spring gardening and organic lawn care

I've constantly been adding things to my outdoor chore list lately, and started crossing them off today. Lots of text here, but there are pretty pictures down below!

We live in a condo, so lawn and landscaping maintenance aren't actually our responsibility. However, I love to garden and asked for permission to plant flowers. We have an end unit and lots of flowerbed space to work with. This year I have also asked permission to care for our lawn area myself. Our homeowners' association uses a landscaping company that applies chemical fertilizers and pesticides to the grass, and I have a huge problem with that for so many reasons. Most importantly, Celia loves playing outside and I can't let her onto grass covered in pesticides! I'm so shocked and freaked out when I see neighbors walking barefoot and letting their kids roll around on grass that's literally just been covered with pesticides. Anyway, I wanted to get started with some lawn care today to prevent crab grass and dandelions before it got too late. Don't tell the HOA, because I haven't exactly gotten permission yet...

Here's what was on the agenda:

• Clean deck and outdoor furniture
• Put weed preventer on lawn
• Patch bare spots in lawn
• Water lawn and plants

I started with patching a few bare spots in the grass. Then I spread the weed preventer, which is just corn gluten meal (a byproduct of cornstarch production). You can find this at garden centers with all the other lawn products. It's sometimes labeled "organic weed preventer". Corn gluten meal is an effective organic weed control product when applied early in the spring. I watered the lawn after putting it down to help it sink into the ground.

The next project was cleaning the deck. We have Trex decking and always get a lot of mildew. Every spring I follow the same routine to clean it. First, I use a stiff brush to scrub the deck with very hot water. Then I spray white vinegar all over, let it sit for a few minutes, and scrub again. At this point, I either rinse with more hot water or let it sit in the sun for a while before scrubbing once more with water. This is all you need to clean your deck. Don't spend money on products that are full of chemicals! Can you see the difference between the part I cleaned and the section I hadn't gotten to?

 Late this afternoon I headed back outside to water the plants. This is something I love about the warmer months. Spending twenty minutes outside on summer evenings, all alone to visit and care for my plants, is such a soothing ritual. Things are really starting to get going in the flowerbeds now. Bulbs have come up, flowers are starting to bloom, and the rose bushes are showing signs of life. The smell of hyacinth fills the air.

I'm so happy that gardening season is getting back into full swing!