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Do you want your backyard to be your favorite get-a-way?

... then harness the power of nature NOW to refresh your soul with the landscape design ideas that are just right for you.

Now, more then ever, we can use our own personal Eden. Whether you have a country estate, an average backyard, a patio or deck, a balcony or simply a windowsill, at My Ideal Garden, you'll:

- get the help you need to create your very own oasis.

- learn how to read the secrets the garden holds in store for you.

- discover how your garden can be the mirror reflecting the beauty and wonder of who you are.

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- experience how the natural world invites you to nurture, empower and transform yourself so you can fall in love with your life again.

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Douglas Graham/CQ Roll Call File Photo

Falls Navy Yard tragedy led members of Congress to take a closer look at the privately contracted security forces standing guard at about 9,600 facilities across the federal landscape.

Though the Federal Protective Service, which relies on about 13,500 of those guards, was not responsible for the facility where the Sept. 16 shooting took place, Homeland Security committees in both chambers are examining the FPS with renewed scrutiny.

During hearings called in the wake of the Navy Yard shooting, members questioned why the FPS, an agency within the Department of Homeland Security, has not yet acted on a number of recommendations from the Government Accountability Office.

Between 2010 and 2012, the GAO made 26 recommendations relating to FPS risk assessment programs and oversight of guards training, certifications and qualifications. The agency accepted half of those recommendations during fiscal 2013, FPS Director Eric Patterson told a Senate panel in December.

Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D-D.C., hopes to seize the renewed interest in federal facility security while the Navy Yard tragedy is still fresh in lawmakers minds. She called a September 2013 GAO report highlighting the lack of training on X-ray and magnetometer equipment and active shooter response, the final straw during a recent interview and said she plans to introduce a bill to overhaul the FPS early this year.

Details are still being hashed out, but Norton hopes to clarify how the FPS is monitored, require more transparency in the way each facility organizes its security and define the legal authority of contract guards.

They are your first responders. However, they have no more arrest authority than you or I, she said.

Recent legislative history suggests Norton might face an uphill battle to change the agency. Bills to overhaul the FPS have been proposed in both chambers every year since 2010. Former Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Chairman Joseph I. Lieberman, I-Conn., moved a bill to modernize the FPS through the committee in 2010 and 2012, but the full Senate never voted on the bill.

Former House Homeland Security Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., who now serves as ranking member on the committee, reintroduced an FPS overhaul bill in February 2013. He sponsored the nearly identical versions of the legislation in the 111th and 112th Congresses.

See original here:
Advocates Still Hope for Federal Protective Service Overhaul

Columbus, Ohio (PRWEB) January 07, 2014

A&RJ Landscape answers corporate and private customers demand for expanded services just as harsh winter weather hits central Ohio.

More than two decades specializing in hardscape patios and outdoor living environments means A &RJ Landscape knows what it takes to keep people comfortable and enjoying their front or back yards year round. Now they are working to keep their customers safe and secure in the ice and snow.

Customers may now call A&RJs plows to come to their residence or business for salting or snow removal. A&RJ uses specials salts and materials designed to protect surfaces and plants. The company also ensures that services provided pose no danger to pets delicate paws or for potential ingestion.

A&RJ Landscape will quickly and efficiently whisk away snow and ice whether for residential or for business locations. A&RJ Landscape prides itself on offering the very best in customer service, even in the worst of weather.

Now is the perfect time for us to roll out our new snow services. We want to be there to help our residential customers be secure against the dangers of unplowed sidewalks and driveways while also ensuring our corporate clients are able to provide the best winter experience possible for their own customers, said Karin Jackson, vice-president of A&RJ Landscape. This expansion was a natural fit for our company and really answers a demand from the people we serve - right when its needed most.

A&RJs offers expanded winter service beyond average plowing offerings.

Residential snow removal:

Commercial snow removal:

Other seasonal services include hardscapes, softscapes, landscape design and outdoor staging. Hardscape and landscaping specialties extend to paver patios, retaining walls, seating walls, outdoor kitchens, fire-pits, ornamental ponds, fountains, pergolas, driveways, walkways, putting greens, mailbox holders, light posts, cisterns, drainage, and more. A&RJ Landscape also offers tree and shrub planting, mulching, bed edging, yard clean up, fertilizing, irrigation, sod and grass seed, forest restoration, privacy tree fence rows, and gardens. ###

Original post:
Season’s Meetings Made Easier With Delaware and Columbus Ohio A&RJ Landscape Company's Timely Expansion Into Snow ...

MINNEAPOLIS - When Alice Menge started gardening, it was all about islands. With a nudge from her husband, Dick Sherwood, she's gone continental.

"At first, I had cut out some islands," Menge said of their St. Paul yard, "but he hated cutting around those because it meant trimming by hand. So I just started filling in."

