I love getting dirty!!!

J is in the midst of working on our kitchen and so in order to stay out of his way (until he asks me for help), I decided I would spend my time outside this weekend.  It's finally warm and I think spring is officially here, so hopefully there won't be anymore hard freezes to ruin my weekend work.

I spent my entire Saturday digging out the ridiculously overgrown butterfly bush that was dying last year and that I cut down to a bunch of stumps.  I'm sure that at one time, the butterfly bush was wonderful - I am a HUGE fan of butterfly bushes, but no one took care of ours, so I'm pretty sure it sat in the back for 10 years before we bought the house, and just got out of control.  It took me about 3 hours of digging to get the roots out.  Here's what's left of it... in our fire pit...

I was sure that I wouldn't be able to move today, but miraculously I woke up and felt pretty good, so I decided to head out and get some stuff to plant.  On Saturday, I went to the store and while I was there, found great bulbs.  I ended up getting one for a peony bush (state flower of Indiana) and one for an elephant ear plant that will be used to spruce up our front porch.  I planted them today but don't have pictures of those to show you... they just look like dirt right now.

I also went to Lowe's and got some plants.  A couple for the back where I ripped out the butterfly bush and a couple for the front of the house.  Almost all the plants I got are perennials, but I did end up getting some annuals for my flower pot tower.  The perennials are supposed to get bigger (obviously) and the ones in the back are supposed to spread out, so I started with just a few to see how they filled in and I'll get more if I need to.

Here's what I added to the front:

I know - it doesn't look like much right now... just wait

And here is the back:

I also got some Lemon Grass seed that I planted in the back.  I have a few more packets that I'm going to plant around our deck.  Lemon Grass is as low maintenance as it gets, it smells great and it keep mosquitoes and wasps away, which is great with our new deck and our fire pit out back.  Again - no pictures of this... it's just dirt for now.

I'm really looking forward to stuff popping up - I'm so impatient with things like this.  Luckily, I do have another project to tackle next week while J continues on the floor - I have to get rid of this guy

If he starts to grow again, his vines will take over the world - we used to have vines all over (and under) our deck and up the side of the house - we finally got rid of them and I'm determined to keep them away.
What did you do this weekend??

Weekend Recap

Happy Memorial Day!!!  I'm working today, but I hope you are all enjoying an extra day off!

We had a busy, and very productive weekend!!  It was wonderful and I wish every weekend could be such a good mix of relaxing and working.

We got up on Saturday and made breakfast and relaxed until a little after noon.  Then we started our shopping mission.  I had a lot of stuff on my list, but we got in and out of most of the stores pretty quickly.

We started at Hobby Lobby because I wanted to go look for some stuff to fill up those shelves in the bathroom.  Although it felt like our basket was full of stuff, it turned out to be more of a good start than a finished product.  The best part, though, is that we didn't spend more than $4 on any item thanks to the 50%-60% sales at Hobby Lobby.  Here's what we've got so far... what do you think?

We went to Target and a couple other craft stores so I could get the stuff I needed for the baby shower gift I was making for my cousin.  We also went to a few different stores looking for the yellow sandals I need to wear with a dress to the wedding we are going to next weekend.  That was unsuccessful, BUT we were at Kohl's and I found myself a new bag for work!

I'm seriously the pickiest person ever when it comes to work bags.  They have to have a zipper, they have to have flat straps, they have to have pockets on the inside and they have to be $40 or less.  I am really rough on my work bags and they get  beat up pretty quickly so I don't like to spend a lot on them.  I have been looking for a new bag for over a year now, and I am so excited about this one!!!

We made one more stop at Lowe's and bought some flowers to replace the dead ones in my tilted flower pots.  I also wanted to plant some hydrangeas in a random little circle plant bed that we have in the back, so we grabbed those while we were there.

We had some people over on Saturday night to help us drink the beer we had left from the Cinco de Drinko party, so we spent the evening on the back deck and around the fire pit.

We got up on Sunday and I had to run a few more errands and then we went outside and started working.  I put the new flowers in the tilted pots while J got the circle in the back ready to put new stuff in.  When I was done with the pots in the front, we got the hydrangeas planted and made sure everything got a drink...

I don't know what kind of flowers these are, but they're pretty!

This is really ground cover, so it may look small now, but it will spread out.

Our new hydrangea bed... now they just have to grow!

Once we were done with the flowers, we went and washed our cars and that added up to more than enough time in the heat, so we went home and showered and it was craft time for me!  We also watched the Indy 500 at 7 pm, which is when people who live within 100 miles of Indy finally get to see it.  It's seriously the only major sporting event that still blacks out to the local market.

Thanks to J's help on the paper cutter, I got the invitations to my cousin's bridal shower done... they made their way to the post office tonight so they will go out tomorrow! 

Once I got those done, I will still in craft mode so I started on the baby gift.  I totally planned on taking pictures and making a "how to" on this project, but I got in the zone and before I knew it, it was done!

