May 2, 2008

• Outdoor Beauty - cheap!

  

  It’s FRUGAL FRIDAY! 

  Go to www.biblicalwomanhood.com for lots more frugal tips that make budgeting an adventure. 

   

  I love well manicured yards and lovely flowers.  Frugal and landscaping are hard to manage sometimes.  I manage it by being a beggar.  I’m not kidding.  Several of my family members have awesome landscaping.  I “begged” a few from each of them.  Hostas spread each year, so they must be thinned out in the spring.  Being the lovely family they are, they act as though I’m doing them a favor by ridding them of an abundance of hostas.

   

  My dad gave me “starts” from some bushes.  We broke off a limb, put it in water and now we’re watching for roots to grow.  Once roots have formed, I plant the bush. (This works with vines, too.) Now I don’t go breaking limbs off a bush that I don’t know.  I make sure we are properly introduced first.  Someone might consider it theft (it is against the law in national forests and state parks) or at the very least unfriendly.  

   

  Marigolds are very inexpensive and bring lots of color! (Rite Aid has marigold seed packets for 10 cents.)  Once my marigolds grow and start blooming, I save seeds for next year by pinching off the dead blooms.  I store my marigold seeds in sandwich bags.  All of the seeds usually end up in a shoe box in the garage. 

   

  Try making a big impact by planting everything in one flower bed.  Everything close together will have more visual impact than a flower here and there, standing alone.

   

  Flower pots are a great way to liven up your home exterior.  I find pots at yard sales for pennies.  I use old baskets, old cooking pots, plastic icecream buckets. Any container will do.  Just last week I found a rusty old pot intended for the trash pile.  Well, Old Rusty came home with me.  He’ll look dandy holding a bouquet of marigolds this summer.  I have a resin turtle with a little two inch hole on his shell.  He is meant to hold a picnic umbrella.  Instead, he will handsomely carry a vine. 

   

  Pumpkin vines are beautiful and grow easily.  Back in the fall, we saved our pumpkin seeds.  This is especially frugal as we will have a head start on our fall decorations. 

   

  Rose bushes are excellent mother’s day gifts.  My brother never sends my mom roses, instead he gives her rose bushes.  Who wouldn’t love receiving rose bushes from their son?  Roses all summer and the next summer and the next summer . . .  (You can buy the whole bush for much less than a dozen.)

   

  If the Lord allows my frugal flowers to bloom and flourish this summer, I’ll post pictures.  If my green thumb turns out to be brown, I’ll discreetly avoid the subject.  I know that y’all will mercifully go along.

  • 7:08 am
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