DOWNSTAIRS BATHROOM: THE PLAN

This downstairs bathroom renovation is becoming an interesting project. Little hurdles are popping up—nothing earth-shattering or more than the usual renovation snafus, but odd—but it looks like it's going to happen. Soonish.

Since I've blabbed on about it for a bit now, I thought I'd share with you some of the vision for what the room looks like. You'll notice on the photo below that there are no lights. That's because, just as I was ready to order from an Etsy shop, the store just flat out disappeared. I'm not sure what's going on with that, but maybe I dodged a bullet there. Also, the shower pan showed up on a semi on Tuesday but it was cracked so it had to be sent back. Like I said: Little stuff, but weird.

Just to refresh your memory about what this horrific bathroom looks like, here it is in all its bad early-90s glory. You can probably understand why we declared it "the first room that had to be fixed" when we bought the house 13 years ago. This room has it all: pink countertop (I painted the vanity a couple years ago to improve on the pickled finish), lemon meringue pie wall texture, peeling vinyl flooring, cavelike shower with gold sliding door and, of course, a boob light. Other than the doors, nothing in this room is staying.

It's certainly not the worst bathroom that has ever existed, but it's up there. I should add that there is a grossness factor as well. That thick wall texture collects dust and what I think is mildew and the wainscoting was never painted. The ceiling is also pickled pink.

Let's not linger on that image for long. Here's the plan.

1. Shower tile plan: I'm keeping it basic and inexpensive with plain 3x6 white subway tile in the shower and as wainscoting around the room. I'll break it up a little by inserting thin gray Bardiglio marble tiles as stripes, similar to the photo of the shower. Finding the marble was difficult because the first two things I picked out were discontinued, but then I found a few sheets at a store in New York who sent them to me. I don't need much because I get 18 linear feet per sheet.
2. Shower base: I went back and forth on it, but decided to go with an acrylic shower base. This one is filled with resin (or something) so it feels nice and solid. It will save us a little money over a tiled shower floor, but most of all, I just didn't want to deal with cleaning a shower floor. I like that this one has a super low threshold that's only about 1.5 inches tall and the tiled walls go over a flange right up to it. 
3. Although natural brass is de rigueur, I'm just now warming up to it and I'm not entirely convinced I'll still like it in a year or two or 10. Chrome, to me, will always be there. It's not flashy, but it's practical. Also chrome fixtures cost less than other finishes. There will be a regular showerhead and cross-handle valve trim in the shower (because I like cross handles and dammit, I just wanted them), as well as a hand shower, mostly because I don't know how you are supposed to clean a shower without a hand shower. It will also allow me to use it to water plants and maybe wash the occasional dog. Mr. Much More Patient picked out the Toobi faucet, which is diminutive and should fit on our very skinny vanity.
4. This scalloped mirror is a splurge item, but I feel like it's key to giving some pizazz to an otherwise rather vanilla room.
5. Yep, it's toilet. Let's not get too excited. 
6. OK, now we're getting to the fun stuff. This is the star of the show as far as I'm concerned. The specific marble I'm getting is called Fluid, but really it's just a name of a marmara marble. We'll do it in a honed 6x18 tile set in a perpendicular herringbone pattern (meaning it will run parallel to the walls rather than at a 45-degree angle). I absolutely love it. My mother absolutely hates it. I told her she'll just have to use the upstairs bathroom.
7. This is sort of the inspiration vanity for what we're having built. Because we need a really narrow vanity to avoid the bumped-out variety of vanity we currently have in the room, I've designed something that will be long on legs (we have a large linen closet in the bathroom for the majority of storage) and painted navy. It will be topped with a cararra marble top. If you're counting, that's three kinds of marble in one small room, which I'm sure breaks some kind of design rule, but I'm beyond caring.
8. I'm considering using this fun fabric for a roman shade for the window to bring a little playfulness into the space. 

