We had the most wonderfully quiet weekend that seemed to go by far too quickly, one of those weekends where I tune out the noise of the world and focus on simple tasks like pruning the hedges and sorting paperwork. The weekend flew by in what felt like a few short hours, but I managed to do a little planting of the indoor variety.

Last year I made a miniature terrarium in a glass vessel and it still survives on very little maintenance. I was encouraged by that small miracle to create a few more succulent gardens in glass vessels around the house since I prefer the real over the faux when it comes to indoor plants.

Courtney wrote up a great article on secrets of a successful terrarium and I was inspired by the tips by those experts to create miniature shows of greenery to display around the house.

I had one apothecary jar (above) that I planned on using for this purpose without the lid, but I grabbed a few succulents at the local nursery and two more glass vessels at Michaels – they had a great selection this weekend.

Succulents in soil can thrive indoors in containers that don’t drain as long as they receive some light during the day and as long as you’re careful not to overwater them – a few drops of water once a week is really all they need and some liquid fertilizer twice a year. A little moss helps keep the soil moist and is a decorative element too.

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A few weeks ago, Matt and I agreed to host an outdoor party in early summer in our backyard to raise money to benefit the local public elementary school that my children attend (the committee twisted my arm!) so I thought I’d get a head start on sprucing up the rear yard. We had a bare patch of wall looking a little blah and I’d always envisioned a bench with planters to dress it up.

I went searching online and discovered an affordable ready-to-assemble planter bench, but in its natural state it felt a little too rustic so I thought I’d give it a more sophisticated stain + paint treatment.  As you know, I’m a lover of gray and white but I didn’t want to completely cover up the wood grain so I opted for a stain and paint combo and I’m really thrilled with the results.

I started out with this rustic cedar bench I bought for $70 and with a little DIY elbow grease turned it in one day into something more suitable for the style of our home with a few simple products.

This project was pretty simple, I assembled it when it arrived then gave it a two tone stain + paint treatment, trying out a new stain from the Rust-Oleum line of products.

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There’s a fall outdoor decor party over at Rhoda’s place today which was the perfect kick in the pants I needed to spruce up our porch for the season.  I wanted something  simple, but then foolishly declared I was using only white and green pumpkins on the porch this year.  Then I was told after a dozen phone calls to vendors that “there are no white or green Cinderella pumpkins this early”.  So then I just used faux instead and it all worked out. 

Shades of purple and green dominate with scattered potted perennials and purple mums, I also added tall willow branches inside the mums for height.

This year’s fall wreath is an adaptation of my spring willow wreath – I recycled it and wedged in some preserved green oak leaves from the supermarket, white berry stems, and a few pinecones.  Boom.  It’s what I call my “ten minutes because I’m tired and the kids have soccer practice” fall wreath. 

Tall purple fountain grasses sit next to purple mums filled with tall willow branches.

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It’s the hottest month of the year and my lawn is brown and yucky!  Or at least it was until I decided to do something about it.  This is that patch of flat lawn in our backyard where the kids kick the soccer ball, play badminton, capture insects, and play with their friends, but it was getting prickly under their feet and becoming such an eyesore.  Our front lawn stays nice and healthy, but this one in the rear yard was looking really sad.

I went down to my local True Value to see what I could find in their garden department.  The store manager recommended ammonium sulfate for a quick fix to green it up again, applied in the evening after the hot sun fades and given a healthy watering to dissolve the granules.  Knowing little about lawn fertilizers, I took his advice.

I was surprised how quickly the lawn turned lush and green again, I had it in the back of my mind somehow that these things take a lot of time, but the ammonium sulfate was a great quick fix – here’s the result two weeks later.

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