Spring Home 2009

HOME & 2009 Spring

garden magazine Advertising supplement to the Sunday, April 26, 2009 Detroit Lakes Tribune

111299 Lawnmower maint. ad.indd 1

SPRING Home Magazine

4/22/09 4:29:38 PM

inside the spring home magazine 2 Southwestern comfort

26

10 Dynamic Homes’ 40+ yrs

32 Home trend: greener

Armand and Maricela Radke recently finished their Floyd Lake home, a construction confection of southwestern bliss, where they hope to retire.

After more than 40 years based in Detroit Lakes, Dynamic Homes’ modular building system is only looking up and to more future growth.

16 Beating the energy bill

Detroit Lakes’ Utility Department weighs in on how residents can shave a few dollars off their energy bills.

18 Area gardeners gear up

Profiles of three local flower-and-vegetable enthusiasts as they prepare for the upcoming season.

Soothing with nature

Tom Reiffenberger, an area Master Gardener for more than 10 years, brought his love of gardening and “horticulture therapy” to Lakes Homes.

Architects say more potential builders are looking to be more environmentally friendly.

Published by DL Newspapers 511 Washington Avenue • Detroit Lakes Phone: 218-847-3151 • Fax: 218-847-9409 www.dl-online.com recordtribune@dlnewspapers.com Publisher: Dennis Winskowski dennisw@dlnewspapers.com Advertising Manager: Mary Brenk mbrenk@dlnewspapers.com Spring Home Editor: Courtney Sinner csinner@dlnewspapers.com Circulation Manager: Viola Anderson violaa@dlnewspapers.com

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Photos by Brian Basham/DL Newspapers

Armand, left, and Maricela Radke, right, stand in front of the kitchen and island in their newly finished home on the northeastern side of Floyd Lake. After breaking ground more than 20 months ago, they’re finally getting settled.

Radkes had nothing but time, and wound up with a truly unique space

By COURTNEY SINNER

csinner@dlnewspapers.com

When Maricela and Armand Radke decided it was time for a change to their small cabin on the northeast side of Floyd Lake, the Detroit Lakes couple consulted many friends and contractors about whether to remodel, or simply tear it down and start from scratch.

The answer was nearly unanimous: start over.

They’d owned the property for 15 years or so, and although it held many memories of parties and summer sun with their children, Phillip, now 22, and Brittany, now 25, the structure had a looming mold problem, and heavy winter snows left the ceilings bowed.

So, during summer 2007, they sold off some of the fixtures in the house (Mari says it was “weird” watching people “scavenge”) and broke ground in August.

By the end of that summer, Armand, an optometrist at the MeritCare clinic in town, said the concrete slab for the new house and main structure was up.

The Radkes’ new lake place is now finished, and they’re in the process of moving in and completing landscaping, 2

but it was the interior details — of which there are many — that took the pair the longest to complete.

And yet they had the luxury to take their time.

“We weren’t in any hurry,” Armand said. “It’s not like we were trying to sell a house.”

Their year-round house, which is attached to Mari’s dance studio where she teaches dance classes and yoga, is located on Summit Avenue in town, but they plan to retire here to Floyd Lake eventually.

“Builders are used to moving quickly and having to get things done by a certain time,” Armand said, referring to basic finishes that the builder recommended.

When the couple turned down the basics in favor of something more distinct, like twirly, copper rail spindles on the stairs, the contractor simply said it would take more time.

“But, time wasn’t an issue for us,” Armand said.

So, Armand and Mari thought of every detail and made sure it was perfect, and they wound up with a truly unique space with a southwestern feel.

RADKE Continued on page 8 SPRING Home Magazine

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Handmade lamps, (Left), were from the couples’ friend, Richard Chelmo.

In the Master bath, a copper sink with flowers, (Above), is a focal point.

The stain color on the quarter-sawn oak cabinets is flip-flopped from the wall to the bar, as is the color of granite countertops.

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An enormous loft features white and red oak floors, a hinged windowseat, and impact-resistant glass in the windows to shield against the potential stray golf ball from nearby Ironman Golf Course.

