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How to Take Care of Your Lawn – pH Testing, Aeration & Overseeding
If you have cool season grass (e.g., fescue, ryegrass, bluegrass, etc.), now is the time that you really need to take those extra measures to ensure a beautiful lawn. And when I say extra measures, I mean those things beyond what most of us think of as the…
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How to Dry Hydrangeas…and Now’s a Great Time for Those Late Bloomers!
Alright…it’s confession time. I found out how to dry hydrangeas by accident. I wasn’t trying to create a dried flower arrangement that would grace our home for years to come when I forgot to water it…but that’s what happened. In fact, quite a few of our dried hydrangeas…
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[VIDEO] Introducing…Our Backyard Chickens!
If you’ve been on RYGblog more than once you’ve probably gathered that we are the proud owners of a small flock of backyard chickens …7 of them. And although we do love them because of the eggs they give us every day, we also love them because we consider…
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Top 10 Landscape Design Tips (Part 2 of 2)
Last week I laid out the first five of my Top 10 Landscape Design Tips … and today I’ll finish up with the other five. As I concluded last time, if you want more details on a specific point, let me know and I’ll focus a future post on…
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Rebirth: Our 1960s Ranch House Renovation | Transforming the Front Elevation
Curious about our 1960s ranch house renovation? Well we’ve found that our fellow ground redeemers are … because you’ve asked. We also realized that most of our posts featuring what we’ve done with our outdoor spaces have focused on our back yard … where there’s little evidence of…
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Get Outside & Play! (The Importance of Outdoor Play)
Odds are, if you’ve read even just a few of our posts you’ve gleaned that one of the reasons Britt and I are doing this whole redeem your ground thing is out of our desire to get kids outside to play more…ours, yours, whomevers! A lot of that…
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Tips for Watering Your Lawn
I’m going to take a break from my deeper WHY redeem your ground posts to give you some helpful information on HOW you can redeem your ground. And I mean quite literally…how to best water your lawn. Given that it’s already getting into the mid-80s here, it’s something a…
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The Hanging Daybed – a Perfect Spot to Read or Snooze
So Britt has started this series of posts on redeeming your ground by reading outside; however, as she suggested last week…I’m not much of a reader. I know I should be for so many reasons, but I’m just not. Sorry. That said, I redeem my ground in different…
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The Basics of Amending Your Soil
Last week I posted on the different types of soil…and how clay-heavy soils and sand-heavy soils provide less than ideal growing conditions for your plants. And unfortunately most of us are dealing with one end of that soil spectrum or the other…which requires us to do more than…
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Inspiring Gardens
Sometimes I just want to be inspired by what I see…and not be distracted by someone blathering on about some deep thought or story. So in an attempt to not distract you, I’ll simply include a number of images of gardens that have inspired me. But because I can’t…
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“Slow Down” … by Nichole Nordeman
A dear friend shared this song with me recently and I wanted to share it with you. Although I’m certain that the target audience is moms, I think any parent…mom or dad…or anyone really, could get something out of it (i.e., I’m not turning in my “man card”…
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Our Chicken Coop Design – Front Elevation (Part 2 of 3)
Okay, I lied. I had hoped to finish up writing on our chicken coop design with this post, but I ran out of time and markers…seriously – my gray marker ran out. So today I’m going to focus on the front elevation and next week I’ll wrap it…
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Deer-Resistant Plants & Deer-Deterring Tips
Awww … isn’t Bambi cute!?! Well … that is until he and the rest of his family have laid waste to your garden! That’s not so cute! If your yard seems to be a frequent stop along the Deer Garden Tour, you’re in luck … well, relatively speaking.…
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Why, Yes…Our Backyard Chickens Do Have Names
I shouldn’t find it funny, really…that one of the most common questions people ask about our chickens is “Do they have names?”. Although having chickens as pets is trendy in some circles, it’s still not the norm…so given that most peoples’ context for chickens is what they’re having…
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Easy & Oh-So-Tasty Tomato Pie Recipe
“There are two things in life that money can’t buy…it’s true love and homegrown tomatoes”…that’s according to a song my Aunt KK used to quote. And I think there’s some real truth to that! Money couldn’t…and didn’t buy the true love I found in my Resident…
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How to Make a Scarecrow
The one downside to having a veggie garden is…the critters that come and feast on the vegetables without an invitation! It’s so frustrating going out to find a squirrel dining on the very nice, large, green tomato we’ve been waiting to ripen and dreaming about eating ourselves. And they never say “thank…
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5 Must See Videos That Encourage Outdoor Play
On the heels of last week’s post about designing natural play spaces, I thought I’d follow up with 5 videos that I think, in one way or another, will encourage you to spend more time outside with your kids. Why? Well…because outdoor play is really, really important. Read on…
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Tasty & Very Easy Bread and Butter Pickle Recipe
If your veggie garden is anything like mine right now, it looks more like a scene from Little Shop of Horrors than the tidy gardens that you see in magazines. And that’s largely because my cucumbers are growing out of control. I really don’t mind though…because we love…
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Easy Mustard Pickle Recipe…Try It, You’ll Like It!
Cucumbers have always been a staple in our family vegetable garden. I love when Britt uses them in salads of any sort…and when the girls have fancy tea parties with their Mimi, they love making simple cucumber tea sandwiches. And whether we have a surplus of cukes or not, I…
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Hydrangea – Quick Reference Guide
Based on the positive feedback I received from some of my fellow ground redeemers, instead of burying the Quick Reference Guide to Common Landscape Hydrangeas at the end of the post where some folks might miss it…I’m giving it a post all to itself. So if you did miss it and…
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Natural Bug Spray Recipe
It’s the end of August.and I am so fed up with battling mosquitoes. I know they are God’s creation and all…and I know that they have a great purpose in our ecosystem, but they drive. me. crazy!!!!! They steal so much joy out of an otherwise lovely day! …
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5 Must-Have Shrubs with White Flowers…to Extend the Life of Your Garden
It’s during these long, hot dog days of summer that I’m thankful to still have some shrubs whose flowers are still doing their thing. Most of the flowers from my other shrubs have come and gone, my fescue has definitely seen a better day, and my potted…
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Back Yard Triage: 5 Landscape Design Tips to Bring Life to Your Outdoor Spaces
I know…with these hot and humid days we’re still having, you probably don’t want to be outside in your yard for very long. But now is actually the perfect time to think about your yard, because in the fall…which is just around the corner…it will be the perfect time…
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My Favorite Late Blooming Hydrangeas
I don’t know…maybe I love late blooming hydrangeas so much because I was a late bloomer myself. But hopefully I’ve gotten past my pre-pubescent challenges by now…and it has much more to do with the fact that while most of my yard’s other bloomin’ shrubs have seen a much…
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Planting Your Fall Vegetable Garden…Get On It!
Planting my fall vegetable garden always sneaks up on me…and this year is no different. So in the next couple of days I’m going to try to jump out from behind the eight-ball…clear-out my very spent summer flowers & veggies…finally…and get my fall veggies in the ground. And…
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Stamping with Okra…Yes, Okra!
Here’s a little craftiness for you crafty gardeners…stamping with okra! Yes…okra! When you cut off the head of the okra there is such a charming and unique shape to be found inside the rough, elongated exterior that makes for an adorable stamp. So if your garden is producing way…
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