Potting Up Geraniums

The cold weather has begun in typical hit and miss fashion here in the Boston

area.  I had glorious pink geraniums in a wire planter outdoors, and thought why

not take them inside and see if they will last.  I remember my mom doing this, and she

potted up her outdoor geraniums in a large blue and white ceramic planter.  

She was always one for putting plants in containers, where I was used to putting things

directly into the ground.  And when winter arrived....that was it 'til next year.

Last fall she and dad sold their home on Martha's Vineyard and 

many of the day to day items, like pots and garden things, 

got parceled off to the kids.  

( I love that at my age I can still be called a kid. *wink*)

I ended up with a pair of terra cotta and white ceramic planters so

 I decided to bring in my geraniums like I recall mom doing.  

They are full of blooms and look incredibly pretty.  

However they are also very summery looking, and don't exactly mix with the 

pumpkins and fall garland I have about the house.  

How long can I have them with Thanksgiving and Christmas coming up?

There were so many geraniums I had enough to put some in an old

vintage funeral basket.  I filled the bottoms with some pea stone as there is

no drainage, and I will try not to overwater.  They look so lovely, 

but with the holiday decor about to happen, its times like these 

that I think a green house or a conservatory would be ideal! 

 A modest sized one would be very nice indeed.  

I would be in heaven with something like this!

But I don't , and have no plans to create one.  Yet.

 If I could figure out a way to find an old one on Craigslist that has been disassembled 

and is looking for a new home, then maybe I could have a small conservatory...

In the mean time I have outdoor plants indoors, and I am trying to make them work.

I added little velvet pumpkins I made to this planter.  Pretty cute.

BUT.....

At first sign of lots of dropped leaves or yellowy brown stuff, these will have

to head out to the compost pile.  

Oh, and someone told me to cut my geraniums back to about a third of their growth.

That way they will come back fuller than ever.  

But they look full now and have tons of blooms~so can I wait to cutback?

Just enjoy for now, then toss?

Any of you gardeners have any input for me?

See how full they are?

Oh, yesterday I met a blogger pal and we went antiquing in Boston

at the Vintage Sowa Market.  

Guess what I found...a wonderful piece of french furniture!!! 

I will share all about that and the very fun time I had at

 this blogger meet up on my next post. 

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Tiny Topiary Garden Arbors and Interior Store Shots

 I like gardening and I love arbors and garden ornaments 

and all those kind of things~I have seen fairy gardens in blogland, 

but didn't realize there was a fairy garden industry out there~

 On Fathers Day I took Colin to visit his dad at a big Nursery

 in Wayland Mass, called Mahoneys. They had a section dedicated 

to fairy gardening! There were iron arbors and gazebos and

 tiny benches and chairs and wheelbarrows and garden tools~

all incredibly adorable and almost irresistible. 

 At the last auction I was lucky to get a heavy plaster planter 

that looks like a basket~once I saw the tiny fairy selection

 I decided to plant a fairy garden in the antique 

basket planter using Teeny Weenies.

 Teeny Weenies are the tiny plants like ferns and such that

 they sell to go with the fairy garden things.

Its really darling~this is it before I added the potting soil, 

but now it is outside all planted up with the wire arbor added in the middle.

 So that was really fun~thought I would share what I do on my day off...

 Strategically taking pics to avoid kitchen pileups~

you can add these arbors and gazebos to any planter for a fun touch.

 In the middle of the top row is a new coffeepot in 

my favorite purple transferware~I found it though

 a facebook connection of all places!! 

Someone asked me to like her shop...and when I went over,

 there was my reward!! Mar Bailey has a lot of things that 

I like in her shop~check out her link if you are interested!

 Look at how often they put gazebos and arbors

 in the paintings of the transferware~

its very romantic I think!

My teenie weenies all planted up~

and rare shots of my house these days...

 I do love topiaries for decorations~especially good fakes like this one!

 I took some of the teeny weenies and added them

 to the zinc conservatory I have in the store.

I hope they live!!

 Back to the ranch~ I took a pic of a faded delphinium...

it reached up into my opaline chandy and it looked so pretty I thought...

 I still love that wallpaper I found at Lowes...

I will be using some of it at the store in a desk soon.

 The Lilly table sold~didn't take long, you all were right!

 My brother Paul and his GF Deanna and her daughter Lilly 

came up from Texas for a visit~they come every summer and pop 

in to see us sisters in Boston and then head to Marthas Vineyard 

to live off the fat of the land at my parents~now THATS 

a summer vacation!! Deanna and Lilly said visiting my store 

was at the top of their list! Oh yeah baby! 

 Some interior shots~I was asked to send them to someone...

 Just don't feel like I have the touch for getting good shots lately in the store..

might have to call Betsy and borrow hers...she is on picmonkey making perfect!!

 Wings and pink chairs...

 These look a little overexposed...

Hey~tomorrow I am getting my sign!! 

I was supposed to get it today but the sign guy called me 

this morning and said he propped it up to take a pic to send to 

me and it fell off the counter onto the floor and got 

a huge scratch!! ARGH!! I feel like I have been waiting forever.

Well tomorrow I am getting another paint shipment,

and I should have the new Chalk Paint color Florence!

Until then~

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Garden house gets antique fencing

The small garden house I built sits on top of a small hill and overlooks my garden.

 It was getting overgrown with weeds so it was time for a little attention. 