The second bedroom has maple floors and a more “antiquey� feel, Mari said.

6

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7

RADKE Continued from page 2 The old cabin, which was roughly 1,900 square feet was narrower and had two bedrooms, a kitchen and bathroom and up a spiral staircase was a loft. The prior owners had added on a few times, Armand said, so many of the rooms were small, and didn’t have as much “useable space” as the new home.

The new house has 2,400 square feet (800 upstairs, and 1,600 downstairs), only a 500 square feet increase, but Mari said it feels much bigger because of the height of the new house — the great room has an enormous vaulted ceiling lined with tongue-in-groove rustic cherry.

Speaking of wood, the house is full of it, and yet doesn’t feel overwhelmingly “woody” — probably because Mari used a different kind of hardwood on nearly every surface for variety. It’s not conventional by any standard, but Mari wanted everything “just a little different.”

Dark walnut floors and trim are in the master suite, maple in the second bedroom. Brazilian cherry is at an angle to the house on the great room floors, and a mismatchy pattern of white and red oak is in the loft.

Kitchen cabinets are in quarter-sawn oak, but stained in two colors, a few with frosted glass. The main cabinets are more of a natural oak color, with crown moldings in a dark stain. The bar is the opposite: the dark stain with natural accents.

And because they wanted a darker granite countertop in on the main cabinets, they chose a lighter shade of granite for the bar for contrast.

And if all that sounds like too much variety, one thing keeps it tied together: the slate tile, with a subtle sheen, in the foyer runs through the mudroom, main hallway and kitchen, and returns in the accents on the adobe-style fireplace and in front of the double doors leading to the lake.

“We wanted wood or tile throughout the house,” Mari said.

They had carpet in the old cabin, she said, but sand from the beach is much easier to clean off hard surfaces than with carpet.

Lake life details like tracked in sand, or lights along the staircase from the loft for dark nights were all taken into account when designing the home.

The loft is large — Mari said she planned to do yoga there, Armand can store his music equipment, and there’s still plenty of room for two twin beds, a long window seat hinged for storage, little antique cars and a souvenir miniature coffee cart from Costa Rica.

Big picture windows, topped with tiled arches, face both the lake and Ironman Golf Course to the southeast of them.

The windows on the golf course side are all impact resistant, too, Armand said, a detail he thought of since they’d had some broken windows in the old cabin.

Sinks for the kitchen and both bathrooms were one of the only things they imported, all of hammered copper. A large farmers-style sink is in the kitchen, and in the master bath, a round copper sink with flowery in-lays.

Outside, a few pergolas, wood-slat topped overhangs that they hope to grow vines over, are still under construction, but will accent the beige siding.

On the lakeside, they moved the house’s footprint 10 feet back from the shore after mitigating with county officials, and employed their son’s landscape architect friend to help come up with a “permeable” design for stone pathways to the lake so as to not break new lakeshore regulations.

Through the whole process, though, the couple knew what they wanted, and Armand defaulted to his wife on major decisions.

“You don’t now how many magazines we looked at … and took pictures of everything in restaurants and on vacation,” Armand said. “It’s (Mari’s) one chance to build a house.”

And yet, at the end of the day, it seems to be all about the memories from the past and for the future.

“The kids grew up here,” Armand said. “We play in the lake some, fish some, water ski, but it’s mostly about watching the sun go down at night. You can’t beat that. And it’s perfect for looking at the stars.”

The Radkes’ great room features an adobe-style fireplace with the same slate tile from the kichen, foyer and hallway. Brazilian cherry floors, perpendicular to the angled fireplace but diagonal to the rest of the house, are just another unique facet to the home. Supple leather chairs with southwestern accents continue the theme in the house.

8

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Photos by Courtney Sinner/DL Newspapers

In Dynamic Homes’ factory, workers construct many different homes at once using an assembly line system.

