Posts Tagged ‘DIY’

At this point in the season, many of your gardens are past full boom. Leaving these shrubs and flowers can offer many benefits. There is a natural beauty and texture to dried or faded flowers that adds a unique and rustic charm to your garden. Keep them even through the winter for visual interest when many other plants have gone dormant or lost their leaves. Birds will feed on seeds from dried flower heads—a very important source of food for our flying friends. Dried flower heads in your garden will […]

I’ve always admired prickly pear cactus for its distinctive paddle spikes, bright red buds, and showy yellow flowers. There are 181 different species. Opuntia is a perennial shrub with waxy skin. The cactus thrives in sandy soil and dry conditions. It grows wild in arid areas in the south and southwest. Opuntia is indigenous to the Americas. Pear cactus is a domesticated crop plant grown and harvested throughout the world. Right now is the plant’s growing season and when you see “baby paddles” forming. This is the ideal time to propagate. I’ve never grown prickly […]

  When most of us hear the word oranges, we think of Florida but I think about the hills of Sicily. Blood orange trees grow robustly around Mount Etna between Messina and Catania. This region is known as a microclimate. The soil is fertile and the weather is dry. But what makes this environment so unique is the volcanoes’ impact on temperature. It increases the air temperature during the day and in the evening, it drops just below freezing for one hour only. This sudden daily change is necessary to […]

I’ve been to the Rockaway Hotel many times for rooftop cocktails, seasonal markets and for dinner and luncheons. The food is top-notch and the cocktails are 5-star. Whenever I walk in the door, I feel like I’m in Manhattan for the evening, yet I’m only 10 minutes from home! Last week I signed up for my first experience at the hotel – a wreath-making class hosted by Amy Febinger. Amy is a floral designer living and working in Rockaway. She creates beautiful sculptural arrangements for all occasions including weddings, corporate […]

It’s funny how I’ve been thinking about citrus fruits lately and it’s almost winter. I was preparing my bath of fruits and herbs the other night. While slicing up the lemon, I remembered that my friend Jodi posted a picture of dried fruit Christmas ornaments last year on her instagram account. They looked beautiful. I wanted to try this! I called Jodi and got some pro tips and creative crafting ideas. Below are the directions for this holiday craft. DIY Fruit Ornaments Supplies: Knife Cutting board Baking sheet Parchment paper or wax […]

While I loathe the term “self-care” I’ve been attempting – during this off-season – to hit the reset button. For once, I’m realizing I need to focus on my mental and physical health. I’ve been taking baths almost every night. Sometimes I log off and leave my phone out of reach. This is proving to be a challenge. More times than not, I set up the laptop on the toilet seat cover and watch nature documentaries while floating in the warm bathwater. There was a great YouTube video on ant […]

When did coconut oil become so popular? My jar ran out after a long three months and I realize now how much I use it. Besides cooking delicious Indian foods, or using it in place of butter and shortening, coconut oil has so many other uses. First the obvious. Raw organic coconut oil is wonderful as a skin care product. A 16 oz. jar is around $5.00. Using the oil as a moisturizer is less expensive than buying those fancy over-marketed creams and lotions, which often use coconut oil as […]

Previously published in The Wave. For the past four years, our backyard has been a renovation dumping ground. Now that the house is essentially done, we wanted to clean things up and start the backyard garden for the summer. In April, I watched this awesome show on Netflix called Love Your Garden. It’s hosted by Alan Titchmarsh, a professional English gardener, poet and gardening journalist turned TV personality. Alan and his quirky, knowledgeable team visits homes around the United Kingdom helping people transform their gardens. The families are deserving, having […]

It’s mid-April: the time to slip out after dusk with your trowels, rakes, plants and seeds. If heavy rain is in the forcast, get prepared to launch your green grenades over your shoulder on the way to work. What? I’m talking about guerrilla gardening, planting in places that need a little love and wouldn’t otherwise get it– abandoned lots, under the el, unkempt street medians, every tree pit on the blvd. past 90th st. Rockaway Beach is the perfect target, and the result is aesthetically pleasing, enhanced public spaces, not […]

I had two ideas – not original because people do this all the time but nonetheless I wanted to share them on the blog. The first is using a kombucha bottle (which I love the shape of) to store salt. I cook a lot as you know. Having the salt right by the stove is convenient. Putting it in a nice bottle means I can leave it out and it will look nice. Eventually I will do this with all my spices! Make sure to put a few grains of rice in the […]