I am of half Irish descent, so St. Patrick’s Day has always been my favorite holiday of the year. Every family member on that side of my family has their own yearly traditions, but we all always have a traditional Irish dinner every year. A couple of my traditions include making Irish soda bread &…
Continue reading ➞ Winter Sowing Bells of Ireland Flowers for St. Patrick’s Day
Winter is almost over & spring is almost here. Our weather is generally unpredictable during this time of year with warm & sunny days backing right up to chilly & windy days. I am itching to do some planting outdoors, but our average last frost date isn’t until mid-May. I do have an indoor grow…
Continue reading ➞ Super Simple Winter Sowing with Milk Jugs Tutorial
It has finally started to warm up here after weeks upon weeks of frigid temps & over 30 inches of snow. We have been enjoying a few 40+ degree days here, which of course just serves to get me itching to garden it up as soon as possible. I’m in gardening zone 5b, so planting…
Continue reading ➞ Gardening Adventures: Seed-Starting Planning
First thing’s first, I tend to avoid buying perennial plants that stay small since I feel like the bigger the plant, the more value I get out of my money. I prefer perennials that get at least 5 feet tall & I have a hard time even looking at small variations. Because of that, I…
A year ago, a forgotten bundle of dried celosia flowers paved the way to the growing from seed journey that was 2020 for me. I was able to harvest a bunch of seeds from the flowers, all the while not being so sure that it would end up working out. I planted the seeds in…
Continue reading ➞ Adventures in Gardening: Harvesting Celosia Seeds
2020 has been a year alright. Just like everyone else, I had to change & adapt throughout this crazy year in many different facets of my life, gardening included. I had a few successes, a few failures, tried new gardening methods & new plants. This year’s gardening adventure was certainly a learning experience, more so…
Continue reading ➞ 2020 Year in Review: What did my Garden Grow?
Whew, it has been one eventful growing season over here! 2020 brought a lot of new gardening challenges, chief among them was my quest to grow from seed. As a general novice in this gardening field, I decided to dive right in this spring by starting a bunch of seeds indoors. Mainly because I was…
A few years ago I started to make my own fresh Christmas arrangements using items from my garden (check out my tutorials for Christmas wreaths, porch pots & garlands). It’s definitely a labor of love, but it is completely worth it once you see the finished project. Plus, you can’t beat that making your own…
Continue reading ➞ How to Dry Celosia Flowers for Holiday Arrangements
Hello, November! It’s the month when gardeners that live in places with cold winters scramble to get the last of their gardening chores complete & their gardens buttoned up for the season. I am no exception & have been rushing to finish my fall gardening chores. I ordered iris bulbs & seed garlic in early…
Continue reading ➞ Fall Gardening Chores: Planting Iris Bulbs & More Garlic
Shopping for tulips is one of my favorite fall gardening activities. There are just so many different varieties of tulips out there & I pretty much want them all. Planting tulip bulbs isn’t as much fun as window shopping for them though, especially if you have a lot of bulbs to plant (check out my…
The Plantiful Gardener 