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gardening

The Best Way to Get Rid of Yard Weeds in Grass

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I love the beauty that comes with the arrival of spring… the birds chirping, sun shining and freshness in the air. But one thing I dread is the arrival of yard work. Having to drag yard tools around, pull out the lawn mower and apply bug repellent. One of the biggest annoyances is the overgrowth of yard weeds in the grass.

This year, this is the situation I was presented with:

Yikes. The weeds were so high in some places that I had to mow first before trying any sort of weed treatment. I was careful to only mow in the areas that had weeds to avoid spreading seeds in other areas of the lawn. After sweating away in the April sun with the lawn mower, I decided to use a combination of the two following yard weed control products:

I used the Scotts Turf Builder (with Weed Control) spray first, then went back in with the Spectracide Weed Stop for Lawns. They treat different types of weeds, so I wanted to make sure all bases were covered. I know the instructions say to use only a certain amount per square yard but I decided to use it all in the specific area of concern. These are both products that you can link to a hose and spray leisurely while you listen to an audiobook or music on your earphones. (My personal favorite is opera music.)

About a month later, this is what the treatment did for the lawn and yard weeds:

Yay! Something that finally worked for getting rid of yard weeds in grass. Seeing the grass look this weed-free was a relief. Now I just have to do a little overseeding and watering to fill in the bare spots. I’m confident that by next year the grass will look absolutely amazing.

Posted by Louise

How to Regrow Food from Scraps

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I read an article recommended by a friend a few weeks back about regrowing food from scraps, including scallions, celery and lettuce, and just had to give it a try. I quickly learned that I could regrow a scallion in about a week to its full size. Here’s the proof:

Regrowing ScallionsThis is definitely information that your local grocery store doesn’t want you to know! So I was excited to find about this amazingly comprehensive piece from CustomMade.com about how to regrow 19 different types of vegetables. I’m excited to experiment with carrots and lettuce next! Click the image to see the full list:

regrow-food-scraps-018

Image courtesy of CustomMade.com

Yard Workout: Burn Calories Doing Yard Work

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It’s estimated that you can burn as many as 450 calories per hour while doing yard work.Think about that the next time the grass needs trimming or the garden needs some tending!

How awesome is it that you can burn calories while beautifying your property. Here are a few ways to turn common yard work duties into an intense full body workout.

Preparing for Your Yard Workout

Before you begin any exercise it is of the utmost importance that you are well hydrated before, during and after the activity. You should also consume a well-balanced meal a couple of hours before beginning. It’s also important to stretch your legs, back and arms before getting started. If you have health concerns, consult a doctor before beginning any new health regimen.

Raking the Yard

Flickr/donhomer

One common outdoor chore is raking the yard when it’s full of leaves. Stand with your feet a little more than shoulder width apart while maintaining good posture. Use long sweeping motions to gather debris with the rake, and as you stretch forward bend your knees and engage your core. Make sure that you alternate sweeping motions from left, right and front. Do this at a pace that will raise your heart rate. These motions also force you to engage your legs, back and arms. Make small piles of debris and move onto the next area.

When all the piles are completed, it’s time to throw the debris into the trash bin. Do squats. With your feet shoulder width apart, stand over the pile of debris, do a power squat down as low as you can go, grab debris with both hands, lift your body up and throw the leaves into the bin. Repeat these steps for all piles (take a break if needed).

Tidying the Yard

Even if it’s not the fall season, you probably have debris on your property that accumulates throughout the week, such as papers, branches and sticks. Every time you find something new, do five jumping jacks or 10 standing leg lifts (put your hands on your hips and alternate lifting your legs forward or to either side). When you’re done doing your reps, bend at the knees to pick up the debris.

Mowing the Lawn

Flickr/seanhobson
Most modern day stand up mowers are self-propelled, meaning there is no need to actually push the mower (it goes on its own; you just guide it). Turn off the self-propelling feature so that you’ll be forced to actually push the mower for a period of time. You can always turn it back on if you get tired. Mowing the lawn using your own power will raise your heart rate and make you burn calories. Remember: it’s important that you periodically take breaks and rehydrate with either cold water or a sports drink that contains electrolytes.

