10 Tips for Beginning Gardeners

Martha Loveless of Loveless Real Estate Services
The Best Carmichael Realtor | Keller Williams Realty 916-.270.7081
Homes for Sale in Carmichael / What’s Your Carmichael Home Worth?

The rewards of gardening are great — fresh air, exercise, beauty and relaxation, to name a few. But designing and planting your very first garden can feel like an overwhelming task. Luckily, gardens are surprisingly forgiving creations, and the best way to learn is by simply diving in. Here are 10 tips to help get a new garden off on the right foot. And if you don’t think you have enough room for a garden, click here! I’ll prove to you that even the tiniest homes have space for a garden

1. Get to know your site. Take your time to get familiar with your property before beginning a new garden. Here are a few things you may like to try while you’re getting to know your landscape:

• Take a leisurely stroll around your property with a notebook and make a rough sketch of the existing planting areas.
• Add notes to your garden “map” about which areas get the most sun and which are shaded.
• A simple soil test from your local garden center will tell you whether your soil is well-balanced in nutrients and pH.
• If you’re thinking of growing edibles (vegetables, fruit or herbs), it’s a good idea to have your soil tested for lead. Most at-home kits aren’t reliable indicators of lead in the soil, but you can send your soil samples to the Lead Safe America Foundation for a free lead test. If you find that your soil has an unsafe level of lead, you can still grow edibles in raised beds or pots with new soil.
• List which existing plants and features (such as fences or paths) you’d like to keep and which need to be replaced or removed.
• Spend time just hanging out in your garden. Let yourself daydream and see if any creative ideas present themselves.

2. Determine your style and goals. Gather a few images that inspire you and look for a theme. Are you drawn to lush flower-filled gardens or more crisply defined modern outdoor spaces? It helps to pair a few words with the pictures you’ve chosen, so try to come up with something that evokes the sort of garden you want, even if it’s not an “official” style term.

For instance, maybe you’ll decide your style is Industrial Zen or Playful Modern or Simplified Cottage. While you’re figuring this out, it helps to keep a photo of the exterior of your home at hand — whatever style you choose should be able to work well with the architectural style of your home as well as your personal preferences.

Once you’ve named your style, take a moment to jot down the activities and features you imagine enjoying in your landscape. If you have children, you may need a lot of open space for running around. Or perhaps you dream of relaxing in the middle of a big wildflower meadow — whatever it is, write it down.

5. Pick the right tools for the job (without going overboard). Having the proper tools makes garden chores more pleasant — but don’t think you need to buy out the store on day one. Just a few tools and supplies should keep your garden running smoothly. The basics include:

• Gardening gloves. Choose a pair that feels comfortable and protects against thorns.
• Shovel. This is essential for preparing sizable garden beds and for digging holes for trees, shrubs and large plants. A shovel with a pointed tip is more versatile than a flat spade.
• Trowel and weeding tool (or a Japanese gardener’s knife). Use these tools to dig holes for planting and pull weeds out at the root.
• Long garden hose and spray nozzle. Select a hose long enough to comfortably reach each of the main areas of your garden.
• Hand pruner. Sharp clippers can trim branches and cut back woody plants like rosemary.
• Metal rake. Use this to spread mulch and prepare beds for planting.
• Leaf rake. Use a flexible plastic or bamboo rake to gather leaves.

6. Mix up perennials and annuals. A common newbie mistake is to grab too many plants from the “annuals” section at the nursery, making for a garden that dies back within a single year. For longevity and color, go for a mix of perennials (plants that come back year after year) and annuals (plants that bloom and die within a single season).

7. Repeat, repeat, repeat. One great way to give your garden a professionally designed look (with little effort) is to repeat the same plants and hardscaping materials in different places throughout the landscape. Avoid picking one plant of each type, as this tends to appear jumbled — even in a wild English cottage-style garden, plants look best when repeated or planted in clusters. The same goes for other materials: Choose just a few hardscaping materials for paths, pots, planters and outdoor furniture, and repeat, repeat, repeat.

