Gardening for Fall

My flowerbeds have been looking a little tired. The long dry spell left my beds dried out and the Day Lilies were taking over the beds with their dried out leaves. It was time for some fall sprucing.


I just love adding some fall mums for a frugal bit of color. For $2.48 each (at Lowe's this week), I was able to brighten my bed up with a little bit of color. Best of all, the mums come back every year and when I see their bright colors start popping up in my beds, I know that it won't be long before my favorite season is here.I trimmed the Day Lilies down for the year. They could have lasted a few more weeks, but it made it easier to pick a good placement for my mums. I put eight mums into the front flowerbeds and marveled how something so simple can make a girl so darn happy!


I am still loving how we solved our barren spot in our lawn with this boxed in tree. I planted four mums in and cut our sad little Hostas down. I am hoping that they do better next year because they looked pretty sad this year. A fresh bed of mulch (an extra bag tucked in our garage from the last project) and my tree looks a little bit brighter.

How do you prepare your flowerbeds for fall? Do you plant again or just cut things down? I am a newbie gardener so I am always looking for tips!

Fruits of Our Labor '08 Edition

Things are coming along in our garden and I am finally picking some of those tomatoes. This year had been going really smoothly until two things happened.

1. The wascally wabbits found my garden and ate ALL and I mean ALL of my parsley. They barely left me a little stem to remind me of my former giant parsley shrubs I had grown.

2. The wascally Emily witnessed Ethan picking the red tomatoes and has been plucking my green tomatoes for me.

Does anyone have any home remedies for rabbits... or toddlers?

In other gardening news (and things for you to do with all those fruits & veggies):

Preserving Veggies & Saving Money Too (@ Dinner Tonight)
Veggies on the Grill (@ Stop the Ride)
Rosemary & Recipe (@ Urban Garden Casual)
5 Reasons to Start Your Own Garden (@ Blueprint for Financial Prosperity)
Death by Chocolate Zucchini Cake (@ Everyday Food Storage)
Gardening Basics: What to Do With All That Extra Zucchini (@ Get Rich Slowly)
Organic Vs Conventional Gardening (@ Blissfully Domestic)
In the Garden (@ Problem Solvin' Mom)

How are your gardens doing so far? Are you eating anything yet?

A Peek at the Vegetable Garden

The tomatoes are starting to grow and I am seeing little green ones popping up everywhere. I can't wait to eat them!

The herbs are growing bigger and everything is doing really well except for the basil which did not survive the Indiana frost. I haven't replanted it yet, but am thankful for lots of flat leaf parsley and rosemary to add to my dishes this year!

The garden view from the patio. I did get some more mulch to freshen up the bed and keep the moisture in. I am loving having my garden so close to my house now so it makes it easier to water and maintain.

Here is what is happening in the gardening world:

The Ultimate Green Workout (@ WiseBread)
Keeping the Skills Alive (@ Simple Mom)
How to Service Your Reel Mower (@ Apartment Therapy)
Non-Toxic Mite Control That Works (@ Shelterrific)
Turn Your Patio or Balcony Into a Vegetable Garden (@ DIY Maven)
Find Grocery Savings in Your Own Backyard (@ Not Made of Money)
Making a Tomato Trellis (@ Stop the Ride)
Freedom Gardens- Grow Your Own Food (@ Nature Moms)

How are your gardens growing? Feel free to share a link in the comments- I love to see what everyone is up to in their backyards!

The Bad Side of Gardening

Our neighbors have the most beautiful yard on the block. The landscaping is impeccable and they are always working on their lawn. I can see them slaving away while I sit in my little lawn chair in my garage...which is why they have an amazing lawn and I have a so-so lawn.

Last week, I headed over there to chat with them and saw them sitting in a huge pile of overturned dirt that they had dug up. They were sifting through the dirt for roots to a plant that had been planted there ten years ago. The family had hired a landscaper to come and do their landscaping and he had the perfect plant for the side of their house...something called the Chameleon Plant (read another bloggers experience with it here).

