We've Moved...

...not houses, but hosts. 

You can now find the new and improved Home By Hanley at http://homebyhanley.wordpress.com/

You will be able to subscribe by email or by RSS Feed.  Don't forget to update your bookmarks!

Hope to see you there!

Allison

Around the House: Funny Product Name

Slip that in her drink!

How Many Steps in this Again?

I have another post in the works, but I couldn't resist posting right now.  Arriving home from work today, I had one of those moments that just make you shake your head and wonder. 

For the back-story: Shane works on Saturdays but has Mondays off.  Since he's able to get to the store on a day and time without hordes of frenzied soccer moms and their whining children running amok up and down the aisles, Shane does the grocery shopping.  I love the fact that he does it.  It makes the weekends and weeknights easier on me since I don't have to fight the soccer moms and rush-hour shoppers.  However, it is sometimes a struggle since I am a control-freak.  (I'm Allison, and I'm a control-freak.  That's the first step, right?) I have a hard time letting go of the meal planning and the shopping.  Sometimes, I miss grocery shopping.  I just like the grocery store and the inspiration of seasonal produce.  I like to eat and I like to cook - enjoying grocery shopping fits right in.  Occasionally, Shane forgets something, or is confused about what exactly I wanted him to pick up at the store and I have to run out at another time to get it.  I'm not usually upset - it gives me a chance to get to the store.  Other times I am left frustrated or shaking my head.  Today was a head-shaking day.  

I've been trying to be better about clipping coupons and using them.  Actually remembering to bring the coupons and then handing them to the cashier is the biggest challenge for me.  90% of the time, I leave them at home.  The other 10% I don't remember the coupons even exist until they've expired.  Last night, I took action.  I clipped new coupons, threw out the expired ones and organized them all into two piles: grocery store coupons and Target coupons.  I placed each pile into its own labeled envelope and left them on the counter.  My intention being to use the coupons as we had need for them.  This morning I reminded Shane about the coupons and asked him to take the grocery ones with him to the store.  Shane not only remembered  to take the coupons - he remembered to use them too. 

I knew something was up when I got home today and spied a box of Carnation Instant Breakfast sitting on the counter.  I knew we didn't need any instant breakfast and since Shane doesn't use it, I couldn't imagine him buying it on his own.  So I asked him if he remembered the coupons today.   While talking to him, it slowly began to dawn on me that Shane hadn't just used the coupons for items we needed (e.g. the $1.00 off 10 Yoplait yogurts) but that Shane remembered to use all of the coupons. 

We now have 2 lbs of unnecessary butter and two tubs of spreadable butter (boy, Paula Deen would be proud) along with two jars of jelly we didn't need and who knows what else.  Apparently, the only coupon Shane didn't use was the second $1.00 off yogurt coupon we had. 

All I could do was shake my head.  He at least used the coupons, something I have not been too successful at doing.  I had to calm the control-freak inside of me and let it go.  I guess I have some baking in my future to make Paula Deen proud and use all that butter!

Is anybody else a recovering control-freak? Does your spouse take on some of the chores and leave you frustrated? Any ideas for all that butter?

Etsy-Mania!

I have a confession: I am obsessed with Etsy.  I definitely lose myself for hours at a time just browsing.  I spent a couple hours the other night perusing the "Geekery" section where I found a plethora of vintage and handmade goods ranging from a Captain America Nintendo Cartridge Clock to a complete Jayne Cobb gift kit from Ma Cobb.  I find Etsy's website much easier to use than eBay, in which I never was interested in the first place. I also think the website is easier to browse. 

You can search by item type: Vintage, Handmade or All items and then by a number of categories including Art, Furniture, Weddings, Papergoods, Needlecraft, Pets and Holidays among many others.  Whether or not I'm searching for something specific, I feel like I'm on a treasure hunt and strike gold every time.  You can also take the Etsy Taste Test and identify which objects from a given selection you like and you will have suggestions that fit your taste on your home screen every time you log in.  I like that I'm able to "favorite" items I like and come back to them later, or use them to browse different Etsy Shops for similar items.  I think the taste test works almost too well.  I log on and I'm teased by all the neat things on my home page and can't resist that first click to learn more about something I see. 

