Posts with the label Remodeling
Showing posts with label Remodeling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Remodeling. Show all posts
Nov 15, 2021
Geometric Black Wall Treatment in the Master Bedroom
Here! See some pictures of my room! Quick before the clutter explodes all over the place again!
In case you can't tell, what you see in the above picture is a geometric black wall treatment in the Master Bedroom. We designed the room with this little recess for the bed to sit in specifically so we could have a cool wall treatment.
Here is the wall before:
I drew up several designs, and this was our favorite.
You can tell, because I drew a heart in the corner.
Then I painted the wall black. I'm pretty sure this was black paint I bought to paint the shelves in our library, but ended up not liking it. I still wish this was more of a matte finish, but we all have our crosses to bear.
With the wall painted and a stack of 1.5" mdf trim, I was ready to go. Theoretically I should have been able to take measurements and cut the angle perfectly, but I have never had that happen in real life. Pretty much every angle I adjusted it with a hundred tiny cuts until I got it perfect, and then cut the straight edge to length. I got tired of running up and down the stairs after a while and just brought the miter saw into my bedroom. I figured all the dust would be worth it. I have no regrets.
And then there are shelves full of books and Legos. All the things a married couple needs.
The art on the wall below came from HERE. Its a paint by number Mandy from Vintage Revivals had designed to paint on her daughters wall. I just painted it on a big ol' canvas instead. I kind of wish I had done the whole wall, but maybe there is enough going on in here with the black wall treatment behind the bed.
So, there you have it. A black wall treatment in the master bedroom. Are you edified? Enlightened? Enriched? Enraged? I can't take responsibility for all your emotions, so get a handle on yourself.
Jun 7, 2020
How To Turn Weeds into Lawn in just 99 Easy Steps
1. Get rid of your old Septic Tank.
Think you don't have a Septic Tank? Well, maybe you don't. Maybe what you have is just a ghetto cavity deep in the ground that your toilet waste has been pumped into for the last 15 years. I don't know. Your sewer set up is really none of my business.
Wanna see a picture of OUR hole in the ground?
Those are actual wooden logs floating in it, FYI. We used a backhoe to dig it up. When we cracked through the slab of asphalt with that was laying across the top, the smell slammed into us like a stinky slap in the face, but after a bit it wasn't so bad. Probably because the smell floated into all our neighbor's yards. It's fun to live in our neighborhood.
Anyway, get that sucker pumped out and filled in and move on with your life as quickly as possible. Then you'll be ready to get to the actual yard work.
2. Chop Down Some Trees.
I mean, you don't have to. But if you are going to chop down any trees, NOW really is the time to do it. You don't want to tear up your pretty new grass during the massacre. This big ol' tree in front of our house was really close to the foundation. It also grew directly over the gas line. And, like half of the trees on our lot, it was growing into the power lines, so every couple of years the city came and hacked the top off. With so many strikes against it, we decided maybe it was time for this tree to move on. Good thing we still had the Manlift!
 |
It started raining on us but I bribed Colin's friends with plates of cookies if they would help us drag all the branches into the backyard and we managed to get most everything cleared up.
Right next to that tree there was a plum tree and a snowball bush that we tried to save, but in the end, they didn't make it.
2. Remove all the Weeds.
First I used Vinegar to kill my weeds, cuz I had read somewhere that it was the best thing to do. It killed a few weeds, but apparently vinegar doesn't kill the roots, so it really doesn't get you much in the long run. So next I used a deadly weed killer and sprayed the heck out of my weeds. A few of them died, but I think my weeds are some kind of super strain, because mostly they just mocked me. I finally gave up and had the front lawn tilled. I found some guy on KSL who was just trying to make enough money to justify the tiller he had bought.
2. Remove all the rocks.
There is no picture for this, but I think you get the gyst.
3. Remove all the rocks.
You missed some.
4. Remove all the rocks.
Nope, you still missed some more.