Over the years, this plant has taken over their beautiful yard so my neighbor searched on the internet to see if she could find out more about this plant. Guess what? It is one of the most invasive plants in the world. So invasive, in fact, that New Zealand has banned this plant from their country.

Desperate to remove this plant from their yard, she has been in contact back and forth with the New Zealand government and they recommended she do the best she could to remove it. The roots to this plant can be planted deeply though and so they are trying to find all of the roots and are burning them because they don't want to put them in the landfill.

When she was browsing at a flea market, this past summer, she noticed that same plant was being sold in buckets for $6.99. She went over and spoke to the person that was selling it and asked if they knew anything about the plant, "It is a great ground cover," they said. She promptly informed them just how wrong they were.

I have heard of other plants taking over people's lawns too. Have you ever had any plant that you have planted that you would tell someone NEVER to plant? What has been your experience with invasive plants?

Now the good sides of gardening... Here are some great gardening reads to help you with your gardens this year:

Miles of Aisles of Chemicals- Except Now Their Green (@ Garden Rant)

BFP Garden Project: The $29 Kick-off (@ Blueprint for Financial Prosperity)

How Much Does a Garden Really Save? (@ Get Rich Slowly)

When Can I Harvest My Basil? (@ The Kitchn)

Free Mulch! (@ Frugal Upstate)

Garden Entertaining Tips (@ The Kitchn)

High Food Prices Lead to Growth in Backyard Gardens (@ ParentDish)

Focus on Garden Flowers (@ Chocolate on Cranium)

Food Gardening Is On The Rise (@ You Grow Girl)

Deck Makeover (@ CraftyPod)

Natural & Green Lawn Care (@ Nature Moms Blog)

Tips for Improving Your Garden Soil (@ Blissfully Domestic)

A Beginner's Guide to Organic Gardening (@ Mad About Martha)

Top 15 Frugal Gardening Tips (@ Thrifty Mommy)

The Makings of a Frugal Garden (@ Keeper of the Home)

How Our Garden Grows

Welcome to my little garden. After my earnest attempts last year, I realized that the place I had planted in was far too shady for any good growth. After much thought and careful consideration in my yard, I decided to plant our garden alongside our patio. It is a sunny location that is close to the house, so it will make it easier on me to maintain it and water it throughout the summer.

This year I planted Italian flat leaf parsley, basil, rosemary, cherry tomatoes, regular tomatoes, green peppers, cauliflower, and broccoli. I had some troubles finding vegetables this year so I am either really late to the gardening party or too early. I don't think I am that late considering our crazy Midwest weather, but who knows? I am hoping that our little bit of earth will help to combat the higher grocery prices this year.

I am really excited about enjoying some fresh produce from own yard again. I am also looking forward to the children helping me pick from and maintain the garden this year. Ethan was so excited to help water and also helped to hand me the plants as we did our initial planting. I can already feel that this is going to be another great year for us and I love our new garden location.

How is everyone's planting coming along? I hope your gardens are doing well!

In the spirit of good gardening and outdoor projects, here are some great links to some other fun reads:

33 Backyard Projects You Can Do (@ Tip Nut)

DIY: Build Your Own Garden Box (@ casasugar)

Planting Potatoes In Old Tires (@ Stop the Ride!)

The Bountiful Container: Gardening in Small Spaces (@ Get Rich Slowly)

The Children's Garden (@ Shakyard)

Get a Good Sack and Get To Totin' (@ Modern Cottage)

Buying Bulk Gravel (@ Clever Dude)

Rolling Out the Beauty (The Lylah Blog)

Garden Without Spending A Lot of Green (@ Not Made of Money)

Thrifty Containers for Tomatoes (@ You Grow Girl)

Creating a Kid-Friendly Garden (@ Parent Hacks)

Making Compost at Home (@ How to Compost)

The Big "O" (@ Innstyle Montana)

How Does Your Garden Grow?

