Things are  a little crazy around here. The air conditioning ducts are being installed around the house and we are frantically trying to keep going on the Master Bedroom closets. I am trying to decide if I can squeeze an Ikea trip in this week. Meanwhile  I am still working on planting some of my finds from this year’s Scott Arboretum Plant Exchange. So while the chaos continues I thought I would show you some of the beautiful container plantings that I have been admiring. Because who can’t use a little gardening eye candy!

On Mother’s Day we managed to make a quick trip over to Terrain (which was filled with well dressed mothers who were busy dining and shopping inside). Of course I was outside, checking out the plants. I did pick up a couple of interesting perennials but my favorite thing about visiting Terrain are their interesting plant combinations. I like the mix of perennials, annuals and even small shrubs and vegetables. This mix helps to keep the cost down and actually extends the season. In this amazing undulating planter above they have mixed a small grass with succulents, ground cover and a few annuals. I also like the addition of the small pebbles.

The show stopper were a pair of GIANT logs. This picture really isn’t doing it justice, but the carved out logs were stunning (and about 6′ long). I would imagine you would need a backhoe to get it into place, but it was really unexpected. Here they have actually planted some colorful lettuce w/ moss, ground cover and a few flowers. I’m not sure over the long term whether all of these plants would do well in the same amount of sunlight, but it was pretty cool.

After our little excursion we stopped over at Scott Arboretum to say ‘hi’ to the fish and so I could admire some of their amazing grounds.

In the front of their building they have quite a few containers in part shade. They have used a lot of perennials and they have done a beautiful job of picking ones with amazing texture and color. Above this coral bell (heuchera) had a silvery purple leaf. It was paired with a succulent and a small pine.

Another similar planter with more heuchera and a couple of blue pansy thrown in for added color.

This really makes me want to rethink some of my containers. Granted, both of these places have the advantage of greenhouses and staff to replace plants on a whim, but I will keep plugging away here. I like the idea of using small shrubs for a season and then putting them in the ground in the fall.

I hope all the Moms out there had a great Mother’s Day! When I envision my ideal Mother’s Day, I picture sitting around in the backyard sipping mimosas with Mr. S., while my kids happily play nearby. Of course reality is quite different, but I feel very fortunate to have such a wonderful family who I adore, temper tantrums and all.

We are making slow but steady progress in the bedroom. Mr. S. has left the critical path, but now we have an actual functioning ceiling fan complete with a ceiling medallion! I know that fans are often frowned upon in the design and blogger world, but for comfort and energy savings they are hard to beat.

Hampton Bay Vercelli Ceiling Fan in Brushed Steel, Home Depot $209

I also think this one is pretty good looking. It is definitely on the modern side, but I like it. Our cats are VERY suspicious and Spike won’t even come in the room, which is very unlike him. We also incorporated a ceiling medallion. Previously we added plaster ones in the Living Room and Kitchen but decided to give a lightweight urethane one a try this time. This is the Reece Ceiling Medallion from Architectural Depot, $24.45. I’ve never ordered from them before but the price was right and it shipped the same day I ordered it. It was easy to cut and Mr. S. was able to use longer screws on the ceiling fan bracket to make everything work with the added depth. I think the quality is pretty good and after some primer and ceiling paint I think you would be hard pressed to know the difference.The ceiling fan installation had a few small hiccups, but overall wasn’t too bad. I was going to have our contractor install it, but with the hot weather coming later this week, Mr. S. was growing very impatient. The wall control that comes with the unit is pretty fancy and so far works well. The light can even be dimmed. I give it the thumbs up! We may order the same one for the kids’ room.