This fantastic old iron fretwork came from a job on an old home

 Mr. Maison Decor was working at last week.

 I saw a pile of these on the ground

at the job site and asked if I could have them~and sure enough,

since it was destined for the trash, I got my treasure.

The other thing we got was a big pile of old bricks,

 the kind I like, the whitish pinkish looking bricks.

I made a little platform for the garden house to

 sit on to keep the weeds down inside.

I think the iron work was used on roof  lines as decorative edging, 

but I am not really sure.

 It makes a cute miniature fence for my little conservatory

 that I made out of old windows last year.

The sun was just coming up behind me as I took this picture, 

and you can see that the garden house sits above the lower lawn and garden area.

 This is a small grassy area we put in, 

and we plan to build the garden shed up here.

The shed will block that area that Mr. MD is fond of putting his things!

My other plan is to use this idea from a 

Better Homes and Garden book I had for the rose arbor.

 It will be a gateway of sorts to the new shed.

I will join the two pillars with this arched piece.

The white climbing rose is in the ground now, 

and hopefully will climb up the pillars.

We will be putting in cement bases for the pillars to stand on.

The garden shed will be in the back behind the little garden house.

 We won't have to look at 4x4's and things like that anymore.

 Pink and purple flowers are what I prefer to plant in the garden.

The last of my spring pansies.

"Antique"~I had to buy this color!

Roses and catmint mingle together.

Rustic and ornate, makes for one pretty garden spot.

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A petite garden conservatory made out of old windows

The story ends this way:

Here is the beginning....
My petite garden conservatory..how it came to be:

It started with this image.
Wow...a bunch of old windows put together to make a garden solarium!
That went right into my brain file..the one where I start hatching a dream plan.
 I figured the next time I saw some old windows being thrown out on the side of the road,
 I was going to claim them. Sure enough, it happened!
There was a pile of nice small sized windows that could fit in my mini-cooper this week!
 I brought them home and asked my husband to unload.
He smiled a funny smile and gave me a kiss...
he thinks I am kooky sometimes...quirky, kooky and lovable. ;-)

Thrilled with my find, but I needed to do some more research online and in magazines.

This little greenhouse is on a stand. That's a neat idea from Country Gardens Magazine Summer '08.

 In my mind I secretly want one of these attached to the house...swoon.

I like the scrolled iron at the top here.

Looks like there is a wooden base with legs 
( maybe it's a table base) 

and then the windows are put together on top of that. Neat.

This is cute, but maybe a tad too small?  
Maybe I could make a village....

I saw an idea on a real model that I might use for my plan
..a stone base.

Maybe I should build a mortared stone base and stick the greenhouse on top like above? 

We have lots of rocks in our yard...wanna see?

 

Yes, this really is my back yard..my husband likes to collect granite blocks.  

I like to collect old windows. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

But lets get  back to my little miniature conservatory project. 

I wasn't sure how to put them together, and as I often do, 

no plan in my mind, I grabbed my tote bag of tools.

I have a lot of drapery hardware and I decided I would 

just start attaching them to each other with angle irons. 

 I started to build a basic box with the larger of the two sizes I had.

I wasn't going to get fussy about this and started

screwing without benefit of a level. Sorry Dad.

The last window had to be coaxed a bit before I put the angle iron and screw to it.

The windows leaning against the chair are going to be the roof!

Now the basic window box shape is built. 
You can see the old spring system in the sides.

It's pretty solid! 

An iron hanging planter and bracket from TJMaxx

Wondering what I could use for a fancy iron scroll for the top like the model picture I loved.
 It hit me: I had that new iron planter on a scrolled iron wall mount bracket!!! 
Yippee.It was a perfect fit.
 As my husband says, "better lucky than good". 

 Now I have the roof finial mounted with screws. 

I am going to turn this into a hanging planter conservatory. 

I will leave open the ends for ventilation and mount 

a hook inside that I can suspend a hanging plant. 

Otherwise anything in here  in the summer is going to cook.

I attached a piece of aluminum gutter strapping by snaking it through the joint in the roof and anchored it to the top. This was going to be the planter hook. I tested it out.
I hung a pink geranium and blue lobelia planter from the hook and it happened. 

I was just captivated!  I fell in love in my yard.....

Couldn't stop staring....
I'm getting there! But it really need some more finish work.

I made a pattern of the peak of the house
 and traced it onto a shingle and then cut it out with a jigsaw.

I found some lead flashing and I cut it to fit the peak, with my kitchen scissors.

 I tacked it all in place with nails.

Then I secured the scrolled bracket to give it the frenchy flair!

I covered the exposed spring system with a primed 1x3. 
I notched out one side so it would fit better.

I used a solid white stain by Cabot
 to paint anything that wasn't white. 
I didn't want a completely fresh white paint job. 
 I wanted to leave the areas with the age and patina of time.

I added an old skeleton key.

An iron & glass vessel is going to serve as a petite lantern.
 A zinc number 1 plate to say this is the first one I ever made.

Hubby and son put a slab of granite in place for 
my petite garden house. 
It's handy having an excavator and operator around the house!

Set on it's new foundation, it is a proud little structure.

I'll plant foxgloves and bleeding hearts around it.

I know I will get a lot of pleasure looking at it in my garden.
I will gaze upon it from my office window.

Rainy days and sunny days it will bring a  smile, 

snow on the roof with a little bird feeder inside...
candles inside for an evening garden party...

I see it twinkling in my garden all year round.

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