I've watched a coworker become obsessed with Etsy over the last several months as she prepares for her wedding in October.  She has definitely purchased some unique items that will make her wedding extra special and ensure that all her guests leave with the couple's monogram imprinted on their brains.  However, I'm pretty fond of the custom wedding hanger she ordered.  As I've watched my coworker order more and more from Etsy, I've become wary of creating an account.  I know it can be a slippery slope.  I can see myself having a hard time resisting that perfect fill-in-the-blank-here that I just have to have and going nuts with PayPal.  I've managed to resist until the last week.

While searching Etsy for maps to create my desired map art in my dining room, I caved.  In order to save the location of the maps I found, I had to create an account to add them to my favorites.  Now I feel myself teetering on the edge, just looking for a reason to purchase all the neat things I've found.  There's not a lot separating me from slipping down into Etsy-mania.  I hardly sit on my computer and surf the internet, yet I find with Etsy I can't resist.  It compels me to sit and look.  Yesterday, I found myself checking to see if an iPhone app existed for Etsy to make mobile browsing easier.  (A couple 99cent apps do exist, but I'm not sure they are official).  Trust me, it's bad when I start shopping from my cell phone. 

So far, I've managed to not purchase anything just yet.  But be warned...I've probably already found the perfect Etsy birthday or Christmas gift for you.

Does anybody else have an unhealthy obsession with Etsy or another website? What other neat things have you found while browsing Etsy? Anybody make neat things that they sell on the site?

The Man of the House!

It is a pleasure to be writing in this blog now.  I have just been introduced to the blogosphere and am now writing my own blog If You Give Your Wife A Cookie and am contributing to RedCoatGamers.  Allison wanted me to contribute to her blog as well and it is really exciting.

I recently posted something that I think relates to both her blog and my own.  As I contribute more to this blog I will continue to come up with posts that work for both hers and my own.  His and Hers blogs... How romantic.

Hot, Hot, Hot

Ever seen that episode of The Office when Michael returns from his Jamaican vacation with Jan? He brings back a steel drum that he practices in his office forever playing the one line: I'm feeling hot, hot, hot.  Not without reason, I've had that stuck in my head for days now. I saw the rerun of that episode on TBS the other night and it's been flippin' hot here for days. 

Okay, it's been typically Washington, DC in July hot all month, but this massive heat wave hit us on Thursday and it's been sweaty miserable since.  Last night I turned on the news to catch the weather (like it's going to be anything other than hot...) before bed and it was 90 degrees at 11pm with a heat index of 100 degrees! Holy Cow! I guess I should be happy with the fact that my A/C has been running nonstop and the house is 85 degrees at best.  That's approximately a whole 15 degrees cooler than outside, but it just feels [Insert completely whiny voice here] so hot. 

I don't know about anybody else, but the heat results in me making poor decisions.  Take last night for example.  After peeling off my work clothes (stuck to my skin after the walk from the metro station) and getting more comfortable I couldn't decide what I wanted to do for dinner.  The heat makes my appetite disappear, but I felt I should try and eat something.  I decided to have a glass of wine while I thought it over.  My appetite didn't return, so I had a couple more glasses.  I ended up giggly and drunk and irritating the heck out of my husband.  Finally around 9:30 I broke out the Whirly Pop to make dinner.  Nothing does the body good like buttery, delicious popcorn and copious amounts of wine.  Needless to say, the heat didn't really help with the hangover this morning. 

I was pretty amused when my mom emailed me the following cartoon though:

How are you all staying cool? Does the heat cause anybody else to make poor dinner decisions? Am I just blaming the weather for my poor decisions?

Abracadabra.... Organize Closet!

I wish I could simply wave a wand and accomplish large tasks with nothing more than a flick of the wrist.  In actuality, organizing the closet really wasn't that monumental of a task.  I'm also one of those people that love an afternoon spent organizing things to unleash their full efficiency potential.  My husband thinks I'm crazy.  

Our closet under the stairs would probably afford Harry Potter more room than the one at the Dursley's residence, but it's been an inefficient mess since we moved in.  Everything was more or less piled and thrown in there and my earlier attempts at promoting some type of order failed.  (The command hooks I bought and attached to the wall to hold our broom, etc. all fell down).  It also didn't help that the door needed to be sanded down on the bottom and we were unable to open it more than 8 inches or so without scratching the wood floor.  Not only could you not get into the closet, once you squeezed your way in, you had to dig through piles of stuff to find the paper towels or whatever else you needed.  It wasn't working and my anally organized self was screaming inside every time I opened the closet.  