Now onto the closet wall (i.e. the unfinished side of the room)…

The Ikea PAX unit is looming at the moment, but I think once we get doors and install the floor to ceiling curtains on the other side of the room, I think everything will balance out. As you can see we have installed one of the four units. The base on the right one is ready to go, but our AC guys are going to be running a duct to the right and I was afraid if I put it in, they wouldn’t be able to get it in, so I am holding off temporarily. Almost all of my clothes are now piled up in the closet, not quite a girl’s dream closet yet, but at least it has potential! I am going to start the bases for the middle tonight now that the old cabinet is empty and can be brought out to the garage. Then we should be able to empty out the playroom enough to allow the AC guy to get into the closet in there. As you can see it is all a giant puzzle, that gets harder and harder to solve as we move along.

I have to say that the PAX was pretty easy to put together. I wasn’t sure what to expect but it didn’t take very long and Ikea has a new plastic “tool” that helps you properly space the nails for the back piece. It is interesting that the pins for the closet shelves screw into place. Clearly the shelves and the rails help stabilize the unit. I wasn’t expecting that, but putting those in really tightened it up.

How was your weekend? Did you cross off anything from your to do list?

P.S. I will be back with an update from the Scott Arboretum Plant Exchange later this week. It was a lot of fun and my garden is a little bit fuller.

The garden is in peak spring lushness here. I shot these photos earlier this week. Since then we have had  a nice rain and everything is even greener! Almost all of the plants are out but the leaves haven’t had a chance to be eaten by bugs (or bunnies) or scorched by the summer sun. I thought I would highlight a few of my favorite pairings and plants for offering texture.

Above is a partial sun area of the garden. The Virginia Bluebells are still looking lovely, which I like for their nodding blue flowers, but also for their nice oval leaves. Here they are paired with a Rheingold Globe Arborvitae and hosta. I bought the Rheingold on clearance at Home Depot a couple of years ago. I had another one which didn’t make it, but if I find these again for a good price I will definitely pick a couple up. The color and texture are really nice and they only get to be about 30″. So far it has also kept its “globe” shape really well.

This image is in my partial shade garden back by the garage. I really like how the Golden Spiderwort ‘Sweet Kate’ brightens up the bed. It tends to die back in the hot weather, but for now I am really enjoying it. It is paired with a Japanese painted fern, forget-me-knots, geraniums.

Another spot in the same garden with more painted Japanese ferns, bleeding heart and caramel heuchera. In the back are the lovely tall ostrich ferns, hosta and toad lilies.

Our garden mascot, the blue goat along with some brunnera. You can see that the painted Japanese fern makes are reoccurring appearance in this bed.

I picked up this Peony (Paeonia Japonica) a couple of years ago at a plant sale. It prefers shade and is doing quite well in my shady side yard. The red stems are quite lovely with the large delicate flower.

I think my favorite tulip remains to be the Viridiflora variety. I like how this one pairs with the hosta. These also seem to be fine in this partial shade location (they just bloom a couple of weeks later than their sunny friends).

Lastly I wanted to highlight Euphorbia or spurge. I picked up mine at the Scott Arboretum plant exchange, where there always seems to be plentiful quantities.  It was one of those plants that I wasn’t that into but I was looking for something that would do well in deep shade under the pine tree and I also put some in a partial sun position as a filler plant. The sap is poisonous, so I have been careful to keep it behind other plants to minimize the chance that the kids will get near it. And the verdict, the one in deep shade hasn’t bloomed but did fine all last summer in the dry weather and the one in partial sun look like this! I am thinking I might pair it with the Virginia Bluebells, although it is a lot more aggressive than the bluebells and could overwhelm it.

This weekend is the Scott Arboretum Plant Exchange, one of my favorite events of the year. Who knows what beauties I will find this year. Stay tuned!

What is blooming in your garden?

P.S. My AC contractor is suppose to be here later today with the Air Handling Unit for the Third Floor. I am so excited!

Things are still a little crazy and stuff is piled up high in almost every room, but 3 walls in our bedroom are painted! Fortunately I really like the custom gray color (which is a modified Classic Silver from Behr Ultra). And the white trim is looking good! Part way through the priming I was regretting our decision to paint the stained window trim, because well primer looks like crap. But now that they have had a good coat of paint, they are looking nice. We definitely still need to do another layer of caulk (since there are weird little gaps all over the place thanks to 125 years of use and settling) but the room (at least on one side is starting to take shape). The ceiling trim and ceiling paint still need to go on (which will be by our contractor after the air conditioning goes in).

