Spring, it's heavenly!

It's official, it's spring! And here in the deep south it's already feeling like the dog days of summer. I definitely am NOT looking forward to the 100+ degree temps but I can't lie, I'm loving the weather now.

Josh and I planted an organic garden recently and it's taking off! I'm looking forward to having some fresh veggies in the near future. If you want to stay chemical free look into companion planting, we set up our garden like this and have had ZERO pests in our garden! It's amazing and we have chemical free produce to munch on all season.

Try companion planting for a chemical free and pest free organic garden

We have also enjoyed trying new types of gardening like for example growing pineapples, potatoes and tomatoes from their actual fruit. The tomatoes were actually an accident, they started coming up in our compost from an old tomato!

Left: Pinapple plant, Right: Sweet Potato, Bottom: Tomatoes from compost

Some other oddities around the Wright lake house is none other than LIZARDS. These guys are everywhere down here and I have to admit it took me a while to get used to them hopping around. The great thing is that I have hardly any bugs, which is amazing especially since we live on a huge lake.

These guys stay full and keep the creepy crawly bugs and mosquitoes off of me. I have grown to love them for that reason alone :) Even the ugly one is kinda cute when he sits on the mushroom and listens to the gnome's stories...

 

It's so nice to see everything in bloom, it rejuvenates my soul. I think I have come to realize that heaven in my mind is being surrounded by none other than plants, animals and pretty furniture. Random? Well, it is my heaven not yours :)

Plants...

My little herb garden

These bulbs were from my grandmother, she got them in Mexico

Sunflowers are about to pop..the birds love them!

I heart Hostas.

Our little front patio where we sit and look out over the lake

Animals...

 

Emma and Blue (aka the "kids"). I love how Blue (and his dirty nose) is sleeping standing up. Hard life!

These two go at it every morning on my dock..I have no idea what they are fighting about!

Pretty furniture...

My neighbor recently did a trade with me..I got these two circa 1930's beauties! Above is the bar cabinet

Circa 1930's china curio..gorgeous! Try trading with a friend, you'll be surprised what they want to get rid of!

See how I wrapped all of that up nicely? :) What is your idea of heaven? What would it include?

-Rach

Country Living

Pumpkin picking in a local patch

My canned pickled okra!

Blue LOOOVES the cotton field beside our house (not that you can tell or anything)

Get it HERE

Over the past few months I have been getting used to this new life called living in the middle of NOWHERE. It has had its up's and down's but altogether it has taught me quite a bit. I'm learning things like how to can and preserve food from my sweet 70 something neighbor, what processes it takes to prepare land to be farmed and how to live in a town that still lives off of roadside veggie stands and really lives off of it's own land and agriculture.

Yes, it has been quite a learning experience and with that comes a step back from technology (as you may have noticed) and me being a bit more removed from TV and computer. It has been altogether refreshing. I seriously suggest everyone do it for a bit, just to step back and learn things that you can't get from a web article or TV. You would be amazed at what you get from it. At first you might go through a "guilt" phase just because you feel as if the innerweb needs you (especially if you write a blog or are an avid Facebooker), but once you get past that you really start to see clearly. I definitely had a few weeks of "Are you ok? I just noticed you haven't been posting, tweeting, etc ."(Which in this day I guess means one is clearly unstable or having a secret life crisis??) It is sad, actually.

With this awakening of Josh and my back-to-basics life we have been on this kick of wanting to buy a mini-farm and live more self-sufficiently. If you're wanting to learn how to do anything from keeping a one acre farm to harvesting and storing food to keeping bees to making your own wine I HIGHLY suggest a book we have been reading called The Self-Sufficient Life And How To Live It by John Seymour, it's amazing!

I'm not a good farmer.

A few months ago I decided I was going to be a serious farmer. I gathered my veggies and tended to my lil crops day in and day out. Then summer hit. And I sort of let my farmer skills fall by the waist side. I did however, manage to somehow bonsai my tomato plant, so I feel like I DID in fact, accomplish something.

P.S. The tomatoes pictured above all came from the same plant. Over time they just kept shrinking! Oops. 

Hail Storm

Five days ago, a hail storm made its way upon our little Auburn plains. It was so quick and so unexpected, my poor little garden barely made it. Spring storms in the south are so unpredictable this time of year...bringing in the plants every other night is really starting to get to us!

How's the weather in your area right now? I wanna know!

P.S. How cute is the garden mushroom that my gnome sits under? The hubs made it!

Citrus peels to start your seedlings

Who would have ever thunk it? Apparently any citrus peel ( including lemons!) works great as little starter containers for your baby plants. Just make sure you put a tiny hole in it for drainage. Voila!

Image via My Roman Apartment

Before & After: Our new garden!

Before (Yuck!)





After!



Lighting added to enjoy our new backyard!

As I said here, things have been very busy at the house of Wright getting ready for spring. We have baby birds singing in the backyard and the plants are growing like crazy with the warm weather we've been having.

We decided to take the few extra days I had off from work to make a butterfly garden and to plant a multitude of veggies in giant planters all over our deck. It was such a fun project and turned out much better than we had planned!

We turned on some island calypso music, made piña coladas and gardened all day in the hot sun; It was the perfect ending to our spring break vacay.

What have you been doing lately to prepare for spring? I wanna know!

Tree Homes

Redwoods Treehouse Restaurant, New Zealand (By Pacific Environments Architects)

O2 Treehouse

Kadir's Tree House/Hostel, Southern Turkey (By Jon Rawlinson, Flickr)

Kobayashi Takashi Beach Rock Resort (By Wikimedia Commons)

How AH-MAZING are these tree houses? They're definitely not something that I was found playing around in as a kid!

I must apologize for being little absent lately, we were all over the place last week and to top it off, got a wild hair to build a veggie and a butterfly garden the day we got back (insanity?!). I'll post pics in the next few days– they turned out much better than we had planned!

Branch Out

How cute are these organic kitchen towels? I must have one hanging from the rack in my kitchen pronto. I just love strong graphics like these..so simple and classic.You can find them ( and alot of other fun stuff) HERE.