I'll see if I can figure out how to take some pieces out without taking it apart, so I can do a quick tutorial on it sometime this week.

Overall, I had a pretty productive weekend!  I'm working today, but taking Friday off so we can go down to Texas for a wedding so I'll still have a short week/long weekend.

How did you spend your long weekend?

Our Front Yard

The inside of our house is at a point that we can live in it and enjoy it while we save money to make some larger improvements.  The outside, on the other hand, is in some major need of TLC and improvement, and now that it's summer, we are all set to get moving!  We started this weekend by making some improvements in the front yard.  J's the "expert" in the yard, but I like pretty plants and flowers, so that's where I come in...

Here's what we started with...

I really like the bushes that don't look dead... the others are just not ever pretty.

There were some random little plants in this area, but I asked J to get rid of them.

In yesterday's Weekend Recap I showed you the flowers and the gloves that came home with us from the nursery... this is what we did with them.

I worked on the little patch by the stairs while J started on the bushes... here is my project:

I got the idea from my mom who has one in her back yard.  It was SUPER easy and I think it's just what this spot needed!  Here are the steps for the DIY tilted flower pots:

Supplies Needed:

- 60" pole of 1/2" rebar

- Hammer (to get the rebar in the ground)

- One large plastic pot (base)

- Drill (to put a hole in the bottom of the base pot, if there isn't one already)

- 4, 10" terracotta pots

- Rocks

- Potting Soil

- Plants to fill pots

Step 1: Dig out some space in the mulch where you want your base pot.  Hammer the rebar about 2 feet into the ground.  Put your base pot over the top of the rebar, fill with about 2" of rock and pack the mulch around the bottom of the base pot.  Fill base pot with potting soil

Step 2: Slide your first pot down the rebar, tilt to one side and let it rest on the base pot's soil.  Fill the base of that pot with rocks (for drainage) and then add potting soil, not filling above the inside rim line.  Repeat this with remaining pots, allowing the next pot to rest on the one below it and tilt the other direction.  When you get to the fourth pot, you may have to hammer the rebar down further so it cannot be seen... this is about as high as it should be in the top pot

Here's what it should look like when you finish Step 2

Step 3: Fill your pots with flowers.  Make sure the flowers you use will be good in the location of the tower... don't put full sun plants in a shaded area.  Also, I would use plants that stay fairly short... something that grows to be 12"-14" tall is probably too tall for this project.  I honestly don't remember what it is that I even put in these pots, but here's what's in my pots

The top is a flower that we were going to split but could not... obviously not blooming yet.
The bottom is a clover... again, I don't remember what kind... I just thought it was pretty.

These two pots have the same plants in them, and we actually just bought one a split them.
The green leafy plant should also have flowers soon.

And one more time... the finished product:

 

I put Chicks n' Hens in the blank space in the base pot to spruce it up some!

Now... on to the bushes.  Here's the progress:

 

Once J ripped out the yucky bushes and marked off the new flower bed area

I actually forgot to take pictures along the way since I was hard at work doing other things, but here's how it turned out...  we have to go buy some more mulch to put around the bushes and to even out the rest of the bed, but you get the idea.

I'm pretty happy with how it turned out!  The flowers are impatiens and those green plants between the flowers are a different kind of impatiens with smaller white flowers that will bloom a little later into summer.  It was a great day to be out in the yard, and I'm so happy that we have some pretty flowers in the front.  The bushes will hopefully grow in quickly and we will do a much better job of keeping them under control than they were when we moved in.

On to the back yard... in a few weeks  :) 

Weekend Recap

I was going to do this last night, but i got wrapped up in Desperate Housewives and The Good Wife and completely forgot to get on my computer :-D

Hope everyone's weekends went well... we were super busy, but it was a great weekend!  We went for our last long-ish run before the half marathon, on Saturday... 6 miles.  It was a great run... one of the best I've had in a long time, and I ran with an average pace of about 30 seconds per mile less than what I plan to run for the half, so that was a great feeling.

J took me to a new place for breakfast after our run.  The Cloverleaf Family Restaurant... it is quite the hole in the wall, but the food is amazing and it's a really good price.  I'd share the website, but they don't have one  :)

We got home and then headed to a Birthday party for one of my coworker's little girl.  She turned 5 and had a rainbow birthday.  Her mom took some of the best and most colorful ideas ever off Pinterest and made a really cute party out of them!  As I was in Walmart trying to figure out what you give a 5 year old, I came up with this cute idea...

10 lollipops, some floral foam, some silk flowers, and small flower pot and some purple ribbon, and voila!  Her mom said she loved it and that 3 of the suckers are already gone...

After the party, we headed down to a local nursery to pick out some flowers for some front yard projects we had in mind.  The result will have to wait for another day, but here's what we came home with... 

Before and afters coming soon...

Hope everyone had a great weekend!!!