The wall color was originally inspired by a picture from a Martha Stewart magazine that I literally had taped to the wall for years. She calls it “graceful gray” and has it listed with sophisticated neutrals, so I will pretend for a minute that I exude sophistication. I do actually think it is a pretty good match to the inspiration, although I plan on having a lot more color mixed in.

So while one side of our room looks somewhat organized the other side is a giant mess! I did manage to finally start the bases for the Ikea PAX closet systems. We are going to add a shoe drawer below that will be built into the floor molding. This has been a careful balancing act, trying to fit a drawer while not making the closets too high and still leaving enough space for a duct above. Hopefully my AC contractor will agree when he gets here at the end of the week. These pieces took hours to get leveled and set. Nothing in my house is remotely level, but anywhere near the fireplace is even worse. This location is not only next to the main chimney but also sits partially on the fireplace box in the kitchen below.

I started by installing a level piece to the back wall. Since it is screwed to the wall I didn’t need to level it at the bottom (phew!). But the two pieces coming out (which will support the majority of the closet) had to be cut at an angle to work with the sloping floor and then carefully tweaked around uneven floor boards. It took a bunch of tries with the jigsaw (because for some reason our circular saw has gone missing), but they are finally in.  I also installed the blocking at the back and one piece on the front. I don’t know if you can see in this photo or not but the front 1×2 is level left to right. It is tight on the right and has over a 1/4″ gap on the left. Yikes! I am hoping that this is square and level enough that I will be able to make the drawer work. This is my first try at making a drawer from scratch, so we will see! I am leaning towards making the drawer with the Kreg pocket screw system and routing out for the drawer base. I figure if it is a complete bust I can order some pre-manufactured dovetail drawers.

My goal this week is to keep ahead of the AC guys, so we get the ducts in place, without compromising too much of our closet and ceiling spaces. Fingers crossed!

Our Master Bedroom may still look like a giant mess (fingers crossed we will get some paint on the walls this weekend), but I am making progress on selecting products for the space. I have the carpet, ceiling fan, fabric for the curtains and new bedside lamps, not to mention a bunch of Ikea closets in the garage. I decided it was time to update my mood board so I could show where it stands. I feel like we are finally getting close to the aesthetic that I was going for, even if it has been a couple of years in coming together.

Besides the new ceiling fan the other new items that arrived this week were a pair of lamps. I am quite smitten with them. I ordered them from Joss and Main and they are made by Krush a division of Luminance and called the Elle Table Lamp in satin gray. They are nice and tall but flat. They have a very Venturi feel to them, which is fitting sitting in front of the Best Panels. We were planning on using a more industrial looking lamp, but I actually think these will work out really well.

Another unexpected change is that the large metal panels for the behind the bed (from the Best Showroom) won’t fit like I thought they would. They have been sitting in the garage for about the last 8 years and I thought I had checked my measurements, but well I didn’t! Instead of 4 panels we are going to have 2 panels going vertical instead. I still like the abstract pattern (part of a flower) but now I have 2 more panels to find a home for (maybe outside?).

I still need to decide on a chair (the current one is a place holder). I also need to make the curtains, which I am not particularly looking forward to, but will hopefully go okay. I am going to order pleat tape, which should hopefully make the pleating part fairly straightforward.

I hope everyone has a lovely weekend! We are suppose to have lovely weather here, too bad I will be spending most of it inside.

