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The upper left image was the living room when I first saw it. The tiny window was replaced with garden doors creating a bright,

open space which became less so when the 16' ceilinged screen porch blocked the sun again. By that time, I'd added drama

and we settled in to what felt like a beautiful cave. When the kitchen renovation became a reality, all rooms leading to and from

it became involved in a decision about paint color and the use of paintable wallpaper which allowed me to have my focal walls (texture) with the use of a single color, down and upstairs, including the ceiling and trim. Now a soft, warm grey (Silkweed -

Rona) it's bright again. It also took 12 years to realize this was a passage space, and didn't need to be a 'room'. A full sized

picture window in the front of the living room has given us much needed NE light which, without the large tree blocking the

window, it considerable. Our affinity for ferns began inside and with the brighter space, their many varieties and the ZZ plant

are doing very well. When painting a house, in this case, one room at a time as there was no place to move anything, is not something to jump into; the wrong color, once chosen, had to be dead on so I painted a huge swatch on the wall of each

room and lived with it for about six months, watching it through winter and into spring. This neutral grey reads differently

through the daylight and evening; changing with the light; It was perfect and it will only need refreshing from time to time.

Tip: when choosing paint colors, stick with just "three", and chose them from the sale color family; let the light in the room play

with them making it appear as if there are many more.

Many changes and years later our house has a

new face and a lot less going on. Never will I be called minimalist but there is a lighter, calmer feel

to the space and just enough eclectic energy to

say "it's home and this is who we are!"

Redecorating is as much fun as shopping, costs far less or nothing and you don't have to leave

home! The functional and welcoming front

porch will be repainted in time but for now, despite the current "what was I thinking" color, it's a wonderful room and has increased the value of

our home wihle providing a lof of additional living, and storage space! Practicing what I preach, there have been an on going series of edits (dusting evolves into an edit/I can't remember where everything was, so some doesn't go back, or I

nose through the in-home decor armoire and find

pieces of decor, currently not in use and am

inspired to put them to use again, in a different room, or a different way. in the end, it's a fresh

look and it costs 0 dollars!

"It takes two consecutive summers of heavy rainfall to realize that nutrients essential for the growth of plants are being leached into the sub soil and out of reach for the plants' roots. This year I have seen, without exception, hundreds of properties where the plants are experiencing nutrient deficiencies. In most cases nitrogen in the form

of nitrates is the major nutrient deficiency. In an earlier article in this column this year I wrote about the nutritional deficiency called chlorosis that commonly shows up on

most ornamental trees and shrubs. The typical signs show up on the leaves causing them to turn yellow prematurely usually with some pattern of darker green veins. Most

of the trees and shrubs planted in urban gardens in southern Manitoba were developed through genetic manipulation for some outstanding feature.For example, Schubert Chokecherry was bred from the native chokecherry tree for its purple leaf colour. Once that colour feature was developed, the trees were then propagated by cloning to maintain that consistent leaf colour character. Plant clones of any kind usually have less vigour than the native parent or parents. Furthermore, the clone may become

more susceptible to diseases, pests, structural wood problems and nutritional deficiencies. Clones or cultivated varieties dominate the supply of trees and shrubs in most nurseries and garden centres. Amur maple is a small tree bred for its red fall leaf colour. It is also one of the most susceptible to develop leaf sclerosis. Like all chlorotic

plants it needs a supplement to release whatever nitrates are in the soil. That supplement for the most part is iron chelate which should be added to the nitrogen-based fertilizer. These susceptible trees and shrubs should be treated with fertilizer and iron chelate at least once a year - spring or fall. I do mine twice a year - once in mid-May

and again once in mid-June. Other common woody plant clones that can succumb to nutritional deficiencies and subsequent disease are pink flowering spireas,

hydrangeas, ninebarks, European mountain ashes, tower poplars, Swedish aspens, silver maples, roses, Japanese barberries, cotoneasters, elderberries, dogwoods,

grape vines, Virginia creeper and many more; prepare to begin regular fertilizing with the added iron chelate to your gardening chores if healthy plants are your objective." Mike Allen, 2010

PS: rather than waiting for spring, use dormant spray after all 'stressed' trees & shrubs have lost their foliage, but before the temperatures drop to below

+5 degrees Celsius (typically done in the spring) and this will help them recuperate from a long, hot, rain free, disease & bug filled summer.