Dynamic Homes stays ahead of market by being, well,

By COURTNEY SINNER csinner@dlnewspapers.com While most construction companies sit idly from lack of building projects and jobs are few and far between, one, Detroit Lakes-based Dynamic Homes, continued to produce 50 out of 52 weeks of the year in 2008 – the only company in the Upper Midwest to do so – and they expect business to be up again in 2009.

And although executives say they never quite saw the building boom that larger markets did (so it might be why they haven’t quite felt the pinch), they credit their product diversity, or dynamic-ness if you will, and dedicated employees for their long-term success.

The company, which builds modular homes and commercial buildings, was in its infancy in 1969 but was undercapitalized, current Vice President of Sales and Marketing Tim Olson said, so the Lund Boat company purchased Dynamic Homes in 1970.

That lasted until 1973 when the Lund proprietors opted to let Dynamic Homes go, and it became a publicly traded company, remaining that way until 2000, when owners made it private again.

Now entering its 40th year, Dynamic Homes has produced more than 10,000 houses and commercial properties 10

dynamic

for buyers in six upper Midwest states: Minnesota, North and South Dakota, Wisconsin, Iowa and Nebraska.

“We’re going to be around a while,” Olson said.

Modular buildings are created in sections in a factory setting, complete with everything from cabinets and countertops to flooring and sinks, then transported to the site via wide semi and assembled.

Olson likened the process to a puzzle — where the pieces are created in a controlled environment and put together later, unlike a traditionally built house (which they call “stick-built”) that might take longer because builders are dealing with things like weather.

In the factory, the sections, or modules, are rolled out (literally, rolled on tracks created by the company’s founder) with assembly line precision.

In the massive factory on Roosevelt Avenue, employees work on a dozen different homes at once, each at a different stage in the process. Olson said they finish one and a half houses every day.

They produce 200 homes a year at that rate compared to three or four that a regular contractor would produce (and also get inspected by more organizations more often), so they get many of the high-quality supplies at a bulk discount, which can trickle down to savings for the con-

DYNAMIC HOMES Continued on page 13 SPRING Home Magazine

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One of the chalet-style model houses built by Dynamic Homes has a loft above.

The other model home is much different, highlighting the diversity of their building style.

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Dynamic Homes’ main offices and factory are located on Roosevelt Avenue in Detroit Lakes.

DYNAMIC HOMES Continued from page 9 sumer.

Dynamic Homes President Paul Okeson said the price compares “apples to apples,” but many of their houses wind up being slightly cheaper simply because “stickbuilt” homes rarely come in at or below budget.

Picking trims, flooring, and other home finishes can also be less of a headache, since Dynamic has many inhouse options.

Buildings assembled modularly also go up much faster.

The average stick-built home takes upwards of six months from start to finish, but for Dynamic Homes, many of their houses are ready to move into within 90 days of placing an order.

Most of their homes are 2, 3, or 4 modules that get put together by a crane on site, but Olson said they’ve done a 10-module house before and are working with a prospective buyer for a 12-module home.

And while the company has a number of floor plans to choose from (everything from ramblers and split levels to chalets and two-stories), 85 percent of the homes they build are completely customized — something both Olson and Okeson say they’ve both done for themselves a handful of times.

“I wouldn’t build a home any other way,” Olson said.

For Olson and Okeson, much of their time on the job is spent dispelling myths about modular homes.

14

“I used to think it was trailer homes when I came to work here,” Okeson, who has worked with the company for five years, said, “but there’s a difference.”

Similarly, Olson said the “M” in “modular” often gets mistaken for “mobile,” but “it’s just how the house comes to the job. That’s the only difference.”

The vast majority of the homes are built with a full basement, too, since the typical excavating, digging and foundation process is done before the modules arrive to the site, so buyers have the option of installing a basement.

It’s not a finished basement, though. Buyers are left to finish that separately, one of the few limitations that modular homes have.

“Our job every day is to educate,” Olson said. “There are people who come in here, and it’s our job to get rid of their predetermined thoughts, and they realize it’s a sophisticated process.”

At the end of the day though, Dynamic Homes relies on its employees, everyone from the front desk receptionist to electricians and plumbers. More than half have been employed by Dynamic Homes for upwards of 15 or 20 years.

