Lipstick, High heels, Pearls and Daydreams

Bonus post today!

A fellow knitter sent me a link to this website.  Go ahead and click it.  I'll wait.

Much sighing.  You guys.  THIS.

Now, I'm not a cleaning nut.  I go through phases where I'll scrub the beejeebus out of stuff and other times where I look at things and think, well, you can still make out the floor through all the cat hair, so we're good.  See, I work a full-time job and I have a lot of hobbies that I like to do.  I try my best to keep up with the dishes and the bathroom fixtures, and the necessary stuff that makes me feel like I could at least have someone come over if they give me an hour's notice, I dim the lights, burn a candle and they sign a contract that they will not open that door at the end of the hall.  Sort of like the story of Bluebeard.  Just.  Don't. Open. The. Door.

In my mind, my imaginary life is most akin to that of a 1950's housewife.  Things are clean and spotless and blindingly white.  I am, in short, together.  In reality though, I am one step away from being featured on Hoarders.  Okay, not really, but there is that spot under the radiator in the kitchen where I spilled something two months ago and the mop doesn't reach under there and, well... it mocks me every time I go in there. (I see you, spot and your day will come!)

Recently, a friend loaned me The Magic Art of Tidying Up and it has changed me.  I piled all my clothes on my bed and went through every single one of them, picking them up, turning them around and waiting for my body to tell me if this piece sparked joy.  Amazingly, it works.  9 garbage bags of clothes later (I didn't even think I had that many clothes and yes, most were donated), my bedroom is a place of serenity and stays that way.  It was truly magical.

All this to say, that when I opened this link the other day, my heart literally skipped a beat.  Oh, the beauty of the packaging, the simplicity of the ingredients, the suggestion of the scents... I was weak at the knees.

I was suddenly transported.  There I was, bright white sunshine streaming through my laundry room windows, the stacks of neatly pressed and folded clothing (all of it white of course), the scent of slightly scented ironing water hanging in the air - clean, crisp, serene.  My black and white polka dot dress, black heels, pearl necklace, bright red lipstick and neatly curled hair...I want it all.  I want to buy all the things.

Shopping cart filled up, credit card out... then I remembered... and closed the website.  Tonight, I will pull on jeans, dig out my cruddy sneakers and go down to my dark, dank basement that smells slightly of cat pee thanks to my cat with litter box issues.  I might wear pearls though.

All Cooped Up!

I will start this out by saying that I don't have a lot of experience building things.  My dad was a great woodworker and built all sorts of things, but other than the occasional birdhouse, I never built anything.   I take that back, I once built a fence from scratch, using only hand tools.  It didn't look bad and it did the job, but I kind of messed up the gate.  Oh well, it kept the dog in the backyard.

Last year, when I decided that I was going to take the plunge and get some chickens, I started looking at pre-built chicken coops on the interwebs.  Wow.  Talk about sticker shock!  Combined with the fact, that so many of them are made overseas out of press board and who really knows what's in that paint anyway?

The next stop was surfing the web maybe doing it myself.  I looked at lots of designs... I mean lots.  Days were filled with various websites and I even bought a book with really cool designs in them. That's when I discovered this site.  The Garden Coop has some slick, sophisticated designs and their plans, according to the reviews were very, very thorough and easy to follow - perfect for someone like me.

After some thought, I decided on the Basic Coop and purchased the plans.  My thought was to build a run onto it, so I played around with some graph paper and the basic design and came up with the idea of building the coop section with longer legs and extending a run of the same height off of it.

Did I mention that I've never used a circular saw before?  There were some parts of the cutting that made me nervous, like the plunge cuts, where you basically plunge the spinning blade into the middle of the board where you want a cut.

The Internet is full of helpful advice and I did a bit of research on safely using a circular saw, purchased some safety glasses and set about cutting all the wood to the sizes I figured out I needed. True to all the reviews, these plans are amazing!  Every step was laid out for me and it was really easy to follow along.  I'm sure experienced builders might find them a little too detailed and probably didn't have to refer to them like I did, but I sure appreciated them!

