One of Northern California’s most loved walking holiday home tours returns this December, with five elegantly decorated homes in East Sacramento’s historic Fabulous Forties neighborhood open for viewing.  For 39 years, this popular tour has grown to include nearly 5,000 patrons from throughout northern and central California.  The homes showcase elaborate renovation while preserving historic design, custom interior decoration and creative holiday décor that is sure to ignite the spirit of the season. Homes on the tour this year range in style from a stately Tudor to a beautifully remodeled plantation home that was at one time a multi-family duplex.

The tour is completely run by volunteer parents from the school. According to Leslie Wilson-Lopez, a parent and one of the tour’s four co-chairs, the holiday tour is a fundraiser for Sacred Heart Parish School and funds raised are used to help offset tuition and to provide assistance to those who families who might not otherwise be able to afford a Catholic education.

The holiday tour includes a holiday boutique and café located at Sacred Heart Parish School’s gymnasium at 39th and H Streets. This year’s talented interior and floral designers will include: Beyond the Garden Gate, East Sac Florist, Holiday Home, Kerrie Kelly Design Lab, Lumen’s and Twiggs Floral Design Gallery.

Here’s a summary of what each home has in store for the tour:

Southern Bungalow on 38th Street

Built in 1915, this  38th Street home  Southern Bungalow may be 3,000 square feet on 1/3 acre, but it is the least bit ostentatious. Once again, Philip Rice of East Sac Florist dazzles the homeowners. This time with his dramatic holiday take on Contemporary Country meets edgy Rock-n-Roll.

California Cottage on 42nd St.

As you enter this lovely 1924 California cottage, a beautiful wreath greets you at the front door. The family monogram on the wreath is a sign of things to come inside, as Kerrie Kelly Design Lab has decorated this home for the holidays in a very approachable and authentic way that is personalized to the homeowners.

Majestic Tudor on 45th St.

Built in 1925, by well-known craftsman and architect Squeaky Williams, this elegant home replicates an authentic Normandy Castle.  Upon entering the grand foyer this Christmas season, you will be greeted by traditional holiday décor, created by Carol Shellenberger and Mary Shaw, from Holiday Home. The designers called upon the homeowners’ classic style when decorating this majestic home for the holidays.

New England Manor on 46th Street

This 1939 Grand Brick Tudor home, in addition to our 45th Street home, is suspected to have also been built by well-known Sacramento builder Squeaky Williams. The long walkway and warm brick porch are only the beginning of what lies behind the front door, including holiday décor and furnishings by Elizabeth Lake, senior lighting designer of Lumens Light + Living.

Fab 40s Charmer on 47th St.

The holiday theme for this 1925 bungalow is “simple elegance intertwined with family tradition.” Pat Stromberg, Nancy Storm and Patti Green, from Beyond the Garden Gate, set the décor tone in this newly remodeled home by adopting the homeowners’ clean, yet classic taste, along with their family-friendly surroundings.

If you go:

WHEN: Friday, Nov. 30 through Sunday, Dec. 2
Friday 11 a.m. – 8 p.m. (Homes open for touring at 11am; Café and Boutique open at 12:30 Friday due to school dismissal)
Saturday 10 a.m. – 7 p.m.
Sunday 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.
TICKETS: Tour tickets are $25 in advance starting on November 1st; $30 after November 29th.  Organizers predict another sellout this year and suggest advance purchases when possible.
Please check the website for ticket retailer locations or to purchase tickets online!  www.sacredhearthometour.com or call the Holiday Home Tour Information Line
at (916) 556-5050.

