Projects Revisited

Recently I've been out of town a lot (for fun and for work) plus with football season starting and a visit from my sister, I haven't had much chance to work on some new projects lately. Hopefully that will change this week, but for now I thought I would give a little rundown about how some of my projects are working out for me a few weeks or months down the line.

Fabric Organization
I used an Ikea Billy Bookcase with a CD insert for fabric storage in my craft room creating bolts out of foam core for the pieces that were at least half a yard long. The CD insert has the perfect sized cubbies for my fat quarters and my scraps are stored in baskets and jars I already had. I also used an antique Japanese soda crate to store my thread. I have really liked how this has turned out because it is really easy for my to see exactly what I have on hand and not have to go digging through things to find a fabric that I am looking for. My only problem is that I am starting to outgrow this solution, having acquired a few more fat quarters than will comfortably fit in my cubbies.  

Keeping Plants Watered During Vacation in the Bathtub
I tried a trick that I read online to keep my plants from dying while on vacation, namely putting them in the bathtub with a little water and then covering it with plastic wrap to effectively create a terrarium. I tried this while Frank and I were on vacation in Italy earlier this year. I have to say that it worked a little too well. The soil in the plants was very, very damp when I came home. Some of my plants, like the basil, did well with all the moisture but it was too much for my rosemary plant and it died. I think that I would try it again (it was definitely better than all of my plants dying while I was out of town!) but I would cut a lot more holes in the plastic wrap to let more of the water escape.

New Mailbox
The antique cast iron mailbox that I had been using was just too small and my mail was always overflowing and getting bent when it was delivered. After hunting on eBay for a while I found a larger orange vintage mailbox that I made over with some oil rubbed bronze spray paint and hung out front. I absolutely love that my mail doesn't get squished anymore but my problem is that I am too short for it. Because of the wood siding on my house I had to hang it between the angled slats such that there is space for the lid to swing open. One slat farther down would obstruct the door bell, but where it is currently placed makes it hard for me to reach the bottom of the mailbox since it is so deep. I need to get a thin piece of wood to mount on top of the siding and then mount my mailbox on top of that to fix it, but I haven't done it yet. Once I do that I think it will be perfect. Either that or I need to grow a few inches.

New Dining Room Chairs
After years of using some Ikea folding chairs that had seen better days in my dining room I scored a great deal on Craigslist on a set of eight dining room chairs from Crate and Barrel for only $500. I could not be happier with the chairs. Not only were they a super fabulous deal, but they are so comfortable and I love sitting in them. They are also in fabulous shape and you can't tell that they aren't new. I can't say enough about how happy I am with this purchase. I still need to do something about making or buying a bigger table so the chairs comfortably fit, but those things take time.

Front Porch Makeover
I did a few projects on my front porch this summer to spruce it up. First up was my self watering planter. I checked the water level once a week and it worked really well until I was an idiot and went to Japan and didn't check the water level before I left. Not surprisingly, if the water reservoir is empty the self watering doesn't work. It was working really well up until then so I would definitely do it again. I also joined two rugs together using duct tape to make a runner on my porch. It has held together really well and I have had no issues with it coming apart. My other little decor items on the porch, like the house silhouette art I made and my geisha vase, have stood up well being outside with no issues or damage. The teal spray paint on my table has also held up well with no fading of the fun, bright color so far.

I could keep going but I'll stop for now. If there are any of my other projects that you would like an update on, please let me know. I'd love to share. Also, how about your projects at home? What has worked out really well for you? Has anything gone not quite as well as planned?

End of Summer Garden Bounty

As summer is drawing to a close I am enjoying a bunch of tasty things in my garden. Despite the fact that I have been a neglectful gardener (Weeding? Who has time for weeding?) and things are looking overgrown, my garden has thrived in spite (or despite) of me.

My herbs have been amazing. I really need to do some thinning in the area where I have my perennials for next year because they are crowding each other out now. My lavender has continued to flower even after I gathered some to dry, so I may gather more. I also plan to harvest and dry a bunch of the herbs and package them like I have in the past plus I am also thinking of making some compound butters. It just seems like a waste to not take advantage of my over abundance.

My zucchini plant was pretty prolific (aren't they always?) and I also had a decent crop of tomatoes. I actually have a lot of green tomatoes on the vine still so I am looking forward to having a few more before the weather turns. My lettuce has also been nice for some fresh salads this summer.

I really love fresh picked tomatoes from the garden. They always taste better than tomatoes from the store. One of my favorite ways to eat a tomato is to cut into thick slices and sprinkle a little sugar on top. I know it sounds a little strange but it really is delicious. Apparently my great-grandfather used to eat tomatoes this way and it has been passed down among the generations.

