the haystack needle

little gardens

Juniper and I spent the afternoon at the Brooklyn Flea with my friend Yolanda. It was nice to get outside with this summer weather we've been having. Every time I go to the Flea, I want to take home one of these succulent bricks by Little Gardens. They have a booth every weekend at the Flea. (If you're local, they sell their little gardens for much less at the Flea than through their Etsy shop.) I love their antique brick gardens. I'd put one on my dining table as an everyday centerpiece. 

Image via Little Gardens. 

succulent head

My mom has always had a green thumb. The 100-year-old house where I grew up had an acre of land, and there were these amazing English style gardens in the backyard with neat ivy borders surrounding the flowerbeds. I miss those gardens, and I'm not even sure if we have any photos documenting the amazing work of my mom's hands. She kept all the flowers blooming in harmony. She's also good with houseplants. You'll find a thriving jade plant in her house that has been around since my oldest brother was in elementary school!

So last Christmas, I gave my mom this ceramic lady head from one of my favorite places, Graceful Gardens. I'd been eyeing this sculpture piece for a while and finally decided she was meant to be at my mom's house. My mom hung it in her kitchen and decided to plant little succulents. So far so good. I think the green sprigs look like a cool hair piece (kind of like a succulent version of a Ban.do accessory!) 

new desk space

After a month of having my desk against a back wall in our loft — the same spot where the movers dropped it off — I had a brainstorm a couple weeks ago that I wanted my desk to face out into the apartment. Something about facing a wall, even with pretty prints or photos above, was feeling stifling. Then I took the idea one step further and dreamed about how pretty it would be to look over my desk and see fresh green plants. So last week, we moved my desk to its new spot, with chair against the wall and the desk facing out in the open space. Right in front of my desk, I clustered all of my plants, succulents, and terrarium together to create a little indoor garden space. Just like my Oxalis plant above (which is blooming!), I feel like I'm thriving in the new space. 

graceful gardens valentines

My favorite flower shop, Graceful Gardens in Williamsburg, has some gorgeous flower bundles pulled together for Valentine's Day. I'm in love with "the Shelley" above: anemones (my favorite), ranunculus, sweet pea, roses, wax flowers, and a tag with a line from P.B. Shelley's poem Love's Philosophy. 

Grace's take on a dozen roses makes even this girl (who's not a fan of roses) swoon. The berries and burlap wrap make the roses feel more wild and special. 

Organic roses mixed with peonies and wax flowers in a vase.

And a vintage chemistry set filled with flowers to say "we've got chemistry".

Happy weekend to you all! xo Jen

Images: Graceful Gardens

the airconditioner (almost) killed my plant

I like to think that gardening, along with cooking with what's in your pantry, are skills I've adopted from my mom — and are just exceedingly slow to develop. Behold my lovely plant from Graceful Gardens, which looked suicidal a couple weeks ago. I wanted to share my lesson learned, don't give up your plants! I almost did, and this guy came back to life. 

I love that this plant has clover-shaped leaves and little white flowers that bloom. Grace at Graceful Gardens informed me that this plant's leaves fold up at night — and then will open back up in the day. But a couple weeks ago, the plant didn't bounce back come morning light. I used to have this plant in our bedroom, set on the windowsill. I'm pretty sure that the month-long spat of sweltering 90 degree days (and our airconditioner pumping constantly) is what made my plant look so sad. The leaves had shriveled, and the stems looked like hay. It was bad. There were literally just a few semi-alive looking green shoots left when I decided to take action. I deadheaded away, pruning off all the bits of dead leaves and stems. I gave it a good watering. And I moved the plant far away from the airconditioner. It took less than a week, and I looked down one day to see my plant had come back to life. Now it's healthier than ever. Hooray!

what's in store: graceful gardens

I have a habit of attaching myself to one or two shops in my neighborhood that become my little oasis of inspiration – where I go when I'm feeling stuck or want to be surrounded by lovely things. There are some amazing shops in this city that can you give you quite a lift, even if you don't take away something for yourself each time. When I lived in the East Village, my go-to spot was most definitely the John Derian shop. I could get lost for hours in that wonderland of a boutique. Here in Williamsburg, I stumbled upon this new garden shop a few weeks ago called Graceful Gardens. Since then, I've been in at least five times, and the sweet owner, Grace, was kind enough to let me take over with my camera the other day. The shop changes up all the time, so I think I may update this post as new finds come in. (There was this clever cactus display that sold before I had my camera!)

I know I've been on a plant and flower kick recently, but this is no average garden shop. The plants are displayed in so many whimsical ways (I love the air plants inside the spokes of a bike wheel!). I adore all of their gorgeous terrariums — I walked away with one as my first purchase there. And the place is brimming with vintage found objects (for sale), mossy pots, and low-maintenance succulents. There are cut flowers as well, of course. I think the shop is rather magical.

Graceful Gardens also offers garden design services. And I love how they have a mindset of sustainability — their grown flowers and plants are organic and locally grown. The packaging and vases are made from biodegradable or recycled material. And you can bring those plastic nursery pots back after planting and Graceful Gardens will return them back to the growers. 

 

If you're in the area, I highly recommend a trip over to Graceful Gardens. It's one of those places where it's impossible to walk away in a bad mood, even if you came in feeling in a funk.

Graceful Gardens
485 Driggs
Brooklyn
718.782.1365

flowers, pruning, and instant window box

My weekend was a whirlwind of go-go-go followed by an entire Sunday of relaxation and unplanned bliss. It was a weekend that kept throwing me examples of how people and friends can really amaze you. I was up at 5am on Saturday for a photo shoot, which first brought on some crankiness that quickly passed as I soaked in the beauty and quiet pulse of the Flower District. I was floored by the kindness of someone at G.Page who literally ran down the street to hand me the $3 change I'd forgotten. I got to play with flowers for an entire day — and now the apartment is bursting with cut flowers and plants. It's such a treat. 

 

I decided to turn my vintage soda crate into an instant window box. I love the whimsical look of the peppermint and pink blossoms peeking out of the crate. 

A few of my plants came out of winter looking tired and lacking of sun (much like me). On advice from my local garden shop, I took my little ivy plant and clipped off every last dead leaf (there were a couple dozen dead leaves hiding in the twisty vines.) Then I stuck it in the shower for a couple minutes to give the entire plant a spritzing spray of water. The pruning worked! Almost immediately, my ivy perked up and there are new leaves sprouting. This past week, I've looked around to find lots of unnecessary stuff hanging around me like dead weight — I purged a few bags of unworn clothes and shoes. After the shoot, Dan and I realized our apartment needs an entirely new furniture arrangement to open up the space, maximize the sunlight coming in from our windows, and enjoy more walking room in our main area. Since our apartment is a funny layout, the only real way to do this is to create a setup where his big flatscreen and our sofa are not set in position for TV-watching (we're going to put felt pads under our sofa to swing out the sofa when we want to watch a special program or catch a movie on Netflix.) We decided the extra effort needed to watch TV is a worthy sacrifice to have a more open, sunlit living space. And it fits right in with our new goal to limit our TV watching this spring and summer. Dan does have his beloved Red Sox to watch, but overall we want to cut off the television from being that background noise that tends to happen when you're nested inside all winter. It was a full weekend. Hope your week is off to a good start! I'm planning to share my new favorite garden shop with you later this week.

(photographs by me)