Hose Reel

We were in desperate need of a hose reel for the back yard.  Our 100ft hose was constantly snaked around all over the place. This was the hose on a good day:

Everyone tripped over it because it's in a high traffic area.  However, I didn't want to settle for a cheap plastic reel from Target or Home Depot. I wanted a nice one that would last for years and not degrade every summer.  I wanted an industrial looking, wall mounted, pivoting hose reel. And so I found this one at Gempler's .

I've loved it!  The pool area and side yard are in two different directions; the hose unwinds easily either way. It's effortless to reel out and reel in.  I would love to have a bright yellow hose to contrast against the grey wall...one thing at a time.   

Vertical Garden

It's been so long since I was last on here.  We had many projects come together during the summer. But, then the girl's started school and I was overwhelmed.  Both girls are now going either full time or part time. You'd think it would give me more time to write.  But to be honest, I needed time to focus on me. Time to hike and go back to yoga. Time for our poor dog Penny who gets whatever time I have leftover from the kids. She is patient but her sad face tells me when she's had enough. Also with the girls being in school comes 40 hours of mandatory volunteer time.  I love being a part of their school community but it doesn't come without it's additional commitments.  Anyway, here I am. I'm back.  I've missed this outlet. 

One project I complete was starting a vertical garden. As I've mentioned before, our west and north walls are very sun exposed.  The only plants successfully growing on the west side are succulents, and not all succulents can take the heat.  My plan, or dream, is to successfully grow edible plants vertically along the entire west wall so when I look out I'll see a wall of green. Here is the beginning of my adventure! 

I think part of what's harming the plants are the ceramic pots they're in. They only intensify the heat. So, I thought what if the plants are "hanging" and not coming in contact with the hot floor? I started looking into Wooly Pockets, which I've been eyeing for quite some time now. But, I wanted a product that was better priced. I want to cover a large space.  I found these on Plants on Walls.  They're 3'x2' and they have a drip irrigation line already running on top so you can plug it in.  I decided to start with one of these. With twelve pockets I could do an entire herb garden.  

Next, I had to figure out how to hang them.  To avoid damaging the fence I thought I'd configure another option.  I saw these palettes below at Whole Foods. It looked like a good way to go. I pulled out my tools and Dave picked up a palette I saw on the curb about a block away.  

I got to use my new Kreg jig and I love it. Can't wait to do more with it!

Construction finished! Mission accomplished! Now time for the gardening. I left that in P's hands which she took care of very well!

The finished product is up and running and doing well. Some of the plants aren't too happy in this spot. Others, like strawberries, are very happy campers. I'm considering doing this section with just strawberries. 

 

I like how the plants look pool side. It's much nicer to glance out from our dining table and see green, green we can eat.  This is the beginning of a good direction.

Blueberries

Blueberries. The girls eat them by the fistfuls. Organic blueberries are not cheap. I'm going broke!  I decided it was time to invest in blueberry bushes. I bought two. I had no idea you could grow blueberries in Southern California. I thought they needed cool places like Oregon and Washington.  But a friend of ours has blueberries. She told me there are varieties that require less "chill period".  And her's were in wine barrels to supply the bushes with the right soil. And so I did the same. 

As I mentioned before, the area surrounding our pool has no shade.  It's an ideal spot for growing lots of edibles that require lots of sun.  The bushes are now hanging at the end of the pool.  My plan is to do a vertical, edible garden on the west wall of our property. That pallet in the corner of the picture is the beginning of hopefully something wonderful.  

Food prices are climbing. I'm focused on eating clean, without pesticides or GMOs.  That gets pricey. I'm also tired of wondering if the label on my food is real.  And, I also want to teach the girls about gardening and plants and where our food comes from.  Growing our own food seems like a good next step.  We'll see how it goes. 

When I bought the berries and barrels and a few other seeds and stuff a man was behind me in the check out line. He says to me "you must have a really green thumb".  I cringed. I don't....really.  I told him so and I said I hoped my $300 investment was't going to turn out to be a waste.  I've feared doing an edible garden for years. All the gardening I've done on our house has been a "learn as I go" method. I finally decided it's time to try this.  I got the courage. 