Olson has been there for 30 years — and one factory worker said he started at Dynamic just three days after his high school graduation in 1975.

“We saw a recession in the early ‘80s, and we survived because of our product and our employees, and I think that recession was worse,” Olson said. “We’re starting to see it turn around, we’re starting to see more activity.”

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Increase your home’s energy efficiency

without breaking the bank

By THRESSA JOHNSON Home energy can all too easily turn into a major drain, both environmentally and financially. To reduce your bill and lessen your personal effect on the environment, keep these tips from the Detroit Lakes Utilities Department in mind: ■ Unplug cords for items not currently in use, like cell phone and laptop chargers. The "bricks," or boxes on power cords, will draw in energy even when not plugged into gadgets, and devices like televisions take in power when switched off, meaning they should be unplugged, too, if not put to use often. Some appliances use up as much energy when turned off as when they're on, a fact many consumers aren't aware of.

■ Change your lightbulbs. Compact fluorescent bulbs provide a simple way to save a few bucks. Their light quality has improved in recent years, but you may need to test out a few brands before finding one that suits you.

■ Measure your watt usage. Wattmeters are inexpensive, sometimes only $20, and help you realize how much electricity your appliances use. Buying or borrowing a wattmeter will pinpoint any plug-in appliances that are drawing excessive amounts of energy, allowing you to look into investing in a more efficient model.

■ Look for the "Energy Star" logo when shopping for home appliances. It signifies that the product has met the Environmental Protection Agency's and U.S. Department of Energy's standards, making them more energy-efficient than base models.

■ Seal yourProvide ducts, or have ductwork insulated. Energy We seeps easily through cracks, which in turn finds its way

into your electrical expenses.

■ Instead of turning down the thermostat, turn on a fan. Be sure to have fans on only when people are in the room, to be especially cost-effective.

■ Invest in an Energy Star programmable thermostat.

These thermostats automatically change settings for dayto-night use, as well as weekday-to-weekend, allowing you to save on heating and cooling bills.

■ For rooms that see little use, but often have their lights left on, installing motion sensors can save energy by automatically shutting the lights off after a set length of time.

■ Be sure to have your furnace and air-conditioner cleaned each year before their season of use. Annual tuneups can prevent issues like dirty filters from sucking up extra energy.

■ When replacing decorative lighting, consider purchasing LED light strings, which use up to 95 percent less electricity than C7 incandescent lights.

A few easy exchanges and adjustments can cut energy bills dramatically, while significantly lessening stress on resources and the environment, leaving no reason to fear flipping a switch.

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17

Submitted photos

Sue and Larry Larson, who live north of town on Highway 59, tend to a lush pond and garden in their front yard. In the back of their house, tall hollyhocks may eventually be a new focal point.

Area gardeners prepare for another

season of flowers

By COURTNEY SINNER csinner@dlnewspapers.com The lakes area is full of people that love to plant seeds in the spring and watch fresh, green sprigs of life poke through the soil.

For many, the love of gardening began during childhood and has burgeoned into a lifelong hobby. The following area gardeners are a few of many that received “Beautification Awards” the last time the Chamber of Commerce ran the contest back in 2006.

Sue and Larry Larson Sue and Larry have been in their house off Highway 18

59 since 2004, and although some of the landscaping was there when they moved in, it was their more than sevenfoot-tall hollyhocks that got the attention of passers-by a couple years ago.

They couldn’t get them to grow as tall last year because of chillier temperatures, but the couple, who both grew up with green-thumb families, says they’ll try again this year.

Sue, one of 14 children, lived in Idaho for a time before moving to the Lake Park area with her family. She remembers her mother being excited to start planting vegetables in the rich, black soil that the valley is known for.

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PROFILES Continued from page 18 “I just loved being outside,” Sue said. “I would rather have gardened, and make my sisters stay inside and cook.”

Larry, who grew up on a farm outside Lake Park, saves the seeds from some of the flowers, and marks the colors to plan for future years.

