than some of the newer types, though they may still tend to bareness at times.

Most gardeners who love roses accept the bare canes just place their roses in a rose garden area all together, or plant them where they will not interfere with the overall look of the landscaping, preferring to make those adjustments so that they can still enjoy their favorite flowers.