When my husband Adam and I first moved into our home last summer, we had grand ideas about what we should do with our front and back yards. He is an intern architect, so he has access to computer programs that facilitate all of our planning. But planning is just the beginning and now I feel overwhelmed after visiting the garden tended by Sacramento resident, David Roberts.
Roberts is an environmentalist who draws on nature for inspiration. He is a professional landscaper by trade, so I shouldn’t be too hard on myself when I look at the Bermuda grass that blankets my front yard. I’ve heard time and again that lawns suck up so much water, so I’d like to get rid of that one day and plant an orchard of fruit trees, which is easier said than done, I know.
When I found out that Roberts used Round-Up to get rid of his Bermuda grass back in 1987, I realized even the most environmentally friendly people use that stuff I’ve heard called many bad names.
Even though our hottest days are probably gone for the year, Roberts said there’s still some opportunity to get to “ground zero” if I want to get rid of my crummy lawn. He added that it’s actually a good time if you want to get started. “Planning as you get into the cooler season is great, because the soil is warm still, but the temperatures begin to moderate and the plants are able to be under less stress.”
This is good news because as I learned from Dave Tamayo, environmental specialist for Sacramento County, no matter what kind of plant you get, if you put it in a place not too healthy, it will be stressed and won’t be able to fight off chemicals such as the Round-Up I’m about to purchase.
Tamayo is an entomologist, or as I’d like to say a bug expert, who explained that most bugs in your garden aren’t necessarily bad bugs. And, Roberts teaches a Green Gardener course in West Sacramento (which is now underway). He’s trying to change the minds of professionals.
“(They) think they know the industry, which from their perspective, they do, but we’re trying to bend their minds into new practices and change the way things are done a bit,” he said. That is, he’s trying to get people to be more environmentally friendly.
Tamayo and Roberts are both advocates for River Friendly Landscaping guidelines. There are seven of them that I need to remember as we undergo this major landscaping transformation.
One includes water conservation – which by getting rid of my lawn will eventually get me there. That is the foot in the door, as Roberts says, but it’s still just one piece of the pie.
Another is to create a healthy soil. Roberts said native plants don’t always need a lot of fancy nutrients, but when you have an old garden that may have been doused with fertilizers, you will have to rebuild the health of the garden.
“We’re taking a lesson from nature, instead of from man,” he said. “We invented fertilizers, which helped us with our crops, but on the other hand, we also ignored the natural systems, and, in some cases, helped to deteriorate them through chemical use.”
Roberts explained that the soil food web is all the microorganisms: fungi, bacteria, bugs, that all create soil structure. Just by having organic matter as mulching, he said, begins the process because the mulch gets deteriorated and it’s taken into the ground by certain organisms.
OK, but how can you differentiate between good bugs and bad bugs? That was my question for Tamayo, who chuckled a little before simply stating if you see bugs damaging your plants, those are the bad ones. Then he threw a wrench into the logic and said if your plant is having a problem, you need to be sure you know what’s causing it. I guess you could think bugs are killing your plants when something else is.
Tamayo said people apply insecticides to lawns, even though in California insects are rarely the problem to them. There are a bunch of tests you can try on your lawn if you think bugs are ruining it. (See http://ucipm.ucdavis.edu/QT/parasitesinsectcard.html for more on that.)
Fortunately when you do have lawn insects, a lot are susceptible to nematodes, or micro worms, that can harm the insects that are damaging your lawn. I understand you have to be good at following directions if that’s the route you go as they are susceptible to drying out, not to mention, expensive. Tamayo said rather than killing the insects, the nematodes give the insects a bacterial disease, turning some insects red.
I feel like I’ve learned a lot about environmentally friendly gardening, but am nowhere closer than I was before. Well, Roberts did at one point during an interview call his plants his children and, at another, said that not all his clients want to tend a garden — they want a landscape.
Maybe that’s more my style. I’d love to be all Zen and take the 10 minutes a day to unwind by tending the garden, but shoot, it’s going to be dark by the time I get home.
If I ever get to that point of Zen gardening, I plan on incorporating all of the river friendly landscape guidelines: Water conservation, soil health, water and air quality, landscape locally, wildlife habitat, less to the landfill, and conserve energy. Read more: http://www.msa.saccounty.net/sactostormwater/RFL/
And I’ll remember to water only between the hours 4 p.m. and 7 a.m. For spring through fall, odd number addresses water on Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays. Even number addresses water on Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. During winter, watering is only allowed on Saturdays or Sundays.

