Everyone wants to create a certain atmosphere in their home. Some prefer to have a cozy, comfortable and informal feel, and others want a their house to look like it came from the pages of a magazine, in perfect condition. Whatever your style, in order for a house to be a home, it needs to be a place where memories can be made.

One addition to a home that can certainly help make your house a home for building memories in is a porch swing. Porch swings add an element of fun and relaxation to any home. They provide a place for resting and kicking back after work at home or in the office.

Porch swings can be found that will fit anyone’s sense of style or look good on any porch. There are big bulky swings with large cushions, and there are very small, metals ones that are much like a glorified lawn chair, and everything in between.

With starting to work on home improvement projects, it is best to work on with tasks or simple projects appropriate for beginners. There are many different simple Home Improvement woodworking project that are ideal for new crafters. The first step is deciding what you want to make. In this article we will discuss several novice level projects and what you will need to complete them. Let’s first look at one of the most popular woodworking projects for new and experienced crafters — the birdhouse.

A small birdhouse makes an ideal starter project because it is easy to make and gives our feathered friends a place to call home. Your birdhouse can be as simple or as intricate as you wish. When first starting out a simple design is best so you can master the fundamentals of working with wood. If a birdhouse isn’t your cup of tea, consider making a magazine rack or letter holder. Maybe you are in the mood for a more ambitious project and want to make something larger like a bookcase or set of shelves. The possibilities are unlimited when it comes to creative woodworking projects.

For any room of different sizes, you can brighten up the atmosphere by using crystal chandeliers. A chandelier is a lamp suspended from the ceiling that contains multiple electric candles to create plenty of light. These lamps are often beautifully adorned with the finest crystal in various designs and styles. You’ve probably seen glittering chandeliers on shows that profile homes owned by the rich and famous. However you don’t have to be a celebrity to glamorize your home with one of these lighting devices.

At your breakfast table, there’s nothing quite like beginning your day watching one of the smallest of God’s creations, but one of the most interesting and delightful to observe – the hummingbird. If you want to attract hummingbirds to your yard, one way to do so is by planting a hummingbird garden.

Want to add a focal point to your garden with a retaining-wall-raised flower bed? You can actually shape and build up your own retaining wall with the right tools. Learn how to build your own retaining wall…

Above ground pool landscaping that’s economical and a garden asset

The above ground pool has become a popular alternative to the more expensive in ground pool, for a number of reasons. For one thing, it’s affordable. If you rent your home, and decide to move, you can take it with you. You don’t need to hire a pool maintenance company to keep it clean and safe. A pool, whether in ground or above ground, is a magnet for kids, providing lots of summer fun. However, there’s no deep end or diving board involved with the above ground pool, so it’s also a safer prospect for young kids. In cold winter climates, the above ground pool is much less of a hassle to empty and bed down for the winter.

If you’re thinking about setting up an above ground pool for the summer, this makes a great project for the winter months. There’s not too much effort involved in setting up the pool, but now is a good time to plan your above ground pool landscaping design, ready to go by late spring.

Perhaps the only drawback of the above ground pool is that, without some thoughtful above ground pool landscaping, it lacks the aesthetic value of the in ground pool. Here we offer some above ground pool landscaping ideas that solve that problem handily. Let’s explore some of your options.

With decking surrounding the pool, you satisfy several design and function objectives. If you situate your pool such that you have eight feet of decking on all sides, there’s plenty of room for sunbathing, with chaise lounges and chairs for relaxation. Better than a day at the beach. When you build in stair access and a railing, you’ve got an attractive and comfortable gathering place. This also makes it easy to supervise the kids at play, while you kick back and read a book.

Deck lighting is another component you want to consider for your above ground pool landscaping design. Hot summer days extend your use of the pool well into the evening hours. Installing a simple solar lighting system provides more hours to make use of your pool.

When you make your deck design, incorporate a few well placed planter boxes for additional visual appeal. Choose low maintenance flowers, such as gazanias, marguerites or ice plant, that will thrive in the summer months. Plantings of a single species gives a unified and cheerful appearance to your above ground pool landscaping design.

Make a place on the deck for a patio table and umbrella for a quick lunch or dinner spot. Cook up some burgers and serve your crowd, buffet style.

While a real lawn may suffer from liberal doses of chlorine, splashed around by rambunctious kids, artificial turf does not. A four foot perimeter of artificial turf makes a safe and durable addition to your above ground pool landscaping scheme.

With your above ground pool, surrounded by twelve feet of these landscaping goodies, you’ll have the most popular summer hotspot in the neighborhood!

Weed Prevention 101: It all comes down to good yard management!

