Fear This Gardener

Lovely but overgrown

When we first found this house on 49th street, back in April of 2011, it had a bleak looking overgrown tangle of muddy weeds in front. As we visited the house and the previous owner, I watched as the flowers and plants grew and grew, flowering here and there. There were peonies in the late spring, lavender in June and a huge bright pink Easter Lilly in late June. I imagined myself keeping all of these flowering plants, rearranging them and keeping tabs on them.. Learning as much as I could about when things were in bloom and what to trim. 

Vivid Lilies

Fast forward one year and we have a mess of weeds, ground cover that is competing for attention, trees that are falling over with the weight of ill-proportioned branches. It's a nightmare for anyone who wants a simple, organized garden that doesn't require a ton of watering. (I personally feel watering is as bad as taking a too-long shower. Wasteful and decadent, only to be done on hideously hot days in July.)

One single solitary bloom

As I mentally moved all these plants in my planning last week while on vacation (aka working, but at home), I sketched tall plants (waaayyy to many of them) to the back, ground cover to the front and a nice organic flow to the patches of things that I massaged around the yard. After 4 days of digging rooted, overgrown hostas and awful naught ivy, I gave in.

 

 

I am going to remove it and start over. I feel awful.

 

It's a mess

I have grown to love the little blips of blooms that come and go, but they are killing each other! There isn't enough of anything to make sense design-wise and I'm sure the neighbors think I'm crazy for trying to tame the crazy "Victorian" mess.   Were the Victorians insane?

The Charlie Bucket Kitchen

Our basement kitchen has acquired a name and I'm not entirely sure it's a good one. 

While working on the kitchen shelves a few weeks ago, Trent's friend (who will remain nameless for his safety) came over and swiftly determined our temporary kitchen was a little sad.  He called it our Charlie Bucket Kitchen in reference to Willy Wonka's main character Charlie who lives in squalor only to find glorious fortune in the Wonka Chocolate Factory. 

The name stuck.

I'm finding that the more we embrace the Charlie Bucket-ness, the more fun we can have.  It no longer has to be a work of art; this space where we will cook for the period of time while we work on the real kitchen.  The shelves can be a little Wonky and the floor will probably always be dirty and that's OK. 

Basement kitchens were even featured in this month's This Old House Magazine with a story about a couple who are renovating their kitchen with no help from the outside world. They have spent the year cooking out of their basement.  They included a recipe for Toaster Over Beef Wellington, which is right up our alley!

So.  Here it is.  The Charlie Bucket Kitchen. 

Feeling the political energy today

THE toaster oven

It looks better in color, not quite so basement-y

Special spice rack

Fancy dried goods shelves

Blogging is hard

This little foray into the blogosphere was fun when we weren't in the middle of a rehab and a move...now it's just hard. 

Trent and I spend most weeknights planning what we will do on the weekends to complete a project.  Currently, there are several:

Most important is the second floor bathroom.
This is the highly coveted shower pan.  It's really heavy and pretty fancy.  It's big too, takes up most of the room!

What's going on around that pan is the plumbing (new lines for all pipes, made of a completely BPA free material), and new mold resistant wall boards over the blow-in foam insulation.  There's also a built in shower shelf there on the left.   I have zero technical terms right now, but if anyone is interested, I will check and get back to you.

Nice window, huh?  It will be a transom eventually.

When we're not working, we are trying to eek out a little neighborhood fun.  This weekend was the annual WHNA All Neighborhood Rummage Sale.  We set up a lemonade stand with made from scratch lemonade in our Charlie Bucket Basement Kitchen.  (see Willy Wonka for reference)  Nice, rustic fun!

Sophia's new friend Payton selling her heart out

Happy as a Clam with no teeth