I Love Plants.

The title of this post may be weird, but it's so true. I love plants and landscaping. I never really paid much attention to it until I worked one summer for my city planting and watering flowers. They are seriously real pretty, guys! And my mom is definitely a green thumb so I'm used to having boatloads of flowers around.

This summer we were determined to dedicate all our efforts to making our yard more pretty. Since we had to wait a bit for landscapers, I started by assembling a few pots/planters. These things have been my babies for the past few months and I check on them every day (it's not hard when you don't have many to look after!). I thought I'd share a few of our smaller outdoor "projects"..

This little sitting area is brought to you by Ace Hardware. The chairs were on sale and only like $15 a piece, and actually quite comfy. The petunias had already been planted in this cute little pot, so I couldn't pass it up. These sit on our front porch and get quite a bit of use. I don't think there was a single day I didn't sit in them for a solid 6 weeks straight.

This big square planter had been in the old shed, and I was pretty determined to put it to use (I like free). It requires machinery to lift/move, but for now it sits on the back "patio." The blooms pretty much all died after we got 7 inches of rain a few weeks ago (the planter had very poor drainage), but thankfully they are working their way back.

And onto more petunias. Andy and I found this cute little bicycle stand at the 3rd Sunday market and I about died when I saw the little umbrella. (There are similar items at Big R if you're in the market). Again, I just bought a basic pot with pre-planted flowers at Ace and it fit perfectly. These blooms are also flourishing quite nicely. This sits between the "patio" and deck (more on that in another post).

 There was another large round pot that had been sitting empty at one of the farms, so I had been planning to snag that one too. Late in the season, I went to Home Depot to look for something good to plant. I love dahlias, but they only had one plant left and it looked really sad. I bought it anyway. I got home and realized the plant was about half the size it needed to be, as I way under-estimated the size of the pot. Oh well. I planted it anyway.

It actually looks hideous in this picture. The plant has improved since I planted it, but it is definitely still sparse. The blooms it does have are beautiful! More dahlias, please.

 Flowers are such a cheap way to put a smile on my face.