this is how our garden grows!

it's official... our garden has been planted! we kinda waited a bit longer then we probably should have, but it's been a busy busy past few weeks. so before i head out of town for the weekend, evan and i decided that this must get done asap! last night evan picked the weeds, turned all of the soil in our garden bed, and then added some of our compost that we're so excited to finally use! so today (after a fabulous lunch with friends) i got to work gettin' dirty! last year was our first garden and i became what you might call OBSESSED! i have a whole collection of what i consider garden porn. ya know, beautiful close ups of my pretty plants from every conceivable angle. i absolutely loved it! so after one year under my belt, i feel like i learned quite a lot and now i'm hoping for a really successful crop this year. finger crossed!

here's what we planted...

cherry tomatoes

heirloom tomatoes

banana peppers

red bell peppers

yellow squash

cucumbers

mesclun

butter lettuce

romaine lettuce

and a separate pot of basil

has anyone else got a summer garden going yet? if so here's to hoping we're all successful!

and so it begins...

yesterday we got to pluck our first goodie from the garden! check out this beautiful 100% organic home grown zucchini!

and we've already got another one coming in too. yaaay for fresh veggies!

you grow girl!

i just walked out to check on the garden this morning and was so pleasantly surprised when this big beautiful zucchini bloom was there to greet me...

we've also got lots and lots of little cherry tomatoes coming in...

oh how happy i will be when we get to harvest all of these goodies. i'm definitely hooked on gardening now. this is my first time ever having a real garden (not just some wilting plants in a pot) and i find myself going outside every few hours just to look at it. everything changes from day to day and it's so very exciting watching it all grow. you can count on what may end up being an obnoxious amount of garden updates in the coming weeks. hope you like looking at plants!

surprise!

evan and i were down in new orleans all weekend visiting my best friend. we got home super late last night, and this morning when i went out to check on our garden, i had this lovely little bloom waiting to greet me. the zucchini is on its way!

master cleanse- day seven, and some weekend goodies!

the cleansing is still going strong! it's day 7, and after a slow start to the day, i'm feeling fabulous. steph (my cleanse buddy) and i did a little fabric shopping earlier, and even hit the gym after that! i haven't updated in the past few days because on days 4, 5, and 6 i was pretty much just coasting through it. with the exception of some really low energy on day 5, it's been pretty uneventful. the weekend was a little bit tougher though, simply because it was beautiful out and it would have been so lovely to have a little cookout, and most weekend get togethers tend to revolve around food or drinks. somehow we all stayed strong and made it through!

i'm still thinking about going for 12 days instead of 10. i'm already at 7, and the thought of being done in 3 days is quite appealing, but i feel like i could really benefit from just a couple more days. it is after all, just two more days out of my life, not eating solids. in the grand scheme of things, not too big of a deal at all.

all cleanse business aside, check out what evan built in our backyard this weekend. a raised garden bed! lots and lots of veggies await!

she's a beauty!

on saturday we drove out to blue max and had them dump a ton and a half of soil in the back of evans truck. that baby was riding low!

then it was time to fill her up!

perfect!

barkley discovered that the soil was a nice cool spot to lay out...

...and take a much needed nap. gotta love that pup!

hope everyone enjoyed a lovely weekend as well!

a little more here and there...

a few additions to some previous posts...


the studio makeover is still on going, and some new organizational goodies have been added.


i had a large cork board that i just no longer had any space for. so i cut it down and put bits of it in some old salvaged frames that i repainted. this size is much more to my liking!



ahhh... gotta love a makeover!





i've added onto my teacup collection that i started on our trip to asheville a few weekends ago.


i'm now only missing one green teacup and saucer. i'm currently bidding on one on ebay and i guess we'll see how that turns out!



now i just need to have a tea party, perhaps with wine though. a wine party with these little cups sounds just about perfect!




i also added a few more goodies to my skeleton key collection. 10 newbies to be exact. scooped these bad boys up from miss emily gene over on etsy. somehow i still feel that i need more!!!


ahhh... i just love 'em!



garden update... lots more of our little seedlings out grew their starter pots and were ready to get movin' on up to the east side! they're all real stoked on their new larger homes...



mmmm... squash!




i think that perhaps i actually purchased some magic beans when we went seed shopping a few weeks ago. our string beans are already about 14 inches tall, and on tuesday they grew 3 inches in one day! mind you, we planted these from seeds only one week and 4 days ago. i can see how folks grow (pun intended) to really love gardening. this is fairly amazing!



if all of our plants produce fruits and veggies as expected, we're going to be rolling in produce. i absolutely can not wait for it!




we're gearing up for another productive weekend around here. evan will be laying some new flooring and i plan to do some painting. doors, window trim, and the ceiling are all due for fresh coats. lots of coffee and good music will hopefully get us through it...

happy friday!

meanwhile, back on the home front...

well, my high hopes for bright sunny days this weekend were shot down by the over lords. it was cold, rainy and just all around pretty gross. i'm so very much over these grey days. apparently today is supposed to be nice and sunny, and possibly even somewhere around the 62/64 degree mark... i will take that and run with it!

