Holiday decorating is a slow process at my house. I’m so amazed by all the holiday home tours on the Internet … I haven’t even really thought much about the inside. I love doing my outdoor containers though. I leave them decorated (sans lights) almost all winter because I love looking at them. I take no credit for the design ...
This might look like a picture of some pretty double welt, but it’s really a picture of what the almost end of a project looks like. I’m this close to finishing up the chairs that have been in my house for about two years and I’m so excited to show you them. There’s been a lot of hemming and hawing ...
Some gardeners are much better than I am about planting late-season crops. A friend on Facebook just posted a beautiful haul of beets the other day. I am just burned out by the end of the summer and I consider it a success if I can just stay on top of harvesting and general maintenance. Planting, and more importantly, nursing ...
Where do you stand on mailing things? Have you gone entirely digital or do you still fall back on mailing a good old fashioned note? I’m a big fan of more traditional methods. If I get an invitation to something in the mail, I know they really want me there and that I wasn’t just included because I was in ...
I was born and raised in Wisconsin, and other than a brief stint down under, I have lived in this state for my entire life. If you’re not familiar Wisconsin, you probably associate the state with three things: cheese, the Green Bay Packers and cold weather. It’s no coincidence that these are the first things that come to mind when ...
If you’re coming to the blog today from Hooked on Houses, welcome! I’m so happy you found me and thank you so much to Julia for featuring our bathroom addition. A couple years ago we ripped the top off half of our house and stuck it back on higher. We created tons of extra space without adding a single square ...
I realized a funny thing while taking pictures of this week’s Garden Appreciation Society bouquet: I enjoy the bouquets that are harder to come by more than the ones that I made when the garden was in full flush. There’s something about the challenge that makes me appreciate that bouquet even more. Or maybe it’s just that it forces me ...
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.
Composting purists would not at all approve of the way I compost, but frequent readers of this blog know I appreciate the K.I.S.S. principle (even though that acronym reminds me of a bad kitty poster in my third-grade classroom). This means that I don’t overthink composting, and generally just throw the stuff in the bin, […]
Bet you’re surprised to be seeing a post here on Sunday. It might, indeed, be a first. But in addition to being a Sunday, it is also May 1 and I happen to have a fantastic guest here today. You might even say he’s a rock star. Michael Nolan is the co-author of a book […]
The rain continues here, making southeastern Wisconsin just one of many places with totally depressing weather this week. At least we’re not experiencing the storms and flooding that so many other areas are.Anyway, it’s putting a major damper on my ability to take some pictures of what is happening in the yard, so I thought […]
You know you have issues when you set out to just take the dogs to the beach for a walk and you end up 45 minutes later driving your lawn mower down the beach. But that’s exactly what happened on Sunday. This was the view from the lawn mower on Sunday. It’s way too early […]
Far be it for me to tell the producers of a successful PBS show how to do their jobs, but I think the people who make “P. Allen Smith’s Garden Home” are missing out on a golden opportunity. Turns out the guy is funny. Really funny. And trust me, after watching almost every episode of […]
Pruning is one of the most difficult thing for some gardeners to do. I think deep down inside we know it’s a good thing for our plants, but it’s still hard to cut away growth that we’ve worked so hard for. Last year I pruned my Hydrangea ‘Limelight’ down to about 4 feet tall for […]
Four gorgeous flowers on this ‘Red Peacock’ amaryllis. Zoom out a little and you see the bulb did this all on her own. It’s still in the paper bag it came in! For several years I’ve purchased amaryllis bulbs from the yahoo plant co-op I’m a member of, potted them up and given them away […]
I’m very excited to share a little Q&A session with talented garden designer Jack Barnwell. I found out who Jack was last summer after spending years admiring one of his designs without knowing who was behind it. I make it a point to visit the garden at the Hotel Iroquois on the island every year […]
First of all, sorry for the radio silence last week. Deadlines at my real job got crazy and when I’m writing fast and furiously for work, it’s so hard to come home and put together a couple sentences for the blog. The good news is that I have some exciting posts planned for this week, […]
Look what finally gets to see the light of day. This little boxwood (‘Green velvet’ I think) is such a trooper. When I planted it near the corner of the garden I never realized that it would be buried by snow plowed from the driveway every winter, but it is. How it manages to retain […]
I’m so excited and honored to have my little yellow lamp redo featured on one of my favorite blogs, Better After, today. If you’ve not checked out Better After before, it’s so worth it. You wouldn’t believe the inspirational stuff that people come up with. I’m honored to be in such good company.
If you follow The Impatient Gardener on Facebook or Twitter, you know that Mr. Much More Patient and I are having a, um, discussion about the future of the back yard. For years, he’s been bugging me to create a real path out to the detached garage so we don’t have to walk over the […]
You wanna garden? Oh yeah, I know you do. But ya know what? Working in your beds right now may be the worst thing you could do for your garden. Check out why on my guest post over at The Design Confidential.
You all know I have kind of a thing for Tim Wood, right? I certainly mention him enough here. Well, that’s not entirely true, even though he seems to be a very nice, intelligent and sort of funny guy. I really have a thing for his hydrangeas. (Honestly, Tim, I’m not stalking you … just […]