If you are rolling your eyes at the fact that I seem to have designed yet another gray, white and navy room, I can't help it. The heart wants what the heart wants. Plus, the only navy things in the room are the vanity and the roman shade, both of which could easily be changed down the road, and almost any other accent color will go with the rest of the gray and white color scheme in the room.

The shower will be opened up to the ceiling, where the subway tile will run all the way up and over. The rest of the ceiling will be painted wood planks to match the kitchen ceiling and the hallway outside. We might be able to reuse what is there, but we'll relocated the fan to the shower. I haven't decided what the shower door will be yet, but it will be some kind of glass. Although I prefer completely frameless, I'm not sure we have enough room to have a door opening into the room so it may have to be a sliding door. 

Lots of decisions left to make, but until the sledgehammer falls, I've got time to figure out the details. 

A GUIDE TO THE BEST GIFT GUIDES

Today's post was supposed to be a big photo-filled post showing you all my outdoor Christmas decorations. But it's not, mostly because on Sunday the dogs decided to go on an expedition down a bluff by my parents' house. They made it down OK, but the old one got stuck down there and couldn't get back up and the young one did make it back up but through a mud pit filled with burrs. If you have never experienced the hell that is a huge hairy dog covered in what must have been at least 1,000 burrs caked on with mud, you don't really know what a pain in the butt that is. Suffice to say, Sunday ended up being filled with rescuing the stranded dog (Mr. Much More Patient had to rappel down with a rope and walk to town on the beach with her) and then hour upon hour of bathing them and trying to get the burrs out. And nothing happened outside.

That's probably OK though, because I've been meaning to share some gift guides with you. I didn't do my own gift guide this year because they are a ton of work and I have to do one for work so I thought I'd take a year off (or maybe it's two years now) and just share some of the great gift guides that other people have done.

Michael Ruhlman, professional chef and author, offered up two gift guides: One for small items and one for bigger, serious chef kind of stuff. One note on his list: He says he favors Wustoff knives and I used to too, but then I tried the knife recommended by Cook's Illustrated, which has quickly become my favorite. And at less than $30, I can't imagine why you'd look elsewhere. PBS also has a good guide for every kind of cook.

Some gifts for gardeners. My addition to the list: A Sneeboer gardening tool from Garden Tool Co. Few people will treat themselves to these amazing tools (they should, but it's definitely a treat), but I can't think of a better gift for a hands-on gardener.

The New York Times has a gift guide for just about any kind of person on your list. And so does Apartment Therapy. I'm particularly fond of their White Elephant gift guide, but since the kids in our family are now old enough to join in, some of these are not appropriate for the Impatient Gardener family Christmas. Although something tells me my nephew would miss the joke in the "Sponge Worthy" sponge holder.

The Verge has some interesting things on its home essentials gift guide.

I love giving books for Christmas, especially these days when I think people are less likely to buy themselves a nice book. My niece and nephews get books from us every year (whether they like it or not) and I enjoy picking them out more than almost any other present we give. Here's Publisher's Weekly's best books list for 2015, which is always a good place to start.

So, now the big question: How are you doing on your holiday shopping? I'm feeling pretty good about it. Between scaling back a little bit and just having fewer people to shop for these days (which is sad because if we're not buying for them anymore it's because they have passed away), I'm in OK shape. I have one very difficult person on my list who I have no ideas for, but if all else fails, he's getting a Sponge Worthy sponge holder.

THE REAL-PERSON's GUIDE TO RENOVATION

We are getting close to officially committing to redoing the downstairs bathroom. This is a big deal because (1.) this was the room we swore had to be redone immediately when we first saw the house we would buy—more than 13 years ago, and (2.) it is pretty much the last room to be renovated in this house.

Everything we've done in this house has been "designed" by Mr. Much More Patient and me and pretty much every project has been a combination of professional contractors and DIY. Through all those projects I feel like we've gotten pretty good at this whole renovation thing, from a real person's perspective. With so many renovation shows on television, it can be easy to think that the only way to do a renovation is to hire a designer and a contractor and sit back and relax, but that's not practical for most people.