8. Combine seeds and starts for an affordable mix. Starting an entire garden from seed can save money, but it can also be incredibly frustrating. Purchasing only started plants is not only expensive, but it also may limit your choice of what to grow. The best option is usually a combination of the two: Pick up some started seedlings at your local nursery and start some of your own from seed. Good plants to start from seed yourself include lettuce, radishes, beans, sunflowers, marigolds, cosmos and zinnias.

9. Grow what you like. This sounds utterly simple, but it’s something even the most experienced gardeners sometimes seem to forget. Why grow squash if it’s not really your favorite? Over the years, we’ve stopped bothering to grow beans and zucchini, instead devoting extra garden space to family favorites like snap peas, radishes, Tuscan kale and mini pumpkins for Halloween.

10. Further your garden education. Seeking out local workshops is a wonderful way to learn more about gardening and connect with other gardeners in your community. Check plant nurseries, community gardens and botanical gardens in your area for free or low-cost workshops on a wide range of topics like container gardening, using native plants, attracting pollinators, creating a water-wise garden and composting.

Gardening is a lifelong learning experience, and even the most seasoned gardeners are learning all the time — so don’t beat yourself up if it seems that there’s too much to know. Just begin somewhere and take it one season at a time. The wonderful thing about gardening is that there’s usually room for do-overs.

Martha Loveless
916.270.7081
The Best Carmichael Realtor
www.LoveSacMetroHomes.com

*information provide by www.Houzz.com*

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No Space for a Garden? Guess Again!

Martha Loveless of Loveless Real Estate Services
The Best Carmichael Realtor | Keller Williams Realty 916-.270.7081
Homes for Sale in Carmichael / What’s Your Carmichael Home Worth?

You don’t need a huge yard to create a garden. See how to tuck in greenery on a patio, balcony or windowsill.

Rethink the hanging basket. Much favored by urban gardeners for dangling off lampposts, hanging baskets exist in other, cooler guises too. Great for exploiting unused wall space in a small balcony area, a hanging basket can be any shape or size, provided it’s securely supported.

Try an industrial, trough-like design, something like this one, rather than the traditional round wire version.

You could even construct your own hanging containers using upcycled cans for a beautiful and economical look.

Go big with window boxes. Treat window boxes as a mini garden, filling them with annuals, perennials and herbs for maximum variety and interest all year round.

Choose specimens that are reasonably tall so you can see and enjoy them from indoors. Plants such as Verbena bonariensis grow on tall, strong stems that won’t block the light but will bring welcome height to a window box.

For something big on impact but, perhaps, lower maintenance, try planting a row of grasses in a window box. Again, you’ll be able to appreciate these from inside, and they create a pleasing green screen that softens an urban view.

Decorate outside as you would in. Instead of trying to grow a garden in a tricky, dark courtyard, why not brighten it up with geometric tiles and attractive furniture? Treat the low area outside a basement window as an extension of inside so that it’s pleasant to use and great to look at from within.

Exploit a corner. Build planters into a corner to create a green focal point. Trailing plants help obscure the horizontal lines of the planters and, paired with smaller specimens, give a lush, abundant feel to this relaxed seating corner.

Here, the homeowners have adapted pallets to make them watertight, then painted them white.

Nurture an indoor garden. Rather than just dotting a few potted plants around, think big and go for an abundant, indoor garden look. Group large houseplants of various sizes and heights together on the floor and use mirrors to max the effect.

Alternatively, take the more is more approach, but use a single piece of furniture, such as a low bench or shelf, to organize your potted plant display. Tuck this under a sunny window and watch your plants thrive.

Introduce climbers inside. Grow vertical climbing plants indoors, trained up a simple, minimal wire mesh partition. This one flanks stairs, but the idea would work well against a sunny internal wall too.

Or let trailing plants go wild. Turn the indoor climber idea on its head and encourage trailing plants to really go wild. Let lush growers, such as this devil’s ivy, hang down from the highest shelf, giving a jungly vibe to a minimal interior.

Make use of internal architecture. The low wall that borders these stairs has been designed to hold potted plants. If constructing something like this is too involved or expensive, look for existing features that could become home to a row of plants or a dedicated long planter, such as a windowsill or mantelpiece.

