Did you Get Lost in the Garden?

One thing that is important to me is that our children learn to appreciate gardening and nature. All kids should learn at some point how to plant a seed, how that seed becomes a plant, and what it takes for that seed to grow. Learning those three ideas will instill in the child an appreciation for where our food supply…

Last year I told you about the Japanese maples that grew naturally from underneath a tree at my parent’s house. I over wintered young trees in my garden shed (see the April Video update) and have been taking care of them here in our garden. The other day I transferred the Japanese maple seedlings from the shed because it was…

Looking for a thick ground cover that is green even in the dead of winter? Do you want something that will cover your yard with absolutely zero maintenance? Then look no further for you have found your answer! Chickweed is taking America and Tennessee by storm. It will quickly cover your lawn and garden in a dense mat of green…

I’ve been spending a lot of time dreaming about what is to come for our family, our new house, and the gardens. It’s easy to come up with ideas but always much more challenging to implement them. I’ve designed a potential house plan and I know how we would site it on the property. There is still a lot of…

This weekend’s weather was a sign that there really is a light at the end of this dark tunnel we call winter – and it’s not another trains headlight! Spring is coming and the warm weather that we’re having this week has me itching to get in the garden – which is exactly what I did over the weekend –…

Here is our house in early spring. We took this picture soon after we bought it. There isn’t much that can be said of the landscaping at this point. It was basically a blank slate to work with. There were two Japanese hollies in front of the garage that died due to the frost and one large Nandina that is…

Today I stopped by one of our big box home improvement stores and visited the declining stock in their gardening area. I’ve mentioned before about the good deals you can find there and so today I found a couple deals! While they are desperately cleaning out their summer and autumn wears to make room for Christmas trees, I picked up…

Last week I was in one of the home improvement stores and started wandering the gardening shelves…always a dangerous thing! I looked around at all the packaged plants which in most cases are way too early to plant out and got sucked in by the displays. I ended up coming home with one Arapaha thornless blackberry plant. I love blackberry…

These two crepe myrtles are holding strong to their color. Although these bright red and orange beauties are not mine, I did manage to get a couple seedlings from them to plant in my yard. Most people think of crepe myrtles for their summer flowering colors, but these two are evidence that there is more to a myrtle than meets…

It all adds up!  Everything you do has some sort of financial cost to it that can contribute to your business expenses when beginning your nursery business.  Often we don’t think much about them.  I know I’m guilty of not considering certain items as part of the expenses.  There are lots of things that sound so minor that you might…

Is there a flower more typical of fall than mums?  Probably not!  There are definitely some flowers worthy of autumnal appreciation but the mum is the most common one you’ll find this time of year.  I put together a little project for Lowe’s Creative Ideas that uses mums and reuses my dad’s old wheelbarrow. The wheelbarrow planter project was easy…

The holiday season is in full swing and while they say the recession is slowing we all should still be watching our pennies. Why not put together some low cost holiday gifts? If you’re interested check out my post on Low Cost Gifts For Gardeners at Complete Organizing Solutions!

With fall almost here it’s time to start thinking about gardening chores and the task that most people have to do in some way is deal with the leaves. What do you do with the leaves is an important question. For way too long many people have burned them which to me is the worst possible way to dispose of…

As real gardening time approaches and we stop planning and dreaming to actually begin planting we have to know what we are going to do with our gardens. The big thing on my mind lately has been the vegetable garden. I miss the tomatoes, squash, and cucumbers that came out of our garden fresh everyday. I want to grow more…

Last week I wrote about my seed starting “mini-greenhouses” made from clear plastic cups so I thought I would share how my tomato seeds are doing so far. To sum things up I am very pleased with the results as I have very strong and healthy growing tomato seeds are in the mini-greenhouse cups.  Some of my tomato seedlings are already…

Rosemary is an herb we use frequently in our cooking, at least when we have it around. In years past I’ve been able to walk out the front door and cut a few sprigs off the large rosemary bushes in front of our steps. I love how easy rosemary is to propagate. In fact rosemary is so easy to root…

The Bradford Pear tree (Pyrus calleryana), sure it looks nice but it’s one tree that people should stay away from planting in their yard. At first glance you might wonder “why shouldn’t I plant a Bradford pear tree?” They have a great shape, they grow fast, and they flower profusely in the spring. Unfortunately for the homeowners who plant the…

Tuesday find ourselves cold again – waking up to temperatures in the mid teens in our little frost pocket. Fortunately the garden shed stayed about 10 degrees warmer without any extra heat. I hope to eventually add something for heating purposes but for now the shed is overwintering many of the plants I made from cuttings. Yesterday’s look back post…