It’s totally possible to get a great full body workout when doing yard work. When you think about your chores in this way, they are less daunting and go by faster. While doing your yard workout,  concentrate on your breathing, good posture and hydration.

Have fun losing those pesky pounds!!

Posted by Eve

 

Photo credits: Flickr/donhomer, Flickr/seanhobson

 

 

4 Amazing Benefits of Vegetable Gardening

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Gardening at home, whether it’s done indoors or outside in your yard, can be a very satisfying experience. It’s estimated that over 160 million Americans garden every year. For many, it’s a hobby, for others a profession, for some it’s a way of life; it seems all gardeners garden because of its many advantages. Here are four benefits of vegetable gardening that might encourage you to get out there today and sow some seeds.

It Gives You Peace

Flickr/pictoquotes

The average day is full of distractions, from the television to disagreements with family members. Your garden is a place where you can find some peace and serenity. The only distraction is the occasional butterfly or bee buzzing by. You can relax and listen to happy birds chirping nearby or put on a pair of headphones and turn on some classical music while you’re tending to your vegetable plants or working in the dirt. No matter what’s going on in your world, you can find respite by going to your garden and communing with nature.

 

You Feed Your Family and Save Money

Flickr/galant

One of the top benefits of vegetable gardening is that it gives you a way to provide your family with healthy, homegrown foods while also saving you money on grocery bills. A one-time investment of about $50 in seeds and supplies for a small garden can yield you hundreds of dollars in vegetables that you would have bought for your family at the supermarket during the year. Additionally, you can harvest the seeds from your newly grown veggies and keep them for a decade or more. Many say that stockpiling seeds is even more valuable than collecting gold–vegetable seeds give you the security of knowing that you’ll always be able to feed yourself and your loved ones.

 

You Get Moderate Exercise

Flickr/usdagov

If you’ve been looking for a way to ease back into a more active lifestyle, vegetable gardening just might be the solution. It gives you a way to do moderate exercise with a purpose.It’s estimated that you can burn 300 calories in an hour of gardening.

You’ll have an excuse to walk more as you carry supplies to and from your garden. You have to dig holes and till the soil with repeated back and forth motions. You’ll also have to bend and stretch to pull weeds and pick your greens. Once you get used to performing these activities every day and your body feels more refreshed, you might be inspired to step it up and start doing morning jogs around your neighborhood or a little yoga for lunch.

 

Your Kids Learn How to Grow (In More Ways Than One)

Flickr/all-seeing_angler

If you have young children or teens, vegetable gardening could be an activity that changes their lives and inspires them in the future. A lot of young people in modern times are housebound — tied to their computers. They rarely come outside unless they are trying to get better reception on their cellphones. If you show them how to garden from a young age, you’ll teach them the timeless lesson about sowing good seeds, watering them, watching them grow and then reaping the benefits. This lesson will apply to just about every area of their lives.

Let these 4 benefits of vegetable gardening be your inspiration for starting your own home garden this year. You may be surprised at how rewarding and uncomplicated it is to grow your very own veggies.

Posted by Jade

Photos courtesy: Flickr/pictoquotes, Flickr/galant, Flickr/usdagov, Flickr/all-seeing_angler

 

 

Protecting Your Organic Vegetable Garden from Pests

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Starting an organic vegetable garden is such an exciting experience — especially if you’re a first timer. As you start to see your little sprouts coming up more and more, you’ll probably also start to feel more and more protective of your little veggies. The goal is to keep the garden organic, so you don’t want to spray it with chemical pesticides and weed killers. Here are some tips for guarding your organic vegetable garden from unwanted pests using natural methods.