Unfortunately I don’t have a whole lot of exciting stuff to show. You are welcome to come over and watch my primer dry if you like. The electrician has been working away and hopefully the AC contractor will start in the next week or two. My regular contractor is done until the AC contractor is finished. In the meantime though I needed to pick out a paint color for the hallway and a ceiling fan for the bedroom, and prime and paint the bedroom and hallway. The paint samples required 4 testers, but we have a winner! Cool Sky by Behr it is! I would say that it is a light gray blue. If left to choose by myself I would have chose something slightly darker, but since Mr. S. and I have to agree (and both live with it) this is what we are going with. One of the few downsides to my other half being an Art Director is that we spend a lot of time discussing color. The good thing is that we usually come to a consensus after a few rounds. The lights in the final space with be halogen and LED so the color should feel more blue and less gray once those are in (currently there is a sad incandescent bulb hanging in the hallway which give a yellow glow).

I am having a hard time getting a good picture of the color. It is less gray in person. And yes all of the trim in the hallway will eventually get painted. The white trim is pretty dingy looking at the moment.

So it is on to the Master Bedroom Ceiling Fan. We chose this one for the hallway:

Acqua Ceiling Fan in Bronze from Matthews Fan Company, purchased from Joss & Main but available at Lamps Plus

We had been planning on installing a silver colored fan for our room, but then I started to doubt my choice with the oil rubbed bronze in the hallway. I went on a long tangent of searching for the perfect fan (with a light) and in the end I pretty much ended where I started, but not quite. Clearly a Ceiling Fan Round Up is in order.

Acero Ceiling Fan by Minka Aire, $399 at YLighting

I first pinned this Acero fan over a year ago. I still like it and its slightly industrial vibe. The price was a little bit more then I wanted to spend, but given all of the ugly ceiling fans out there I was pretty much resigned to go with it until…

Hampton Bay Vercelli Ceiling Fan in Brushed Steel, Home Depot $209

I came across this almost identical one at Home Depot for half the price! The only difference I can find is that it has 5 blades instead of three and the blade shape looks slightly different. It is on its way now! It should be here tomorrow.  I am just relieved to cross this off my list. Hopefully I will like it in person!

Does anyone else have any ceiling fans to recommend?

While we were at Ikea ordering up our PAX closet system, we did a quick trip through the store (after all why not take advantage of the ballpit for a bit). I wasn’t on the search for anything in particular, but I saw some really cute summer accessories that I couldn’t resist. How cute are these summer items? So colorful! My favorite are the flamingo cups ($1 a piece).

Here is a breakdown of some inexpensive summer accessories that I picked up and a few more that I considered:

Barbar Square Tray, Ikea $6.99

Sommarkul Striped Dish Towel, Ikea $2.99

Sommarflint Flamingo Glass, Ikea $1

Frasig Pear Paper Napkin, Ikea $1.49 for 30

Sinja Gingham Dish Towel, Ikea $5.99 for 2

Rotera Lantern for Tealights, Ikea $3.99

Blomster Glass Lantern Ikea, $16.99

I didn’t pick up this large glass lantern, but it was really nice in person. I need to think of how I could use it before I can justify picking it up.

Has anyone picked out any cute accessories from Ikea lately?

P.S. Our closets are in the garage waiting to be assembled. Pretty exciting! Now please try and excuse my dusty wrinkled clothes for a couple more weeks while we get our room together.

Things have been moving along quickly here! I feel like a GC coordinating all of the trades. It may not look like much but we are one step closer to air conditioning. My electrician should be done with the new sub panels for the air conditioning and third floor today (Yeah!) Our bedroom ceiling is also drywalled (No more cracks!) and there is even an electrical box waiting for a ceiling fan. By the weekend we should be able to paint 3 sides of our bedroom and actually start putting a few things back. I actually need to order all of the stuff that I have been busy pinning on Pinterest for the past year including a couple of ceiling fans and barn door hardware. I also need to head over to Ikea to order the closets (fortunately the kids are more than willing to go to the “ball pit” any time).

