New Rocking Chair
Last Monday at my lunch hour I ran over to Rabbit Creek, a great new antique mall in Tallahassee, and bought a rocking chair and footstool I’d had my eye on for a while. The owner of the booth where I found the chair was …
Author: Leslie Kimel
Doctor’s Cabinet
On Saturday I made a new improvement to the back bedroom. When Rob went out to get his hair cut, I ran up to Bainbridge, Georgia, and bought an old doctor’s cabinet I’d seen at Sharon House Antiques. Bainbridge is a little town 20 miles …
A New Birdbath
For years I’d been bothered by a certain little spot in the yard, a weedy, unkempt area at the base of the giant spruce pine that grows by the living room windows. Every time I’d walk past it, I’d say to myself, “Boy, that looks terrible.” So finally, two Fridays ago, I went to Tallahassee Nurseries and spent my birthday gift card on a cute little granite birdbath to help gussy up the place.
I bought the birdbath on my lunch hour while dressed in my very uncomfortable office clothes. (Yep, I’m back at the office now, after two and a half years at home.) It was burning hot at the nursery, and I had to load a 100-pound birdbath into my car while wearing business attire. Ha ha, I really wanted that birdbath!
As soon as I got home that evening, I started setting up the birdbath under the spruce pine. I weeded the whole area (it was full of small-leaf spiderwort, a horrible invasive), then leveled a spot for the birdbath. The birdbath looked so cute when I got it into place. With its short stature and chubby stem, it kind of reminded me of a mushroom.
At this point, the area under the spruce pine was neat (weed free) and featured an adorable birdbath. But it needed some color—there was nothing around the birdbath but some old brown leaf mulch. So on Monday, at my lunch hour again, I went back to the nursery and got five hot-pink pentas. I came home that evening and planted them, then mulched the area with fresh, fragrant pine bark nuggets.
I decided five pentas were not enough. I needed five more. So I returned to the nursery at my next opportunity. I planted the five additional pentas on Saturday morning (yesterday), really early, before the sun was even up.
The yard was dewy and cool, and as I was heading back to the garage for some snippers, I saw the most magical sight: twin fawns making their way together through the backyard to the woods that lie behind it. I peeked around the side of the garage to watch them (they were spotted and delicate) until they disappeared, like ghosts or angels, among the trees. I never saw their mother, but she must have been close by.
I felt tingly and excited when I went back to my work, as though I’d just witnessed a miracle—which, of course, I had. The world is so full of wonders. I floated some dew-studded roses in the new birdbath and was quite content now with my little spot under the spruce pine.
Another Look at the Pond Garden
I wanted to show you a few more pictures of my pond garden. This is a garden I’ve really struggled to get right. Rob and I built the pond in 2010, and I’ve been working on the surrounding garden ever since. The garden is contained …
Our Latest Garden Bed
In October 2017 Rob and I started developing our latest garden bed—a large curving area under the giant pecan tree in the backyard. For years this new bed looked rather awkward and scrawny, with lots of bare spots and weedy spots, but recently it’s had …
Star Jasmine Time Machine
I’d like to introduce you to one of my favorite plants—star jasmine (Trachelospermum jasminoides), a fast-growing woody vine with evergreen leaves and, now, in late spring, loads of small, white, pinwheel-shaped flowers. Star jasmine is lovely to look at, but the real reason you’ll want to grow it is its intoxicating perfume, which is rich and, well, positively delicious, with its hint of vanilla.
The fragrance is so nostalgic for me. When I was a kid, star jasmine grew along the rail of our back porch and scented the whole backyard. It was heavenly. My Barbie doll had a glamorous white fake-fur stole, and I thought that the blooming jasmine, glowing pale in the twilight, looked like a giant version of the stole as it cloaked the porch rail.
The star jasmine bloomed in May, and its fragrance was like a sort of soundtrack (or scent track) that accompanied the magical, exciting days at the end of the school year. Its special smell was in the air as the pace of life slowed down, so pleasantly, for the summer, as the rules loosened up, as the weight of homework began to lift and my sister Kris and I had more time to play after school. Fresh from our baths, we’d venture out into the warm twilight in our nightgowns.
