I spent the day at the Los Angeles County Arboretum last week attending the L.A. Garden Show and touring the display gardens and marketplace there. I was impressed with some clever succulent planters that were created by a group of Arboretum volunteers using re purposed natural materials like palm fronds and hollowed tree stumps. (The ideas people come up with when they have a lot of garden debris to dispose of!)

This Queen Palm frond was planted two months ago. A hole was drilled in the back of it to secure a hook for hanging . A “planting bag” constructed from chicken wire was fit into the frond cavity and filled with sphagnum moss, cactus mix, coco fibers and shredded newspapers and closed with wire.

Close up of chicken wire mesh that holds the succulents in the palm frond.

Arboretum volunteer Beverly Harris happily poses beside the hanging succulent bag and succulent chair planters that her group of volunteers made to sell at the garden show. Beverly said that the frond succulent bag took over 15 hours to make and they used chopsticks to gently insert each succulent cutting into the moistened planting media.

I’ve seen lots of old tree stumps used as tables, but I love the way it looks as a planter for these succulents!

My raised vegetable bed is in germination and growing mode with all my favorite lettuces, heirloom tomatoes, squashes, sugar snap peas, curry, chayote and more! Next to gardening, I love to cook and I can’t wait to see the first set of leaves burst through my 2″ layer of mulch. I’m not the only one waiting though …

I set out some whimsical sheep and geese garden ornaments to give me something to look at while I wait for my culinary babies. The birds are scared of the ornaments too, so I have a built in scarecrow. What luck!

Take a look.

“Mother Goose” waits on my Persian baby cucumbers called, “Green Fingers” from Renee’s Garden to sprout. I looked high and low for these small, crunchy cucumbers that are usually found only in farmers markets.

This sheep was cheap! Only $2 dollars at the market in the “Easter Decor” clearance bin. How do you like my wooden spoon plant marker? I planted “Runway Arugula” also from Renee’s Garden. It is supposed to be slightly less tangy than regular Arugula, but same peppery taste!

The sheep decor straddle my “square foot” wood dividers. Have you read the book, “Square Foot Gardening” by Mel Bartholomew? It is a clever planting method for intensive and effective yield of maximum vegetables in small square foot garden areas!

A few weeks later when the veggies and herbs start to grow, the sheep and geese look like they are in a foraging field! As for me, I am in heaven.

Chris Hassell is a multi talented and multi tasking, Epcot landscape architect.

 I learned  a lesson about asking for help while I was in Florida last weekend at the Epcot International Flower and Garden Festival.  It was a thrill to be asked to speak at this iconic horticultural venue on “Art in the Garden,” because as far as I’m concerned, Disney has a major corner on artistic expression be it “imagineering” or “plantineering.”  Unfortunately, my excitement turned to  horror as I realized that I could not open my slide presentation  on my laptop and show-time was less than 24 hours away!

Apparently, the Power Point presentation that I had laboriously created on my office computer was not saved in a format that my laptop could open or read.  I spent hours keying in the same commands like a zombie, but nothing worked! 

My husband returned to the hotel room from his “Magic Kingdom” outing and found me pulling my hair out and talking to myself.

“What’s wrong?” my husband Larry asked.

“My slide presentation isn’t working and I’m ruined and  I will never be asked to speak at Epcot again!” the words flew out of my mouth like projectile vomit. 

“Calm, down, calm down Shirley….tell me exactly what’s wrong?” he asked in his most calm “Mr. Rogers” voice

“I don’t know what’s wrong.  The presentation worked when I tested it at home, but now it doesn’t.” I cried.

“Why don’t you call the show coordinator, Debbie Mola  and ask her to help you find a “tech person” who can help you?” he advised, always the practical person. 

“What, and tell her my presentation isn’t working so that she’ll  think I’m unprofessional, start worrying  and never ask me to come back?” I responded in an emotional tizzy.

“Stop, Shirley. Professionaldoesn’t mean, perfect….technical problems happen all the time. You think you’re the first speaker with slide show problems? Call her right now or you will have real problems come tomorrow when you have no slide show!”

I knew Larry was right, but I felt embarrassed because I wanted to come in as “Ms. Polished Presenter“  and make a great first impression. When I made the call, Debby was very gracious and  promised to have someone help me within the hour. 

Almost immediately, Chris Hassell,  a landscape architect at Epcot, (who happens to be a  computer wiz)  was at my door. Poor Chris, he had to endure my long-winded drama story. In contrast, his answer was short and positive.