So I thought I'd share a real person's guide to renovation.

Start by saving photos like crazy on Pinterest and Houzz. Don't even pay attention to what you like about the photo at first, just save it and then go back later to see what themes emerge.

1. GET A VISION

Thank goodness for Pinterest and Houzz. Both sites have made it easy to like pictures without a lot of thought and for me that's important at the beginning of a renovation. I just like pictures and then go back later and look for themes the come up or little touches I liked over and over again. I couldn't tell you what my design "style" is, but you'd probably get a good idea if you looked at my Houzz ideabooks.

2. START SOURCING

Did you notice how I haven't mentioned making a budget? Here's why: Unless you have a very specific amount of money set aside for a renovation that you're going to spend no matter what, I find it difficult to impossible to set a budget early on in planning. You will have no idea how much a faucet or a toilet or a counter will cost until you actually think about buying one so your budget could quickly become a moot point before you even get started. As I start to firm up specific elements that I want to incorporate, I add them to a spreadsheet along with potential sources so I can keep an eye out for sales and keep an eye on the budget at the same time.

The sink, which is really nothing special but I really loved it, was the first thing I chose for the new bathroom upstairs and every part of the design referred back to the sink. Pick what you love the most and use that as the basis for every other decision when designing a space.

3. PICK YOUR STARS

As you are sourcing things for your project, you're bound to fall in love with a few things. If they are in the realm of affordability, great. If they aren't, start searching for a lower-cost alternative. But either way, if you really love it, if it gives you heart palpitations, use it. Cut the budget elsewhere to allow for it and then make it the star of the show. In every room we've renovated I've fallen in love with one or two things and they became the jumping off point for the entire design. In the upstairs bathroom it was, of all things, a $90 sink. In the downstairs bathroom, which I'll tell you more about soon, it's the floor tile. I think it's really important to allow yourself to have the one (or maybe two) things you really, really want in a room. You'll never regret getting them, but you'll definitely regret not having them.

4. CONSIDER YOUR CO-DESIGNER

I think a lot of couples have one person who takes the design reins and another person who sits back and speaks up once in awhile, and that is certainly the way it works in our house. Mr. MMP doesn't speak up often when it comes to design specifics (we definitely start on the same page though), but when he does, he almost always gets what he wants. If one person only wants one thing in a room, for goodness sake, let them have it or at the very least find a compromise that they really like and you sort of like. For our upcoming bathroom project Mr. MMP really wants a faucet that is completely unlike what I had envisioned for the space, but he likes it, it's in the budget and heck, it's only a faucet. It is not going to make or break the design. And let's be honest, renovations can be stressful; keep it light where you can.

I knew I wanted big built-ins in the master bedroom, but in order to afford that, other things in the budget had to give, so I did all the painting in the room (except for the ceilings), including the built-in, I made the cushion for the window seat (which didn't make it into this early picture of the room), and we chose floating floors we could install ourselves. By taking on the projects we could do ourselves, it freed up some of the budget for other things and satisfied the DIY itch.

5. FIGURE OUT WHAT YOU WANT TO DO

By this point you've got a good idea of the scope of the project and where your budget is at and you should have an idea of how much of a project you'll have to do to stay within the budget or how much you want to do. Once you figure that out, you can start getting quotes from contractors, but be upfront about what part of the project you want to do yourself. Some contractors will be reluctant if you plan to do a part of the project that can hold up the whole show yourself. Keep looking. It's your project: do what you want and find a contractor who will work with you. I pretty much always do the painting, which I'm confident I can do myself vs. taking on a project like tiling, which I've never done. Small finish details such as installing lights and some fixtures like doorknobs and towel bars are also things we'll take on to help cut the budget. Whatever you do, be realistic about what you can reasonably take on because there is nothing worse than having to pay someone to finish or fix something you spent days or weeks on to begin with.