5. Plan out your sprinkler system!
For this, we used Richard's brother, who planned out the whole system for us. If you don't have a brother-in-law with sprinkler skills, I think Sprinkler World will also work up sprinkler plans for you if you buy your parts from them.
6. Dig your trenches.
We rented this bad boy.
It made the work easier, but it was still exhausting. And because of poor planning, there were still a couple of trenches we had to dig by hand. I swear, digging will be the death of me.
7. Remove all rocks.
I know you think you already did this, but apparently you didn't, because there are still SO MANY. Good luck finding somewhere to put them.
8. Remove all rocks.
I'm not kidding.
9. Remove all rocks.
For reals.
10. Put in your pipes.
Use your brother-in-law for this too, if you can trick him into it.
11. Bake your brother-in-law a cake.
Or cookies. Or maybe a pie. Or he might never talk to you again.
12. Fill in your trenches and rake everything smooth again.
13. Remove all rocks.
You are really bad at this. That's why you have to keep doing it over and over.
14. Wait all winter long because someone at the hydroseed place told you didn't need to call to get on the schedule until October 10th or so, but when you call on the 10th you find out that they stopped spraying hydroseed on October 1st.
Try not to be too bitter about this. But pick a different company to use when its time.
15. It is Spring! Time to kill the weeds again!
Good luck! They are even more resistant to weed killer than they were last year!
16. Remember just in the nick of time that you also need to get rid of the stump leftover from the tree you cut down last fall.
Pay a tree service to grind it out for you because you've learned the hard way that removing stumps yourself is virtually impossible.
16. Rake the soil smooth again.
17. Remove all the rocks.
It is possible that someone is sneaking the rocks back into the soil when you are not around.
18. Get some Topsoil
We had our topsoil delivered from Topsoil.Rocks. That is the name of the company. https://topsoil.rocks/wp-content/cache/all/index.html The price was good and the delivery was free and they left us with a big pile of dirt in the road. Good times.
I spent ALL DAY with my boys shoveling dirt into the wheelbarrow (wheel barrel? I don't know what it is called! I could look it up but I don't care!) and dumping it in piles around the lawn. I made it about a 3rd a way through the pile. So the next day we rented a machine to help us because we wanted to not spend the rest of our lives shoveling dirt.
We wanted to rent a bobcat, but that big thing was the only one we could find on a Saturday. Those stupid tracks tore the crap out of everything. We tried to fill in some holes in the backyard, and it is now a total disaster.
19. Rake the yard smooth.
20. Remove all rocks.
21. Remove all rocks.
22. Remove all rocks.
23. Remove all rocks.
24. Remove all rocks.
25. Remove all rocks.
26. And so on.
27. And so forth.
28. Forever
29-46. and ever......
47. Install Curbing.
The curbing will look too tall after it is installed and you will think it looks wrong, but it isn't! It is supposed to be that high to account for the thickness of the grass when it grows in. It will be fine.
Curbing is sold with a minimum. The guy I used charges for at least 100 feet. Some people require you to pay for 150 feet. So we figure if we were paying for it anyway, we'd put in as much as we could. We were just going to section off space for flowers in front of the house, but we decided to extend it all the way around the side of the house while we were at it. It came out to 90 feet.
The lines looks too wiggly from a distance. I wanted them wavy. But I'm not sure I like the way it turned out. I'm hoping once it is full of plants the wiggly lines won't be as noticeable.
48. Get angry at the weeds that can't take a hint.
Dig them all out by hand.
49. Rake the yard smooth.
It doesn't seem to make a difference. Do it anyway.
50-57. Remove all rocks.
58-63. Curse rocks to the deepest trenches of hell.
64-88. Shake your fists at the sky as the rocks mock you.
The rocks have recruited all their friends to help ruin your life.
89-92. Refuse to give in.
93. Never give up!
94. Never Surrender!
95. You will be victorious!
96. It's Hydroseed time!
We chose Hydroseed primary because of cost. I think I got a quote for sod once. It was in the thousands. I don't remember. Lots of money. The cost for Hydroseed for the same area? $180.00.