“I can fix it. Do you have a copy of the presentation on a memory stick?” he asked

“I do.” I answered handing it to him.

“This has happened a few times with some of our speakers and I know what the problem is exactly. I’ll have this up and running for you in a few minutes,” Chris reported.

I was so worked up that it was hard to accept Chris’s word that he could fix the problem. Chris’s calm demeanor and confident approach won me over. He explained to me what I had done wrong and showed me how to avoid the problem again in the future. A few keystrokes later, and the slide show was up and running! I came back to life!

It’s funny how the situation seemed so insurmountable to me, but just computer 101to someone like Chris who knew what he was doing. The lesson I learned was that there is always someone out there who understands what seems arcane to me and can do a better job fixing a problem than  I can.

My slide show scare also brought a new appreciation for my own work as a landscape  designer and gardening coach. I realized that even though  some of the information I dispense to clients and television viewers may seem basic to me, it might be exactly what they need to know to solve their gardening dilemma. Just the thought that I could be a hero to them, like Chris was for me, brought a smile to my face and a confidence to go out and share my information with the world, with or without a slide-show!

Landscape designer and television host, Shirley Bovshow

Are you guilty of committing crimes against your landscape? Find out what not to do before you dig into the dirt and your pocketbook!  Watch landscape designer Shirley Bovshow weigh in along with a group of nationally recognized gardening and design experts on HGTV’s “25 Biggest Landscaping Mistakes” on Sunday, April 13, 2008 at  2 PM PT and 5 PM ET.

From excessive garden ornaments, to “irrational irrigation” decisions to underestimating the cost of your future landscape, there will be issues that we can all relate to. Watch and then let me know your thoughts!

One of the segments I included in my “10-Ways to Incorporate Art In Your Garden”presentation at the Epcot International Flower and Garden Festival was on creative mulch ideas. Gardeners  know that top dressing garden soil with mulch is an effective step in conserving soil moisture and retarding weed growth. That’s all good, but I want my mulch to beautify my garden as well. Here are some ideas for “out of the box” mulch ideas that put some common collectible items to work in the garden.

If you collect seashells or sea glass, take it out of that coffee can or glass jar in your book cases and use it as a decorative mulch in one of your container gardens! Ornamental grasses become “wild dune grasses” when given this topping. Use weed cloth between the soil and shells to keep the shells from becoming buried in the soil after watering.

Wine drinkers- re-purpose wine corks as mulch in a fragrant culinary herb garden instead of throwing them away. “If you are going to be a lush, you might as well have a lush garden!” DesignerPeter Crompton shared this idea with me.

See your favorite vintage? This is a great conversation piece.

A common jade plant looks like a horticultural sculpture in this glazed cobalt container and vivid orange tumbled glass mulch and glass rock. Give your plant a year-round display with decorative mulches. You can also use broken ceramic, hand painted tiles, nut shells, and other material that will not rot or break down with water.

This  ”Living Tapestry”  succulent pillow” was created by Shirley Bovshow

My eyes are ready to close as I put the finishing touches on my presentation on “10-Ways to Incorporate Art in Your Garden,” for the the Epcot International Flower and Garden Festival  this weekend. I’m going to miss posting on my blog and sharing with my faithful readers while I’m away, so I decided to give you  “sneak preview” of one of the art pieces I created for the show. The “living tapestry”-succulent pillow.  It is a Shirley original, as far as I know, (a vision came to me for it while watching Citizen Kane a couple of weeks ago). Inspiration comes from the most unlikely places!

This pillow is so easy to make that you will feel guilty accepting compliments for it. Here we go. 

Ingredients

Outdoor pillow in solid color (plants show  better)

1 large bag of  moss- (make sure you moisten it before using).

3 small succulents in 3″ pot or smaller per pillow

Panty hose

A sense of style

Xacto knife

Directions

Open the seam of pillow on one side and remove all the stuffing. Insert moist moss in its’ place. Position your succulents where you would like them. Groups of three look nice, but you can add more- hey, it’s your pillow! Remove the succulent from the pot and place inside a piece of panty hose that is closed at one end. (This keeps the roots from completely breaking apart as you insert the plant through the slit you create on the pillow). Cut some slits where you want to place your plants and insert the succulents.