6. START SHOPPING

A lot of people just work through their contractors to get the parts they need for a renovation, but I've never done it that way. I'm a pretty savvy shopper, so I feel confident that I can often pick up plumbing fixtures, doorknobs and utilitarian lighting at a better price than a contractor would charge me. Sure, they will probably buy it for less, but a lot of contractors will charge retail to their clients and keep the difference as part of their fee (which is at least partly understandable as they do have to spend time sourcing and delivering those items). This is where the spreadsheet comes in: I'm constantly looking for sales. On Black Friday, when everyone was shopping for gifts, I was ordering plumbing parts, but I got a lot of them for 15% less than the lowest prices I'd seen previously. Just make sure that everything you order will work in your space by confirming with contractors if needed. Use a cash-back program like Ebates, which finds coupons for you and gives you cash back through Paypal or a check. I started using Ebates before our big renovation and I'm now up to $1,200 cash back. Sometimes it's only a few dollars on an order but all of that adds up quickly.

When your house looks like this, you better make sure you're on the same page as your contractor and if you're not, it's helpful to have another person around to be the nice guy while you lay down the law.

7. HAVE A WHITE HAT AND A BLACK HAT

I've talked about this before because this is a big lesson I learned during our major renovation five years ago, but contractors have to be managed and there are going to be times when it's not necessarily fun. For us, it worked to have one main contact person (usually me) who hammers out all the important pieces of information with the contractor as well as being the go-to person for questions (which I'd then usually take back to Mr. MMP if we had to make another decision). But sometimes that person needs to be rather firm about something. You can't be a pushover. So if there are times when something is not going right, the point person should be the first one in to handle it and that can make you go from white hat status to black hat status. And that's where your partner comes in (and if you don't have a partner in life working on a renovation with you, I suggest you introduce an interested friend early on in the process to the contractor) with the white hat. When things got tense, Mr. MMP would come in and reinforce the message of what needed to happen with a sympathetic undertone. "I know this seems like it's not a big deal, but it's very important to Erin, so it needs to happen," is one approach that worked well for us. By justifying your contractor's feelings on the matter but also being firm about the issue at hand, everyone ends up feeling warm and fuzzy. The contractor does what he needs to do, you go back to being friends and your project ends on a happy note.

Some day I'm going to go a little more in depth in how to deal with contractors, but I'd love to hear from some contractors who are willing to speak candidly about what makes their job easier and why the do the things they do (like starting a project all gung-ho for a few days and then disappearing for three weeks, which is the main complaint I hear from people).

Anyway, those are my tips for doing projects in the real world. I'm not a designer, but I know what I want for my house. I'm not a contractor, but I know what I can manage on my own and what I'm not ready to take on. And I'm not a relationship counselor, but I know that you CAN make it through a renovation without killing each other.

What tips do you have for a successful real-life renovation?

MASTER CLASS ON WINTER CONTAINER CONSTRUCTION

I'm a late Christmas decorator. At least it seems late, since I usually finish it up a couple weeks before Christmas, which is apparently late these days. But I like to take advantage of milder weather to do my outdoor containers, which is easily my favorite holiday project.

I'm busy gathering materials now. I picked up some $6 wreaths at Home Depot on Black Friday. They look like $6 wreaths, which is to say rather plain and uninspired, but by the time I'm done filling them out with other greens and nice bows, you'll never know. I also cut a mound of red twig dogwood over the weekend and I'm hoping to score the branch cut-offs from people's Christmas trees at a few places like I did last year.

Deborah Silver photo

As usual, the best place for inspiration when it comes to holiday containers is Deborah Silver's blog, and this year she treated her readers with step-by-step articles on how those works of art come to life. I've been using foam to stick branches in for a couple years now and it makes such a difference, and not just because the soil in a lot of containers is frozen already. I highly recommend spending a little extra to get foam for containers.