The Garden Fence

One of the best ways to keep small mammals, like rabbits and cats, out of your organic garden is to put a fence around it. You can go all out with a professional wire fence that’s rooted in the ground, or you can keep it simple with a plastic green fence that you can buy at a home improvement store. If you choose the latter option, place wood panels all around the edges of the garden and secure the plastic fencing to it with staples and a staple gun. Then get thin bamboo poles — thread then through the holes and gently hammer them into the ground.

garden fence

Keep Your Neem Oil Spray Handy

The deeper you get into the summer, the more you’re going to feel the urge to protect your lovely organic garden from crawling critters like worms, flies, and snails. Neem oil is a natural product that helps keep garden pests away. They just don’t like the smell or taste. Add about three drops of Neem oil to a quart spray bottle filled with water. Keep your Neem oil spray handy and on your hip, like you’re farming in the Wild Wild West.

neem oil

Scare Crow or Moving Owl for Birds and Squirrels

You’ve taken care of the crawling pests and kept the bunny rabbits at bay, but how do you deal with your flying friends? There are certain crops that birds absolutely love, like corn. They can’t resist those sweet delicious kernels of corn and will go through great lengths to peck through the sheaths. The classic solution that farmers use to ward off birds is a scare crow. You can also step it up a notch by putting a motion activated owl on a pole and putting it near your corn. The only thing better than that would be a scare crow that does the Macarena (or maybe just the two-step).

motion activated owl

Stand Up Weed Puller

Weeds are going to find their way into your organic garden. They love the delicious fertilizer, soil and water as much as your veggies do. They steal resources from your plants. So to keep your garden organic, you have to get in there and pull them out regularly. Luckily there’s a product on the market that makes this easy — it’s called a stand up weed puller and it works well on stubborn weeds. Just push the three pronged end of the tool into the dirt, twist it a few times and pull out the weed. You need a little elbow grease, but it gets the job done.

weed puller

Maintaining an organic garden isn’t as difficult as it may sounds. You just have to keep a close eye on it and keep a few natural products and tools handy. Happy #Gardening!

Posted by Jasmine

3 Yard Work Cheats / Short Cuts

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If you are fortunate enough to have a house with a yard, you know that it can be both a blessing and a “curse.” The effort it takes to beautify and maintain your property can be strenuous, but it is also rewarding. Whether, it is general maintenance or beautification, it can be time consuming to keep your yard looking wonderful. Here are a few yard work short cuts/cheats that will help make your yard work more manageable each year.

Make a List

First off, it helps to get everything down on paper. When you see the list of chores on paper, it doesn’t seem as difficult a task. You can then take each chore and divide them up over the weekend. So take a bit of time walking your yard to detail the chores that need to be done. This includes everything from leaf removal to trimming hedges and bushes to spraying your trees. Writing the items down will ensure that your precious time is not wasted and help you envision the process of completing each task.

Hire the Neighborhood Teens

In years past, it was commonplace for homeowners to hire neighborhood kids to help them with yard tasks. Chances are that you have at least one trustworthy, hard working teen in your area who would love to earn some extra cash on the weekend. Not only will it make your yard work easier to manage, it can also be beneficial to your relationships with neighbors. Cordially speak to the parents of the teens you may want to hire to negotiate a fair rate. $20 for a few hours of work is usually considered fair for a young person. With your written list in hand, ask your teen helper to do all of the bending, stooping, kneeling and heavy lifting that is required to complete the job.  For your privacy and continued safety, have all of the materials and tools on the outside of your house, ready to be used.  For a job well done, a tip may be in order. Keep relations friendly so that you have a good rapport with neighbors and teens for future years.

The Water Timer

As a yard owner, you realize that there are specific times that your lawn and garden needs water in order to thrive. Invest in an outdoor water timer that is easily attached to your water spout to make your yard tasks easier. Most modern timers allow you to set a start time, an end time and even have the water turn on at multiple times during the day. Human error can cause a yard to dry up when you forget to turn on the water — a timer is your safest bet. A quick note: some homeowners make the mistake of watering their lawns at the hottest time of day.  All that does is cost you money because the water evaporates when the sun is at its peak, so you do not give your lawn the proper nourishment and hydration needed to keep it looking green and healthy. The best time to water your lawn is at sun up +\or sundown.

Use these yard work shortcuts/cheats are not difficult to accomplish.  With a plan and a bit of effort, you will soon be entertaining more in your backyard instead of working!!
Posted by Eve