snug harbor

Two Sundays ago we spent some time at Snug Harbor Cultural Center and Botanical Garden.  There was a plant sale and I took the opportunity to stock up on some plants for the garden.  I picked up some small dahlias, European wild ginger, some dusty miller for the window boxes, a pink iris (Beverly Sills,) cherry tomatoes (to grow in pots this time around,) and trollius (alabaster.)  It was a little hard to resist buying more.

A little background history on Snug Harbor via their website:

"Robert Richard Randall, Snug Harbor Cultural Center’s founder and benefactors’ bequest of 1801, created Sailors’ Snug Harbor’s original three buildings as a “haven for aged, decrepit and worn out sailors.” Over the next century, Snug Harbor expanded to 50 structures and 900 residents from every corner of the world. By the turn of the 20th century, Snug Harbor was the richest charitable institution in the United States and a self-sustaining community composed of a working farm, dairy, bakery, chapel, sanatorium, hospital, music hall and cemetery."

Snug Harbor currently has many garden spaces including a beautiful peony garden.

There are tons of lovely old growth trees as well.  I believe these are sycamore trees:

The Chinese Scholar's Garden  was open and had free admission for the day.  Neither of us had ever been there before so we decided to check it out.  To enter the garden you pass through one of the Victorian cottages on Cottage Row (currently a gift shop) and walk down a path.  All of a sudden you will come to a forest of bamboo.

I must admit I was a little intimidated by the bamboo.  It was beautiful but whenever the wind blew and the stalks touched my shoulders I wondered if the bamboo somehow knew what we did to its relatives!
After passing through the bamboo we came upon the garden complex:

I think the photos say it all. Breathtaking.

rambling...

Things have finally been happening around our house after a long pause. We've mostly been cleaning up the yard and planting some perennials around the house. At this very moment, we're having our upstairs hallway painted! I can't tell you how happy I am to not have to do this myself. I loathe painting. I promise to post some photos as soon as it's done - I'm not doing it so you know it will actually get finished! I can't wait to see it and to finally hang up the light fixture we bought for it many months ago.
New flowers in the window boxes:

New flowers in the hanging baskets:

My peony has buds on it this year. The roses are budding as well. The ferns are taking over everything in the front. Daffodils and tulips came and went - I planted huge white double tulips and they looked amazing. I'll have to remember to take photos next year!

I planted a few different varieties of allium last year: Globemaster, Gladiator, Drumstick and another that I've already forgotten the name of. I haven't seen the Globemaster or Drumsticks yet but I'm pretty sure that these are the Gladiator in front:

Oh and this crazy allium:

All of the bulbs came from my favorite nursery: Martin Viette.

Did I mention that we used to have a dirt patch directly in front of our house? Ever since the giant yew was dug up we've been wondering if we should plant some grass in front. I was against a lawn because I don't like all of the maintenance it entails - weeding, watering, mowing, etc. I finally gave in and allowed Fernando to put some seed down. This grass promises to use less water than the average lawn. It took a few weeks but we actually have a nice shaggy start:

So there's some dandelions and clover too. I hate the idea of poisoning the dirt with chemicals so when we can really start walking on it I plan to pull those out by hand. I do like the new grass (Fernando was right) - I wouldn't mind plopping down on it for a picnic.

Some more pretties from Martin Viette waiting to be potted:

We've also decided to replace some of the wood on our front steps. Last weekend, we sourced some boards that would be a good replacement and hopefully we'll get working on that with my Dad in the near future. I'm excited to have freshly painted stairs and not the multicolored mess we currently have. We just need to decide on house colors.
Another doorknocker:

The other one I had posted about just wouldn't fit. I can't wait to paint the door and hang this guy up... if he fits. It reminds me of the one at 10 Downing Street (spotted over at Katy Elliott):

How nice is that glossy black door? I like the idea of black and near black for trim on a brick house. Just like this one:

Anna over at doorsixteen posted this interior by Stephen Roberts a while back and it reminded me of how much I wish I could stack up logs like this in my living and dining room fireplaces:

I'm afraid that will never happen (without some crazy chopping, hammering and glueing) because our fireplaces are way too shallow. So I'm settling for some logs in the fire ring outside:

Winston chopped those for us from a tree in our backyard. What of the bamboo you ask? I've resorted to stomping on it as new shoots pop up out of the ground. We will never be rid of the root system. I'm hoping to keep it from receiving needed sunlight and that maybe it will eventually die off underground. I'll just have to keep that up for the next 150 years.

chop 'em while they're down

We had a few big snow storms that damaged the evil bamboo in our yard. It wasn't exactly chopped down, but it was on the ground from the weight of the snow and very easy to chop. Since we couldn't get around the back, Fernando decided to hack at the fallen pieces. After the snow cleared and the recent rain storms, we were left with this disaster:

Where's Jamie Durie when you need him?


Did I ever mention the bird's nest of a mess that was growing on our arbor? I couldn't wait to clear this off - it was mostly dead growth and matted leaves weighing down heavily on the lattice.

We hired Winston to clean it all up this week. I'm not sure how he handled this job by himself, but as you can see the results are incredible:

We now have a blank slate. I'm thinking Clematis for the arbor.

He also chopped down the remainder of the bamboo!

