DIY Life

I have a huge perennial garden in my backyard. Being somewhat persnickety, I have a grid diagram of my garden showing where each plant is and when its flowers are due to bloom. But this year I'm going to have to make some major changes.

Several of my plants have grown to enormous proportions so they need to be split and relocated. Others just aren't performing well, so I need to put out feelers and see if any family or friends are interested in them. Because so much work needs to be done anyway, I've decided this is a perfect year for a garden redesign.

BBC Lifestyle has a virtual garden design tool -- an easy way to envision how your garden may look. The tool is simple to use. You'll enter the dimensions of your garden and select the plants. The selection of plants is somewhat limited, so you may have to choose some that are roughly comparable to what you really want. Next is the fun part -- the tool will render a 3D image of your virtual garden. Enjoy!

These simple homemade cards add a personal touch to any gift or greeting. In fact, packaging a variety of them in a box or simply tied with a ribbon makes a great gift in and of itself. You'll need the following materials:

• Card stock. Soft pastels, cream, or even black work well.
• Paper cutter. While scissors would work, a paper cutter helps you get a perfect edge.
• Fabric. This a great project to use up scraps of fabric. You'll need a green for the foliage, yellow or orange for the center of the flowers, and a variety of colors for the petals. For added interest, opt for subtle tone-on-tone patterns or mottled fabrics; solid colors tend to look flat and lifeless on the cards.
• Glue stick. Make sure to choose a glue stick that works with fabric and paper.
• Fabric scissors. Sharp scissors with a fine point (such as scissors made for quilters) work best.

I'll discuss how to make your greeting cards bloom after the break. You can follow along step-by-step in the gallery.

A couple of months ago I made the switch from working full-time in a typical 8-5 office to working full-time from home. While I love working from home, my office leaves a little to be desired. Instead of the large office I used to have, I now work in a tiny corner of my living room.

So redesigning my office space is on the forefront of my mind: storage, comfort, and functionality are the priorities. When searching for creative ideas, I found an article from Shape with some great tips for creating a healthy home office. I'll share some of the tips I'm going to try after the break.

When I do laundry, I have to do a careful inspection of my son's pockets. Among other various items -- such as Pokemon cards, Hot Wheels cars, and erasers -- I'm bound to find a collection of pebbles and rocks that he's found outside.

My parents really hit a home run last Christmas when they bought my boy a rock tumbler. We ran the tumbler with the enclosed rocks, grit, and polish just as recommended. We had great results (my son even made a ring for me using one of the stones). But the refills were somewhat expensive and, frankly, I thought it took some of the fun out of it.

So, instead of ordering the supplies, we've done several cycles with our own materials. My son has a great time hunting for small stones that might polish up well. It's so much more interesting and educational than ordering a bag of pre-sorted stones. I'll discuss what we use for smoothing and polishing after the break.

Have you signed up for a flickr account yet? It's such a great tool. Not only is it a great way to share photos online, it's also a good method for backing up the photos you keep on your hard drive. And now, flickr.com has teamed up with other online vendors to offer some really cool tools.

When you sign in to your flickr account you'll see a section entitled "Do More With Your Photos." You can click over to other sites that will use your flickr photos to create books, frame photos, design calling cards, and more. HP is one of vendors available. Among other great options, they have this simple photo cube. Best of all, it's free!

Check out the gallery for step by step instructions.

Many parents keep a baby book for their child, lovingly placing their footprint, their first lost tooth, their first cut lock of hair, and photos inside. But for foster and adopted children, their histories aren't so simple. A life book is more than just a scrapbook or a photo album -- it's a record of a child's history.

My son is adopted. He has little to no memorabilia from his early years. But, thankfully, from the time he entered foster care at age 5 1/2, his social workers maintained a life book for him. It's a tangible thing that gives him his roots, so he can blossom healthfully in his forever home with me.

A life book is an honest, age-appropriate record of a child's life so far. It doesn't sugarcoat aspects of a child's life that are difficult. Instead, it tackles them head-on and becomes a helpful tool for foster parents, social workers, therapists, and adoptive parents to use when talking to the child about their history. I'll share several tips for creating a life book after the break.

I adopted my son just after his 10th birthday so we decided to have a belated party. I asked him what shape of cake he wanted He thought about it and answered "rectangle... I'd like a rectangle cake."

When I was a kid my mom always baked up something fabulous every birthday. (My favorite was a Big Bird cake that used a frosted sugar cone for the beak.) So I explained to my son that he had more options besides round, square, and rectangular. He was really excited, but didn't quite know what to do.

After some searching on the internet, we settled on this snake cake. It was right up my son's alley, yet easy enough that I knew I could pull it off. It turned out terribly cute, if I say so myself! Want another creative cake idea? Check out this sushi cake.

I'm all about instant gratification, and this quick and easy cereal box organizer delivers. It's a fun craft to do with your kids, a perfect way to reuse cereal boxes, and a great place to store your magazines. My son and I had an awesome time making this magazine rack.

The project couldn't be more inexpensive -- you probably have all the materials you need lying around the house right now. All you need is a cereal box, glue stick or double-sided tape, sturdy paper, and scissors or an exacto knife.

Simply measure and cut the desired angle on a cereal box large enough to house magazines. To cover the box, I used leftover wallpaper; contact paper or heavy wrapping paper would also work well. Check out the gallery for more details.

I recently adopted a 10-year-old boy. Despite his having a big room with a big closet, a big dresser, and a big bookshelf, his stuff has slowly spilled out to the rest of the house in a big, big way. I've reassigned drawers and shelves all over the house for his belongings, but still we've had trouble keeping any semblance of organization.

I don't know about your kids, but for my son, anything that requires too much effort is useless. The over-the-door rack I bought for his baseball caps? It's completely empty. The case I bought for his Hot Wheels cars? It doesn't even house one measly little vehicle.

But there are kid-friendly storage solutions. What I've learned is that when it comes to kids and storage, easier is better. I'll discuss what I did after the break.

If you live in a warmer area than I do, your flower garden may already be delighting you with springtime blooms.

But here in the Midwest, the first shoots of spring are just starting to poke out of their winter hiding grounds. Each morning when I open my dining room curtains, I'm greeted with the sight of my backyard garden seemingly asking me -- begging me! -- to get outside and do some spring cleaning. Here's what's on the agenda:

• Raking out. I use a small 3-prong garden rake to pull out all the pine cones and other debris. It allows me to get to everything without disturbing any young growth.
• Weeding. My garden has its fair share of weeds. Some are simple, like the wild carrot, which is fairly easy to pull and doesn't seem to come back. Some are a bit more difficult: my worst garden enemy is thistle.
  Thistle has a long taproot, and it's nearly impossible to dig the root out completely. The most effective solution I've found is to dig it out as far as possible and -- very carefully, so as not to kill wanted plants -- pour boiling water on the remainder of the root.
• Trimming. I have an arborvitae hedge that needs to be trimmed a couple of times each year. The spring is easy, because there's no other large growth to get in the way.
• Cutting down. I cut down most of my perennials in the fall, but I leave some up, because the wintering birds seem to like the flower heads.
• Dividing plants. Each year my sisters and I have a swap meet of sorts. Our phones will be ringing off the hook with questions like, "Could you use some Bee Balm? How about some Candytuft?" To keep the plants from taking over I divide and rearrange as necessary.

It's a lot of work, but the rewards are great. Here are just a few of my "rewards" from last year's efforts.