The crew at Detroit Garden Works creating the bases for winter containers. Deborah Silver photo

Here are Deborah's tips:

• Constructing the base of the containers
• How to make the centerpieces
• Putting it all together

Deborah Silver photo

Of course, having a big building to do all the main work in (along with a lot of helpers) would certainly make this process easier, but one must make due with what they have.

Bleached pinecones on garland. Deborah Silver photo

I'm also loving bleached pinecones (Deborah uses some on her amazing garlands), so I'll be following this tutorial on how to do that. 

I don't have a real vision on exactly what I want to do this year, inside or out, but maybe that will make it more fun. The plan is to finish up the outside this weekend.

Do you decorate outside as well as inside?

3 GREAT BOOKS FOR GIVING AND GETTING

I love giving and receiving books so perhaps it's serendipitous that it took me so long to write about this trio of books that that has inadvertently turned into a holiday shopping post.

The first is Charlotte Moss's Garden Inspirations. This oversized book is published by Rizzoli, which is known for beautiful, photo-filled books and this one is no exception. Page after page of gorgeous color-filled photos are a feast for the eyes.

The book is equally divided between matters of the garden and the interior, although the whole point of Charlotte Moss's way of thinking is that both of those areas should reflect each other. My absolutely favorite part of the book is a perspective drawing of her garden and house (I love it so much I think I'd like to have someone make one for me) that spans two pages, but every photo of her garden is incredibly inspirational. The photos of gorgeous table decorations and bouquets picked from the garden really put Martha Stewart to shame, not in the least because Charlotte Moss makes it look effortless while Martha certainly does not.

All photos courtesy of Rizzoli

But it's not just pretty pictures. Moss shares her go-to garden design tips, many gathered from a lifetime of touring great gardens all over the world, as well as interior design philosophies. I have a lot of books, but this is one that is beautiful enough to earn a spot on table, where it will be enjoyed, perhaps in bits and pieces, time and time again. Certainly any gardener or frequent entertainer would love this gem.

Next up is another beautiful book that will be a hit with gardeners with a strong appreciation for European history. A Day at Chateau de Vaux-le-Vicomte is a small book that comes in a beautiful little slipcase that is packed with great history and beautiful photos of the 17th century castle that inspired many of the great chateaux of Europe. The book is more about the castle than the gardens, although the two are obviously important to one another. If you have a Francophile on your list, this should be a hit.

And last on this little book tour is Habitat: The Field Guide to Decorating by Lauren Liess. To say that I'm enthusiastic about this book is putting it mildly. I love this thing (I preordered it months before it came out and sort of forgot about it so the surprise of receiving it was even sweeter). With Pinterest and Houzz, not to mention so many great blogs, one hardly needs to turn to books for interior design inspiration. So interior design books only appeal to me if I can get something from them other than a lot of pretty pictures (although I want those too, of course). If I'm going to shell out for a book, I want information that I can't get on a blog or website. I want to know HOW to make my house look like the ones in the pictures.

I've only bought two interior design books in recent memory: Sarah Richardson's Sarah Style and this book by Lauren (who I feel like I'm on a first-name basis with after reading her blog for several years), and that's because I happen to like both of their styles very much. Lauren's designs in particular have soul to them. I'm so sick of rooms that are so general anyone could walk into them and feel at home. I want my home to feel like me (or us). I want the objects in it to say something about me (so help me god if I ever buy books just because the spines are the right color to match my decor), and I think Lauren does this better than anyone. 

What's great about her book is that she details how to get certain looks and offers tips for every room in the house. She even weighs in on perennial design questions like mixing metals and creating a cohesive room. If you read decorating forums, you'll find that the holy grail of interior design is "timeless." No one wants a room that looks like it came out of a catalog circa 2000 (or any year, for that matter). Lauren tells you how to achieve that. I want to live in every room she designs and I can't think of higher acclaim than that. 

