New Orleans - Homes and Gardens

The first event today was to make our way back across the big river to have lunch at Rosalie's house.  On the way, we stopped to get some of the gunk washed off the car from yesterday's rainy travel day.  With our GPS, "DD" programmed and checked, we drove across the Huey P. Long Bridge and in just a few minutes arrived at our friend's house. The last time we visited was a couple of years ago, and she had recently moved into this house.  Now she's recently started a small business which involves a plant and gift shop stocked with "found" and "re-purposed" items.  She's quite creative in making something beautiful and artistic from almost nothing.  She repots plants into many different types of containers and sells them in her shop.  Her business, "New Orleans Green" is a certified green business.  She's having a lot of fun with it, but is still paying the bills with her educational consulting business.

This is a corner of her creating room:

Here she is fixing a soda for Jim - see the stove?  She bought that when she lived in California, had it shipped to this house in New Orleans.  She loves that stove!

This is one corner of her back yard.  Inside the brown shed,

is a supply of containers for her plants:

After we toured her home and yard, she served our favorite - her homemade Red Beans and Rice!  Absolutely delicious, as always.

After lunch, we left Rosalie to prepare for a meeting and took ourselves on a walking tour around the Garden District.  Driving along a New Orleans street:

Beads!  There were a lot of beads in many trees, but they really took over this one:

The streetcar on St. Charles Avenue:

We saw so many beautiful homes and took so many pictures, I had a hard time choosing what to share. This one is distinctive because of the fence - the wife of the original owner missed her cornfields so much that he had a fence built in the shape of cornstalks:

A close-up view of the fence:

 More gardens:

 An interesting wreath!

Beautiful home!  I'm not sure this house was even "on" the tour!

I loved this porch, it was so inviting, I almost walked up and sat down for a glass of iced tea.  I wonder if they would have minded?

We saw many historic homes, including the one in which Confederate President Jefferson Davis died, several houses owned at one time by author Ann Rice, Actor John Goodman's home, and so many more!

At the end of the tour is one of New Orleans famous cemeteries - there was a lot of action there today!  Seems they are filing an episode of the TV show, Vampire Diaries here.

The tour completed, we headed back across that big river again, and back to our own special home-for-now at Bayou Segnette State Park.

Tomorrow - more adventures planned!