Grow big in the smallest spaces. This idea works well both inside and out. It’s based on the concept that if you use small pieces in a compact space, they will make it look smaller. It’s better to play with scale and fill a tiny area with a few big, bold pieces than clutter it with a lot of mini objects that draw attention to the cramped dimensions.

Here, a comfy sofa and lots of bold, skyward-bound bamboo plants beautifully fill this micro balcony, giving it height, greenery and a comfy place to sit.

Design a lush light well. A skinny scrap of a light well alongside this London home has been cleverly greened up with tall Japanese maples. They’re vibrant green in summer but turn yellow in the autumn and have striking red branches that contrast with the white walls during winter.

The grasses planted around them turn golden and die down, leaving space for fresh spring bulbs and ferns to herald the beginning of a new year.

A clever additional detail is the metal wall sculpture, which is lighted from behind. There are also lights inside the containers that throw shadows across the white brick walls at night.

How To Score A Deal On Home Appliances

Martha Loveless of Loveless Real Estate Services
The Best Carmichael Realtor | Keller Williams Realty 916-.270.7081
Homes for Sale in Carmichael / What’s Your Carmichael Home Worth?

Who doesn’t dream of a kitchen full of shiny, new appliances and a refrigerator with a touch screen door that plays music, has a calendar and more. But lets be honest, who really needs all that! If you’re looking for a deal on home appliances, use a few of these tips and tricks to score BIG!

BUY AT THE RIGHT TIME.  You can’t go a week without seeing some kind of sale on appliances at one of the big box stores, but if you haven’t been researching for awhile, you might not know when a deal is really a deal.  There are certain times of the year when you can get a better value on appliances.  Timing is everything, and the best time to get a deal on home appliances is when stores need you more than you need a new appliance!

January is when manufacturers will put out new appliance models and retailers are eager to move last year’s inventory.  (Refrigerators are the exception: new models come out in the spring.)

Also note these times…the last days of the month, when stores are desperate to meet quotas – and certain holidays, like Labor Day, Memorial Day, President’s Day, Black Friday – when stores take advantage of your day off and slash prices.

ASK ABOUT PRICE MATCHING.  This is a service provided by many stores, and one that many fail to take advantage of.  Retailers like sears, Best Buy, Lowe’s and Home Depot will match the price for similar items – but you need to embrace the challenge of matching up identical product numbers…if it’s off by one number or letter, it’s a no-go.  Even better is Home Depot’s offering 10% off competitor prices.  Best Buy also matches online prices with competitors like Amazon.

CHECK OUTLET STORES. Best Buy and Sears have outlet stores where discounted merchandise is available.  You can sometimes get a great deal on a refurbished or open-box item at these stores.  If you’re not stuck on something brand-new or that’s never been used (or even looked at) this might be a great option for you.

SHOP PRE-OWNED.  You’d be surprised how many ideal items are out there being re-homed by people who just renovated their kitchen and got rid of a perfectly good refrigerator or bought a new home and gutted everything even though it was all brand new because they hadn’t picked it out themselves.  Their loss is your gain.  “Craigslist is one of the best sources for finding local private sellers who are looking to quickly offload equipment they no longer need.  Ebay is another good option, but be sure to shop locally.  There are also a number of great spots for pre-owned luxury appliances, but they tend to be tied to local markets – check in your local area.  Some appliance repair shops may even have inventory to sell.

SCRATCH & DENT…may sound unattractive, but it’s a great way to get a brand-new appliance that might have a little blemish at a big savings.  Google the term and see what comes up in your local market.  Some areas have scratch and dent warehouses packed full of savings.  Many of these items have a small scratch or dent in a place you can’t even see – like on the side, which won’t show when the appliance is installed.

CONSIDER WHAT YOU REALLY NEED.  It’s easy to walk into the appliance section of Best Buy and be seduced by the $4,000 French Door refrigerator-freezer with mood lighting and the ability to make sparkling water from the door….but let’s be serious.  Do you really need all that?  So save hundreds of dollars by going without the in-door water & ice. Problem solved.