After three decades of filling in, their yard - front, back and boulevard - is all garden.

With an eye for design honed by taking classes, visiting other gardens and learning from her own mistakes, Menge has crafted a natural, lived-in showcase with a harmonious array of textures, shapes and colors.

Viewed from the screen house in a corner of the yard, the landscape seems to levitate its way up to the two-story house. The front, anchored by a ginormous, rough-hewn maple, enchants. And that's before you follow one of the tidy stone paths to a fairy garden on the east side of the green-trimmed stucco house.

So, after covering every square inch of the property with gardens, is she done?

"Hmmm, probably never," said Menge, 63.

Spoken like a true gardener. Even when the destination is reached, the journey doesn't end.

And this journey involved collecting rocks from far-flung locations, fits and starts with waterworks and plants and a storm that cost them a third of the 80-year-old maple, as well as some unusual evolutions.

For starters, Menge worked "backwards," not tackling the front until the back was finished. The back yard itself has mutated mightily, from flowers to perennials to the current shrub-and-tree-dominated landscape.

Here is the original post:
Couple gets rid of lawn, makes garden oasis

Matt Blashaw, host of DIY Networks Yard Crashers, wants to give a racing-themed backyard makeover to an area fan and homeowner.

Blashaw, a licensed landscape contractor, and crew will meet with fans from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday at the NASCAR Hall of Fame, 400 E. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.

Homeowners must bring a picture of their current backyard and be ready to convince Blashaw why they are the worthy fan to receive a free backyard makeover.

Blashaw will select the yard, which will appear in a future episode of Yard Crashers, which will be filmed in early 2014.

There is no charge to participate in the casting call, parking is available in the halls Brevard Street garage for $3 for the first 30 minutes, $1 for each additional 30 minutes, up to $15 maximum. Details: twitter.com/nascarhall.

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Read more:
'Yard Crashers' casting call Sunday at NASCAR Hall of Fame

January might be the most important month in the garden calendar; it is the time when we can stop fussing and start thinking.

Perhaps you have just moved to a place where the garden is nonexistent or old and tired, and in either case needs a fresh start. Perhaps you have a part of the yard that needs redoing, or you are simply pondering how you set about crafting a garden.

From the safe tether of a soft chair, you can soar to the heady heights of landscape design, which is the most important but least considered aspect of garden-making.

Plants bring life, sculpture, texture, color and more to the garden, but they need a framework. I've known plant geeks whose entire yards are random collections of favored flora. They are places that are wholly enthralling to their creators, but to no one else.

Every garden needs a coherent structure. Design is pragmatic it creates safe steps instead of muddy slopes but it also drives scale, sets the mood and establishes a spirit of the place.

In the 1960s, Geoffrey Jellicoe, a giant of 20th-century landscape architecture, wrote a book with his wife, Susan, that described the two essential elements as "form" and "content."

Form "is the disposition of space," they wrote in "Modern Private Gardens." The photos in the book, of mid-century modern houses and gardens, are in black and white and not particularly flattering, but they reveal a real paucity of plantings that, to my eye, actually deflates the central argument. There is too much form and not enough content.

Since the 1960s, we have enjoyed a horticultural revolution; far more ornamental plants are at hand along with an accepted need to use them in more natural ways. But this surfeit requires a keener sense of restraint to avoid a formless jumble.

Jellicoe, for a while, had formed a design partnership with another great modernist, Russell Page. Whenever I want to be recharged, I read Page's classic "The Education of a Gardener" for his masterful insights and his gift of taking visual concepts and putting them into words.

Page's fundamental approach to garden design was forged when, as an art student, he was told: "Know what it is you want to say, then try and express it as simply as you can."

Read more:
The Gardener In January: A Blueprint For Green Dreams

Idea Spectrum develops powerful, yet user-friendly landscape design software for Windows 8, 7, Vista, and XP. Designed for both homeowners and professional landscape designers, you'll appreciate how easy our software makes it to visualize your landscape design ideas. Compare our landscaping software. Read the Landscape Software review by Landscape Contactor Magazine, and the review from Landscape Architect magazine.

Version 2013

"Realtime Architect is an incredibly powerful program that can be easily customized into the designers dream software quickly. And the simultaneous 2D and 3D capabilities allow you to give your client twice as much product in half the time." - David Hawthorne, Complete Landsculpture.

Version 2013

"This is absolutely the best landscaping program that I have ever used. The program is so user friendly my kids can even use it. I cannot believe how real the pictures really look. I give this program 5 out of 5 stars, I am so happy that I found you all." - Von Lindsey

Version 2013

"What super software this is. I have designed my house and yard and also others in my family using your software and when they see it on screen they cannot believe their eyes. Anybody can use this software and I highly recommend it to landscapers and instructors of landscaping. Awesome." - James Long

Go here to read the rest:
Landscape Design Software, 3D Landscaping Software - Idea Spectrum

LECANTO --

Citrus Countys Florida Yards & Neighborhoods program is hosting two workshops.