I don’t know why I loved playing outside in my nightgown so much, but I did. Maybe it was because my nightgown was prettier than my usual clothes and I could pretend it was a fairy’s dress. Kris and I would run and “fly” in our nightgowns. We’d chase fireflies, sip honeysuckle nectar, and jump with the little red-striped froghoppers that dwelled in the grass. And all around us was the haunting, bewitching scent of star jasmine.
I planted star jasmine in my current yard because its fragrance never fails to take me back to the happiest days of my childhood, when summer vacation was just around the corner. I also planted it in hopes that it would enchant my little niece as it had enchanted me. I wanted it to be a part of her childhood too.
Near the front steps of the house, my star jasmine grows on an arch at the head of a stone path. A twining vine, it was easy to train on the arch. It climbed right up. I snip at it once or twice a year to keep it from veering off the arch and into the trees. It’s fast growing but (luckily) not too aggressive.
Aside from the occasional pruning, my star jasmine requires nothing from me. It doesn’t seem to be bothered by pests or diseases, and I never water or fertilize it. This carefree plant is happy in sun or shade and in all kinds of soils. Though it’s native to southern China and Japan, it’s quite at home in Florida. It doesn’t like the cold though, and is only hardy to Zone 8 on the USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map.
If it will grow in your area, I think you should plant star jasmine for your children or grandchildren (or any young people you love). It’s sure to delight them and linger long in their memories.
Brick Project Update
For the past year, I’ve been working on outlining all my garden beds with bricks. I dig a trench around each bed, sink the bricks about halfway into the soil, and arrange them in a sawtooth pattern. The bricks add a nice, tidy edge to …
Back Bedroom Edits and Improvements
I’ve been trying to improve the back bedroom again. Everywhere I’ve ever lived, I’ve enjoyed decorating the bedrooms most of all. I had a great bedroom when I was a kid, and I think I’m always trying to re-create the charm of that first place …
Decorating Spree
Last Friday after work, I embarked on a little decorating spree that lasted through Saturday evening.
Around noon that day (Friday, I mean), I received in the mail a pair of vintage McCoy wall pockets—two sunny yellow ceramic flowers that I’d ordered off eBay. I was very excited. As soon as my workday was over (I’m still working from home), I ran into the sunroom to hang them in the gaps between three gold-framed photos under our big dragon-boat carving on the main wall. I’d been pondering those gaps for months, wondering how to fill them.
After the cheery wall pockets were up, I cleaned the whole sunroom from top to bottom. I even dug out some fun vases to add a bit of pizzazz to the bare marble table by the back door. But when I ran outside to gather flowers for the vases, I fell into a familiar predicament: I couldn’t bring myself to pick even one! I ended up making bouquets of anise leaves instead. Ha! It never fails; I always feel too sorry for my flowers to disturb them.
The decorating continued on Saturday, which saw me up before dawn making improvements to the back bedroom. Earlier in the week I’d bought an antique spool cabinet at Memory Lane Antiques in Tallahassee, and it was waiting patiently in my closet for setup. I got it into position on top of the chest by the door and started filling its six little drawers with various thrift-shop treasures—a celluloid fan, a rhinestone brooch, a beaded coin purse, etc. Then I rearranged all the room’s pictures and knickknacks, which was very satisfying, like working a puzzle. I cleaned the whole room, then moved on to the breezeway.
The breezeway was so filthy that I had to enlist Rob’s help in the cleaning. The main reason the breezeway gets so dirty is that it’s our cats’ favorite hangout—and, as Rob says, only partly joking, “cats are disgusting.”
We mopped and scrubbed for about four hours as Rob sang a modified version of “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” substituting the names of our nine cats for the names of the reindeer. When the floor was finally clean and dry, we unrolled a colorful new rag rug that I’d ordered off Amazon. We’d moved all the furniture outside when we started cleaning, and we gave it all a good washing and/or dusting before moving it back in. Then we dressed up our rickety table with a brand-new tablecloth.
The cats had been hiding during all the ruckus of cleaning, but now they emerged to check out the new rug. They loved it. They rolled on it. They scratched it. They curled up on it. They napped on it. Every single cat in the house had to try out the new rug.
“Aww, there’s nothing like a new rug, is there, babies?” Rob said.
I asked, “Did I do a good job with my purchase, kittens?”
Leroy replied in the affirmative by rolling onto his back on the rug and exposing his cute, pink, peach-like tummy.
As Rob petted him, I went out to pick more of my dumb, flower-less anise bouquets. I had quite a few vases to fill on the breezeway.
