Share my passion for all things gardening!
The Budget-Wise Gardener by Kerry Ann Mendez (St. Lynn’s Press, 2018, 176 pp., $19.95) We gardeners love to save money, don’t we? After all, by stretching our dollars, we can spend even more on our passion right? Before I started reading The Budget-Wise Gardener, I envisioned it would be about starting your own plants from seed, recycling products, going to […]
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Cool Plants for Cold Climates: A Garden Designer’s Perspective by Brenda C. Adams (Snowy Owl Books/University of Alaska Press, 239 pp., $35) I have found a book geared for those living in a colder climate who have a tendency to let their heart govern their plant purchases! I’m sure you know what I mean because I often suffer from the same affliction: I […]
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As you’ve landscaped your yard and garden, have you kept birds and other critters in mind? That has been first and foremost on my mind over the years so I thought I would discuss how to garden for wildlife today. In this post, I’ll explain what we’ve done in our own landscape and how you can get your garden listed […]
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I have been really excited about today’s column because it is a profile of my sister, Anne Moore Knapp, and her beautiful garden in Gig Harbor, Wash. Here is a link to it in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Artist’s colorful landscape designed to age gracefully. To be honest, this was an unexpected column. Bill and I drove the nearly 300 miles […]
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I was in Chicago last week for a conference hosted by the Association for Garden Communicators. Chicago is an amazing place with so many green spaces and gardens to enjoy. One of the gardens we visited is the Chicago Botanic Garden. For my column today, I decided to write about their Buehler Enabling Garden because there were so many usable ideas […]
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Oh my! The topic for my column this week is one that so many gardeners ask about: dealing with deer. And who can blame them for being frustrated? Here’s a link to the column in today’s edition of The Spokesman-Review: Tricks to keep your garden from becoming a deer smorgasbord. Fortunately, I’ve got you covered in both my column AND […]
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Let me start out by saying I did not come up with this creative idea! I recently watched a video from Garden Answer and it totally inspired me. In the video, Laura makes an obelisk out of willow branches. And just like all of her other videos, she makes it look easy and VERY COOL. Take a look: Ever since […]
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My husband and I have lived on a 5-acre property for 27 years now. Even though we’ll want to downsize at some point, neither of us can picture ourselves on a tiny city lot! Well, Master Gardener colleague Kurt Madison and his wife Margot Casstevens have made the move from 10 acres to a city lot, and are adapting quite […]
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Last fall, I took a course on permaculture because I really wanted to gain a better understanding of what it’s all about. In the final class, we were introduced to Beth Mort, who presented a wonderful lecture on how she uses permaculture principles both in her own life and to help others design their landscapes. Beth owns Zinnia Designs for that […]
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I’ve recently returned from a wonderful 2-week trip to England. It’s been fun sharing some of the things I saw with you through Facebook over the past few days. But I wanted to write about and share photographs from something I repeatedly saw in some of the beautiful gardens I visited: the use of natural materials for plant supports and/or […]
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