Why I Oughta...

I've lusted after the green Versailles Orangerie planter boxes that you see all over Paris filled with trees in gardens and parks.  I've posted about them a couple of times here on the blog and even thought about trying to make one on my own .  While were were trouncing around Paris this Summer, we certainly saw the original ones with upright wood slats.  But, I also was tuned into a new version: made from metal.   Here, below, is one of them I saw on a side street in Paris.  It has a scrubby tree/shrub in it, but feels fairly underplanted. And, below, are pair of them (unplanted as well) in the park leading to the Eiffel Tower.    A closer look inside these shows they are two-piece containers with an interior 'cage' that seems it can be 'lifted out' (see the corner hooks below).  I'm guessing that two-piece setup is intended for Winter as they can leave the planter in place, but take the tree to the Orangerie for overwintering.  The other thing (see below)

All this social distancing and being on quarantine has me putting together a lumber delivery from the fine folks at Menards.  Or...at least assuming that *if* I put a lumber order in that they will deliver it.  The list of 'essential' jobs and stores includes hardware stores, so I'm thinking that they're open? There are a few projects that I included in my 2020 to-do list including a raised planter or a Versailles box.   With all the time spent at home, I've also added another project or two to my list:  a garden obelisk and a boardwalk.  More on both of those at some point. Today, I'm thinking - once again - about the Versailles planter box that we first saw at Luxembourg Gardens in Paris .   Why?  Because I recently came across this photo on Instagram that features a couple of the Orangerie boxes: View this post on Instagram Love this pair of Versailles boxes, with their wonderful metal topia

Yesterday, I posted about how after seeing the French gardeners use cocoa bean shell hull mulch in the gardens and beds in Luxembourg Gardens, I decided to try the stuff myself.  But, it wasn't just the mulch that made an impression on me during our visit.  So, too, did these large green tree containers.  They are all over Luxembourg Gardens and other parks/gardens.  They're really quite striking. A little digging on the Web and I discover that they're actually called Château de Versailles tree-boxes.  There are a couple of sources that offer them.  But...brace yourself, they're not cheap. What looked initially to me like wooden boxes turn out to be cast iron frames with wooden slats that make up the sides.  The corners and braces are all cast iron.  See here below: Photo via Jardin du Roi Soleil - this is their photo and product .   If you've been following along on the blog, you might have seen the little planter box that I made for Natalie for our p

The photo above is from the plans at Gardener's World that were our inspiration Back in April of this year, I published a list of seven additional or addendum items in my Spring/Summer To-Do List that included: "Work out the patio container situation" .  We had a hodgepodge of containers in our back patio and Nat wanted to do something about it.  She shared a few photos of planters that she liked and we came across this plan from Gardener's World that featured a simple timber planter .  You can see it above and how it features a two-tiered planter with three sections. After noodling it a bit and altering the plans a little, we ended up trying our own hand at making a similar patio planter.    Off I went to Menards and I ended up coming home with a van full of 2x3's of treated lumber. That 'altering' of the plans included Nat's decision to lop off the top level and just make it a flat-topped planter.  Here's how it ended up: Because I

Right before we went out of town for a few days recently, I gathered all of our patio containers and put them together in order to assist the watering - which was being done by one of our neighborhood kids.  I snapped this photo of all of them in one spot to text to Nat to share with the girl's Mom so she knew what needed to be watered, but I figured I'd post it here to mark what our patio containers looked like in July of this year. In the far back, in the yellow pot 1 you can see the Chicago-hardy fig tree 2 that my Sister Vic and Equation Boy/Man gave me for my birthday this year.  Right in front of that is one of my wine barrel planters with a grapevine 3 growing on the trellis.  That's also the pot that has the Lemon Coral Sedum growing in it . In front of that wine barrel, but mostly obscured is my large basil plant.  It is sharing a pot with one of my Elephant Ears .  Then, buried under the foliage is the other wine barrel planter.  That's this one wi

I've been chasing a cast iron urn/planter (or pair of urns/planters) for the better part of six months.  And now, I've acquired one.  This one fit the sweet spot between price and looks and came from a gardener in LaGrange that had upgraded to a different set of planters on either side of her stoop.  This thing is HEAVY and as you can see on the base, it sunk into the ground.  Due to the weight, I'm not sure where, exactly, this is going to end up.  Maybe in front.  Maybe in back.  That's for Nat to direct in terms of where we want it to live.  One thing is certain:  I'll fill it with flowers as soon as I can this Spring. 

We have two containers on the driveway that we're planting tomatoes in this year - instead of the usual raised bed garden that we had at our old place - and this is one of the varieties:  Chocolate Sprinkles Hybrid Cherry Tomato.   An heirloom, this isn't.   We picked them up at the Home Depot on North Avenue and let the girls pick out their own plants.  One of them picked these.  Guessing it was the name.   From the Bonnie site , it says this is new for 2016: This cherry tomato has it all: good looks, great flavor, heavy yields, and disease resistance. Bite-sized, cherry-type fruits are beautifully colored — red striped with dark green — that explode with rich, robust flavor. This highly productive plant forms its fruit in clusters, and starts bearing early in the season. We'll report back on the harvest through the season, but I'm hoping that they'll survive the driveway conditions.