How would your dream backyard look?

That was the question posed to me by one of my twitter followers friends.

Truth be told, I hadn’t really thought about it, considering that this is the wasteland that is my current reality {Horror of Horrors!}:

The lonely little patch above next to my Mommy-Cruiser is the proposed site of my garden.

Until now, my backyard and front yard have just been places to banish the Churrens when they get too rowdy or are getting too much screen time.
Yes, I’ve seen all the HGTV shows devoted to prettying-up the outside. However, when it’s cold more than it is warm where you live, you spend most of your time indoors.  With the onset of spring and my ambitious gardening plans, I guess now is as good time as any to start dreaming planning.

Given my limited backyard space, I would love for my vegetable gardening to look like this:

photo courtesy of Martha Stewart.

I am a sucker for container gardening. It just seems so “a place for everything, everything in its place” organized.

This one gives me a reason to drink wine collect boxes. I may finally get up the nerve to ask Sam’s Club for some.

photo courtesy of LLH Designs.

If I didn’t have a garden, and I had the space and unlimited landscaping $$$, this is how I would want my backyard to look {Swoon!}:

AfroMartha can dream, right? Photo courtesy of http://www.flickr.com/photos/jerikoegel

My family loves to play board and card games. The kids and Hubs are partial to Monopoly and UNO. I LOVE Phase 10. I could see us right over there in the back left corner getting down! Add a pitcher of Lemonade, a bucket of popcorn, and we’ll be all set! (Disclosure: the preceeding links do lead to my amazon affiliates ID)

Speaking of a bucket of popcorn, this looks fun!

Photo courtesy of www.miss-design.com

How about movie night in the backyard?! How fun is that! Hey wait a minute, this set up looks almost like my front yard (without the all the ugly).

This is how my front yard currently looks:

This might actually do-able in our front yard!  Would it be ghetto wrong to set up the front yard for movie night? I’m not sure

Landscape etiquette questions aside, I now have some inspiration to get out and stock up on wine boxes, and search for an old movie projector cute-up my outdoors

How about you? What would your outdoors look like? What are your outdoors plans for the upcoming spring and summer?

2 Tales, 1 conclusion, Part 2

Thanks for joining me for The Conclusion. Go here to read part 1.

So yesterday I was waxing poetic about the weather how we are going to suffer for it in the higher price of produce this spring, then I started talking about how I fell off, kitchen-wise. I’m sure some of you were like ‘huh? what does the weather have to do with her falling off in the kitchen?’.

You know how sometimes random, seemingly unrelated things lead you to a conclusion? No? So I’m the only one who draws wild conclusions from random happenstance? Got it.

Anywhoodles…I believe I was about to say what I am going back to. I’m going back to reclaiming the passion I used to have for homesteading. I’m going back to making more from scratch. Why? Because I want my family to enjoy healthy foods. Healthy foods, in addition to an overall healthy lifestyle leads to good health. I cannot control everything, but I will control what I can.

Besides, what kind of self-respecting DIYer would I be if I didn’t make stuff from scratch? So here are just some of the things I want to make from scratch:

Breads: Using whole grains such as oats, flaxseeds, rye, barley. I forgot how much I love making bread. Kneading dough is so relaxing, kind of like taking out my frustrations of the day on the dough. Now I just need to work on not eating too much bread. One of the joys of living in the midwest is having access to Amish-type bulk goods store. Ours is called “A Bushel and a Peck”, and it is just a few country miles away. They carry the more esoteric items you won’t find in a regular chain grocery store, at great prices.

Canning: I hope to be able to make some strawberry jam from scratch this spring/summer for my PB&J-loving family. I would also like to make more sauces from scratch. Last night I made my first batch of chunky vegetable packed Marinara sauce. Easy-peasy. Canning is pretty easy, but we have been spoiled by the convenience of easy store access.

Gardening: I am using the anticipated higher pricing of produce as motivation to do what I’ve been wanting to do for years, which is to finally have that vegetable garden. It is my hope that I will be able to can some of the proceeds from the garden to last until next spring. On my wishlist for my garden? Tomatoes, Strawberries, Cucumbers, Heirloom carrots. Trying not to bite off more than I can chew…

Do I plan to spend all my waking hours on homesteading activities? Nooooo. Afterall, I still have to design, blog, take care of kids, spend time with Hubs, hang out with my friends, and so on, and so forth…oh boy.

So, wish me luck, or better yet, JOIN ME!

Let these amazing colors inspire you as they have inspired me!

Source: romesticity.com via Yetunde on Pinterest

 

 

Source: romesticity.com via Yetunde on Pinterest