This book would be appreciated by anyone looking to create a home with soul, but I'll be honest. I don't think you should just buy it for your friends and family or wait for them to buy it for you. Pick it up; I promise you won't be disappointed (and this is coming from someone who paid more for it than it's currently selling for). 

What books will you be picking up for friends or yourself this year?

A note: I've provided links to all the books on Amazon, because who's kidding, that's the first place you think of when shopping for books. But if you have a great independently owned bookstore near you, please consider buying your books there. I don't mean to get preachy but there are few places in the world more comforting to be than a small, well-stocked bookstore where you can peruse to your heart's content and there are little signs on the shelf with recommendations from the staff.

FRIDAY FINDS (with a side of snowfall)

Before I get into Friday Finds, a few notes. 

1. I have been working on a post with three book reviews in it for weeks now and still haven't finished it. Next week. They would be excellent gift ideas too.
2. Our first snowfall of the year is expected to come tonight and it could be anywhere from 2 to 8 inches. Let's hope its on the low end of that! Still, it was enough to spur me into getting out of bed early and spending about an hour outside before work digging dahlias and moving pots off the patio. Most of those things would have been fine with the snowfall, but it's a pain to dig in the garden when there's snow and it's really a pain to have to shovel around pots, which need to be put away for the winter anyway. So that's pretty much a wrap on the gardening season. I can't believe how quickly it went.

I'm sorry, this just cracks me up.

I would like to try to make these. She calls them breakfast bars, but we know they are really dessert for breakfast. Which is the best kind of breakfast.

I go to the Lurie Garden every summer when I'm in Chicago, but never in a million years would I have dreamed it would be this gorgeous in autumn. Shawna's series on it has been amazing.

Rambling Renovators photo

So Jennifer put up some temporary wallpaper and changed a corner of her living room into a jazzy little winter wonderland and I completely love it. 

Did you see Chris and Julia's new pantry? I don't care if deep down I know it won't look like that in a year (unless they are superhuman, which is possible) and it makes me wonder how they know how to cook all the stuff that came in a box but was put in a container and now has no directions, it's still amazing. My favorite part is that pocket door, which is a cheapie from a big box store that they made look like it was original to the house. 

Thanksgiving is so abundant and over the top, that I sort of like seeing simple table settings. You spend more than a day cooking all that food, why not let it shine? This one is right up my alley.

Have a great weekend everyone! It's sort of the last one before all the hustle and bustle starts so sit back and enjoy!

10 GARDENING JOBS FOR LATE FALL

As a Midwesterner, I have been raised to be excellent at complaining about the weather. It's the No. 2 most popular hobby in these parts, bested only by something related to football. But this fall we've had absolutely nothing to complain about. This El Niño year has given us the most lovely weather, including the conditions we enjoyed this past weekend when I was able to garden in shorts for most of Sunday. On November 15. That is unheard of here. 

Much of the country has been enjoying equally unseasonably warm weather, so even though we are all making holiday lists and dreaming of leftover turkey sandwiches and pumpkin pie, there are still garden chores we can do now. And anything you do now will only make your life easier come the busy spring gardening season. 

I rake the leaves out of the bed and Mr. Much More Patient swings by in the lawn mower and mulches and collects them. 

1. Deal with the leaves. 

Rake leaves out of garden beds and off of your lawn. I've been reading a lot of new theories on leaf management, many advocating leaving them where they lie for the benefit of wildlife, but I'm not a fan. I suppose that works if you don't have a lot of leaves or if you live in the middle of a city where places for wildlife, but here, where the leaves fall a foot deep and there are more than enough places for wildlife to take refuge, the disadvantages of leaving leaves far outweigh the advantages. Leaves form thick, solid mats that foster mildew and lawn problems, and insulate garden beds, making them perfect for protecting nasty weeds. I'm not saying you have remove every last one, but get the majority out of the way. Plus, if you don't pick up leaves you will miss out on the chance to turn them into leaf mold simply by doing nothing but putting them in bags or in a pile and letting them rot down, and thus creating an great soil amendment. 