How has your garden turned out this summer? Did you do a better job of tending yours than me? What did you grow? Do you eat your tomatoes with sugar? Do you have any ideas of what else to do with an over abundance of herbs?

Drying Lavender From My Garden

Although I planted my lavender plant in my herb garden a few years ago it has never been big enough to have more than a handful of flowers over the past few summers. This year my lavender plant has finally come into its own and I have quite a good number of flowers. In fact, the lavender flowers are so bountiful this year that it seemed worthwhile to gather and dry them.

The lavender flowers should be harvested when they are dry and after any morning dew has already evaporated.

It is also good to cut the flowers before they have fully bloomed because then the dried lavender will be more fragrant. Unfortunately due to being out of town a lot of the time this summer I am a little late with gathering my lavender, but I'll just have to make do. I think that my lavender will still be nice.

When cutting the lavender I cut as low down as I could to have the longest stem possible. Once I had cut all the flowers I gathered them into several small bunches and secured them with an elastic band on the end. As the stems dry they can shrink so using something stretchy means they will always stay secured. I then tied a bit of twine to the stems to hang the bunches in a cool, dark place which for me meant a spare closet.

A few weeks from now I should have some nice dried lavender for craft projects or recipes. Do you grow lavender in your garden? Do you dry it?

Week in Pictures: 7.22.2012

This past week has been a whirlwind with preparing to go to Japan for work at the beginning of the week and then being in Japan for the rest of the week. So far my business trip has been very productive and as an added bonus I've had a chance to see a lot of friends from when I lived in Japan. I always enjoy being back in Japan and this time has been no different. Here is a sampling of some of the photos I snapped this week.

Collage One, First Row
- Right before heading off to Japan I hit up Target to find some treats to bring my co-workers in Japan (omiyage)
- I discovered the first ripe tomatoes in my garden before my trip. They were delicious and I hope when I get back more are ready to eat
- Tuesday afternoon I took off from the Detroit airport after grabbing lunch with Frank

Collage One, Second Row
- Wednesday evening I arrived in Nagoya absolutely exhausted. Barely sleeping for a few days followed by a thirteen hour flight and a thirteen hour time change will do that to a person.
- As I was riding the bus from the airport I saw a lovely sunset over Mikawa Bay
- I wanted to stay awake to try and get adjusted to the time zone so I went to Vegebird to get some delicious kushiyaki (grilled skewers) and umeshu (plum wine)

Collage Two, First Row
- After work on Thursday, I took a walk by my old apartment building and am happy to report it is exactly the same as when I lived there. I do this every time I come back to Japan for work just to reminisce.
- I met up with some friends for dinner on Thursday night who happened to be staying in the Toyota Castle Hotel. When I met them in the lobby I discovered that the Toyota Castle now has a tanuki mascot dressed up in a bellman's outfit complete with a top hat. Of course I got a picture with him. 
- For dinner we headed to my favorite place to eat in Toyota City, Tsubasaya. The have the best tebasaki (chicken wings) 

Collage Two, Second Row
- Tsubasaya had a new item on the menu, amai ebi mayo, which was fried shrimp covered in mayonnaise and topped with jelly beans. It was too strange not to order.
- Following dinner, we headed to Second Story (a tiny bar nearby) for Magic Night performed by Sawa-san. When I lived in Japan, Magic Night was every Wednesday but it has since moved to every other Thursday. Lucky for me, it just happened to be on the Thursday I was in town. Sawa-san had some amazing new tricks and I am always impressed by his act. 
- My trip overlapped with the Nagoya Oktoberfest celebration so I headed over with some people on Friday night. It was a little strange (Oktoberfest in July in Japan?) but really cool. There were huge tents set up with table underneath and the outside was ringed with German beer and food stalls. Up front a German band, wearing lederhosen of course, played polkas all night

Collage Two, Third Row
- What do you eat at Oktoberfest? Sausages, sauerkraut, potatoes and beer!
- Oktoberfest closed down at nine, so we headed out for more eating and grabbed some dumplings
- Saturday morning I decided to head out to Gujo Hachiman, a little town on the Yoshida River in Gifu Prefecture that is famous for the Gujo Owari dance festival and plastic food replicas 

Collage Three, First Row
- While I was walking along the banks of the Yoshida River I stumbled upon a man fishing for ayu, a local fish
- Being in Gujo Hachiman, I had to try my hand at making some food replicas and created a little pastry. Eighty percent of the food replicas that are on display in the windows of Japanese restaurants are made in Gujo Hachiman
- Saturday night I went back to Nagoya Oktoberfest, this time with a different group of friends 