I bought a little organic basil plant back in March. That little baby has grown and supplied us with all the basil I need to make our pesto sauce every other week.  I use to buy so much basil and waste so much basil. No more!  It's always fresh and delicious. I've saved at least $50 since I haven't bought a bunch of basil since March!  

Here's an interesting article from the LA Times about blueberries for Southern California. 

Compost Bin

My compost bin has been one of the summer's best acquisitions... in my opinion anyway. I love this thing!  I got it used from someone we knew here in the valley.  It needed some adjustments and our friend Juan, helped me by adding missing boards and chicken wire to keep it rodent free.  

We juice regularly and the pulp that comes out is ideal for a compost bin.  The girls half eat bananas and leave other fruit laying around.  Before I felt guilty for throwing it all away but now I feel that it's going into the compost bin and serving a purpose.  

My mom added to my fun by getting me this super glam pitch fork from Crate & Barrel.  It's the perfect height and weight to move the compost around.  I feel so city slicker/farm girl when I use it!  

Composting has it's science. I knew some of the rules from growing up with my mom semi-composting. She didn't exactly use a bin.  To this day she digs holes next to her plants and buries her kitchen scraps.  She has always had some pretty healthy and delicious fruit bearing plants.  Gotta love her unconventional methods. Anyway, I know the no dairy, no meat rules.  I also know the layers need to alternate between wet and dry. When I dump in the wet kitchen scraps I know I have to dump in some dry leaves to balance it out.  I am mostly learning as I go. I'd love to know more about the worms you can add to brew a worm poop tea or something! Google and YouTube have been very educational.

I must say though, when I churn the piles it smells delicious.  It smells like a good, deep, oaky/earthy red wine.  It smells so good I crave a glass when I'm done.  I was warned that moving the bins around was going to be hard work.  I admit, it is a bit tough.  However, I'll take churning my yummy smelling earth to doing a bunch of bicep curls at the gym any day.  My guns are getting back in shape just with my decomposing banana peels and snazzy pitch fork!

I love looking out the window and seeing my bin out there.  It could use some sprucing but I know I can't paint or stain it. I plan on using this future soil in our edible garden so it has to have natural organic materials.  Dave suggest I coffee stain the boards. Not a bad idea! I have big plans for an edible garden on our property.  Due to lack of space in the sunny areas the garden will go vertical!  I have plans, we'll see how they go!  Until then I'm making some yummy soil for my future tomatoes from my old bananas. From earth you come and to earth you shall return.....

  

6235 Lubao Interiors: backyard

I couldn't resist the opportunity to photograph this house!  Who knows who will buy it next and I want to remember it as Rudy (the owner) had left/designed it. This is exactly how it was intended to be!  I'd also like to copy many of his details for our house.

I took many, many pictures.  With Dave out of town I had both girls with me.  You will see them quite a bit.  You will also notice many tilted shots and other peculiarities but this is as good as I could get it on a Sunday afternoon after a long weekend.  I'm so grateful to Hilary and Debbie for letting me come in at the tail end of their open house! 

Because I shot so many pictures, all worth sharing imho,  I'm dividing them up by sections. Today will be the backyard.  The first thing I noticed in the picture above was the great large tree at the southwest corner of the lot. It was giving the backyard amazing shade at 3pm when I took these pictures. The tree is ideally placed. 

You'll also notice that the back patio isn't parallel to the house. Instead it jets out and I'm not sure why but this positioning propels you out into the yard and also draws you back into the house. 

 There's a path that circles the backyard and it starts off with a perfect fountain!  Perfectly placed and perfectly designed. 

Outside two of the bedrooms there is a row of olive trees and just past them is a rose garden. From the inside you feel shaded by the trees with highlights of the roses. The brick pathways seem to "announce" the outside. In a portion of the house that integrates the inside and outside you will see how these particular bricks play a part in the continuation and delineation of spaces. 

I love the garden art. 

I love the lines of the house from all angles. 