editor@valcomnews.com

Special services available to seniors will be the focus at “Senior Awareness Day” at the Pannell/Meadowview Community Center on Oct. 26 from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Seniors can learn about free services, including:

• Free flu shots with Medicare Part B
• Eye screenings
• Dental exams
• On-site pharmacists
• Home and fire safety
• Haircuts/grooming
• Massages
• On-the-spot legal assistance
• Crime prevention workshop
• “Free Bookstore”
• Gardening tips
• Much more.

There will be leisure enrichment resources, a senior café and more. Language translation available.

The Senior Awareness Day is sponsored by the City of Sacramento’s Neighborhood Services Division and Department of Parks and Recreation. The Pannell/Meadowview Community Center is located at 2450 Meadowview Road (corner of 24th Street and Meadowview Road) in Sacramento. For more information, call (916) 808-6525.

The Sierra Curtis Neighborhood Association is hosting its 24th annual Curtis Park Home and Garden Tour on Saturday, April 24 from 10:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. in the Curtis Park Neighborhood.

Curtis Park reflects a remarkable collection of period houses built between 1910 and 1925 that at the peak of popularity for Bungalow and Craftsman styles. Six residences will be featured with a focus on these styles including a two-story Craftsman featured on the cover of Sacramento’s Curtis Park book by local author Dan Murphy, and a very unique home and former residence of local artist and Sacramento State University art professor Jack Ogden.

The annual tour is a showcase of each homeowner’s own creativity and enjoyment of a fine older home. Tour goers will enjoy beautiful original interiors balanced with recently updated kitchens, baths and master suites. Enjoy patios and gardens including one crowned by a massive oak tree surrounded by wood seating, decking, and used brick pathways.

Known as the “happiest day in the neighborhood”, tour goers will enjoy a lovely Spring day walking or bicycling from home to home in the shade of mature tree canopies. Relax and enjoy live music, refreshments including lunch, vintage cars, self-guided residential walking tour brochures and history displays at the north end of Curtis Park at Donner Way and 26th Street.

There will be a price break for those purchasing tickets in advance; tickets can be purchased on-line at www.Sierra2.org, or at the Sierra 2 Center, The Fringe, The Ivy House, The French Hen or Collected Works. Advance General Admission tickets are $20 ($15 for SCNA members), and day of the tour tickets are $25 ($20 for SCNA members).

The event is a fundraiser for the Sierra Curtis Neighborhood Association and benefits the Sierra 2 Community Center and SCNA programs. Refreshment sales benefit the Sacramento Children’s Home, a Curtis Park neighbor on Sutterville Road.

Cook Realty returns as major sponsor. Their continued support of this fundraising event is appreciated.

For more information, call Sierra 2 at 452-3005 or visit www.Sierra2.org.

“The Home and Garden Guide” Special Advertising Section is a new publication of the Valley Community Newspapers (publishers of the Arden-Carmichael News, the East Sacramento News, The Land Park News, The Pocket News, California Kids and The Valley Shopper). This section is the landscape and home design resource in the Sacramento area.  Inside, find articles ranging from home, design, decor, architecture, garden, events, and the local community.

 

Download the April edition of “The Home and Garden Guide” here. Download the May edition of “The Home and Garden Guide” here.

 

This publication was inserted into our four community newspapers. The first publication of the section was April; the second was published in May. The April and May editions have different editorial content and were marketed as unique publications.

For information on advertising in the May edition of “The Home and Garden Guide” or any of our future special editions, call (916) 429-9901 or contact an advertising representative directly, please e-mail them at (listed alphabetically):

Melissa Andrews: melissa@valcomnews.com

Patty Colmer: patty@valcomnews.com

Marc Harris: marc@valcomnews.com

Linda Pohl: linda@valcomnews.com