2. Clean your tools.

This is the last gardening project I'll do this year, as I use my tools every time I'm in the garden. But at the end of the season, I'll bring them all in the basement, give them all a good scrub, sharpen them if needed, oil the blades and apply a little boiled linseed oil to the wood handles. When spring comes they'll be good to go. 

3. Weed!

Weeding is no more fun in fall than it is in spring, but you're going to have to do it sometime, so if you can stand it now, do it. Some perennial weeds like offender No. 1 around here—garlic mustard weed—are easy to pull and stand out bright green against the fading garden so it's easy to spot them.

4. Put away pots.

Dump out pots and store them in a protected area for winter. Bonus points if you clean them first, but I've never bothered. At most I give them a rinse in spring before planting, but it really is better to scrub them out with a diluted bleach solution. (Do as I say, not as I do.)

A couple dozen pots of perennials are heeled in the raised vegetable garden for winter. When the ground freezes, I'll throw on a layer of mulch for some extra protection. 

5. Heel in perennials still in pots. 

Any plants that you haven't had time to put in the ground have officially missed the planting window if you're in zone 7 or lower. No worries: Just find an out-of-the-way spot in your garden, and bury the pots up to about an inch from the rim. Keep them well watered while you can and after the ground freezes, give them a nice layer of mulched leaves (I know, I told you to get rid of them, but mulched leaves are different), straw or evergreen boughs. I always use a corner of my raised garden for this and the pots are removed by the time I need to plant seeds.

6. Plant bulbs.

Yep, there's still time; you can plant bulbs right up until the ground freezes. A bonus is that many stores and bulb companies are offering fantastic sales for procrastinators so you can really make out. 

7. Keep everything watered.

I'm absolutely convinced that one of the critical factors in a plant surviving a tough winter is whether it enters winter well watered. As long as you can use your hose, keep watering. And yes, these last two tips are repeats from my September suggestions, but they still apply even two months later. 

8. Cut back perennials. Selectively.

There's a fair amount of research that suggests that perennials fare better when left to stand over winter, but it's not always possible to leave an entire garden standing. Some plants just look terrible going into winter, have flopped completely or are prone to reseeding, which makes them good for birds but not great for the gardener. Other plants like hostas turn into a goopy mess that fosters and environment that's perfect for nasty things like slugs to hide and lay eggs. I'd say I cut back about half the garden in fall and finish the rest in spring. I leave a few things standing because it makes the winter landscape much more attractive, but I like to get a jump start on spring gardening.

Last year I used string wrapped around stakes to protect plants from deer. This year I may try just using a deer repellent. 

9. Protect sensitive plants.

Anything that is questionably hardy, particularly beloved or dear or expensive and on its first year (so I don't really know how hardy it is here), usually gets a layer of protection. For some plants, this is burlap, which can protect flower buds set in summer and fall. Many others get a chicken wire cage that will be stuffed with shredded leaves or evergreen boughs after the ground freezes. This protects them from wind and sun scald more than cold, which is often blamed for damage caused by the former conditions. Equally as important is protection from deer, who get very hungry when snow is covering everything else they eat. Last year I caged almost everything, but it was a lot of work and quite unattractive. This year I think I'm going to use deer repellant. I have been using Messina's Deer Stopper II all summer and have been very impressed so I think I'm going to give it a real workout by trying it over winter as well. Reapplying it won't be particularly fun but it will be a good excuse to trudge around the yard in the snow. 

10. Bonus job: Edge beds.

I never seem to get to this in fall at home, but at one of the master gardener projects I work at, we always edge the garden bed in fall and it makes that job so much easier and faster in spring. It will also help keep grass from creeping in beds in spring before you can get out there to garden.