The CCY&N program is a public education and outreach program of the University of Florida funded by Citrus County Utilities.

Florida-Friendly Landscaping means using low maintenance plants and environmentally sustainable practices to produce a beautiful landscape. For more information about Florida-Friendly Landscaping visit, http://www.bocc.citrus.fl.us/waterres/conservation/conservation.htm.

Irrigation Scheduling and Management

Citrus County Florida-Friendly Landscaping is offering a free gardening workshop on Tuesday, January 14 from 2:00 pm to 3:30 pm. Irrigation scheduling and management are essential to successful and sustainable gardening. Providing the plants with the water they require and efficient application of this resource is the topic of the day.

Winter is a great time to evaluate your existing system with practices that include: planning water reducing retrofits, regular monitoring and catch can testing to calibrate the system. Plan to reduce unnecessary water consumption.

Classes are held at the Citrus County Extension Service Building located at 3650 W Sovereign Path in Lecanto. Please contact Steven Davis at (352) 527-5708 to confirm your participation. Landscaping 101

Citrus County Florida-Friendly Landscaping is offering a free gardening workshop on Tuesday, January 21 from 2:00 pm to 3:30 pm. Landscaping 101 is the first in a series of educational workshops providing guidelines for successful landscape design and planning.

This first workshop describes the site evaluation phase of landscape planning. Bring a site plan or aerial photograph of your property and we will begin the process. A series of five workshops are scheduled providing participants the landscape design skills needed to create attractive and sustainable garden improvements.

See the rest here:
Yard and landscaping programs offered in Lecanto

MISSISSIPPI STATE UNIVERSITY EXTENSION SERVICE/GARY BACHMANA friendly garden gnome brings year-round interest to your landscape, and if their lore is true, a dose of good luck and a little garden help, too.

GARY BACHMAN Office of Ag Communications

Even though the weather in the middle of winter prevents much gardening with plants, dedicated and enthusiastic gardeners find ways to keep fun and interest in the yard all year long.

You may have seen garden art in other people's yards, but have you considered bringing it into your own? A whimsical way to jump right in is to bring home a gnome.

Garden gnomes are creatures of woodland legend that represent the most elemental spirit of the earth. Gnome comes from the Greek word for "earth dweller," and these statues were first used in German gardens in the mid-1800s.

Early garden gnomes, which were made of terra cotta, were painted and clothed like miners of the day. From the very first, gnomes have been dressed in the little pointed hats we instantly recognize. From Germany, the use of garden gnomes spread to France and England. In parts of Europe, their presence is a status symbol.

Garden gnomes today come in a variety of materials and clothing styles and can be found around the world.

Tradition says garden gnomes bring good luck and goodwill to the gardener who invites them in. Ancient lore says gnomes take care of the gardens they inhabit, enhancing the harvest.

Some believe that at night, gnomes get busy and take care of some of the smaller garden chores. This concept is the basis of the animated movie "Gnomeo and Juliet" in which blue and red gnomes come to life when their owners are not looking.

With all this history and lore, aren't you ready to try at least one gnome in your garden? Even if you laugh at these stories, garden gnomes have value as yard ornaments and can bring a simple pleasure to your landscape.

Read this article:
Bring a garden gnome home to your landscape

January might be the most important month in the garden calendar; it is the time when we can stop fussing and start thinking.

Perhaps you have just moved to a place where the garden is nonexistent or old and tired, and in either case needs a fresh start. Perhaps you have a part of the yard that needs redoing, or you are simply pondering how you set about crafting a garden.

Adrian Higgins

Adrian Higgins has been writing about the intersection of gardening and life for more than 25 years, and joined the Post in 1994. He is the author of several books, including the Washington Post Garden Book and Chanticleer, a Pleasure Garden.

Archive

From the safe tether of a soft chair, you can soar to the heady heights of landscape design, which is the most important but least considered aspect of garden-making.

Plants bring life, sculpture, texture, color and more to the garden, but they need a framework. Ive known plant geeks whose entire yards are random collections of favored flora. They are places that are wholly enthralling to their creators, but to no one else.

Every garden needs a coherent structure. Design is pragmatic it creates safe steps instead of muddy slopes but it also drives scale, sets the mood and establishes a spirit of the place.

In the 1960s, Geoffrey Jellicoe, a giant of 20th-century landscape architecture, wrote a book with his wife, Susan, that described the two essential elements as form and content.

Form is the disposition of space, they wrote in Modern Private Gardens. The photos in the book, of mid-century modern houses and gardens, are in black and white and not particularly flattering, but they reveal a real paucity of plantings that, to my eye, actually deflates the central argument. There is too much form and not enough content.

Original post:
January: Time to plan the garden