Martha Loveless
916.270.7081
The Best Carmichael Realtor
www.LoveSacMetroHomes.com

*information provide by Jaymi Naciri for realtytimes.com*

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Tips for Baby Proofing Your Home

Martha Loveless of Loveless Real Estate Services
The Best Carmichael Realtor | Keller Williams Realty 916-.270.7081
Homes for Sale in Carmichael / What’s Your Carmichael Home Worth?

Are you a new mommy to be? Need to babyproof your home but don’t know where to start? No worries! Here are a few tips to get you started!

Baby Proofing the bathroom:

1. Always test the water temperature before placing baby in the tub.

2. Safeguard from slips by using nonslip mats in and out of the tub as well as on any hard-surface floors near the bathroom — chances are you’ll be chasing a naked, wet baby through the house at some point.

3. Install a toilet lock so little fingers don’t get smashed, to protect from accidental drowning and to prevent any unsanitary exposure.

4. If you don’t have an out-of-reach place to store medicines and supplements, invest in a lockable medicine safe.

5. Keep looking like a hot mama, but always move the flat-iron cord (or any other appliance cord) out of baby’s reach to avoid burns or strangulation.

6. Cover the tub spout to protect his head in case he falls.

Baby Proofing the Nursery:

1. The U.S. government unrolled new crib safety standards: no more drop-side cribs! Also, make sure your crib’s slats are 2 3/8 inches (or less!) apart.

2. Remove those super-cute bumpers, blankets, pillows and stuffed animals from baby’s crib. They can actually suffocate your child. Mobiles with small hanging parts should also come out as soon as baby can pull herself upright.

3. When you think “childproofing,” those plastic outlet covers are probably first to mind. Think again. Many are proven choking hazards, so consider sliding covers instead.

4. A baby monitor is a must-have, but keep cords tightly wound and always away from the crib, or choose a cordless monitor.

5. Store toys in an open toy box so there’s no lid to slam baby’s fingers. Watch for wicker’s easy-to-pull-off wood pieces.

In the kitchen:

1. Pet kibble is a choking hazard, and if left unattended, you can count on it ending up in baby’s mouth.

2. Stove knobs are fun to twist, so keep them turned off with stove knob covers. An appliance lock ensures that baby won’t pull the oven door down on top of himself. Got something bubbling and simmering on the stove? Keep baby safe from splatters and from pulling on pot handles with a stove guard.

3. Every kitchen should have a fire extinguisher, so choose a dry-chemical extinguisher and keep it out of reach on a high pantry shelf, mounted to the wall or in a childproof cabinet.

4. Under-sink cabinets are a typical place to store cleaning products, but with baby in residence, you need to move them out of reach. If they must stay in low cabinets, invest in latches and locks to always keep the cabinet doors securely shut.

Baby Proofing the living room:

1. Cordless shades or cord cleats are the way to keep blinds safe for baby.

2. Coffee tables, TV stands, even window ledges offer plenty of sharp corners at eye level for someone 2 feet tall. Cushion edges with bumpers. Scan the room for breakables and move them to where baby can’t get them. You’ll be amazed by how far up, or over, little ones can actually reach.

3. Research tells us keeping books in view of baby helps her develop a love of reading. Secure bookcases and other tall furniture to the wall with bolts or adjustable, locking furniture straps that attach to the wall and to the object to keep your little brainiac from pulling it over.

4. Place TVs behind closed doors in an entertainment center, or mount a flat-panel model to the wall.

5. There’s a reason mud pies are so popular with the under-5 crowd, and those houseplants are going to look mighty tasty. Keep them out of reach so your little seedling won’t be tempted.

6. Got stairs? If so, a baby gate is a must!

7. Shield your fireplace with a guard door, and protect her from sharp corners on brick or ceramic tile.

Growing out of your home? Need more space for the baby?
Start your home search here!

Martha Loveless
916.270.7081
The Best Carmichael Realtor
www.LoveSacMetroHomes.com

*information provide by www.Parenting.com*

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