When planting their gardens, Larry says the most important thing is “to get the first row straight.”

The couple also plants peonies, tulips and lilies, and in the vegetable garden, strawberries, hot peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers, just to name a few.

Last year, Larry said, deer chewed off the tops of their beets, and one year, they accidentally fenced in a trouble rabbit that had been nibbling on plants.

“We put up a fence, but then found out that it had built a den inside the fence,” Sue said.

Still, she said, they’ll be at it for a while.

“We’ll probably be doing this until we can’t bend over anymore, and then we’ll probably crawl,” she said.

PROFILES Continued on page 22 The Larsons have now planted a few of these “rose trees,” (Right) after the first one was successful.

(Below) their more than six-foot-tall hollyhocks from a couple summers back prompted passers-by to stop and take pictures, Sue said.

20

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PROFILES Continued from page 20 Steve and Renee Specht Steve and Renee started small when they moved to their property, then a new development, 11 years ago.

Steve said they started out with a small garden bordered in old railroad ties, and have added on to it five or six times.

“We figured we’d have less (grass) to mow that way,” he said.

The pair doesn’t grow many vegetables, just tomatoes and peppers for their love of salsa, but their big garden in back is full of flowers, including Renee’s favorite, zinnias.

“I call it our family flower, because my mother’s name was Zinnel,” she explained.

Many of their perennials, she said, came from her sister-in-law Janis Schram, who splits up her perennial bulbs at the end of every season and gives them away to family and friends.

“She’s really the one that helped us get started in a lot of this,” Steve said.

The couple lived in a townhome prior to moving there, and only had a few flowerpots, but now, Steve says it’s their “big hobby.”

Their garden is mostly perennials with annuals to fill in, like sunflowers, but since they live in a location with few trees for shade, they don’t have hostas.

And some things over the years haven’t been successful.

“It happens,” Renee said. “It’s just trial and error, and learning by doing, but it’s basically fun.”

PROFILES Continued on page 24

22

Renee Specht’s favorite flower is the zinnia, which is clear from the photos here. She and her husband, Steve, credit help with their garden to their sister-in-law.

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PROFILES Continued from page 22 Betty Smith It’s probably safe to call Betty Smith an area greenthumb legend.

She has enough awards and newspaper clippings to fill a binder, has been a part of the Lakes Region Gardening Club for over 40 years (she was president from 1978 through 1980, and secretary for a few years, too), and currently serves as the superintendent for the District 11 Horticulture Shows (and the district is a big one — from East Grand Forks to Lake Park and Ada).

These days, her house just north of Detroit Lakes, which she has lived in since 1979, is surrounded by flowers, mostly annuals and hostas — “Everybody has hostas” — but a garden in back is full of gladiolas (her favorite), more than three kinds of lilies, hybrid irises of every color, lilacs and dahlias.

Red geraniums fill up hanging pots, apple trees blossom in the spring, and she could fill a cornucopia with the amount of vegetables she grows, everything from potatoes and beets to radishes and spinach.

“You can’t top the flavor,” she said.

She says she makes five kinds of pickles, apple pickles, beet pickles, and plum jelly, which she says is tart but “has a beautiful color.”

Betty has never had trouble growing anything, she says, and credits her parents with those skills.

“I don’t know what I don’t have,” she said of her garden.

24

(Above) Betty Smith has probably grown every variety of lily, gladiola, (Lower Left), and others, like dahlias, irises and lilacs.

In the spring, a tree in her backyard explodes with pink buds, (Lower Right).

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submitted photos

Thanks to area Master Gardener Tom Reiffenberger, Lakes Homes area group homes have been using horticulture therapy for their residents. Working with nature, he said, has many benefits.

Lakes Homes brings garden therapy to residents for 10 years

By COURTNEY SINNER csinner@dlnewspapers.com Anyone who spends their spare time planting, pruning, watering and harvesting will tell you that there’s something soothing about working with nature.

Tom Reiffenberger has parlayed his Master Gardener status into his job for over 10 years with that very idea in mind.