The coop and run are almost a year old and the inhabitants seem quite happy with it.  During the worst of the winter, I did wish that I had insulated it, as there were a few nights where I was worried about the little dears and ended up wrapping the coop with a thick blanket and closed off 2/3 of the top to keep it a bit warmer in there.  You have to be careful about closing things up so tightly that no air gets in, because that's how frostbite happens - the moisture from their breathing builds up and then ice crystals form.  The girls made it through just fine though.  My only issue was the drinking water freezing solid.

Hello??  We're waiting for our mealworms here.  Hurry up lady!

I'm really happy with my efforts and it is hen approved.  I mean, it's not perfect and a few times, I had to let go of my perfectionist tendencies, but considering that I never built anything remotely similar to this, I'm pretty proud of myself!  It looks nice in the yard, too.

All in all, it did turn out to be more money than if I had bought a ready made cheapo coop like they sell on Amazon, but this is sturdy and I think it is going to last a long time.  The girls are safe and secure and since we do have raccoon and opossum (and fox) in the area, that was important to me. The total cost to build this from all new materials (wood, hardware, screws, tools, etc.) was around $500.

Doh!

Why have I never thought to plant strawberries before?  Little red nuggets of mouth watering deliciousness, sun warmed sweetness... mmmmmmmm....
It makes perfect sense that I do plant them, since I generally make strawberry jam every year.

Strawberry Jam Canned in One of My Vintage Ball Jars

Most years I make strawberry shortcake from scratch and serve it with real whippy cream, 'cause seriously nothin' says summer quite like that to me.

Homemade Strawberry Shortcake

So why, oh why would it never occur to me to actually plant my own?  Who knows.  The important thing is that today I have taken steps to remedy that situation.  I bought 20 bare root strawberry plants.  There are enough growing days left to get them established this fall and actually harvest a few next summer.

Here's something I didn't know.  There are two different types of strawberries - June bearing and ever bearing.  Why decide?  Get some of both.  Yes, have some.  The names sort of tell you what you need to know.  June bearing have one big crop, usually in June of the second year after planting and the ever bearing varieties bear fruit all summer, beginning with the first year after planting.

I can't wait to get them and plant them so I can get those tasty little morsels of summer next year!  I think I may have just the bed for them.... 

NOM NOM NOM!

Another bed and some ideas for next Spring

I've wanted to get back out in the backyard last week, but laboring in a sauna is not something I was willing to do, so I did other things this week.  Mostly sitting on the couch looking up stuff on the internet.  Productive stuff.  No, really.  It was.  Scout's honor.

See, I found this youtube channel by a guy named  Larry Hall.  Basically, you take some vinyl rain gutters and some two by fours, some containers, net cups and some potting mix and you create a self-watering system in which you can grow amazing vegetables in containers.  Since I have an entire driveway that extends all the way into my backyard that gets sun all day long, I've wanted to do a container garden there forever.  These are cool, because it will eliminate me having to water those containers to keep everything alive.  The nutrients go right into the water, which is pretty efficient, sort of borrowing from hydroponics.  I'd probably use compost tea in mine, as I don't want to use chemical fertilizer.  The other thing is that here where I live, I would have to take steps to prevent creating a mosquito breeding ground.  Still, I love the idea - it's simple as can be, inexpensive and I can use grow bags, which are better than buckets or plastic totes since the roots self-prune instead going round and round and eventually killing the plants.

Then, in my travels, I found this guy.  Another thing I've wanted to do again is to grow potatoes in containers.  Besides having a great accent, I love what he is doing with the potatoes, even if he does use chemical fertilizers.  That's easy enough to bypass and again, watering with compost tea would work wonders.  So again, I'm filing this away for next year and in fact, I think I would combine the two ideas and grow potatoes with the rain gutter self-watering system.  I wish I found this in the spring, because I would have done it this year, but oh well.  The possibilities for next season abound!

In the meantime, I decided to start another permaculture-type garden bed with sheet mulching.  I surveyed the backyard this morning and narrowed down two possible sites.

The first site is near the fence and at the moment is a tangle of pachysandra, ivy and thistles.  Probably a few dandelions there too.  You can see the last of the phlox flowering and there is a rose bush struggling to the left.  Sterling, I think.  It doesn't get sun in the morning, because its close to the back steps of the house, but I knew I wanted to put one of the fruit trees I've ordered there.  Possibly the apple, since it would be fairly close to my existing apple tree and cross-pollination, ya know.