Rare is the gardener who enjoys weeding. In addition to being a laborious, back-breaking task, it also goes against the grain of the gardener’s heart. You like to plant and nurture, not pull up and destroy. On the other hand, the weeds will take over your landscape in no time, if you don’t attend to this task, stunting the growth and leaching precious water from your garden plants. You can spray with an herbicide, but many people are now looking for more eco-friendly solutions, especially if they’ve got young kids. There is an alternative to constant weeding chores or herbicides. Weed prevention is the name of this game. If you’re diligent and persistent from fall through next spring, you’ll be delighted with the results of your weed prevention program.

If you’ve spent time weeding by hand, or with a hoe, you know there’s always one or two you miss, while leaving the roots of a number of stubborn weeds with long taproots. Some gardeners figure that pulling them up is enough, leaving them to compost right on the spot.

You should always gather up the weeds, bagging them up and hauling them away. If you dump them into your compost bin, some weed seeds will survive and pop up again when you spread your compost. Weeds are generally described as weeds, because they survive under the most adverse conditions!

When you put your garden to bed in early fall, while the days are still warm, you can skip that final weeding. Cover flower beds not in use with black plastic garden tarps, available at garden centers in rolls. Weight the tarp down with rocks or bricks and let the sun do the rest. A couple of weeks under that heat makes short work of the weeds. Slide the tarp to the side and simply pick up the dead weeds. Replace the tarp and weights, and leave in place until spring. This weed prevention technique eliminates that knee high mess of weeds that crop up by April.

You may find a few renegade weeds, but applying phase one of your weed prevention program has saved you many hours of hard work. All you need to do is add some well-aged fertilizer and the compost of your choice. Work into the soil, water the area thoroughly and slowly and wait a day or two. Turn the soil again and you’re ready to plant. So much easier.

When you’ve planted your beds, you implement phase two. Mulch is essential to weed prevention. With a 2-3 inch layer of whatever mulching material you find most attractive, any erstwhile weeds lurking in the soil will have a much more difficult path to seedling stage. There are those die-hards sure to pop their heads above ground, but with your mulch, they are readily spotted and easily removed, root and all.

If you make a weekly inspection of your entire garden, you’ll find that you can dispose of all your pickings in a small paint bucket. Depending on the size of your garden, this weekly weeding might not even take an hour. As the growing season proceeds, you’ll find fewer and fewer weeds.

When fall arrives, start your weed prevention cycle over again. With a thorough preparation of beds in fall and spring, good composting techniques and mulching,
you’ll spend far less time weeding and more time babying the plants you want.

Fall is the time to reduce your spring gardening tasks with weed control fabric

When summer is over, all of the flowers are spent and leaves are falling, it’s time  to prepare the garden for winter. There are bulbs to store or divide, leaves to rack for composting, beds to weed to prevent sprouts you’ll be battling big-time next spring. Don’t forget the gutters and perhaps a couple of loads of brush to haul away. With fence repairs and roof checks, you’re pretty busy. By the time you’re done, the rains have come and you’re done in the garden until spring.

Of all garden tasks, weeding probably holds last place in the gardener’s list of things to do. Tedious work it is and repetitious as well. Only the most fastidious weeders ever eventually rid the garden of weeds, until a few new ones blow in on the wind.

Weeding is much like doing the laundry. No one notices, unless you fail to do the task. Although there are various chemical products available to target weeds, more and more people are becoming aware of the potential dangers of using such chemicals in their gardens. This perspective doesn’t change the gardener’s opinion on weeding. So what’s the solution to eliminating the frequent weeding chores? Weed control fabric offers multiple benefits in certain kinds of garden situations.

In landscaped areas, where you’ve got shrubs, small trees, roses and other perennial plants, you may have significant amounts of bare space between your plantings. This is a perfect situation for weed control fabric.

The dark colors of weed control fabric also warm the ground, useful in areas where heavy frosts persist in winter. This cloth also allows you to plant a few days earlier in spring, if you want to put in some annual herbs or flowers along a pathway. Just remove the cloth, turn the soil and plant! The soil will also be less compacted, especially with clay soils.

Another outstanding virtue of weed control fabric is that you do not even need to weed the area before laying down the weed cloth. Lacking oxygen and water, those weeds will be deader than a doornail in a couple of weeks, without you lifting a hand or resorting to chemicals.

Weed control fabric comes in rolls of a few standard widths and lengths, such as a 3-foot wide by 50 foot long roll. The fabric is virtually impermeable and is available in green and black. All you need to do is roll it out, covering large areas of bare ground as you cut to size. Leave an opening around your plants sufficient to water. For example, rose bushes need a watering area roughly the diameter of the branches. With a stand of pampas grass, just cut the weed control fabric right up to the edge of the planting.

When you’ve covered that area of your landscaping, your weeding days there are over, excepting the errant weed showing up in the rose bushes come spring. Easily and swiftly dealt with for at least a week, if you’re a perfectionist.

