THE NEW TROPICAL HOUSEGUESTS

The dilemma of every obsessed gardener: Too many plants and not enough space in your garden. My solution to this problem was to invite them into the house and integrate them into the decor. I guess you could say I'm kind of like the botanical version of a crazy cat person. Fortunately, I have a wife who likes indoor plants (maybe "tolerates" is a better word) and a son who doesn't feel the need to destroy them, so the plan worked well.

A livened up drab entryway.

The huge living room window keeps these plants very happy.

The fireplace doesn't actually work so there's no worry of burning these tropical beauties.

My kitchen windowsill has become sort of an impromptu nursery. 

And a bit of tiki spirit thrown in for good measure.

HUNTINGTON LIBRARY JAPANESE GARDEN GRAND RE-OPENING

To celebrate the 100-year anniversary of the Japanese garden at Huntington Library in Pasadena, a year-long, multi-million dollar makeover was done to this cenetarian garden.  The Japenese garden will have its grand re-opening on April 11th. I was fortunate enough to see it during a sneak preview a few weeks ago and took some photos. If you've been to Huntington Library in the past few years, a lot of what you see in the photos will look familiar since the main structure/layout of the garden hasn't been changed. But they've added many new features and enlarged the garden. Construction was in full-force when I visited and there was clearly still a lot of work to be done so I'll be surprised and amazed if they actually finish on time but the grand opening date hasn't been delayed so it looks like they might actually pull it off.

Check out the official Huntington Libary Japenese

press release for more photos and details here:

HUNTINGTON LIBRARY, ART COLLECTIONS AND BOTANICAL GARDENS

1151 Oxford Road, San Marino, CA  91108