Rejoice in the grassy future that awaits you!
97. Cry into your pillow when the city shows up two days later to replace the sidewalk in front of your house, trampling the hydroseed on the easement all to heck.
98. Sit Around and Watch the Grass Grow.
Hydroseed is cheap, but it comes at a cost. The first week especially we constantly worried that we were watering it either too much or not enough and had no idea if we were doing either one. But One Week later we had tiny blades of grass shooting out of the ground!
Look closely. They're there.
99. Take pictures of your brand new baby grass!
WEEK 2
It looks like grass! It really does! And what the heck is that round thing pushing up out of the ground?
Why are you here, giant mushroom?
WEEK3!
Hot dang, would you look at that? There have been several more mushrooms pushing up from the depths of the soil, but I eat mushrooms for breakfast, so they were no match for me.
During week three, we got to mow the lawn and put down fertilizer. Exciting times!
WEEK 4!
Folks, we have grass. We also have weeds. Lots of weeds. But enough time has passed that we can put down a broad leaf weed killer. And weeds are normal in the first year, but hopefully by next year the grass will be strong enough that it will choke out the weeds. You know what they say: The best defense for weeds is a healthy lawn.
So, that's about it. You too can have grass by following these simple steps.
Here is a fun before picture. This is from Google Street View right after we moved back in to our remodeled house. I especially like how cute and tiny the minivan looks in this picture.
And here is how it looks today!
Here is the WAY BEFORE, just for reference:
That's the end. Go home now.
Dec 2, 2018
A Short and Rather Useless Book Review - Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
Of course you do. It has probably haunted your nightmares.
Those pictures don't even begin to do it justice, though. They were taken very soon after we finished remodeling. In the couple years since then, more and more stuff found its way into that room until it was stuffed full like a hoarders paradise. I didn't take a picture of that. Why would I take a picture of that? It was the room I liked to pretend didn't exist. Only problem: it is the first one you see when you walk in the front door.
But finally we decided to do something about it. So we got bought some used shelves, and got some cabinets from the Restore and made this:
I tell you what. Trim is kind of a magical thing.
Then we had to get all the stuff out of there and paint the shelves. Which brings us to this:
Yeah. We didn't quite manage to get all the stuff out of there. There is also a very large stack of (cough-Richard's!) stuff in the front hall. We've gotta finish the shed before that stuff has a home, so stop obsessing over it already.
So back to the shelves.
They are pretty.
They are also full of books, for those of you who have trouble interpreting things you see in pictures.
Most of our books had been in boxes for over 15 years. They've been in boxes ever since we moved into this house, just waiting for this day. When we built the shelf we worried that we wouldn't have enough books to fill it, but we ended up with way more books that space. We got rid of several boxes full. And now we are forced to really only keep the ones we love.
I'm not sure all of these books qualify, which actually brings me to my point.
I wanna talk about my books.
So here is what I'm gonna do. Go through the shelf. One book at a time (or maybe a series at a time, cuz who cares?) and tell you how I feel about it. It's gonna be fun. For me. I don't know if it is going to be fun for you or not. That's not really up to me.
We discussed several different organization options when we were stuffing the books up there, even tried out a few, but in the end we just shelved them alphabetically by author, with all the genres all mixed up together. Which means the very first book on the very first shelf is The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams.
This is very fitting, because it is one of my favorite series of all time.
For those of you who aren't familiar with it, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy started as a radio show. (feel free to correct me. I could go look it up to make sure what I'm telling you is true, but I'm way too lazy at the moment.) Then Douglas Adams wrote the book, and then it became a miniseries on the BBC. That is where I was first introduced to it as a kid. He kept writing until there was a trilogy, and then wrote a few more. They call it a trilogy in five parts.