The second site gets a good amount of sun every day and would be a great place for tomatoes, peppers and possibly another fruit tree.  Right now, there is a type of perennial sunflower/daisy thingy I purchased at Fordhooks on a whim and it is much, much too big for that space.  I keep it cut back, but if I didn't, it would get over 8 feet tall.  This is actually what grew back after I dug it up and replanted it toward the back of the yard where the size made sense.  So, yeah... this one is going to have to go.

After mulling over both possible sites for the new bed, I ended up choosing the first one for a very simple reason.  (and this is where my youngest daughter should stop reading)  Bees.  Those yellow flowers are a bee/moth/butterfly magnet and I figured I would give them a few more weeks of luscious pollen before tackling this bed.

Decision made, I hauled out the weed whacker and discovered several new curse word combinations.  I hate that darn thing.  It's inexpensive (cheap) and the strings don't advance automatically like they are supposed to and most of the time, whirl back onto the spool.  

At any rate, a short vocabulary building exercise time later I had this

Chop and drop.  

I spread some newspapers I purchased this morning (I should have read them first, I suppose), wet them down and added a layer of cow manure and wet that down too.

Then I mixed a five gallon bucket of my compost with ten gallons of peat moss, about 3 gallons of vermiculite, two big handfuls of pulverized lime and a handful of Epsom salts.  

I spread half of that mixture over the manure, wet it down, then another layer of manure and topped that off with the remaining soil mixture, wetting each layer down.  Once I got that smoothed out to my liking, I spread a layer of pine shavings over the whole thing and gave it a good soaking.  

Here's the finished bed.  I would like to get another couple inches of pine shavings on top before winter hits, but I'm pretty happy with it so far.  No digging is always a good thing.  Time will tell whether or not the pachysandra and ivy actually succumb to this method or not.  They may just rear their heads, look in my direction and say, "Thanks for the manure, lady."  I'm also wondering if the poor little rose bush will benefit from this sudden glut of nutrients.  Hope so.

For those of you who may be wondering about the addition of lime and epsom salts, the lime is for the calcium and the salts are for the magnesium, both of which prevent blossom end rot in tomatoes, melons, peppers, etc.  It's not enough to neutralize the acid that the manure adds, but will make a difference to the plants.  The peat moss and vermiculite were added because I have a fairly dense clay soil and I wanted to aid in drainage, especially at this particular bed site, since it sits pretty close to my downspout.  

After everything was said and done, I weed whacked the walk again and then decided to take a few pics of my backyard as it is now to share with all of you, plus one of the tree well bed I finished a couple of weeks ago.

New bed and walkway  

Coral Bells in flower

Creeping Charlie.  Someday, I'll make beer with it.

Bed I did a couple of weeks ago.  I ended up planting Russian sage, lavender, Greek oregano and English thyme on this side.  The other side is all seeded with garlic, which has not made an appearance yet.

Well, gentle readers... that is as they say, that.  At least for now.

What if...?

My original idea with the porch was something like this, but as I was pricing out materials I had a brainstorm.  I thought perhaps I could do something that would echo the interior trim of my house.

That's a bit dark, so here's a close up of one side of this window.

After thinking about this for a while and pricing out materials, I decided to do a plain panel and then do trim with a combination of 4" board and 2" board.  Since I didn't install the top board with the thought of 1" board being installed under it, I'm going to try to find 1/2" board to use instead, but I don't know if I can find that in 8' sections, which is what I need to do the top and bottom trim, but I will have to see.

In the meantime, I bought the panels for the front and back of the first railing I had framed out.  After fighting with the drill and the wood screws, I was able to attach both panels and I'm pretty pleased.

From the outside - you can see I still have to scrape
and paint the base of the porch.

From the inside.  I like it!  It's going to give us some
privacy, which will be nice.

The next thing I probably should do is go ahead and put a couple coats of paint on at least the outside board to protect it from the elements.  Rain is called for tomorrow and I don't want this to get warped or the fibers to get raised.

I think I'm going to work on the front railing next, even before I get the trim pieces up.  That way, I can get a real feel for what the finished porch is going to feel like.

Once I get that done, I'll do the trim, finish painting and then I will turn my attention to putting in indoor/outdoor carpeting.


 I've picked out a nice neutral carpeting which I think is a real step up from the old astroturf of my youth.

I think this will give this little space some comfort and a feeling of tranquility, plus and this is a huge plus, it will keep the tiny vampires from coming up from underneath the porch and tapping into my veins for a liquid lunch!

Now For Something Completely Different

Hello Gentle Readers,

First off, please forgive my absence - I've had a bit of an adventure.  You see, for the past 5 years, I've been pursuing my undergraduate degree at the University of Pennsylvania.  In August, I succeeded in achieving a goal I have been working on for 38 years and received my degree in English with a concentration in Creative Writing.

Honestly, it was a big accomplishment and I was tired., so I went on vacation.  I have friends who live in Wasilla, Alaska (Hi Dustin & June!) and they invited me to come and visit.  Off I went.

It was beautiful - unlike any place I've ever visited.  The first day there, we went to Knik Inlet.  We saw whales!

I know you can't see them, but those ripples out there are beluga whales.  Trust me.

See those clouds?  This was weather that stayed for the entire 7 days I was there.  It's weather, so what are you going to do about it?  Honestly, the only time it was really sorta a pain was when we went to Denali.

We stopped at a scenic overlook and there was a panorama sign of the mountain range including Mt. McKinley.

This is actually what we saw directly above this sign.

Nuthin' but clouds.  Ah well.  I still had a great time and got to see a lot of really cool stuff.

Dog Sled Team in Training

Little Susnita River in Hatcher Pass.
 It's that color because it originates in the Mint Glacier.  Isn't it pretty?

 On the way to Denali (or was that Talkeetna?) We saw a dog sled team training with a 4X4.  I think there were 17 dogs altogether and I gotta say, those were some happy puppies.  They have a job to do and gosh darn it, they were doing it.  It was fun seeing them.

We also visited the Iditarod Headquarters in Wasilla.  It was an interesting place.  I know there is a lot of controversy involved with the race and I'm not coming down on either side of that but the history of the race is interesting.

Yearling Moose Calf (one of a twin - the other one is near the tree line)

We drove up over Hatcher Pass and stopped to take pictures of the Little Susnita River.  It was a gorgeous mint green tint, but man, it did look cold!



On the way back to Wasilla, we saw these two yearling moose calves.  They may be calves, but they were still the size of horses.  Mommy moose was no where to be seen, but maybe she was back in the trees there.


I'm back home now and after spending a week getting readjusted to my time zone, I'm ready to get back to my porch project.

Next post - porch railings continued.

The Maths Are Hard

Okay, not really.  I'm adequate at math, despite the B- I received from my college math professor (I'm looking at you, grade-curve spoiling math majors).  But when it comes to this kind of stuff, which is really straightforward math, I get a little intimidated.  It's wood, but for some reason my brain says, "Oh, I bet that bathroom really could use a good scrubbing."

So here we have me as I went out to measure the porch:

Handy measuring tape and pad of paper with porch roughed in...

This is what I came up with:
For the side nearest the driveway, the bottom where the wall will sit measures 83".  Up 36" from the base of the columns in that opening measures 82 1/2".  The columns narrow as they go up.  See the problem?  That second measurement should be bigger, not smaller.

Not to be daunted by mere measuring issues, I moved on to the next opening, between the two front columns, which also taper ever so slightly towards the top.  The bottom opening measures 84".  Up 36" from the base, the opening measures 83 1/2".  Again... should be a bigger number, not a smaller one.  Right?

But whatever, it is math, right?  I moved on to the next opening - where the steps are.  bottom measurement is 50".  I didn't bother with the upper measurement for railings 'cause there's going to be a door there.  A 30" door.  Which means there will be a tidy 10" on either side of the door.  Sort of.  Because once again, the column narrows as it goes up, so that 10" on the column side will obviously be a bit bigger as it goes up.

I think that says it all.