Last year was my first year attempting to garden. Despite my black thumb and my so-so efforts to find a good place to plant, I still had plenty of herbs and tomatoes to choose from. I enjoyed a BLT (made with that yummy faux turkey) with a homemade peppermint mocha almost every day of the summer and I was so thankful that I could pick those tomatoes out of my very own yard thankyouverymuch after seeing the prices at the grocery store. Ridiculous!

My dream was to supply the whole block with produce from my garden. Oh the shame, that I only had one bowl of tomatoes on any given day and very little to share. No baskets of produce overflowing, but I was so grateful to have my bowl of tomatoes to enjoy on my salad and for my sandwiches.

Year two and I am looking forward to another year playing in dirt, but this year I am going to make more of an effort and actually dig up some grass for a sunny spot in our yard. The spot I planted in lacked enough sunshine to get the perfect tomatoes although my parsley grew into giant shrubs while basking in all of that shade.

Here are some links I have been enjoying while doing my gardening research:

How to Build a Square Foot Garden (@ Frugal Dad)

Planting a Kitchen Garden (@ The Kitchn)

Recycle Stuff for Your Garden (@ Nature Moms)

Container Gardening (@ Frugal Life)

More on Building a Square Foot Garden (@ Being Frugal)

Time to Start the Seeds (@ You Grow Girl)

A Total Garden Transformation (@ The Lylah Blog)

Make Your Own Compost Bin- Easy (@ Shakyard)



Sound Off: Do you garden? What will you be planting this year? Have the rising grocery prices determined how much you will be doing this year? Share your thoughts!

After Photos: Making Our Home More Inviting

I am beat, but I got some of our outdoor projects done today. I discussed yesterday that we are working on making our home more inviting to our friends and neighbors and I hope that we have accomplished that.

The project is incomplete until I can plant some annuals and fill out the beds, but I did freshen the beds up for fall and hopefully give the impression that we care a teeny bit about the outside of our home. Unfortunately, while I have been working hard on the outside of the home, the inside has gotten neglected so that is what I will be working on the rest of the week. Remember, I am still attending boot camp!

First, this is the new wreath that I put on our front door. Our front door used to be an ugly boring brown color and our house lacked a little spark to it. The coat of fresh red paint added a little pop to our house and a pretty wreath completes the look. This wreath was made from a grapevine wreath (that I had in our basement) and I got the sprigs of autumn touches from Wal-Mart for $3 total. The ribbon happened to be in my ribbon collection so I used that to hold the wreath in place. I hope this lets our visitors know that this is the place to be!

I love fall mums for my flower beds so I bought some of these from Home Depot for $3.88 each. It adds a little color to my beds and I love that these plants will be back next year. An inexpensive solution for a boring bed.

These beds also were looking overgrown and tired so I thinned them out and cleaned them up. This was a free solution for freshening the beds up a bit!

I loved the color of these mums so I added them to a pot for my front step. It was a great way to make our front step look more inviting and add some color to the front of the house.

The tired tree (with no grass around it) also got a face lift. We used our free brick and bricked around the tree. I added four hostas ($5.99 each) and three bags of red mulch ($3.38 each). Next year I will plant some pretty impatients to add some color to this spot. I loved how it all turned out!

The last thing I did (although I didn't take a before picture, but I am sure you can imagine boring and dull!) was frame our mailbox out with the plants and brick. The greenery came from one of my beds, on the side of the house, so this was free. Another addition of a mum and a little of the mulch completed the look.

Making Our Home More Inviting

I spend a lot of time on the interior of our home, but not enough time is spent working on projects on the outside of our house. We decided that we would spend these last few weeks of the warmer weather working on some of these projects. The benefit of waiting until later in the summer/fall to do your projects is that a lot of these outdoor items are on clearance. The downside though is that the selection is very limited and can make getting supplies for your projects more difficult.