All that’s left to do is cover the weed control fabric with a 2-3 inch layer of redwood bark, pine needles or whatever mulching materials are readily available in your region. Whatever mulch you choose adds to the looks of your landscaping and provides additional warming for the ground surrounding your plantings.

Using this long lasting, multi-purpose fabric this fall takes one disliked task right off your list of spring gardening activities, freeing you up for fun tasks!

The many faces of the small garden: see which lovely face suits your space

Some gardeners, when faced with a small garden space, bemoan their lack of space. These gardeners don’t know how to make the most of the least. If you’re frustrated with a tiny garden, here are several ways you can change this glass-half-empty picture into a spectacular display.

Let’s say your small garden consists of a few steps, with a landing leading to your front door. Up to now, you’ve considered it an entry way, at best. If you browse through some of the garden magazines, or do a Google image search on ‘entry way garden’, you’ll see there are literally thousands of ways to turn that entry way into a head-turning garden oasis.

If your problem is a very small backyard, all you need do is decide what plants and flowers you love best and which will thrive in the available exposure. Whether your small garden is in shade or sun, there are gorgeous plants suited to this mini environment.

Rock gardens are perfect candidates for the small garden space. These look lovely, planted with native wildflowers. With careful planning, this garden can provide at least three seasons of interest. Look online for the many fabulous possibilities.

If you love fresh flowers for your home, why not plant a cutting garden of your favorites. Cutting gardens take little space and you’ll have all the fresh flowers you want.

Bulb gardens in pots are a highly adaptable solution to the small garden space. There are bulbs which grow in every season, so you can have a rotating display of these lovelies. Again, take a look online at some of the bulb nurseries offerings. Bulb plants are some of the most beautifully and intricately patterned of all flowers. Some bulbs may also be forced, indoors for a thrilling mid-winter display. Potted bulbs have an additional advantage in being a movable visual feast.

If you have virtually no garden space, but do have a deck, patio or balcony, you’re still in business. Pots, deck planters and hanging displays can make a formerly boring spot into a bountiful area of color and coziness. Depending on the exposure, any of these locations can accommodate miniature fruit trees as well. Trees can also be trellised for the ultimate space saver in your small garden.

No matter how small your garden spot is, there is undoubtedly a way to create a beautiful landscape.

Now, let’s take a look at the glass-half-full side of the picture. With a large garden, many’s the time when the gardener is forced to neglect this or that garden task, due to other priorities. The small garden is, by definition, low-maintenance. You don’t need complicated watering systems and timers and you surely won’t break your back weeding!

You may find your little garden so satisfying, you’ll no longer yearn for acres of land.

Shade gardening for an exotic display of tropical elegance

So many gardeners, even experienced ones, often bemoan the fact that their apartment or home has no expanses of sunny soils in which to plant their sun-loving favorites. Many also regard a shady garden as a difficult prospect, believing that hardly a plant worth viewing does well in the shade. This is a myth we hope to dispell. If your garden is entirely in shade, there are a world of possibilities whereby you can have a display that rivals any sun-drenched spot in the neighborhood.

Have you ever taken a walk in shady woodland areas and marveled at the carpets of flowers produced in spring? How about hostas, those wide-leaved, graceful perennials which are the subject of many a collector of garden species? Shade gardening is almost an  undiscovered niche to the conventional gardening enthusiast. You may be surprised to learn that there are entire books written addressing this special gardening situation.

Shade gardening does require a special and discerning eye to the design, but the results can be magnificent. If you’re not familiar with the plants that do wonderfully in shade gardens, introduce yourself to the topic online. Type ’shade garden plants’ into your search engine and then follow the links to ones that intrigue you. Nurseries which specialize in shade plants provide a good introduction to the subject and plenty of inspiration. Once inspired, you may also want to invest in a book which covers the special soil needs, gardening techniques and suitable plant combinations required of the shade garden. Now you’re ready to design.

Many plants which do well in shady conditions also do well in pots. Potted shade plants offer another advantage, in that many of them may be brought inside to over-winter in your home. When it becomes too cold for that grouping of cyclamens to survive on your patio, you can move them inside to nestle happily on a kitchen windowsill. The same holds true for begonias and fuchsias. Left outside, they’ll die down for the winter, but will return in spring unless left exposed to a hard freeze. Inside, you have greenery in winter in a cool room.

In temperate regions, ferns, azaleas, gardenias and hypericums die back a bit, but come back strong come spring. Perennials such as carpet phlox live on along shady woodland paths, producing their lovely displays of flowers for years.

If you live in a tropical climate, such as Florida, you can have magnificent displays of color in shade-dappled areas under canopies of larger trees, throughout the year.

A garden spot nearly devoid of direct light can be a real blessing! The sunny field of wildflowers has a formidable rival in the well planned shade gardener’s design.