Letters from the Garden

Cottage

A little lipstick on a laundry pig

I want a laundry room that looks like this: Contemporary Laundry Room design by San Francisco Interior Designer Artistic Designs for Living, Tineke Triggs Or this: Traditional Laundry Room design by Orange County Design-build Spinnaker Development Or this: Contemporary Laundry Room design by Grand Rapids Architect Visbeen Associates, Inc. But that is not the laundry room I have, and as ...

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Cottage

The project clock is ticking

It’s crunch time. It might not seems like it, but the clock is ticking. The holidays are over and the daily arrival of another seed catalog reminds me that it’s only four or five months until all waking, non-working, non-eating hours will be spent in the garden. And that means that any indoor projects that need doing better get done ...

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Cottage

Art at last!

We’ve been looking for a new sofa sort of off and on and a few months ago I walked into the place where we bought our last sofa and talked to the same designer who sold me the one we currently have. I told her exactly what I was looking for and she walked me around the showroom pointing out ...

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Cottage

Darling dots: How to recover a chair

I’m absolutely delighted to be bringing you this tutorial today. I have to say this is one of my favorite projects ever and  I couldn’t be more pleased with the results. This wasn’t even a project I had planned, but I fell in love with the fabric and after giving it some thought, I realized that jumping into my first ...

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Cottage

Everyone’s dirty little secret: the junk drawer

Busy, busy, busy. That’s the theme around here lately. The weather took at decided turn towards downright chilly over the past week reminding me of all the things that need to get finished outside before the snow flies. But you know how you can be flying along checking things off the to-do list and then everything comes to a screeching ...

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Cottage

Changing up the chairs + a chalk paint review

A prudent DIYer does some testing when they work with a new product before jumping right into the real deal. I bet that would be really boring to read about. So, as a favor to you, when I decided to use chalk paint to redo my kitchen chairs I jumped right in with both feet and in the process I ...

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DIY

A temporary, but pretty, tabletop

Here are a few things I’ve learned in the last week: 1. Living near a large, damn near freezing lake (seriously the water temperature off our house is 56 degrees today), has its benefits when it’s amazing hot outside (but it’s still plenty hot). 2. Detroit is not a good place to get stuck overnight whilst flying (in hindsight, I ...

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The Impatient Gardener blog was started in 2009 and its library of posts includes practical how-tos, plant guides, favorite garden gear, successes and failures and much more. If you’re looking for something specific, the search function at the top of the page can help.

Hi everyone! I just wanted to let you know that I worked with Garrett Wade, which has some very cool garden tools, on this post. I was compensated for my time and provided samples to try out. As always, my words and thoughts are genuine and mine alone. I took a look at the extended […]

My appreciation for shrubs grows deeper every year as I appreciate the low-maintenance aspects of them and new, improved shrubs of all shapes and sizes are released every year.  Hydrangeas are not unique. In fact they are so popular that even professional plants people will admit they get a little sick of them. But more […]

There’s something special going on at a little island smack dab at the meeting point of Lake Michigan and Lake Huron. I’ve never been to a place outside the tropics where a garden can be filled with every color and have it work like it does on Mackinac Island. The air there is clear, the […]

Four years ago when I planted comfrey, I went into it with my eyes wide open. I knew that because comfrey grows very deep roots (like 15 or more feet deep), and because it grows very easily from root cuttings, that once I planted it, odds are, it would be in that spot forever. So, […]

I’m writing this on Friday night because a Friday Finds never happened. I gardened after work until late—I’m determined to have every plant that’s in a pot in the ground by the end of the weekend—and waited for a big expected storm to come through to water it all. It’s amazing how efficient I am […]

It’s that glorious time of year when most people are settled into summer and a lot of folks are heading out for vacations. I love a good summer vacation, maybe even more than those blessed  jaunts to warmer places in the middle of winter (although those certainly do more for my mental health), but it’s […]

I waited a bit to show you what I did for containers at my house this year, partly because other gardening projects have been stealing attention, but also because all containers look a little better when they have chance to grow in just a bit. They are all now getting to the point where you […]

A quick note: This post is sponsored by 3-IN-ONE® Fast-Acting Penetrant, but you know I will always tell it like it is, so all words and opinions are entirely my own. Thanks for supporting the brands that support this blog. This time of year is full of big projects. Whipping the garden into shape, never-ending […]