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Health & Fitness

Coming Up Roses

Lauren Kim, the executive editor of MomHomeGuide.com, explains how this spring's rain has been a bonus and a hindrance for her gardening and landscaping efforts.

It's been raining buckets lately here in New Jersey, which has been both a good and a bad thing. It's been great for the gardens that my daughters and I have planted -- in the gardens, our peas, sunflowers, lettuce and cucumbers have sprouted, and the basil, oregano and tomatoes I've planted are doing well. Also, the yellow roses in my front yard have started to bloom, so I'm happy about that!

Weeds and More Weeds
What has not been so great is that all the rain has encouraged the weeds to grow in the planting bed in my home's front yard -- I am sure our neighbors hate our weeds! We're one of the maybe two or three people on our block who don't hire a lawn service (thrifty as we are), but because we're often busy on the weekends, the weeds have been having a heyday!


Cutting Back
So this morning, I got out some garden clippers and clipped back some of the overgrowth in my home's front planting bed. I cut the spent blooms from the spring, and cut back the evergreen bushes that have started to crowd out the roses. I also clipped a pretty rose stem to adorn my home's kitchen table -- nice!

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One of these days, I have to get to the garden center -- I never seem to add enough mulch to my planting beds, so the weeds and grass always grow in them! Those bags of mulch are so heavy that I can only stand to purchase a few at a time. (The employees at the garden shop never offer to help me get the mulch to the car for some reason.)

I am thinking that maybe I should go to a local nursery and order a truckload of  mulch -- and spend several days mulching all the garden beds!

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Lauren Kim is the executive editor of MomHomeGuide.com, a website for moms on creating the perfect home for one's family.

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