I created an open area in the moss so that the plant is nestled inside of it and not free-floating in a sea of moss. You may want to add some “fringe” to the pillow by using some “fishtail seneccio” or a like trailing succulent- I didn’t have time for this detail, but was planning on it. You are almost done. If you like a more true pillow look, sew the seam closed, leaving some small openings for drainage. (Make sure to position your pillows with the seam side down so that it can drain). If not, leave it open and crown the pillow with a focal point plant like a small aeonium or ecchevaria. You are done and ready to receive your praise! Enjoy.

 Oh, yeah, don’t forget to water infrequently!

“Don’t just sit there, help me out!”

 I don’t know about you, but I spend a lot of time at my computer each day, conducting business and blogging away. My wrist is starting to talk back to me and has been complaining of overuse and irritation from rubbing on the desk when I use my mouse.  Can you relate? My gel pad is no good. I threw it away long ago. In it’s place is a soft, shaggy pink fluffy stuffed dog that feels luxurious against my skin. (I’t’s  not an authentic “Beanie Baby”  but “stuffed pink dog” doesn’t flow as well for a post title).

I’m raiding my daughters collection of  stuffed mememorabilia, and taking those stuffed animals off of “dust catching” duty and putting them to my employ as wrist rests. (Say that 3 time fast!) I guess when you think about it, the stuffed characters will still be on “clean up duty” as they’ll be wiping my desk every-time I move my mouse!  I love double duty.

I want to hear  about how you combat your bloggers wrist, so leave a comment. If my idea takes off, you read it here first and you can back me up when I bill my 10% commission.  And you thought I was only good for off the wall garden design ideas!

I discovered a view  in my clients yard that must have been hidden for over 20 years!

I had an epiphany while working at my client Rhonda’s house one day. I was doing one of my “design discovery” expeditions around her back yard looking for site weaknesses and stregnths and invisioning things that are not there, (yet).  I took note of the mature Melaluca and Eucalyptus trees and jotted down that they were keepers for the new design. My eyes panned over to the stately and verdant Privet hedge that must have taken years to grow so tall. Nice.  Rhonda even mentioned to me earlier that morning how much she liked her hedge. The hedge is a keeper too, I thought,…then it hit me!

How come I drive up a very steep hill to get to Rhonda’s house and there is no view from her yard? Rhonda’s  next door  neighbor has an awesome view of the valley below and hillside beyond, but Rhonda has nothing.  Armed with my always ready-for-battle loppers, I ditched my portable beach chair and headed toward the hedge, confident I was going to find hidden treasure. A wayward branch smacked me on the forehead and welcomed me with a nasty scratch. “Great,” I thought, “Welcome to the jungle!”

The privet hedge was over 6 feet deep and densely branched!

I detangled some branches and reached in with the goal of spreading the branches apart with my hands so that I could see what was behind them.  I didn’t want to cut into the foliage because I thought Rhonda would be upset if I disfigured her hedge and found nothing but the site of her neighbors side yard. Being the persistent person that I am, I went  in deeper, sacraficing my body  as a human wedge , using it to pry open the branches of the woody web while fighting back the ants and bugs that resented my intrusion.

I saw a small beam of light. My hands were cramping as I tried to keep the small view tunnel open, so I let go. At this point, I was confident that there was a big sky view beyond, at least I imagined there was. My only option in confirming my hunch was to cut through the branches and open up a port hole. Rhonda wasn’t home so I couldn’t ask for permission. “What the heck,” I thought, let her get angry…she’s gonna love this view I found for her!

The lounge area was created to enjoy the view from.

“Eureka,” there’s a view behind this hedge. A great big view of the sky and the thick layer of smog that lingers over the Valley! What a beautiful sight! I felt like Lewis and Clark  must have felt when they set their eyes on the Rockies.( Yes, I’m obnoxiously enthusiastic about little “finds” like this.) I couldn’t wait for Rhonda to get home and proudly show her the big hole I made in her hedge and the million dollar view I found. I showed her my scratch too, it complimented my story and proved how much I had” gone out on a limb for her.”

Rhonda looked puzzled at first, wondering why her hedge had come under attack.

“Come here Rhonda, look at your view, you have a view behind your hedge, I emphasised.

 I smiled, hoping I’d see a big smile on her face too. She poked her head through the porthole and came out exclaiming, though it sounded more like questioning.

 ”I have a view? I have a view? Since when?

“Since now,” I answered back.

 I reached for my loppers and started to cut more branches without asking permission.  I knew I was safe as every felled branch revealed more and more open sky and pried a wider smile on my clients face. The view is  a focal point for the lounge area I created and extends her yard beyond the limits that her old hedge held back. What’s not to smile about?