Sometimes, you just need a good recipe for the amazing tomatoes and vegetables that are coming in… here’s one we like.

Can’t Be Beet Summer Salad

1 – 4 ounce Herb Chevre
2 cups torn red leaf lettuce and baby spinach leaves
2 large carrots sliced (be creative in your slicing techniques!)
1 large beet thinly sliced (optional)
1/2 cup finely chopped celery
1/2 sliced orange

5 large olives sliced – we like the big green ones (this is a technical blog after all!)

Goat Cheese

Slice 1- 4 ounce chevre horizontally into 4 slices
1 beaten egg
1/2 cup panko bread crumbs
Olive oil to coat frying pan

Dressing:

2/3 c. olive oil

1/4 c. vinegar

salt & pepper

1/2 tsp minced garlic

2 tbsp sugar

Whisk all ingredients together and add to salad as needed.

Directions:
Assemble all ingredients in a large salad bowl. Toss with
Divide the salad onto 4 plates

Dip the cheese slices in egg and then dredge in bread crumbs. Lightly coat a pan with olive oil and heat on medium. Cook the cheese slices for about 3 minutes on each side or until warm. Place 1 cheese slice on each salad and eat your heart out!

In her book, The Artist’s Way, Julia Cameron invites her readers to make an artist date for themselves each week. It could be a visit to any inspiring place. However, since this is a garden blog, I’m going to stick to green inspiration.

How do you even get an idea for something that might add value to your landscape? Well, over here, we make green artist’s dates for ourselves each week. Sometimes, we get in the car early in the morning and ride around with our camera, snapping pictures of color choices and gardens we can see from the road. Other times, we make time to visit the really spectacular gardens that surround our city. There, we get ideas. Not something to copy exactly, but ideas that we let cook in our imaginations. As they percolate, we go about our lives. All of a sudden, an idea for what might be possible springs into our mind. It might be a fountain to add, or a kind of moss to plant. It might be how to make a path that connects our spaces so that we can enjoy our entire landscape. Or, it might be an idea to go greener and shift some of our lawns into more of a meadow. The possibilities are literally endless. But what’s important here is putting yourself in a place that inspires you and gets those imagination wheels cranking.

Tell us how you get inspired!

In future posts, we’ll list some of the other plant groups that have similar (but not the same) offerings.

August is a great time for meandering through some of the area’s most famous gardens so you can get inspired with ideas that you can translate to your own space. Instead of looking at a blank slate of a side yard or back yard, think about exploring other possibilities. Ideas are the seeds for seeing what is possible in your yard and gardens. It helps to have an expert take that idea and put it into action (the hard work).

The beauty of making your outdoor space  beautiful is that you add curb appeal, value to your house, and the best bonus of all… you get to enjoy it.

I was talking to our owner the other day and asked him his favorite watering solution. I got an answer I didn’t expect.

He suggested getting a small sprinkler and putting it on a timer set to go off for a half hour early in the am three times a week. Furthermore, he mentioned that every one of our clients receives this as an added value to any landscaping job. The best thing is they set it up! Ha! I don’t have to feel like a total dunce anymore when it comes to putting this kind of thing together! They consider that part of the job.

I’m thinking what project I can do next…..hmmmm.

We can’t deny it. It’s hot and since we’re in Philly, could we expect otherwise. It’s true we were spoiled last summer – did we think it would last through this year????

It’s too hot to sit outside but not so hot that you are willing to let go of your investment in the plants surrounding your house and gardens.

Here are some somewhat obvious things that will help you maintain while you await cooler days.

Make sure that your mulch is in place – at leat two inches. Mulch serves to keep in moisture and keep weeds down. Even the weeds don’t want to grow when it’s this hot! The trick here is that you have to water long enough for the mulch to hold the moisture. We’re not talking about a short squirt here.  You need a longer time making sure you give your flowers and shrubs a good soak.

While we’re at it, if you have pets – no cocoa mulch! It’s poisonous to dogs. Period.

One of our favorite things to do is set the alarm early – it’s a glorious time of the day- the sun rises around 6 am- it gets hot after that. But watching the sun come up before the heat starts is a great way to start the day. You can set a timer on a soaking hose, or any other watering device or stand and do a meditation while you make sure that you are giving everything a good soak -2-3 minutes at least.

Put a small notebook by the door to jot down ideas or things you want to add or subtract in your garden. Make it pocket sized so that you don’t have to juggle too much at once. You can also add the gratitude given to you by being present in such beautiful space. The world goes into slow motion and beauty around you is magnified.

Suddenly, it’s twenty years later and those plantings that looked so great when we planted them are now overgrown and often beyond pruning.

The difference landscaping can make to a property is in the thousands of dollars. After all, it’s the first impression anyone has before they enter your castle.

Don’t allow yourself to get complacent. Resolve to get things looking as good as they did when you had more energy than a speeding bullet.

It’s more fun to explore garden possiblities if you have given a project some thought beforehand.

Here are a couple of ways we get inspired ideas about our gardens.

1. Take a slow ride through some nice neighborhoods. At the least, you’ll see what you don’ t want and maybe something that you do.  I always include corporate centers that have talented designers for color and flower combinations.

2. Look for some good local garden tours. Starting in May through the summer, there are garden tours all over the Philadelphia area. You can find them listed in magazines like Horticulture or Fine Gardening. You may also find them through local plant societies like the Hardy Plant Society.  We will be listing some over the summer as well.

3. Odd places to find interesting garden ideas are: local theatres with land. A good example here is People’s Light & Theater in Malvern, PA. Their perennial garden is spectacular and you can get a sense of what a stone wall does as a background for perennials.

Brandywine River Museum has beautiful wildflowers and grasses on its property.

Restaurants are also places to get good ideas. The General Warren Inne in Malvern has spent several years creating beautiful outdoor spaces and gardens surrounding their restaurant.

Let us know what your favorite sources of inspiration are – we would love to share some ideas.

The picture to the left is Chanticleer, in Wayne, PA. It is a small, and already internationally known treasure that is off the beaten track tucked into the outer edge of Wayne, PA.  Chanticleer was the dream of Adolph Rosengarten who loved his land enough to share it with all of us after his death.

It was designed with a sense of humor and surprise and there is one around every corner. The hydrangeas are breathtaking. The water lilies bigger than large, rimmed plates. It is an unusual visual feast for the careful observer. You will find large acorns and faces in places that are not typical.

Don’t miss the fieldstone couch and chairs with the remote control. I won’t tell you WHAT  it controls, but it will make you smile.