Collage Three, Second Row
- After Oktoberfest closed at nine, we headed to ID Bar, a dance club in Nagoya that I hadn't been to in years. It was like going back in time four years
- On Sunday morning I headed to the Aichi Prefectural Gymnasium to see if there was any chance I could get a ticket to the Nagoya Basho (Sumo Tournament). It was sold out but I had fun watching some of the younger sumos walking around outside 
- For lunch I grabbed a bowl of kishimen, a flat type of noodle famous in the Nagoya area

Collage Three, Third Row
- Since I was right nearby, I visited Nagoya Castle, which I hadn't been to in several years. They are rebuilding the Hommaru Palace which was destroyed in WWII using traditional techniques. It was really neat to see the progress on the buildings
- It was hot out so I escaped to the cool and peaceful forest surroundings of Atsuta Jingu (a famous Nagoya Shinto shrine) for a little while
- In the late afternoon I headed to Osu Kannon (a covered pedestrian mall) for some fun people watching.  

What have you been up to this week? Have you been busy or are you enjoying a relaxing summer?

June Garden Update: Successes & Failures

As June is drawing to a close I thought I would share what is currently happening in my vegetable and herb garden. I love my garden but I do not have a green thumb so I have some failures as well as successes. Being away a lot I haven't tended to it like I should and the searing temperatures that we have had in Southeast Michigan in May and June this year have not helped things at all.

I'll share my bad news with you first. My sweet basil, purple ruffles basil and the star sister dahlias that I planted in my front bed were incredibly tasty to some little critters and got pretty munched up. They are all now practically dead and I am really disappointed. I'm planning on pulling up the plants and replacing them with something else but don't know what yet.

Despite those disappointments I have lots of great things happening in my garden as well. My lettuce has flourished and there are some little beans are growing on my bush bean plants. Some of the beans are even almost ready to pick. I really can't wait to eat some.

My zucchini plant has bloomed and little tomatoes have popped up on my tomato plants.

In the herb section of my garden my lavender plant is full of flowers and this year I will finally be able to harvest and dry some. I replanted my mint in sunken containers earlier this spring which has seemed to keep it from overtaking my whole garden.

The rosemary, oregano, chives and sage have been in my garden a few years now and have become so prolific that they are overcrowded now. I plan to transplant them with some added space between the plants, but I am not sure if it is better to do it this fall or next spring. I also need to trim out some of the rosemary branches that have died out.

Overall I am happy with how things are going and I have had a chance to use a lot of my herbs in my cooking so far this year.

What is growing in your garden? Has anything not worked out like you planned? What has flourished?

Self Watering Planter Using a Soda Bottle

I am terrible at keeping my potted plants alive. A few long days at work where I forget about them or a trip out of town and they are dead as a doornail. I've seen some links about using a soda bottle to make a self watering planter like this one and this one I thought I would make my own variation.

I started by cutting the top third of the bottle off with a pair of scissors. It was a bit tough to get a straight edge but I cleaned it up after the pieces were separated. Next, I needed to have something act as a wick for the water. I cut four small slits in around the neck of the bottle and then took two unused paint rags and poked one end of each rag through the holes. I wet the rag and filled up the bottom of the bottle to act as the water reservoir. It is important that the water is high enough that the ends of the rag will sit in it but not as high as the slits. I then placed the top of the bottle inside of the bottom and then planted a petunia plant inside.

The roots of plants don't do well if exposed to light so I wrapped some duct tape around the bottom of the bottle to block the light. I wanted something that looked a little cuter than the soda bottle and a $2.50 metal floral container that I bought at Target was the perfect fit to place my new self watering planter inside. 

I decided to put the plant outside on my front porch. With the cute plant I decided to also spruce up the little table I have out front. I bought an inexpensive Lindved table from Ikea several years ago and the white finish was showing its age from being exposed to the elements. With a few thin coats of teal outdoor spray paint it looks brand new and makes a great place for my petunia plant. So far it has been a week and the plant is still alive and kicking. I'll have to see how it goes...

Have you had any luck using self watering for your plants? What are your tricks for keeping your plants alive?

Eradicating Moss From My Driveway

Moss can be lovely. Carpeting the ground under beautiful maple trees in a Japanese garden, moss is gorgeous. Growing on my driveway along the side of my house, however, I am definitely not a fan of moss.

Actually, it has been a big nuisance that I seemed to have been unable to kill. I would try using things I bought to kill it which didn't work very well and I would power wash it away only to have it grow back. I read all sorts of things online saying that if you have a problem you need to keep the area dry and sunny. Well, that wasn't going to work for me. My house keeps that part of the driveway in shade most of the day and my house is not moving. As for keeping it dry, anytime there is rain it takes that part of my driveway a day to dry due to the shade. I needed to find some other solution.