At the far northwest corner of the house there is a huge silver dollar eucylaptus tree. When you look out towards the back yard  the two large trees at each corner anchor the space. Then there are two sections with multiple trees that have obviously been kept shorter and the same height.  I'm not sure if the electric/phone wires are dictating the height or if it was a stylistic choice. 

I love the different heights of the garden. So smart!  And I love the hanging vines! 

These cement rounds line one fence. Not sure why. I sense it's a function thing and I like the solution.  

I love the different types of brick and how they coordinate/complement one another. 

This is the north wall of the house. The kitchen and dining are on the other side. The dirt patch is where they kept an herb garden. I love the genius placement of the herb garden and how useful, not just ornamental, the outdoors was to them. 

This is part of the area I mentioned where the brick integrates indoors and outdoors. Inside the sliding glass door is an indoor patio that follows through to a courtyard. The brick sets the three spaces apart and unties them: the outdoors, the indoors that feels outdoors because of all the floor to ceiling windows and the outdoors surrounded by indoors. Brilliant!

A fence detail.  Just having redone part of our fence I loved seeing that this is the same fence style we used for the back.  Except, he capped it with a plank which makes it more refined and Mid Century. The plank might also help keep water from going inside all of the wooden planks below.  Better to replace one plank than all of them! 

Details of the recessed exterior lighting in the patio. 

This is sheer genius. He left spaces where the wiring could easily hide instead of it hanging out and messy. 

I love his philodendrons. I love his pots. I love the brick. I just love it all!

If you love Mid Century architecture and you want to see the house call Hilary and Debbie!  

I'll post more of the interiors tomorrow!

DIY Succulent Wreath

Once upon a time I was drooling over this wreath. Today I finished my own DIY succulent wreath! Major accomplishment!  P and I made two over Christmas and we gave them to her teacher and principal.  I had a third one set aside for us but I didn't quite finish it. I must admit my hands were in pain. Getting the plants in the compacted moss was rather hard.  But today I was fine.  It must have been the cold water.  The moss gets soaked for a while before it takes the shape of a wreath. The cold water must have been the real problem. I followed these instructions.  The were simple and easy to follow. 

When we stained the fence this week we moved the pots. A few of our succulents lost a stem or two.  The fresh cuttings prompted me to finish the wreath, and more important, to hang it up.  That took some deep thinking.  The wreath needs to be in the shade because it tends to dry out pretty quickly in our arid Southern California climate. The high winds this season dried the wreaths out even further.  I preferred to hang it on one of our grey walls in case it stains the wall but this spot seemed to suit it's scale the best.  I like it with the butterfly chair, the pots and the new door. This was a great DIY project.  A succulent wreath retails for $150-200. Because we have so many succulents throughout our garden I was able to make this one for $15. I'm feeling like the cat's meow!

New Colors!

The house is finally painted!  We're so happy, relieved and excited to have our "new" house.  With the change of colors and texture it feels like a new house.  Walking in and out of our front door feels so good, kind of like when you get an amazing new haircut.  We all have a spring in our step!

Here are a few before and after shots:

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

Here are a few other picture from the exterior.  I'm not ready to take pictures of the backyard. The painters left it really messy.  We had a few changes and  our own clean up to do. However, I'm still cleaning debris left from the two weeks of work. The painting process is a topic for another day. I learned a lot. I would do things rather different next time and I want to share/remember my experience. 

I put off doing any landscaping prior to painting. The new colors are now giving me new directions.  I've started adding and moving things here and there already. 

This is a favorite new angle of mine. The grey really makes the trees and greenery stand out.  I can't wait for the purple flowers to bloom.  

 The colors of the wood and the border of the roof ended up matching.  It wasn't my intent. I actually wanted the wood to be a bit more red. I wanted it kind of like rust so that it would almost look like corten steel.  However, when they put the sample up I really liked how it all tied together.  

A detail that makes me happy is the slatted wood at the center of our windows. They had been removed when I attempted to fix it all myself.  For almost four years it was an awful hole. Now it's back to its prime Mid Century self again!

I absolutely love the contrast of the flowers and plants against the grey and dark brown now.  The house colors made the entire garden really stand out instead of blend away.  I just love it!