March 22, 2013 [19]
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Time to wake up, feed the roses plants and lawn
Three steps to curb appeal 1. Focus on the front door. You don’t need to own your own home to liven up your entry. Even the darkest basement apartment can benefit from a portable pot of living plants. Add some life to the dark side with foliage plants that stay evergreen all year long and don’t mind the full shade. Acuba, Fatsia japonica, variegated ivy or the magnificent large leaves of an Acanthus or Bear’s breeches are all plants that will live for years in a pot despite a lack of sunshine. In the summer months you can add shade-tolerant annuals such as impatiens, lobelia, begonias and coleus. White and lightcolored bloomers stand out
THE GARDENER
in the shade. Next, consider painting the front door a vibrant accent color or at least light up the space with a fresh coat of white. A new door mat, upgraded light fixtures and dusting the cobwebs from the corners will turn any first impression from poor to positive. Marianne Binetti
The third week of March is the best time to fertilize established roses, lawns and small fruits like blueberry, raspberry and strawberry plants. The longer days are waking up these plants and the new foliage tells you that these plants want food now. Do not fertilize tender plants such as newly-planted roses, hardy fuchsias, summer blooming bulbs and shrubs like lilies, dahlias and hydrangeas or plants that surprised you and survived the winter such as phormiums and sedums. March is also the month to evaluate your front landscape and put together a plan for some curb appeal. You don’t need to be selling your home to invest in a better front view. A welcoming front entry, colorful flowers and a cared for landscape does more than just raise property values. There is intrinsic satisfaction waiting for any homeowner or apartment dweller that is welcomed home with a bit of beauty.
2. Wake up the welcome walk. Many homeowners rarely use their own front door – so it is easy to forget about the overgrown plants, slippery sidewalk and other hazards that make the walk to the front door less than welcoming. Take the route your guests must use and then determine if walkways need pressure washing or if there are overgrown plants in need of pruning. A great design idea to widen a narrow walkway is to add pavers alongside the existing walkway creating more surface area. Installing outdoor pathway lights is another bright idea to improve curb appeal. Don’t forget about the impact of blooming plants as you rethink your front walk. Pots aren’t just for the porch. Set a trio of container gardens into the planting bed, keeping the pots level by setting them on top of stepping stones or a grouping of pavers. Pots in beds raises the blooming plants closer to eye level and creates an instant focal point in a boring landscape. The deep blue, deep red, rich purple and other highly-glazed and shiny pots sold at local nurseries are frost and crack resistant and can be left outdoors all year long to add structure and color. 3. Control the chaos with some repetition. Adding curb appeal to your front landscape can be as simple as repeating
WATER MANAGERS have begun slowly filling the reservoir at Howard Hanson Dam at the headwaters of the Green River. As is typical, Army Corps of Engineers slowly begins annual spring fill of the reservoir around March 1, allowing water levels to rise within the dam’s reservoir.
Meet Marianne 9 a.m., Saturday, Windmill Gardens, 16009 60th St. E., Sumner. Sign up for a Marianne Binetti seminar, “Adding Curb Appeal and Color to the Landscape,” by calling 253-863-5843 or go to www.windmillgarden.com
a plant, color or form in at least three spots. Plant different sizes and shapes of containers with the same variety of purple petunia, repeat the rounded form of a clipped boxwood or repeat an evergreen signature plant such as Nanina (Heavenly Bamboo) or Dwarf Alberta Spruce. You can group the same plant material in clusters of three to five, in a staggered hedge, in the center or corner three different beds or even as the focal point plants in container gardens. The reason that repetition works to calm the chaos in a front yard landscape is because it gives the eye a familiar place to rest when your home is viewed from the curb or street. Repetition is like a melody that reappears throughout a song or the repeating patterns that Mother Nature designs when rolling hills, fields of wild flowers or ocean waves repeat to calm and delight the human senses. Don’t forget the obvious: maintenance matters Improving your home’s curb appeal can be as simple as mowing and edging the lawn, clearing away the clutter and weeding and mulching the beds. Repair the gutters, get rid of the moss on the roof and keep your driveway free of fallen leaves and debris. A well-kept home does more than improve the real estate values in your neighborhood – it welcomes the homeowner as well as the guest, calms the mind and raises the spirit. We humans get spring fever for a reason – feather your nest, clean up your cave and create a buzz about your home hive.
[ LETTERS from page 6 ] 256th are elderly and would face a huge debt obligation that they can ill afford. The issue of the B&O tax and just exactly who is in charge of the disposition of that revenue for city projects needs to be clarified. It’s my understanding that tax revenue funds are under the purview of the city – not the Chamber of Commerce. Instead of burdening homeowners on this
256th-area homeowners from an unnecessary and unfair assessment. An LID is not the only answer for street improvements. Kent now has a B&O tax for this purpose. – Sandra Gill
DONATE TODAY: Kent Food Bank, 515 W. Harrison St., No. 107. For more information or to volunteer, call 253-5203550 or visit www.skcfc.org/ kentfoodbank.
Saturday, April 27, 2013 This FUN run and walk is healthy for YOU and healthy for the opportunity to plant a tree or shrub in your honor at a post event the Duwamish-Green River Trail. The race begins at 8 a.m.
For registration information please call 206-768-2822.
Marianne Binetti is the author of “Easy Answers for Great Gardens” and several other books. For book requests or answers to gardening questions, write to her at: P.O. Box 872, Enumclaw, 98022. Send a selfaddressed, stamped envelope for a personal reply. For more gardening information, she can be reached at her website, www.binettigarden.com.
The process takes roughly three months to refill the reservoir. The current plan targets a maximum pool elevation of 1,167 feet above sea level. Water stored during the spring refill of the reservoir will be used to provide water supply to the City of Tacoma and its water supply partners.
strip of road, why not use B&O tax revenue that was approved for road work? This seems like exactly the kind of project for which the tax was designed. It also seems like the city engineers could modify the design and eliminate some of the features (e.g., the center-strip and sidewalk gardens) and downscale this project to save some money. Don’t be in such a rush for the $2 million TIB grant and let’s spare the
$5 OFF YOUR REGISTRATION
Saturday, April 27, 2013
Clip this coupon to save $5 on the cost of registration for the Healthy Earth Healthy You 5K Run and Walk. Good for in person registration at the Tukwila Community Center.
Coupon must be redeemed by April 5, 2013