I was reading one of the later books in the series on the couch in my parent's living room. Arthur Dent was trapped on some alien planet, where he had stuck a chicken bone in his beard. Another alien landed on the planet whose soul purpose in life was to insult every being in existence. He walked up to Arthur Dent and said, "You're a jerk, Dent. A real knee-biter." And then he climbed back aboard his spaceship and sailed away.
The whole scene was so hilarious to me I was laughing my head off. I lay back on the couch, so overcome with mirth, that I kicked my feet in the air.
Have you ever read a book that made you laugh so hard you kicked your feet in the air? I may have forgotten lots of stuff about the story, but the joy of that moment is cemented in my head forever.
So thank you, Douglas Adams. I guess that is all I've got to say. Elesa out.
Dec 1, 2017
Christmas Decor
It's that time once again. Time to pull out your buffalo plaid, wear leggings instead of pants, and be subjected to horrible Christmas Music wherever you go! Ack! I mean, Hurray!
So allow me to share with you my Christmas Decorations from last year. I'd like to show you this year's, but that would require having the house decorated, clean, and me still having enough energy to take pictures and then write about it. Nice try, Christmas. Maybe next year.
Let me shuffle through my box of Christmas photos and see what I can find.
A tree on the front porch = FUN! Someone I knew had an old tree they were getting rid of, and no one else seemed to want it so she gave it to me. The stand was missing and the lights didn't work, but we have enough old Christmas stuff sitting around that we put something together.
Pillows! Did you know you can get REALLY CHEAP pillow covers on Amazon? Like, under $5.00? If that doesn't sound cheap to you, then I don't know how to help you.
I made some of these covers, but in the end they probably cost me more than the ones from Amazon (which I think came from China.)
Uh, what else? Christmas Tree: BOOM
So allow me to share with you my Christmas Decorations from last year. I'd like to show you this year's, but that would require having the house decorated, clean, and me still having enough energy to take pictures and then write about it. Nice try, Christmas. Maybe next year.
Let me shuffle through my box of Christmas photos and see what I can find.
A tree on the front porch = FUN! Someone I knew had an old tree they were getting rid of, and no one else seemed to want it so she gave it to me. The stand was missing and the lights didn't work, but we have enough old Christmas stuff sitting around that we put something together.
Pillows! Did you know you can get REALLY CHEAP pillow covers on Amazon? Like, under $5.00? If that doesn't sound cheap to you, then I don't know how to help you.
I made some of these covers, but in the end they probably cost me more than the ones from Amazon (which I think came from China.)
Uh, what else? Christmas Tree: BOOM
Guess what? The presents under the tree in this picture are fake. We never put the presents out until the kids go to bed on Christmas eve. But presents under the tree are cute. So I wrapped some empty boxes. And the kids loved it. If they were actually presents I would have to keep telling the kids to leave them alone, but since these were fake, the kids could play with them all they wanted.
I love our tree. Its just a hodge podge of stuff the kids have made, silly things I have made, and lots of things that look like toys. But it makes me happy.
Here are a few of my favorite ornaments:
That one of Khan is my favorite. I bought that on Etsy to give to Richard. I actually paid money for it. The fact that the wreath is hanging upside down just cracks me up.
Here are some that I made. Whenever December comes around I start itching to make stuff out of felt.
While I made these I watched Christmas romances on TV. They are all very cheesy, and every single one ended with a proposal. Because that is what Christmas is all about, I guess.
And here we have the Mantle! With stuff on it!
Where are the stockings? I don't know!
You may have thought we were done but that is never going to happen. You are going to be here forever! Because now I will show you my Nativities! Only a few. I have more than I currently have room to display. Here they are! Look at them now!
I'm sorry. I don't know why I'm yelling. Christmas makes me do that. Especially at my kids.
This one came from the Philippines
This one came from Bolivia
And this one came from Ebay:
And here is our Advent Calendar. I feel like I have posted it before, but who knows? My sister has one very much like this. I liked it, so I shamelessly copied it. Thanks Fae!
That is probably enough for the moment. Thanks for stopping by! And a Merry Christmas to you and your leggings!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