The first project on our list of things to do was to work on our back patio. We had a brick patio behind our house that had been uprooted by a large tree root. We saved the money to remove the tree and then needed to put our patio back together. What we found were lots of broken bricks and our hopes of expanding the patio (and matching old street pavers) seemed very far away. My in-laws happened to be redoing their patio and graciously let us have their brick so we made a new design with the new brick and old brick together. The only cost to us is the sand, blood, sweat and tears that are going into the new patio. I think it is going to be beautiful when it is done.

Our next project is working on the front exterior of the home. We had several cracks in our driveway and don't have the funds to repave the driveway. Ryan got some crack filler (I will not go into how many jokes go along with that phrase when we talk about the repairs!) and filled the spots so that they will hopefully not continue cracking.

I spent a great deal of time on our flower beds and planted mums for the front bed and also got a pot and planted more mums in it for our doorstep. I divided some of my perennials and relocated them to the back bed, which was looking very sparse. I rounded it out with some red mulch, which made the bed look more finished.

Finally, our front tree needed a little sprucing up so we decided to use some more of our free brick and brick a box for it and fill it with some shade-loving perennials and mulch. I was originally going to do all of this myself and surprise my husband, but the surprise ended up being on him because I was too much of a wimp in the heat and couldn't get the bricks level like I wanted.

I just wanted to share some of our before pictures and then I will share some of our after photos. I am hoping it will be everything we are hoping for and that it help give our house a little more curb appeal. It is all still a work in progress, but we have high hopes of creating the home of our dreams on a budget!

Frugal Momma's Test Kitchen: Macaroni Grill Rosemary Bread

I made this bread recipe, a couple of weeks ago, and it was absolutely delicious. This recipe makes two loaves and is a great way to use up some of that delicious rosemary in your garden.

We served this with a plate of olive oil with Italian seasonings sprinkled in the oil and freshly ground black pepper.

We don't have a Macaroni Grill here, so I can't really attest to whether or not it tastes like the restaurant's, but I can say it was an excellent loaf of bread. I followed the instructions exactly as written.

Try not to eat a loaf before your husband comes home...that is the hardest part! Enjoy!

Life's Little Miracles

My garden grew something! If you know me, you know what a miracle it truly is! Here are some of my cherry tomatoes I picked for my salad yesterday.

Related Readings:

Overcoming My Fears: Gardening
Gardening Update & Fun Summer Reads
Still Alive

Still Alive

There is a miracle occurring in my garden. Nothing is dying! Everything is still growing! I actually am growing my own vegetables!

The fact that I haven't killed anything is still blowing my mind! My tomato plants, particularly my cherry tomatoes, are doing really great. I did stake them, but my stakes were not long enough. I should have caged them. I should have relocated them to a sunnier spot. These are all lessons that I am learning about gardening. It is definitely a trial and error type of hobby and I am confident that I can make my garden so much better next year.

I picked a spot in our lawn where no grass was going, for fear that I would dig into our grass and lose interest in the gardening or that my plants would die. Next year, I have a spot all picked out where I believe my plants will do better. It is not as conveniently close as the spot I picked this time, but I have a feeling that everything will thrive under all that sun.

My herbs are not flourishing, but a quick discussion with another newbie gardener lead us to the conclusion that my tomato plants are providing too much shade for the herbs and they need more sun. I am thinking of transplanting them to a sunnier location or just using containers and putting them out in the sunshine.

Regardless, I am really proud of myself and how well it is all turning out. I actually ate one of my cherry tomatoes off of the vine and declare them DELICIOUS!

Want an expert's opinion on getting things to grow in your yard? Gayla, over at You Grow Girl, is a wealth of knowledge! I loved her tip on using expired milk on those tomato plants. I recently met Gayla in person and she is really passionate about teaching people how to begin gardening. We went to dinner with a group of other bloggers and I probably was the worst person in the bunch to sit by because all I did was lean over and ask her dozens of gardening questions. Lucky for me, she LOVES to take about it so we got along great! Her website is a great resource for the novice and pro gardeners and she has a great forum where you can share & ask questions. Check it out!