As you can see (below), we all go through phases of "what

was I thinking?"; in the '70's I had kitchen cupboards, table

and chairs in a horrid purple and the accents were yellow.

To this day, I don't like yellow! Eventually you discover a 'comfort zone' that says "you're there" and then, magic happens. Well that, and you take all your 'don't wear it anymore gold' and sell it for $6000 and buy new appliances

and pay off a few bills! Renovating a 'period' house can

be tricky because you don't want to lose the character

of the space but there are so many things that just don't function properly. It takes time to figure out what HAS

to change, what can be changed but not altered to the

point of "where did all that charm go", and in the process

STICK TO A REASONABLE BUDGET. Our kitchen/dining

room moved out of 1942 and into the 21st century, but the orginal bones of the house were kept well in tact.

The 'look' in our house changes constantly, but the bones

will remain constant from here forward.

Heading back outside for just a few minutes...

This year (2011) we had to do something about the crumbling stucco on our house. Initially we'd considered a 'cost effective' option, but ultimately gave into going the

whole nine yards, removing the stucco entirely and INSULATING walls previously

filled with saw dust. A great contractor, BRICE WILLIAMS (-999-5189) had shown up

in the nick of time (fall 2010) to repair a leaking dormer on the 2nd floor; he did a

fabulous job within weeks of our call so we therefore decided we should stick with someone we knew; boy, did that work out. As it turned out, about 40% of our north

wall was rotten, the front porch was held up by rotten post and a river stone, and if

we'd taken that short cut, the walls and front porch would have fallen off within five

years. As luck would have it, Brice also renovates so he has a carpenter on site;

he lent us the carpenter and a few of his guys for a couple of days. They replaced the

wall, rebuilt and totally insulated the foundation and floor of the veranda and gave us

a drop dead gorgeous stucco job. We probably saved five to seven THOUSAND

dollars by not having to source out another contractor (good luck to that in spring) and

we couldn't be more pleased with the results. Sure, we had to give up some of the

unique 'features' of our old house but what we ended up with is a very modern, clean

lined 1942 home, draft and worry free. Had we not done the math, and

the home work, and really, really knew what we wanted, it could have all gone wrong. Check out your contractor(s), see some of their work and make slow, conscientious decisions that won't bite you in the end.

In the past three years, just on our property, we have lost four trees; the largest a 25

year old Ornamental Crab. Spring arrived and with it, half a live tree, the other dead

and not a sign the previous year it was in any kind of trouble. By the time I'd arranged

for an arborist, I had to call back to say "come and remove the entire tree - in less than

a week it had withered and was as dead as the other half. That same year, but later,

the Golden Elder, just feet away from the crab, turned crispy within a week and it was downed this spring because, of course, it was also dead - apparently of Fire Blight too. A Pagoda dogwood died of who knows what, although having the foliage burned

off twice, once by frost and once by the hot spring sun, it's probably an explanation.

This year, while another 'weeping' Royal Beauty Crab (7 years old) was suffering from what I beleived to chlorosis (iron deficiency), I fertlized and treated it with

chelated iron on many occasions and it died, almost over night. Nature is about, if nothing else life and death, you find something to fill in the void and the garden is reinvented; new again. That said, we had best start paying attention to all our trees

and shrubs. There is a lot of diseases out there ready to smite them, and we should

be more aware of symptoms and treatment. Applications of slow release fertilizer and feeding your beds with a couple of inches of compost (Samborski's) as a mulch and

as a food supplement come spring, would do your garden and all your trees and

shrubs a world of good. There's lots of time/just not much warmth!

