Classy and Opinionated Lifestyle Mom Blog
If you’ve been following this blog over the past 9 years, you’ll already know that I love gardening. I have 6 flower gardens (gardening beds) outside and inside my home I grow a lot of indoor plants. I admit, I’m no expert in the field …
Many people would like to live in a natural environment, but are often discouraged by the sheer amount of work it takes just to maintain it so overgrowth doesn’t become a problem. Apart from living in an urbanized, concrete environment, is there another way? Well, …
Our 2017 gardening season is coming to a close. In another 2 1/2 weeks, I’ll start my Fall pruning, digging out my annuals and getting things ready for winter. I have to say, I’m really impressed with how all of my gardens turned out this past growing season.
Every year I work on putting in flowers that bloom during the spring, then flowers that bloom during the summer and for the past 2 years I’ve been working on my flowers & plants that bloom in the fall. My fall garden is finally coming along nicely.
In the front of our home we have 7 orange fall mums. When we put them in 2 years ago they looked horrible…like they were going to croak and not make it. However, I babied them for the past 2 years with good fertilizer and with Miracle-Gro and this year…those scraggly fall mums turned into huge MUM bushes!
Back in June we planted a lot of Begonias (annuals) to add color around most of our green garden plants. We had a few Begonias leftover, so hubby planted a few around those mum bushes. They look beautiful too, but those mums did over-crowd them a little bit. Next year, we won’t be planting any annuals around the mums, now that we know they’ll turn into bushes when in full bloom.
One of my husband’s favorites are these pointy & spiky flowers that he calls “fire crackers” and you can see a few of those above. We have them in red, orange and mustard yellow colors. They come back every year and get bigger & better. Matter of fact, this year we noticed that they had babies! So, I’m pretty happy that they’re reproducing and hopefully next year we’ll have even more.
As you can imagine, things are pretty colorful around here and I’m trying to enjoy it as long as I can. Once late Fall and Winter set’s in…well, everything will turn brown out there and I’m not looking forward to that!
For the past few weeks I’ve been having an issue with fruit flies. Every year when I’m busy harvesting fruits and veggies from our garden…the fruit flies appear. This year, those buggers are worst than ever and driving me nuts! Seriously, I can’t stand fruit …
I love gardening and that includes growing my own indoor plants. Most of my weekly gardening features the past few months dealt with outdoor ideas, tips and information. My feature this week deals with putting together your own little indoor air plant terrarium! What’s really …
The Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens is located in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania and is one of the prettiest botanical gardens in the entire world. It’s a place of natural beauty that’s educational and fun to visit. Lucky for all of us, they’re open year-round to visitors.
When planning a visit to Phipps, you’ll want to allow at least 3 hours in your schedule. This will give you enough time to visit all of the beautiful gardens and exhibits. Admission fees vary from $11.95 for children to $17.95 per adult, with children under the age of 2 for Free. Make sure you wear comfortable shoes (you’ll be doing a lot of walking) and dress appropriately for the season.
As you walk through all of the different theme’d gardens you’ll learn a lot of information about the flowers, plants, trees and shrubs that are there. I highly suggest that you take the time to read the information plaques, take photographs and even notes if you want to remember it all. They have some beautiful specimens from all around the world.
They do have some rules and guidelines in place, so make sure you read about them when you enter the facility. A few of them include: no picking the flowers, stay on the walking paths, don’t walk through exhibits, no food/beverages while touring the gardens and so forth. You can find a list of them on their website too.
The fragrances throughout the gardens are incredible! Yes, you smell the flowers in all of their glory, but I didn’t find any of it to be over-powering at all. I wanted to mention this just in case any of you are sensitive to fragrances. If I could “bottle” some of those fragrances and bring them back home with me, I surely would!
The flower gardens are stunning and I mean STUNNING! I saw flowers that I never knew existed and in colors that I never even imagined. I love how they have theme’d gardens which were really cool to see. It was really interesting to see trees, plants, shrubs and flowers all mixed together. You will see a lot of greenery and then WHAM….up pops some incredible colors!
After we toured the botanical gardens, we grabbed a bite to eat in their on-site cafe and then headed into their gift shop to pick up some souvenirs & gifts for my grandchildren. We had a fantastic time and we plan on visiting again next year and bringing along the kids. If you’re ever in the Pittsburgh area, I highly recommend a visit to Phipps Conservatory and Botanical Gardens!
The Pickleweed is classified as a succulent and can be found in North America, South Asia, South Africa and in Europe. It’s a plant that grows in salt marshes, along beaches & coastal areas and around salt lakes. They’re herbs which means they can be …
How many of you have indoor house plants? For myself personally, I have 15 in total and love having them in my home. Having a nice selection of indoor plants helps to filter the air and at the same time they add beauty to your …