Can book worms be earth worms?

In fact, I really haven't got a clue, but if there's a slim chance for this morph to take place, it's happening right now, in what I have taken to calling my garden.
In our recent home improvement frenzy, no prisoners were taken and sacrifices were made with light hearts and a song on our lips.
The Mister decided that he was not impressed with the heavy, dark bookcases anymore. They look a bit like this HEMNES unit from IKEA (maybe a previous range, I forgot their name):

They looked beautiful in our previous house, but with the new white mantelpiece (oooh, I'll have to tell you about that bad boy soon!) they are not exactly pleasing to the eye anymore, and the years of serving in a 5 cat household started to show on them as well. So something had to be done.

At first we meant to take one of them to bits and get rid of the pieces on the skip. (which isn't too far away, would have been three trips on foot carrying the stuff over) But seriously, who were we kidding? Too lazy to even take the thing apart, and we knew dang well it wouldn't happen. So we figured we could make room in some corner of the house- but then we couldn't be bothered dragging it up the very narrow, treacherous steps. So what were we to do? No fireplace to burn it in, no way to use it elsewhere in the house and no way to pass it on to a new good home as years of... cat activity made that quite impossible. 

So the Man said, innocently: "What if we use it as a planter?" I actually thought he meant to place it outside upright and use it for lots of little pots with lots of little plants in them. And I loved the idea. But then he went "no, I mean as an actual planter, flat on its back and filled with soil!" "THAT'S CRAZY TALK, man, what are you thinking??? Let's do it!"

Basically, it is a much larger version of the japanese temple. All the rest of the awful junk and debris went into it and then we filled it up with soil. Bless him, my darling went and got loads of big, heavy bags of soil from the local gardening shop on foot, probably disfiguring his spine for all eternity. I used to think that I am physically stronger than him (leftover arrogance from those early years of bodybuilding, believe it or not), but he proved me wrong. I lugged one bag and nearly collapsed, but he made quite a few round trips and never faltered. How he does it I will never know.

Anyway, just feast your eyes on our OOAK planter for a minute, if you will:

Sorry about the shadowy photos, that's all I got for the time being.

Under the plastic lid some lavender is hopefully growing, the kitchen unit pansies have a lot more room to play, two ferns are doing me immensely proud (I LOVE ferns from the bottom of my heart, just as much as pansies.) and some random rescue plant called coreopsis from the reduced section in the supermarket is actually thriving now. Oh, and there is a passion flower baby in the left corner, which I am willing to grow and prosper with every ounce of willpower I can possibly transfer onto a little plant that really doesn't want to be here and would rather spend some quality time ANYWHERE but where it is now. 

The stone slabs are actually natural slate roof tiles that came down in one storm or another. And the plastic lid is one half of an old propagator, the other half being kept, just in cae we feel the need to, well, propagate stuff again. 

It all looks a bit daft in the photos, but I swear that if you came 'round for a little bbq, you would like it. Unless you think that having a bbq in a garden made from trash by folks who have next to no disposable income is no fun, in which case you miss out on this:

And I can't see anybody right in their minds not wanting to grab a plate, sip some homemade sangria (sober option with grape juice available, fresh fruit as standard) and climb into a cardboard box to run head- first into the next unsuspecting citizen they can find. 

Be our guest, anytime.

The book worms are waiting.

Oh, and since those pictures were taken we have upgraded to a foldable bbq which collapses to a tiny flatpack of about 1 cm thickness. Nothing if not posh, guys, nothing if not posh.

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May

In fact, it's not so much rough winds but continuous rain. It's pretty much been chucking it down since Wednesday, which is utterly disgusting. And wet.
So, no way I compare anything to a Summers' day! But I promised to tell you how you turn a bed base into a japanese temple, so let's just ignore the weather and head into the... erm... garden, shall we?
Our new abode has a tiny front yard, covered in concrete slabs and nothing really worth looking at. A huge pile of discarded kitchen unit debris and assorted other junk turned into an eyesore, something that made me want to buy really dark velvet curtains to make sure I can't possibly see any of it EVER.
As I told you, I was pretty much drowning in what I can only describe as depression ever since we moved in, and that particular little piece of paradise didn't exactly help raise my spirits. If anything, it made me raise spirits and neck them one after the other. Burp.
Enter the british summer. About two weeks ago, the sun decided to stick around for a bit, instantly making everything look less of a nightmare and a little bit more of a do- able "let's get rid of it!" challenge.
Most of the kitchen unit debris left over from hat I assume was some sort of refit years ago (why would the landlord bother getting a skip when there is a perfectly good front yard available? No, I don't know, either) consisted of decaying bits of plywood, rotting panels and bits of wood with nails sticking out of it. Lovely.
But there was one treasure. A complete, intact, not even a little bit decayed unit about 60 cm square- must have been some sort of wall cabinet in a previous life. The door obviously gone, but otherwise a perfect container.
Container?
Container gardening?
Oh hell yeah, man!
When I came out of that black hole of depression, my first actual proof of life was to grab that unit, fill it half way with debris and junk, then top it up with loads of compost and plant pansies in it. There, instant container gardening. I felt so artsy, crafty, clever and happy! It actually worked a treat, but still looked like a piece of junk with pansies in it.
The Man was sweet about it. Really, really sweet. He said he loved it, and I know he did- he loved the proof of life it was. But it looked like sh.. and we both knew it.
So he got crafty. And if you have been reading this blog for a while, you might know that when that dude gets crafty, the world is in for a big oooooooooooooooooooooh moment!
He rehomed the pansies in something I will have to dedicate a new post to. Honestly, it's so cool it'll make a freezer look like a finnish sauna. (Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm... sauna... *best Homer Simpson voice*) Anyway, with my darling pansies gone this is what happened:

Three of them rib thingies of an IKEA Sultan something or another bed base, cheap spray paint, a few screws and two charity shop tealight lanterns. Oh, and some cheap Morrisons garden lilies, red and yellow in case they decide to bloom. Ka- zamm, a third of the front yard junk and debris gone. (most of it is inside the planter, under the soil. Should help drainage, at least that's the plan.) 

Does it look like a japanese temple or what?

To the left, you can see my little macrame and plastic bottle plant hanger- let me know if you'd like to make you own, it's so easy you'll be laughing all the way through the (short) making of it.

I love, love, love this planter, it actually looks quite classy, and when the candles are lit it'll make you go "whoa... WHOA!" The cost for this was, altogether, about £9. 4 quid for the compost, 3 quid for the plants (on offer, bless them) and 2 quid for the cheapskate spray paint. So, if you have junk, compost and plants on hand, you get off for zero quid. Having a crazysexyclever Man on hand obviously helps, as I would have NEVER dreamed this up myself. Ever. 

So, what have we learned today?

Trash to treasure, junk to jungle, scrap to fab. 

And if you think this is kinda cool, wait until I show you what you can do with a book case. I'll wager a quid you would not have thought of it yourself, because I haven't ;)