The tree and leaf shown here are Manitoba Maples suffering from

chlorosis and without serious endeavors to deep root fertilize them,

there are only so many years of this kind of stress they can endure

before they weaken and die. We are losing too many old trees to

Dutch Elm disease and fire blight is rampant so let's try to keep what is

still healthy that way and what \is struggling, regain its vigor! If you

have trees and shrubs that bear yellowed, not GREEN foliage,

perhaps you should be applying iron chelate to the root ball until

freeze up.

You can add a layer of compost (see Samborski Garden Center) on

top of even frozen soil to act as additional mulch/protection

over the winter, and come spring thaw, will permeate existing

soil, amending it. It's cold outside but the 'season' isn't over !

We all make mistakes, bad judgement calls, and if ANYONE says it's never happened, I'd just be inclined to call

them on that. If we didnt' make mistakes, we'd never learn anything ... so the trick is to allow for error, but don't let

them become huge, money pits. If you have purchased a character home because you loved it for just that, don't convert it into an entirely modernized home unless it's a beater and it's the only option you have. Sometimes

renovating and starting over from the beginning are not options but decisions made prior to purchasing. That said always keep in mind what you 'loved' about the place when you bought it and if it's humanly possible, always LOVE something about a house/condo you are spending a huge amount of money to purchase. Then, when it becomes apparent some aspects of the home are disfunctional, broken, tired, etc., start putting a budget together as to what NEEDS to be fixed, regardless of budget - what you want to fix but need to focus on staying within a budget, and

then those things that we all see, love and say "oh, if I win the lottery, we would" and put those ideas in a book so

you can amuse yourself periodically while you continue to check those numbers every Wednesday and Friday. So,

in our case, the kitchen could have cost upwards of $25,000 and with a few higher end products, even more, but

we didn't have a $25,000 budget; it was more like $5000 and that's not much of a kitchen. In the end, the kitchen

reno became the dining room reno, the main floor, stairwell and upper powder room and the front veranda (now

heated, insulated and as warm as any room in the house). We didn't spend $25,000 doing all of that and we all think

if you want a high end look, it must be custom. Before you hire THAT contractor, have a good look at what the Big

Box Stores offer. You may be in for a surprise! We saved by leaving some original cabinetry in and just updated it.

We have "looks like" counter top without the cost of granite or marble.

NOW, LET'S MOVE INSIDE ... IT'S GOING TO BE A WHILE BEFORE WE ARE SEEING GREEN AGAIN.

Whether redecorating or preparing your home for resale, the process for a successful end is the same; begin by editing and paring down and try to revitalize and

re-invent your home. By changing paint colors or rearranging furniture you can visually change the space. RESALE: If preparing for a move, walk through houses for

sale that are somewhat similar to yours in style and remember, if done right, these homes will have been staged specifically to reach the broadest spectrum of potential

buyers and the choices they made are for that reason alone. When staging, you want to highlight the upside of the house and disguise the down so frequently the homes appear to not be lived in. Check the closets; they are likely stuffed with all the things that make a house a home. If moving you need your house to show it's potential

so edit, depersonalize and declutter the space until it allows the buyer to visualize their furniture in it. If all they see is you, it's going to take longer to sell. We've all seen

an HGTV home buying or selling show where a red wall or a small bedroom so cluttered with junk reads like a messy closet and makes a potential buyer leave; those

people aren't likely coming back. DO OVER: If what you want is a fresh look, remember cohesive colors flow to make rooms appear larger and unfussy furnishings and simple accessories create a spacious, uncluttered space. On TV or in magazines, or in a 'house for sale', you try to visualize YOUR stuff in that space and you're disappointed. Of course you are; it’s not your house so why not reinvent your own home and fall in love all over again. By removing 'stuff' from any given room, repainting

or not, then carefully and selectively considering what 'stuff' you put back, you’ll achieve a more refined space. Editing can be a cathartic process so think before you

re-hang all those pictures. Over accessorizing is a common design error made by many, including professionals. The most important aspect of good home design is

comfort and function regardless of current trends. There is excellent information to be gleaned from these buy/sell shows whether you're moving or redecorating.

"Remember there is no such thing as a space too small"!