For those that thought nature’s relaxing qualities were just coincidental, Reiffenberger, the executive administrator at Lakes Homes and Program Development, calls it horticulture therapy.

Along the lines of music therapy or dog therapy, he said, it helps relax and improve the lives of the residents at Lakes Homes’ various group homes in the area.

Lakes Homes’, a local nonprofit, works with adults who have developmental disabilities, many of whom reside in group homes. The organization has most of their locations in Becker County, but has also expanded to Ottertail and Mahnomen counties.

Reiffenberger became a certified Master Gardener about 12 years ago after taking an 8-week long course through the University of Minnesota Extension Office, where students 26

learned the specifics of plant pathology, insects, diseases and how to research problems and help a fellow Gardener with a problem.

Not long after receiving his certification, Reiffenberger decided to get residents of Lakes Homes involved. The organization wrote up a grant proposal to the American Horticulture Society and received enough to build a greenhouse — the same one that most Detroit Lakes residents see on Summit Avenue.

Now, he said, every one of Lakes’ Homes locations has some sort of garden, whether it’s a simple window box or full landscaping with raised beds, ponds and walking paths.

Residents help with much of the gardening work, he said, but it varies significantly depending on the functioning level of the resident.

“It totally depends on the individual,” he said. “We have a group of very interested people, who had either done work on a farm or grew up around it, and they can be quite independent, whereas some can just hold the hose and water things, and some just put their hands in the soil and feel it.”

There are many benefits, too, Reiffenberger said. It

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The gardens at Lakes Homes feature tulips, (Top), and other flowers and vegetables. Residents, (Above Right & Left), take on various projects from planting seeds and tending to their own plants, to watering. Reiffenberger said completing certain tasks, no matter what it might be, can give the resident a sense of accomplishment.

28

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The gardens at Lakes Homes are all built and maintained by staff and residents together.

lakes homes Continued from page 26 helps with physical activity for some, but for some, the sense of accomplishment from completing a task can be all it takes.

“It depends on their function level, but it’s initiating a task that they can be successful at is why it’s so important,” he said. “And plants, you know, they’re a living thing, so they’re delicate, but if you’re too rough with it and it breaks or whatever, it can also be replaced.”

Reiffenberger recalled one young resident who would fill pot after pot with soil as his task.

“It gets to be rote filling, but then he’s not thinking about other socially unacceptable behaviors,” he explained. “It takes their minds off of other things.”

There are many social benefits, too.

“We often have garden parties or tea parties, and compete at the Becker County Fair,” he said. “And it’s considered kind of a normal act, and appropriate for all age groups.”

Although each garden is different, Reiffenberger said there is typically a lot of color in the front, and vegetable and herb gardens elsewhere.

“And then when people drive by they won’t say, ‘Oh there’s the group home,’ they’ll say ‘Look at those flowers,’ instead of the stigma of the location of a group home,” he explained.

It’s not just planting and tending to outdoor gardens, either.

Although Reiffenberger said they’re busy in springtime with planting, even in wintertime, staff finds ways to bring nature inside with pine boughs at Christmastime and leaves during Thanksgiving.

In the summer, then, they’ll have a “theme.” Last year’s, 30

he said, was peppers and tomatoes — residents helped plant seedlings, which were then sold to staff and other residents.

At the end of the summer, they held a contest for the best produce, or the biggest, and residents could win prizes. At the end, a potluck was held, but the dish had to be made using the peppers and tomatoes.

He continues to help out at the Extension Office, especially in the summers, when they operate plant and pest clinics.

Reiffenberger said the Extension Office continues to offer the Master Gardener class — in fact, they just completed another class in Perham, where over 60 participants became Master Gardeners. Most were from Ottertail County, he said.

He also volunteers his time there for the Plant and Pest Clinic, answering phones and helping research and diagnose plant problems.

Lakes Homes is also sponsoring an upcoming community event for Gardeners: “Real Gardens for Real People,” a gardening workshop, will be on May 2 from 8 a.m. until 4 p.m. at the Detroit Lakes campus of the Minnesota State Community and Technical College.