i wanted to give an update on the flowers that we've got going on outside. if you didn't see the earlier post about the discovery of these little beauties, you can check it out HERE. with all of the previously mentioned rain that we had the past few days, i was a bit worried about how our delicate little sproutlings would handle it. friday night we actually got so much rain so quickly that the flowers were almost completely submerged in water. didn't seem like it would be too good for them. this is what they looked like on saturday...

they plants that were once covered up by the wood pile are now turning green and seem to be getting a bit stronger. the mass amounts of water have got them looking a bit sulky, but i'm hoping that after a few days of sun they'll perk back up.

this little bud is what all of the others should be looking like right now. this one was found growing off to the side of our house. it's getting much more sunlight and is looking like it should bloom any day now.

barkley agrees that this flower is a.o.k!

on saturday i finally got around to planting our little seedlings. evan and i are pretty darn gung ho about having a kick ass garden this year. we're planting 3 kinds of tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, string beans, banana peppers, sweet peppers, basil, rosemary, marigolds, and sunflowers. for two folks who have had a hard time keeping a single basil plant alive, this is quite an undertaking.

while i was planting on saturday, evan was building! i'm so excited about the ridiculous amount of storage that these cabinets will bring us. we've been living out of boxes for months now and i'm more then ready to start unpacking. we're so close i can almost taste it!

the cats were really stoked on the building process for other reasons. empty boxes! these are zaboo's (aka monkey's) little ears that you see here, and that's juan chillin' in the window.

ohhh, all the possibilities!

evan even built a platform for the cabinets to sit on. he's such a handy guy! they will have doors on them a bit later, but we still have to paint the ceiling in the kitchen and we're holding off on the doors until that's done.

evan's new toy. apparently ever guy needs a ginormous miter saw to call their own.

i was just outside a bit ago and now this little flower is even closer to opening up... perhaps tomorrow?

making a house a home...

after a few weeks of not really working on any of our big home projects, evan and i decided to really buckle down this weekend and get some things done!

a couple of days ago we noticed that some flowers were starting to pop up right next to a large pile of wood we had sitting in the backyard that was waiting to be broken down and carted away. this little guy here made us realize that there were probably lots more little blooms struggling underneath the pile to reach the light of day. i was saddened by the thought, but the pile of wood was so large, and we really didn't have anywhere better to move it, so i came to terms with the fact that this year they just weren't going to make it.

i think perhaps evan knew i was sadder then i let on about this, because while i was taking a shower one day he surprised me by moving the entire pile to another location. to my amazement, this is what was found underneath...

they are about the same size as the ones that were not covered, but they are totally yellow from the lack of sunlight. they are also so very soft and fragile. i'm pretty sure they're daffodils, but if anyone knows otherwise feel free to let me know.

i cleaned out all of the leaves that had gathered, and recovered in soil some of the bulbs that were just sitting on the surface. i don't know if they'll make it, but i've taken them on as my new pet project. i know it's not the ideal way for a garden to look, but i do so love the way they have a perfect gradient from pale yellow to deep green.

i also found a few of these larger bulbs just sitting on the surface. i've replanted them and am pretty excited to see if anything comes of it. ahhh, the mystery!

we then took our motivation inside to continue our never ending kitchen renovation. it's really only never ending because we don't often have entire days to spend working on it. to see the steps that it took to get us to this point feel free to read up HERE.

evan finished putting up all the drywall and also mudded and sanded every nook and cranny.

evans mom stopped by for a little visit and helped us prime the walls. we rope as many people as we possibly can into helping us out with this kitchen.

paint time! we decided to go with a really pale grey. we want to keep the kitchen feeling very bright, clean, and airy. with the cabinets being white and the floor a deep brown wood, i think we've made the perfect choice.

this is me in my painting attire. thanks evan for capturing this!

there will soon be tall built in cabinets in this empty space below. oh, how i love me some storage space!

the washer and dryer are in the kitchen, so evan built this little room to keep them all tucked away. he's quite a handy guy to have around. i do believe i'll keep him :)

you can also spot barkley here in one of his favorite spots in the house. he loves to curl up in front of the heat vent and nuzzle his nose right on in there. crazy pup!

i was on such a renovation roll yesterday that i even decided to refinish our back door. the door is as old as the house and was in desperate need of a face lift. we will eventually get a new door, and a little doggy door for barkley, but this will hold us over until that day.

the repainting of the door was such a spur of the moment thing that i didn't even get a "before" picture. it was the same color combo as our front door, so this should give you an idea of what it looked like...

it has such an old feel to it already that i thought i would just go with it and really bring out it's shabby side. i hand sanded the panels to pull some of the blue color through the fresh new coat of paint.

it came out really well and i now know that i can confidently do the front door without fear of ruining it. here's to experimenting!

we still have quite a bit more to do as far as the kitchen goes, but it really feels like it's starting to move along now. i guess having actual finished walls will do that to a room. it's so very gratifying to be doing this all ourselves. it's taking longer (ok, much longer) then expected but evan and i really enjoy working together to make this little home our own. we're shooting for having it done by my birthday which is march 28th. stay tuned to see if we make our deadline...