This spring as I was trying to figure out how to attack my moss I came upon a gardening site recommending that boiling water kills moss. I had tried everything else so I figured, why not? I tried a few pots of boiling water on a patch of the moss and the next day it was brown and dead. This was great! Not only did it actually work, but it also was a solution without any chemicals. It took me awhile to treat the whole patch along my driveway since one pot of boiling water didn't cover much area, but eventually I had killed it all. 

After everything was dead I proceeded to power wash the moss to loosen it from the driveway and then scoop it into my compost bin that the city picks up. This step was also slow going. It also splashed dirt up on the side of my house so I had to go pack and power wash the side of the house when I was through.

In the end I was finally moss free on my driveway. I think two things definitely have helped. First, I had killed all of the moss before power washing so I wasn't just scattering it. Second, I actually bought a power washer (great deal at Sears on a discontinued model!) this year so I can routinely wash that area of my driveway down to keep the moss from building up again. Before I would just have a chance to power wash the area just once or twice a year which wasn't enough.

Have you ever had any moss issues at your home? How did you take care of it?

Resolution Recap: May 2012

Last month my 2012 New Year's resolutions of purging and organizing my home and finishing up projects around the house went by the wayside a bit but I was back on track in May. I am happy with what I accomplished, especially the garage cleaning.

Resolution 1: Purge & Organize
I met my goal of having a volume of at least one trash cart (between my recycling and regular trash) out on the curb on garbage pick-up morning every Monday in May, even on the Monday following my weekend trip to Florida. Here's my breakdown:

- May 7: 3/4 full trash + 1/2 full recycle = 1-1/4 total
- May 14: 3/4 full trash + 1/4 full recycle = 1 total
- May 21: 1 full trash + 1 full recycle + 3 SUV loads full (from garage cleaning) = tons!
- May 28: 1 full trash + 1/4 full recycle = 1-1/4 total

On the organizing front Frank helped me clean and organize my garage. It definitely needs more work, but it is so nice to have space in there to work on projects now. I also did some blog organizing creating my Projects tab with thumbnails of projects as well as my Away tab with a clickable map of where I have traveled.

Resolution 2: Finish Up Projects
I got a lot of gardening work done outside in May including new plantings in my front beds and clearing out my back bed. In my guest room I got a little more done, replacing the old outlets and making over a luggage stand that I rediscovered during my garage cleaning. I also spruced up my garage door by painting it red and replacing the door knob and worked on my application to the historic district for new shutters and two replacement windows. 

In June I hope to fix the trim on the garage door and maybe get some things done in my back entry/laundry room.

How are you coming along on your New Years Resolutions? Did you finish up any big projects in May? 

A Blank Slate For My Back Garden Bed

My back garden bed has been sadly neglected for a long time. Two years ago I bought some wine and roses weigela plants that were on clearance and planted them in the back bed. They were on clearance because they were in bad shape and I didn't do much to help nurture them so they have become scraggly and one even died.

Last summer I was so busy that I just let the bed go and I am definitely paying the price for it now. This spring the bed looked like a jungle and it was a ton of work to get it all cleaned out. To make the work a little easier on myself I cleared the bed in a few different shifts after it had rained. I like to weed when the ground is wet since it makes it easier to pull them.

After the bed was cleared I loosely tied up the weigela with some twine, spread some peat moss with fertilizer on the bed and then rototilled around the weigela. I had a minor mishap when a stone got caught in my blade. It was really jammed in there so I ended up having to use a hammer to knock it out.

With the bed cleared and the ground turned I now have a blank slate in my back garden bed to finally get to some fun. I am planning to plant my sunflowers and zinnias that I started under my grow lamp back there. I also need to do some trimming and care on the weigela plants that have been so neglected. I have a long way to go before it starts to look pretty back there but at least I am on my way.

Have you ever neglected part of your garden and then regretted it later? Do you have any overgrown areas that you needed to clear this year?

Seedling Update

A month ago I built a grow light so I could start some seeds indoors. I am going to use the seeds that I started in the garden bed along the back of my property.

My general plan with my seedlings is to have a row of mammoth sunflowers along the back (12' height) with a row of chianti sunflowers (4-5' height) in front of them. I think the yellow and red will look pretty together. I then have some frilly looking zinnias (24-30" height) in shades of yellow, orange, red and pink to edge the front of the bed. 

Since I took down the tree in my back yard this winter this will be the first year that the bed will have full sun so I am looking forward to experimenting. I've also never grown sunflowers before so that will be another fun first for me.

My seedlings have thrived under the grow lights and I am getting ready to plant them in the back bed. Before I do that I need to harden them off so I have been placing them outside for a few hours a day so that they can become acclimatized. I am hoping to finally get them in the ground this weekend. 

Did you start any plants from seeds this year? How are they doing? What do you have growing in your garden?