Sunday Bits of Inspo #80

themarigoldgc
May 26, 2024
5 min read

We've had a very rainy and grey week but, luckily enough had a few hours of sunshine here and there. In between showers, I was able to plant up most of my beds and pots. 'They' say that summery weather is arriving so that sunshine will make those seeds pop up in no time.

The guys got the new fence up in just a couple of days, too. It went lickety split. Hubby and the neighbour took down the old fence and built the new one in 3 days (also in between rain showers)! All that remains is to build a gate of some kind. I wanted something pretty and fancy but it looks like plain jane is what I am getting ; ) It has to be fairly sturdy as Berkely, the Saint Bernard, likes to jump up and say hello (aka scare the bejeebers out of people).

This was my bag of seed potatoes. They were sprouting in the bag as I waited for a good day to get them planted up. If yours look like mine did, do not break off those sprouts. Instead, plant them a bit deeper to cover most all of the shoot, or place them a bit sideways in the hole/trench. Removing them takes too much energy away from the seed potato.

Cutting seed potatoes in half, leave them out to scab over.

I rarely ever cut my spuds in half, or pieces (just not something I do) but as I have room for 5 rows of 4 spuds in my beds, I needed 20 seed potatoes. In a perfect world, I would leave the cut ones overnight to scab over to prevent disease from setting in, but there was no time as I was already in planting mode. I decided that they'd get an hour in the sun while I raked out the bed and made the trenches. One makes do and hopes for the best.

That is kind of how my week went... I made do and now am hoping for the best, hah!

Here are this week's Gardening Inspo Bits...

I am looking forward to setting up my birdbath with one of these cute solar fountains. They are solar powered so can be placed in any sunny spot in the yard. I have even seen them placed in large cylindrical glass vases in a planter pot. The fountain comes with several different spray nozzles (does not have to be this really tall spray, this was just for fun with the dogs). I'd like to add that these fountains are Hemingway approved. You can also get one with arms that keep the fountain centered in your birdbath, instead of floating around. I like the spray patterns on this one.

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Wood versus metal raised beds - read the pros and cons. I've mentioned this before, but after buying that green bed for the greenhouse, I wish we had gone with metal in the yard, too, rather than wood. Check out how awesome the ones in the above picture look.

This podcast about home gardeners adapting to climate change.

This long wooden deck set up with seating area and eating area. Love the casual, comfortable look... and especially like how the planting beside the deck.

These ideas to steal from The Chelsea Flower Show. Also this article with 8 Landscape Trends from The Chelsea Flower Show.

Renee's Garden Seeds is having their end of season sale. Everything is 40% off, prefect time to pick up your favourites for next year!

Homey Inspo Bits

Pickled Peppers by the jar (small batch recipe). I love small batch recipes that you can use as you harvest a bit of stuff at a time from the garden.

How to deep clean your front loader washing machine. The best advice in this article was the bit about using powder soap! I'm off to the shop to pick up some Tide, lol.

I decided to clean my washer after reading this article but instead using my Mint Cleaning Products to see how they do. I sprayed down the glass door, the front of the machine, rubber door seal, soap dispenser, and the crevice between the seal and the machine with the multi-purpose spray.

I then used the microfibre cloth to wipe everything down, and I gotta say, everything is sparkling clean! Even that yucky little crevice under the rubber seal is clean! I used a wee bit of the scrubbing powder on the bottom of the door to get rid of the hard water stains. They were gone in seconds. Easy peasy.

When I pulled out the filter at the bottom of the machine, it was covered in dog hair and super smelly. I cleaned that with the multi-purpose spray, too, so now the entire machine both smells and looks clean. I sure wish they had a machine cleaning powder so I could run a cycle with it. I wonder if the deodorizer would work? I will find out from the Mint ladies!

Bits of Recipe Inspo

Tomatoes and cheese melted in the oven. — Recipe from Martha Stewart.

Bowls are my most favourite thing right now... Mediterranean Quinoa Bowl and Rainbow Veggie Bowl.

This roasted tomato and cheese spread is all the rave! My daughter makes it with feta cheese instead and uses it as a pasta sauce. See that recipe at this TikTok link.

These two yummy pink lemonade recipes, make them leaded or unleaded. Lemonade has kind of become my go to since I found out that the wine was making my inflammation worse. As I am not a fan of pop or other sweet beverages, am always on the lookout for a good lemonade... this one uses berries of any kind, this rhubarb ginger lemonade is on Facebook (not on his recipe blog yet)

And to finish... this lovely breakfast grazing board! I love this idea, reminds me very much of weekends in Sweden with my fellow nursing school student, Juanita, or buffet style breakfasts at most all hotels in Europe. What a nice way to start your weekend, or special day, or even every day.