It ended up here on the curb:

I wonder if this will have any effect on the ridiculous amount of mosquitoes we get in the summer? He's going to try to get the roots up next. I'm still skeptical that this can even be done. Good luck Winston.

The first signs of Spring:

I can't wait to start planting some more flowers and a few veggies again. And grass. We REALLY need grass.

i guess we could always slice it up and make some more benches?

I could use many excuses here as to why it's been so long since I've posted - we've been sick with the flu (swine flu?,) I've been taking a jewelry class over at FIT, last weekend we did the flea market so we could clear out some of the attic... etc. Really, there hasn't been much to blog about lately.
I had started a post all about the beach. But now it's Fall and totally irrelevant. Maybe I'll save it and put it up one day when we're freezing this winter. Yesterday we had our storm windows put up so that we hopefully won't freeze to death again this winter. We wanted to get the trim all painted before we popped in the windows but it looks like the trim work isn't happening this year. We'll most likely do it next Spring.

The person we hired used this incredibly long ladder and actually said that he was scared of heights!

I like the four paned windows much better than the two paned windows that are on the house - the third floor storm windows are just two paned.

So far we've noticed less noise from the street and less wind howling through the house. On Wednesday, when we had 50 mile an hour winds in NY, this happened:

If you guessed that that's a fallen tree from our yard that fell over into the neighboring house's yard, you are correct. We are very happy to report that the tree did no damage to our house, the neighboring house and (unfortunately) the icky chain link fence around our property. The only thing it did in our favor was take out some of the bamboo. Anyone need some firewood?

I keep saying "neighboring house" because currently, no one lives there. It is for sale and has been for a while. If you would like to be my neighbor - now's the perfect time. The price has been drastically reduced and the seller is selling for much lower than he paid. The house is huge, at 3 stories and it's around 15 or 20 feet longer than ours. I've never been inside. The seller had tried to flip the house when the market was good but his team of workers ditched him, he ran out of money and had to sell the house. Up until recently, the realtor with the listing had a non working phone number on the sign and when you called the office you only got a full voicemail box. People stop by all of the time and ask us about it because they can't get hold of the realtor. They finally added a working contact number so I hope it will sell soon. I feel really bad for that house.

So, do you want to see what I found recently? Yes FOUND! Would you throw this away?

I know these photos are a little dark but they were taken at night. It's a signed studio piece by Roy Sheldon.

It was a curb find. Someone put it on the curb! I almost hit the curb when I pulled over to grab it. It does not fit where I wanted a hallway bench but I'm using it here for now, until I find something that fits by the door. Then it will travel upstairs to our bedroom (no, you won't see it on the curb again anytime soon.)

summer catch up

Peeps inside:


Toby on the chair:

Oscar on the bed:

Yes, we painted the walls but haven't gotten around to the trim yet! Anyway, I don't think I ever posted a photo of the bathroom mirror (Restoration Hardware's "Albion"):

So... some things have gone on around the house and outside of the house. I don't want to bore anyone with more talk about our yard or how we've added a light here or put up some blinds there. We finally gave in and put in two air conditioners. We had been getting by with window fans but it seems that the NYC heat and humidity has finally caught up with us. I love that all of the rooms in the house have doors because it makes it much easier to section off areas to cool down.
3 feet have been trimmed off of the privet out front. The yew out front is also finally gone. The giant (and HEAVY) root on the curb for the garbage collection:

Some pachysandra planted under the hedge:

Sunflowers on the side:

A house next door has been for sale since before we bought our place and they recently dropped the asking price drastically. People have been stopping by to check it out and since we're usually out and about in the yard, they ask us questions about it. I've been noticing a lot of people being curious about our neighborhood and Staten Island in general. I've been having to explain why we live in St. George, what there is to do here, where we eat when we go out, etc. We even find ourselves giving quick tours to tourists and our visitors! So, what better way to show my love for St. George than through my blog - from now on I'll be doing more little postings with photos of the neighborhood. So if you're a little curious, keep looking, if not, feel free to ignore. ;)

First up is the St. George Greenmarket:

Our Green Market is open on Saturdays from 8:00 AM - 2:00 PM from May through November. It is held in the Borough Hall Municipal Parking Lot at St. Marks Pl. and Hyatt St. across from the St. George Theater. We try to make it over there if we are around Saturday mornings. There are no supermarkets nearby and the Green Market is within walking distance from our house, so we try to take advantage of it whenever we can. Staten Island also has a CSA program that we do not currently participate in - although this might be a future possibility for us (when we have a fully functional kitchen!)


I'm really not this grumpy:

I can't resist Tart Cherry Stomp and Apricot Stomp from Red Jacket Orchards. They are both perfect and refreshing mixed up with seltzer or Pellegrino.

I also love the blueberry cornbread from Not Just Rugelach:

If you get there early enough you run into just about everyone in the neighborhood. Last weekend we met a neighbor who personally knew the original owner of our house. He told us a few stories about Mr. Coburn and described how he cared for the interior and exterior in a meticulous manner. Mr. Coburn was the person who added the newspaper headlines to the attic stairs and wrote the quirky notes found around our basement. He had a schedule of chores for every season - when he would put up the storm windows, trim the hedges, etc.
I think that's one of the nicest things about the Green Market - the people you run into and the people you meet.
These photos were taken late in the day after the crowds had died down: