Free and Clear

When the boat was in the backyard it ended up in just about every picture from every angle.

Still more to do but a nice clearing has been made.

Now it’s gone.

I tried getting these photos rom the same angle.

Notice how much more inviting the yard is when the grass is green and the trees have leaves and the boat is GONE!

Even from the far corners of the yard the view has improved.

From behind the Cottage across the yard only the garden carts are in view.

In summer the garden, built up on bamboo trellises, hid the boat but it was still there when the garden was put to bed for the winter.

All structures are down for the season.

Now the scene beyond the potager has a small seating area, some new plantings and a HUGE STUMP.

The stump is almost hidden by the leafy lilac bush.

The work is non-stop.  Always something else to take care of.

Charlie looks surprised that the boat is following him.

But for now we’re free and clear of a giant white (and blue) elephant.

Lah-di-dah!

Next project: mow the lawn and weed the shade gardens.

Are you shocked when you see photos of your yard and there are things you have become so accustomed to you hardly see them? Your house? Your bedroom? Yikes!

Just in Time for a Pinterest Challenge

I’ve been working on painting, stenciling, and staining our dining room chairs.

Before and after seat detail

They were inspired by this pin just in time to enter into The Young House Love Pinterest Challenge.

Design Sponge Chair (link above)

First the chairs were sanded and wiped down with mineral spirits.

Every side and top and bottom need to be hand sanded.

To mask the area that would become a dogwood blossom I covered this x-ray film (which came in the mail as an advertisement) with blue painters tape.

I covered the slick surface of an x-ray with painters’ tape.

I cut out the shapes and taped them to the chairs. (At first I taped the wrong side of the x-ray film and the tape came off slick and non-sticky.  Fortunately the other side worked.  Probably waxed paper or aluminum foil could be used for the same purpose.)

The painters’ tape will allow the flower to remain the natural wood color.

Then I sprayed a grey primer to cover as much of the raw wood as possible.

The grey primer helps adhere the top coat to the surface.

With a brush I carefully painted all surfaces of the chairs which was a time consuming and tedious job.  First I flipped the chairs to get the bottom rungs painted then painted the upper sides being sure to hit every angle.

Dab paint carefully over the tape stencil.

Once they were dry I pulled the painters tape to expose the dogwood blossoms which were placed differently on each chair.

Pull the tape carefully.

To make the dogwood blossoms more recognizable I used a little dark brown stain to  darken the indents at the edge of the petals and dotted the centers.

Close-up of dogwood

I waxed the chairs with Butcher’s Wax and called them finished.

Charcoal chair with a dogwood flower

Another Pinterest pin completed from my projects board.

Are you pinning and projecting?

I’m linked to

Painted Dining Room Chairs: Before and After

I’ve been wanting to paint our blonde oak dining room chairs for a while now.

Dining room captain’s chair

I got a good start recently and I have a glimpse of one to show.

Close-up of dogwood stencil

Before and after.

Charcoal chair with a dogwood flower

Still needs some touch up and wax but at least there’s progress.

Chairs are tedious to paint.

Do you hold on to projects for a long time?

Linked to

Prepping Chairs for Paint

Bentwood oak chairs for the dining room.

On both our master list and my private project list is a line item to paint our set of 4 dining room chairs. I started and Charlie finished  sanding the chairs and wiping them down with mineral spirits.

After sanding the chairs are wiped down with mineral spirits.

I saw this inspiration on Pinterest and decided a set of charcoal grey chairs would be great. My remembrance was that the chairs were grey but as you can see they are NOT! That’s exactly the kind of goof-up that causes trouble for me.

Source: madebygirl.blogspot.com via Jo on Pinterest

 It’s a good thing it takes me soooo looong to get a project going (over a year in this case) because I had another Pinterest moment that I thought would make these chairs ultra special (and if I dont like it I can paint it out).

Source: designspongeonline.com via Jo on Pinterest

My take on the flower above is a dogwood since our dining room has that as a repeated motif.

Dogwood blossom at The Glade

I already have the paint which are 2 free sample cans of Flint by Benjamin Moore.

Flint by Benjamin Moore is a charcoal grey.

And I bought some grey spray primer. I still have to:

• cut out the dogwood stencils,
• tape them to the chairs,
• prime the chairs,
• paint the chairs,
• detail the dogwood flowers, and
• maybe wax the painted chairs.

Whew, seems like a lot to do for 4 chairs. Glad there aren’t more.

Do you ever remember things totally wrong?

Setting Up the Fence

With the old iron fence derusted, primed, and  painted it was time to set it up at the entrance to the potager.

Our now-demolished porch had an iron fence around it.

First we strung a line between 2 stakes so we could keep a straight line with the fence which comes in sections.

Charlie measured the centerline (after eyeballing its position) to make sure he still “had IT!”

Then Charlie cleaned out any old dirt and concrete that was wedged in the hollow fence posts.

The bottom of the fence posts were filled with dirt and cement.

Next he pounded 2-foot rebar into the ground until about 8 inches showed above ground.

Two feet of rebar was pounded into the ground until 8 inches remains above ground.

The we carefully lifted the fence onto the rebar.

A section of fence and the gate.

It seems to be sturdy.

Looking through the fence from the potager toward The Cottage.

I can’t wait until the plants start to grow and the blue fence sits among variegated greenery.

The blue is subtle but distinctive.

And because we never know when to quit we’re thinking of this:

We have 2 longer pieces to add to either side.

Crazy, huh?

What are you waiting for?

Dirty Bunny

A few weeks ago I pulled out our Easter decorations most of which date from at least 30 years ago.  One of the items is a very cute white bunny puppet.

Bathed in sunshine the bunny puppet looks bright white.

Unfortunately this little fellow’s white fur has a dusty grey tint to it from storage.

Unfortunately his fur had turned prematurely grey.

When I looked up how to clean stuffed animals most people said just toss it in the delicate cycle of the washing machine with other like-colored items.  I zipped the little fellow in a mesh bag, tossed him in, and turned on the machine.

Bagged and ready for the wash.

A half hour later I had a nice clean albeit wet puppet.

Dry partially in the dryer and allow to air for the final drying.

I tossed him along with other wet laundry into the dryer but removed him after about 5 minutes.

This year when we put him away we’ll seal him in a plastic bag to keep him clean.

Tra la. A clean bunny puppet to delight the children.

What have you tried to clean with success? Any total fails?

In the Wall

We have a really convenient laundry room.  It’s on the second floor of the house where the bedrooms are also located. In the laundry room is an ironing board.

Ironing Board – Up Position

Not just a an ironing board but one that stores in the wall when not in use.

Ironing Board – Behind Closed Door

The door and trim are oak and therefore needed to be painted.

The door and trim have been painted white.

I decided to paint it white like the beadboard and future trim.

The black spot below and to the left of the ironing board is an outlet that has recessed itself into the wall. Ugh!

One more item on the list completed. Tomorrow we’ll fix the hole in the wall.

Are things getting finished at your house?

Some Old Windows

We have some old windows that I bought for a few bucks at a yard sale. Charlie uses them to cover the early plantings in the potager.

An old window helps warm the soil and protects the seeds.

But we also found among our stuff (and we don’t know where it came from) a basement style window.

This old window has frosted up overnight but the panes of glass are actually clear.

I’ve been wanting to try Catherine’s (at Freddy and Petunia) technique of adding a little music and faux mirroring to a window. Check it out here on Pinterest.

I bought my mirror spray paint. (Looking Glass Mirror-Like Paint by Krylon)

The Looking Glass spray paint by Krylon gives a mirror finish. Spray adhesive holds paper to glass.

I chose my favorite hymn (Great is Thy Faithfulness), photo-copied it on old vellum, and tore it to bits.

Sepia-tones copies of “Great is Thy Faithfulness”.

Then I glued it to the back of the glass with spray adhesive.

The paper is glued to the back of the window with the writing showing through to the right side.

Masking the deliciously worn painted wood with tape and paper I sprayed the mirror paint onto the back of the windows. (Five light coats.)

Spray the Looking Glass paint onto the back side of the window.

After letting the mirror finish dry for at least 24 hours I painted the back with outdoor paint to protect the mirroring. The back paint lifted some of the music so it was necessary to reglue the corners.

The window blends well outside.

I’m going to find a place outside to hang this one-of-a-kind meaningful piece of vintage up-cycle.

A chippy detail.

Do you like it?

Great is Thy Faithfulness

I’m tickled with it.

What music would you have chosen?

Pull Down the Shade

Yesterday I exchanged lamps in the Diva Room at The Glade.

The shades on the lamps in the rooms match.

The shade I used it a little to short to cover the black lamp base.

See the black lamp base sticking out from under the shade?

When I looked inside the shade I noticed the spider (the part that holds the shade to the lamp) was bent down thus shortening the shade.

Bending the wire inside the shade should allow 1-2 inches of increased length.

I could make it longer by bending the spider  up instead of its current position.

Bending the wire up caused the spider to contort and put pressure on the ring holding the bulb clip together.

Unfortunately when I started to manipulate it with my tiny pliers the spider detached itself from the shade. RATS!

The bulb clip fell out of the lamp shade and totally fell apart.

Once that happened the whole spider apparatus fell apart including a small gold ring which held the clip together. I put it back on but it just kept flying across the room.

Happily I found a never-been-used-before spool of “Black Ann” household wire probably 50 or 60 years old.

In order to refashion the spider I cut a piece of wire from a wire hanger exactly the size of the inside top opening.

Hanger wire is easy to cut accurately by bending it back and forth with pliers.

Then I wired the original spider (which I had to cut down a little) to the hanger wire and voila, I clipped it on the bulb and off I went.

The original spider is wired to a piece of hanger and ready to be inserted into the shade.

NOT!!! It wouldn’t stay on the bulb so I cut a second piece of hanger wire and made a cross piece to give the spider some stability. Yea, that was a good idea.

The 2nd piece of hanger wire gave the spider more stability but the clips would not stay on the light bulb.

But it didn’t work.  So I rewired the original spider to both pieces of hanger in a narrow “X” shape, tied the  bulb clip together with a piece of wire, and reinserted the whole thing back into the shade.

This rewired “X”-shaped spider worked like a charm. (Due to the wire around the top of the shade the new spider does not need to be wired or taped into the shade.)

This time it worked.  I had to change out a spiral-shaped bulb for a more traditional shape but the shade stays on and covers most of the socket.

The new lamp lights up the area just fine.

Good Old American Know-how.  Trial and error and perseverance.

When the weather warms up I’m going to spray paint the black socket and multicolored wire mess silver to match the lamp.

Do you conceive a project then waltz right through it? Or do a few missteps take you back to the drawing board?

R-R-Remove the R-R-Rubble

I could have called this post “Cr-cr-cr-crazy Cr-cr-cr-craigslisting” ’cause here’s what I did. I listed rubble on Craigslist.

FREE Rubble ad on Craigslist – Load and leave.

Yep.  Charlie took down our concrete porch and stone patio and piled the rubble in the driveway on plastic tarps.

A pile of rubble in the driveway.

I listed it on Craigslist in the FREE category.

The rubble pile weighs tons.

After getting a few calls from people desiring rubble, a young man with a big trailer and a helper came and loaded it up.

Charlie’s pointing out that the pile of stone he has his left hand on we’re keeping.

Then they drove away with half our pile of rubble. (The new owner of the rubble lives at least 15 miles away and had to come through a toll tunnel to get to The Glade.)

The trailer had to make 2 trips due to the weight of the rubble.

But (wait for it) they came and got the rest.

Nothing left except our field stone and some concrete dust.

Woo-hoo. My motto is “CRAIGSLIST IT!”

What are your crazy notions?

Sidebar: Hiring a dumpster to haul away this heavy load would have cost over $500.

Celebration Alert:  I’ve just been notified by WordPress that today is my 2 year anniversary of blogging “Let’s Face the Music”. Yippee!