Related Links:

Overcoming My Fears: Gardening
Gardening Update & Fun Summer Reads

Sound Off: What is happening in your yards this year? Oh, and it is COMPLETELY fine to say absolutely nothing! Nothing or dying is what is usually going on in our yard!

Gardening Update & Fun Summer Reads

Well, I haven't killed my plants yet so I guess my first gardening endeavor is going good...so far. Of course, you guys might get a good laugh at my expense because I actually thought I had squash already sprouting from the seeds I had planted. Just after I patted myself on the back, I realized that these were just little green pieces of nothing that fell off of a tree. I didn't kill anything though, that was the point in sharing this!

I also have overcome another fear that I have...mowing! Yup, I am terrified of the mower! I told you guys that I am a total girly-girl. I think it was a discussion with my dad, who was trying to teach me how to mow, where he told me that rocks could get thrown at me if I wasn't careful. He also redid all that I had mowed because I didn't mow "the right way" and so I ended up crying and going inside. That is just the kind of fun sport I am!

I managed to mow without any injuries thankyouverymuch. I also made my husband's day because he hates to mow the lawn. Unfortunately for him, this is probably not going to be happening with regular occurrence, but I did help him this week! I offered to switch roles and he could cook while I mowed the lawn, but he wouldn't take me up on it. It makes me think I am getting the short end of the stick here.

Thanks for the fabulous gardening tips that you emailed and shared with me though! I appreciate all the help I can get OBVIOUSLY since I think I am growing imaginary plants.

Here are some old blog entries & articles that I thought you might enjoy. Now RUN outside and enjoy all that nice weather!

Solving the Sand Between Your Toes Blues

Cleaning Up Yo Grill

Busy Day Activities for Warm Weather

Frugal Teacher Gifts

Getting Ready for Summer

Gearing Up for Summer

Summer Survival

Organized Travel

Overcoming My Fears: Gardening

Remember when I made that confession about being scared to work with dough? Well, here is another one of those kind of confessions. I really stink at gardening and I mean STINK! I swear that when the flowers see me coming, they start to wither and hold each other. The violets really do shrink into a ball and the tulips sag their heads. Despite working in a nursery every summer of my high school and college career, I just never was that great with plants. I thought it might be genetic because my mom is the same way, but my grandmother maintains a beautiful garden and the flowers seem to all stand to attention for her.

I also don't like being outdoors. Or being too hot. Or being dirty. Or working too hard. Basically, I am your average girly-girl, who was just made to sit in the shade and sip iced tea.

Fortunately, this girly-girl is extremely frugal, and my dismay with produce prices really got the best of me. I thought to myself, "Why not have a garden for myself?" I immediately pictured myself bringing baskets of beautiful produce to our friends and family to share the bounty of my hard work. Wouldn't it be wonderful to be the neighbor that people can't wait to see knock on their door with loads of yummy treats?

So...I did it! I overcame my fear of planting (and getting dirty) and planted myself a little vegetable garden. I managed to plant parsley, rosemary, sweet basil, cherry tomatoes, regular tomatoes and green peppers.

Don't worry, I was not wearing these shoes....

But I was wearing this highly fashionable John Deere shirt. Why not get into the spirit, I say?

Above is our finished product and I couldn't be more proud! I greeted my hubby at the door with the biggest smile he had ever seen. He gave me the strangest look and said, rather scared, "You have dirt on your face."

So, avid gardening readers, share with me your BEST gardening tips! Tell me everything you know! How do you keep those pesky varmints away from the greens? What is your tip for the best produce imaginable? What is the one thing you wish you would have known when you began dabbling in gardening? Does it run in your family? Please share!