To learn how to design basic floral arrangements, show exhibits at flower shows, or how to judge exhibits, the “Exhibiting and Judging School” will be on May 30 at the Lakes Homes office.

Finally, a middle-of-summer “Shoe Container Show” will showcase plants grown in shoes at the Washington Square Mall on July 16.

Contact Tom Reiffenberger, (218) 847-5642, for more information on any of these upcoming events.

SPRING Home Magazine

Reiffenberger said many of the Lakes Homes residents find enjoyment in working with nature, as can be seen here with this resident.

Hillside Gardening You’ve got a green thumb, and it certainly shows.

Your home is filled with plants of all types, and your yard is lush with vegetation. You’ve devoted many hours to creating a beautiful lawn and garden and have tackled almost every part of your landscape, except for that small hillside near the creek. You planted grass there, and you mow it regularly, but that’s as far as you have gotten.

As with any garden, selecting the right plants for the environment is important. There is a risk of erosion with a hillside, so you will want to make certain that you select some plants that will help keep the soil intact. Deep-rooted plants will work well for that as will some groundcovers.

As you are selecting plants, take their light and water requirements into consideration. If the hillside is shaded and wet, then you will want to select plants that can grow in low-light, moist conditions. If it is sunny and dry, then you will want to select plants that can grow in sunny, dry conditions.

SPRING Home Magazine

Once you have zeroed in on some plants for your hillside garden, you will need to devise a plan for their placement. Since you are dealing with a hillside and want to prevent erosion, you may want to try terracing. Using stone blocks or some other material, you can create a series of terraces in the hillside.

The plants will sit flat on the terraces, allowing you to water them easily and more efficiently. If you have trees in your hillside garden, you may want to create a moat around the bases to prevent water runoff.

Depending upon the severity of the slope, you may need to take additional measures to prevent erosion.

You may want to build a retaining wall or add some boulders or rocks, both of which will retain the soil.

To complete your garden, you may want to add a few decorative touches, like a bench or a statue.

Gardens can be created on hillsides. It just takes a little time and thought. Put in the effort, and you’re sure to be pleased with the results.

31

Planning on building this spring?

A few trends to look at

By COURTNEY SINNER csinner@dlnewspapers.com Trends come and go, but the green movement may be around for a while — and architects are seeing more interest in energy efficiency and “healthier” building materials than ever before.

Richard Larsen, a Detroit Lakes architect who has worked on homes and summer cabins in the area for more than 30 years, and Darryl Booker, a professor at the North Dakota State University School of Architecture, broke down the preference shift in for new construction and remodels.

Booker said it’s not just energy efficiency, either – it’s a “larger umbrella of green or sustainable design, which includes everything from size to efficiency of mechanical systems.”

■ New government tax credits on things like solar panels and geothermal heating are making the energy investments more affordable, and therefore more popular.

■ Overall, Larsen said, people may be downsizing their homes, choosing a more space-efficient home, with rooms that serve more than one purpose, rather than sprawling 4,000 square-foot properties. Even paying attention to how 32

a house’s footprint sits on the lot can affect its energy efficiency, he said.

■ Because indoor space might be smaller, more people are choosing more functional outdoor spaces, like two or three season porches. Booker said it’s not necessarily a new idea, but in challenging northern climates, the concept of more sustainable landscaping and outdoor spaces is coming back.

■ In this economy, Larsen said more people are looking to remodel or add on to homes, looking to increase their property value, rather than starting from scratch. “In a tight economy, everyone wants to remodel, especially in this area if you have a lake cabin and you like the location,” he said.

■ Because homes are being closed up more tightly to be more energy efficient, more people are finding it important to purchase carcinogen-free carpets, and other chemicalfree products. Booker said they’re “using materials that are less processed, less assoc. with toxins. So, moving away from materials and designs that basically ignore the industrial processes, which haven’t been very kind to human habitation.”

For more on how to increase the energy efficiency of your home without construction, see “Increase your home’s energy efficiency without breaking the bank” on page 16.

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