Since the age of three when she'd question her parents on when the garden carrots would be ready to eat, Donna Balzer has been passionate about how things grow. Authour, award winning journalist, columnist with CBC radio and the Calgary Herald and blogger (GardenGuru.net); Balzer took some time out of her busy schedule to share her love of gardening including which plant she wishes she could grow here in Calgary.

As one of the showcase presenter's at this year's Calgary Home + Garden Show, Paul Lafrance provides a pretty good indicator of just how important the art of transforming your living space has become.

Host of HGTV's new television show Decked Out as well as the mini-series Deck Wars, and creator, owner and CEO of his own design company, Lafrance has spent the last 15 years generating state-of-the-art custom deck designs across North America.

East Village is on its way to becoming one of Calgary's most sought after neighbourhoods.

"Starting this year it's fast forward again, it hasn't slowed down at all actually which is really great," said Susan Veres, vice president marketing and communications for the Calgary Municipal Land Corporation (CMLC).

"We finished the year last year (and) interest in the remaining parcels of land was really quite high so our focus last year and this year will be on commercial development, less on the multifamily side."

For the last three years, residents of Bowness have been turning what many see as trash into a yard and garden treasure.

The Bowness Composting Initiative stemmed from an idea from local resident Ted Woynillowicz.

"It kind of started when our kids left home and I'd retired recently and wanted to get back into gardening," he said.

The community of Kingsland is in the midst of a pilot project co-funded by The City of Calgary and the Kingsland Community Association (KCA) to spruce up the neighbourhood.

Supporting Partnerships for Urban Reinvestment, or SPUR, is an initiative that sees the public and the City working together with the goal of improving public spaces and quality of life for residents living in overlooked spaces.

Originally individual town sites, the Calgary communities of Bowness and Montgomery today have become two of the city's most established neighbourhoods.

In 1911, when entrepreneur John Hextall registered subdivision plans for the framework of a village along the banks of the Bow River, little did he know that village would become one of Calgary's most beloved communities.

According to a Calgary Housing Company poll, 84 per cent of Calgarians supported the development of new secondary suites.

After falling short of his goal of legalized secondary suites across the city last year, Mayor Naheed Nenshi is making another attempt at pushing the issue forward.

In a year-end interview on CTV, Mayor Nenshi said that finding a more tenable resolution to the issue is still an important goal.

There is probably a marijuana grow-op in your Calgary neighbourhood, no matter where you live, according to police statistics. Pam Lavers, a resident of Edgemont, has faced this issue not once but three times.

Lavers discovered a house in her neighbourhood had been a meth lab and then became a marijuana grow-op on two separate occasions. It was owned by someone who lives outside of Canada, making it difficult to hold the owner accountable for the illegal activity going on inside.

Calgary's Peace Bridge has been ranked as one of the world's top 10 public spaces of 2012 by an international architecture publication.

"The intent was to build a functional bridge for pedestrians and cyclists that would be special for Calgary and become apiece of infrastructure recognized around the world," said Gordon Stewart, director of the City's Transportation infrastructure.

1. Provide family, friends and colleagues with a detailed schedule when leaving for a showing. Ex: Property addresses, expected time of return, etc.
2. Always carry a mobile phone and ensure that you can get to it easily if in an emergency. Use mobile applications such as Guardly or program emergency contacts on speed dial.