The Atlanta Home Show

What a beautiful day to spend time at the Cobb Galleria Centre for the 36th Annual Spring Atlanta Home Show.  This is the largest home show that showcases over 350 exhibitors with the very latest home and gardening improvement products, and services.  This is the place where you can drop in on a cooking demonstration, walk through an indoor landscaped garden or talk to a kitchen designer about your particular needs.

I had a chance to meet Ahmed Hassan who is a celebrity landscaper and original host of DIY Network’s Yard Crashers.  I was so excited to meet with him (including my husband) and to learn what was going on with him since he had left Yard Crashers.  Alot of people do not know his story of how he has got to where he is now .  Ahmed was a trouble teen and had to make a dramatic change in his life to get himself out of the streets. He did this by becoming a landscaper and love it so much that he has been doing this for over 15 years.  During that time, he was pick up but the HGTV and DIY Networks for his high energy personality, motivational spirit and his love of people and beautiful outdoor spaces.

Since becoming a Landscape Professional Celebrity he has been working with the California Federal of Corrections to help teens to find what opportunities that are out there for them in the areas of Landscaping and Gardening.

Since leaving the show he has his own business and no longer doing the landscaping but he is doing a variety of projects in the Environmental Green Living and Landscaping Consulting.  For more information check out his website – http://www.ahmedhassan.tv/ and  become apart of his facebook page:   www.facebook.com/pages/Ahmed-Hassan-Celebrity-Landscaper

I truly enjoyed hearing Ahmed Hassan speak and please check out his calendar of events to meet him on his website.  There were so many more things that I did at the Atlanta Home Show. Check out and see what I saw by clicking here:

Spring Ahead for Lente

Being a Christian, this is the season for Lente and is it a time to give up something and gain something better.  I decided to sleep for one hour earlier in order to wake up 1 hour early in the morning to see this wonderful sun rise.  Since the weather is getting warmer I have been running in the AM time with my beautiful black labs.  Doing this has given me a chance to enjoy my afternoon more and it allows for me not feel rush to finish everything that I have to do that evening.  This also has given me the chance to accomplish everything that I need to do for the rest of day.  I have a question that to ask you:

What are you willing to give up in order to gain something better?

Let me know what your answer to this question by emailing me at the comments section of this blog.

I also had the excellent opportunity to be a guest host with the Itunes webcast of “Low Carbo Conversations”.  Listen in to what was discussed and let me know what you think of the broadcast!

Click this link here:  http://livinlavidalowcarb.com/blog/lcc-episode-105-courtney-locklear-and-emily-drews-on-the-paleo-meat-obsession/22434

Enjoy this wonderful spring week!!

 

Spring Home Repair and Gardening

Spring is here and summer is around the corner.  This is the time to to catch up with all of your cleaning and to get rid of the things that you once hold onto but really do not need.  I had a chance to visit the Atlanta Home Show to see what are the new  products and home organizers that are coming out for the 2013.

I had a chance to hear a speaker name Tonya M. Williams  who is a HGTV Real Estate & Lifestyle expert discuss about the upward movement of real estate for both the seller and the buyer.  She gave us ideas on how to refreshes our home for the coming season and what are the best low cost ways to remodel our homes.  Indeed it was excellent information!

After hearing Ms. Williams, I then decided to walk around the Atlanta Home Show to see what are the new gardening items and home products.  I stop and saw  a beautiful  model industrialized kitchen that can be place any kitchen and not look too overpowering.  Easy to install closets organizers are being used in  wet rooms, walk-in closets and office rooms.  There were some unique water features  such as vases, brick waterfalls, ponds and fire lighting rocks. Outdoor lighting is very key particularly using it as a focal point for a water feature. Outdoor living is still very popular with different displays of outdoor fireplaces, kitchens and stainless steel grills.

Outdoor living would not be complete unless you have a garden with flowers, trees, ornamental, plants and herbs.  For your garden specifically use, companion herbs which can help you to get rid of any unwanted pests without using any pesticides.  Herbs such as lavender , thyme, chives or any member of the allium family can even deter larger pests, such as hungry deer.  It seems that to be that the strong aroma of certain herbs confuses pests and keeps them away from neighboring vegetables plants.  Having herbs in your garden can help reduce weeds.  Such as parsley which spreads and take over any empty spots before the weeds do.

So this summer enjoy your home both the inside and outside.  Start on your home repairs  and gardening right now!

It’s Spring Time! Time for Community Gardening!

It is that time again to play in the dirt!  April is National Garden Month where every community, organizations and individuals nationwide is starting to toil the soil and nurturing their plants.  Spring is the time to get rid of the old (such as weeds and hard clay soil) and bring in the new (such as compost – black gold and fresh organic plants).  Since the recession has caused a restrain in the wallet, there are more people that are now into planting and becoming involved in community gardens.  This has saved people money by growing their own of fruits, vegetables and herbs.  There are many ways that you can get into the spirit of starting a community garden.   One way is doing a Multicultural Community Garden where you can plant different fruits, vegetables and herbs from around the world that are acceptable based on the planting zone that you live.  To find out what plant zone you are in click here .  It is also good to seek out neighbors from various ethnic groups to learn about their native cuisines and gardening techniques.

Your community garden group can plant a row for the hungry since there is an estimated almost 33 million Americans, including 13 million children that resort to emergency foods because they cannot afford to purchase the food they need.  Being a Volunteer Master Gardener, I was able to assist the local Public Library’s Master Gardener’s Vegetable Garden where we were able to donate weekly pounds of organic vegetable to the local soup kitchens.  If every community garden in the United States was able to plant a row of vegetable and fruit for the hungry what a huge difference it would make to every community.

Have you ever went to the local garden store to find the “best plant” to purchase and take it home to find out that it was not? The best plants are not found in the local garden center or seed catalogs.  Instead the best plants are found by gatherings of quick cuttings or by collecting seeds from the communities’ gardens.  To get these best plants, your neighborhood community garden can organized a plant swap event which would encourage other to share their favorite plant specimens.  You can also share cutting of one of your favorite landscape or houseplants with a neighbors in the community.

Another  way to gather neighbors, friends and family to participate in starting a community garden is to celebrate important “green” holidays such as Earth Day (April 22) and National Arbor Day (April 26).  Earth day is a celebration of green living where the community gardeners can learn about organic gardening, green landscaping and recycling.  On National Arbor Day the community gardeners can come together to plant trees to provide shade and landscape for the neighborhood areas.

Now that winter is finally gone and spring is here to stay, try to make an effort to meet and greet with your neighbors and start a community garden today. To learn more about gardening check out Living Healthy Website:  http://livinghealthy1.org/Products.html .

Have a Bless and Healthy Day!

Denine Rogers Rd, Ld