Try and picture the future Ikea PAX Closets and custom doors. There is still some bits to figure out, like whether I want to install a laundry drawer, but you can get the general idea. Fortunately I can put in the closets before ordering the doors, so I can tweak everything. I am also planning on installing drawers in the baseboard for shoe storage. If all goes well I might be able to start installing the blocking for it this weekend.

I think the biggest surprise for us after our contractor finished demolition was how open the space felt after taking the tiny closet out. I now wish I had done that years ago, since it was generally useless in its old configuration. Of course we will be filling that in again, but this time with a much taller unit that I think will feel much better in the space.

Does anyone have any advice on installing PAX closets? Anything you like or don’t like about them? 

I guess all it takes sometimes is a week of warm weather to get everything growing! This past week has been pretty epic in terms of how fast everything has grown and started flowering. We also managed to finally install the vintage chimney pot in the garden. I am planning on putting some sort of pot on top, although I haven’t found anything suitable yet. We found a date of 1916 on the top. In the meantime I will spend my time imagining the big chimney that this sat on.

Lungwort (Pulmaria) ‘Majeste’

My lungwort has been blooming like crazy. It could actually use some dividing. I love the mix of blue and purple flowers on the ‘majeste’ variety. The whiteness of the leaves is also nice later in the season. The only downside is that when you transplant them, they are really unhappy for a few months. By the fall they usually are regrowing nice new leaves, but they spend the summer looking half dead.

Virginia Bluebell

The Virginia Bluebells have a similar flower to the lungwort, but are quite a bit larger. These are a favorite of mine. They have been slowly expanding in several clumps in my side garden (in part-sun). They leaves are a really nice vivid green and I really like that they are a native plant.

Trillium

Another native that I actually planted at the same time as the bluebells is the trillium. Both of these were planted as ridiculously small root stock that took a full year to come up (I had actually abandoned all hope). The trillium is really a lovely little jewel in the shade garden. They don’t last very long, once the heat of the summer sets in they will disappear until next year. The leaves on the trillium are really quite beautiful.  I bought both of these on ebay from a place in Tennessee (whose name escapes me). There appear to be several sellers now selling the Trillium and Virginia Bluebells.

Another shade plant that has shown up out of no where are my Bleeding Hearts. They were literally a few inches tall last week and now the larger ones are over 18″ high with flowers. I don’t usually choose pink flowers, but I will always make an exception for these shade loving plants. Mine have also grown large enough to divide and I have been adding them to several of my planting beds.

Kerria Japonica with Lunwort ‘Majeste’ below

Finally I would be remiss if I didn’t mention my Kerria Japonica. It is a bit of a weed (it sends out little runners) but it gives such a good show this time of year. I like to cut it back a little bit later in the spring, but right now I am enjoying this at both my back gate and side gate. This plant will grow in almost full sun to shade. The only down side of the sun location is that the flowers bleach out.

What is blooming in your yard?

To take a peak at all of my garden blooms click here.

I have a little weekend update. Our house decided to give us a couple of little presents this week.  These are both thanks to our contractor, who uncovered these gems. Above is what appears to be an insurance policy cover. It reads “Connecticut Fire Insurance Co. Hartford. Henry W. Brown & Co. Agents, 505 Chestnut Street, Philadelphia”. Given it appearance it looks to me like it dates to around the time the house was built. There was a little bit of writing on the back which unfortunately is totally illegible now. This was found in the pocket door pocket. Needless to say it was a pretty cool find. So I was really surprised when he dropped off an even cooler surprise on Friday.

This is a postcard from Harrisburg (Bird’s Eye View No. 3 of Circle of City Iron Steel Pipe) addressed to Mrs. C. G. Grayer living in our house and postmarked April 25, 1913 (exactly 100 years ago next week). The card is in remarkably good condition. It was behind a piece of baseboard in our bedroom. The baseboard did a nice job of keeping in flat and out of the sunlight.

It is pretty difficult to make out the handwriting but Verde is living here with her family. It is pretty strange to think about the number of families that have lived here over the years. I would love to spend a day in the house back in its early years.

I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend!