Did I mention that its April vacation week?  Can you hear the strain in my voice?  Yes, its a lot harder to lead my normal life while also keeping an 8 year old and a 5 year old constructively entertained.

This morning after they got their hair cut, we stopped by a new place I recently discovered.  Gallery 56 is a great consignment shop in a nearby town.  I finally found new dishes.  My old set was vintage china sourced at a garage sale when I was in college.  Needless to say, (15+ years later)  it was a few plates short of a set.  I had filled in with some ikea standards, but as it turns out plate design is kinda important.  The ikea’s are high in the center, annoyingly making our food sauces flow to the outer edges.   I found that these are much better used underneath plants.

Anyway out new dishes in hand, my daughter and I washed, and put away the new (vintage china) set and swapped out the old.  And in the spirit of spring cleaning (and the fact that everyone was happy to help) the insides of the cupboards got a washing and I decided to paint the inside of my cabinet doors with chalkboard paint.  It was a 5 second decision as I had some paint on hand, but I am so pleased with the results.  A perfect place for notes and grocery lists.  And kids love when you start to spontaneously paint things….

So this a long story to tell you that I want to use chalkboard paint in more places  ( I still have leftovers) and in search of ideas….I came up with this….

and this…

and all of these…..

…proving definitively that there is a place for chalkboard paint in the garden.

images from kids in the garden, you grow girl, aloe designs. houzz, homemade simple, sunset magazine, meg hansen, that winsome girl,  and previous studio ‘g’ posts.