Before and After: A Simple Recipe

Maybe it's so easy because everything else in the winter is so hard -

And this winter has been really hard ... On everything - plants, pots, trees, my firewood stash, my back, my psyche -

Here's a simple recipe for a little slice of spring a few weeks early -

1.  Start with a bag of bulbs (from the local nursery, hardware store, big box retailer- they're

     becoming so popular I'm expecting to see them in the 7-11 next year)

2.  Add some empty pots ( I have lots of empty pots - the result of a bitterly cold winter and my lack of foresight) -

3.  Stick the bulbs in the dirt just below the surface (some nurseries are even selling the bulbs in the advanced stages of bloom for the lazy gardener) -

4.  Add some water - plant fertilizer optional -

5.  Sit back with a glass of wine and wait -

Viola!

  

A great way to ease into the spring —

Twenty days and counting ...

IT'S THE ATTACK OF THE HALLOWINES!

The zombies will be having fun once this party has begun because the selection of Halloween wines seems to grow every year.

 

Pinot, merlot, chardonnay, malbec — they're all there. Paired with a peanut butter cup, popcorn ball or candy apple, it's the perfect Halloween treat.

The bottles also double as spooky decorations.

Add a creepy stopper and classic napkins to complete the eerie site.

 

If wine isn't your cup of brew, there are other options ... like tequila. Wine drinkers must exercise caution with this option or before they know it they'll be doing the Transylvania twist.

And these bottles are too cool to discard when empty — they are meant to be boxed up with other Halloween decorations in November and recycled year after year.

With the growing season winding down, mums and succulents are still great options for pots to greet those trick-or-treaters on the front porch.

And when you get to my door, tell them Boris sent you ...

Pots for every occasion

There are some pots that I've owned for years.

I buy them out of necessity — when I've picked up a plant and don't have anything on hand that I can recycle at the moment, many of those are just blah pots because I'm in a hurry to get the plant potted and situated in its place on my patio.

I buy them because I just like the pot and don't have a particular plant tagged to call it home.
 


Sometimes I buy the container not knowing exactly what I'm going to use it for, plants or otherwise.
 


That's how it was with this Hungarian baby bath.

I originally thought I would put it in my garden with my birdhouses and bottle trees. Maybe I would fill it with ice and drinks when I had company since it has a convenient drain for the ice that melts.


But I've ended up using it as a seasonal plant container.
 
It sits on my patio and right now — I have these great ferns in it.



Once it gets cold, I'll have to move the ferns inside, but the bathtub will stay.
 
In October, I'll put some yellow or white mums out to welcome the trick-or-treaters.
 
In the winter, I fill it with pansies.
 
If you use big container plants, you can just drop them right in and lift them right out when you're ready for something different.
 


If I get tired of changing the plants out, I still have the option to ditch the plants and fill it with ice and drinks  or —
 

cover it and use it as a serving table or —


just sit it in the garden with the bird houses and bottle trees. 
 


"He hits from both sides of the plate," Yogi Berra once said. "He’s amphibious."
 


That's the way some containers are — amphibious.