I was so excited to finally tackle this project, I neglected to take any before pictures.  I realized too late that I didn't even have any pictures of the closet from before we moved in.   Suffice it to say the closet was so bad I forbade guests from opening it when they visited.  Here's the pile of stuff that had all been residing in the closet under the stairs once I cleared it out to start fresh. 

 

Once the closet was clear, I swept it out and dusted off the shelves inside.  In order to work some magic, Shane and I picked up two ClosetMaid Laundry Shelves at Home Depot along with a ClosetMaid Broom and Mop Organizer.  Shane drilled the holes and I helped him to install the shelves and organizer with the included hardware,  I could then get down to my organizing business.  That pretty much involved me looking at the various fabric bins, plastic milk crates and Rubbermaid containers and grouping like items together. 

Once I had all items sorted and rearranged into appropriate containers, my closet looked like this:

 It's still a little bit cluttered for my liking, but trust me, it is a huuuuuge improvement.  There are some items, like the cardboard box above, that will move to our shed once we have one.  All that's left to do in the closet is to install our plastic bag dispenser, purchased from Ikea, and eventually install a light fixture. 

I should also mention, that Shane sanded down the bottom of the door so we can now open it all the way up to get inside the closet.  Not only can I find what I'm looking for, it's much easier to get inside too!  We would even have room if Harry Potter wanted to visit. 

Quick Bathroom Upgrade

Despite the lack of posts over the last month, Shane and I have been keeping very busy around the house.  Last Sunday we were feeling extra motivated and completed several posts-worth of projects.  Our quick bathroom upgrade was where we started after a post-church trip to Home Depot.

I find it somewhat amusing that I willingly went to Home Depot after church on Sunday.  When I was a kid, my parents forced us to go to the hardware/home improvement stores every Sunday.  We would go to church and then they'd take us out for a treat at Spunky Dunkers or Dunkin' Donuts.  We'd think we were getting a great deal until after leaving the doughnut shop we would pull into the parking lot at Builders Square.  Was that only a Midwest chain? Does anybody remember the days of Builders Square before Home Depot and Lowes were the only options? I have distinct memories of walking around the home improvement store in my church dress, wondering if my parents would ever let me get home to play again.  Fittingly, I sent my mom and dad a text as we pulled into the Home Depot parking lot on Sunday announcing that the apple doesn't in fact fall too far from the tree.  They chided me for not stopping for doughnuts first!

Anyways, back to the purpose of the Home Depot trip.  A few weeks ago our poorly installed (not by us!) towel bar fell off the wall in the bathroom.  It turns out that the people that flipped the house and sold it to us did not install a lot of things correctly, often using incorrect hardware.  The worst was the shelf in the closet in the guest bedroom that fell as I was hanging things up in there.  Unsurprisingly, we saw that they had used the wrong screws for the towel bar.  Since the bathroom hardware was ugly, cheap and builder-grade, we decided to replace it all.

Here's the before pictures:

 I guess I didn't have a picture of the towel bar before it fell off the wall

 You can't see it here, but the towel ring was awkwardly placed on the wall and kind of low. 

After using the hooks on the back of our door for a couple weeks, we finally decided it was time to head out to the store.  At Home Depot we picked out Delta Silverton hardware in a chrome finish.  We purchased a 24-inch towel bar, towel ring and a pivoting toilet paper holder.

Once home, the installation was pretty easy.  Each item came with a template for us to accurately mark and drill the necessary holes.  Once drilled, we placed the dry wall anchors (we have plaster walls here) and screwed in the mounting brackets.  After that, all we had to do was slide the hardware into place.  Our towel bar was a smidge longer than the previous one and we moved the towel ring up a couple inches on the wall, leaving us with some holes to patch.  Since we have to patch the walls, we're contemplating a new paint color for the bathroom.  The previous owners didn't leave us any paint, and I think the bathroom color is ugly anyway.  I have no idea when we'll tackle that project, but at least the new hardware added a touch of class to our bathroom in the mean time. 

I present, the after pictures:

I'm a fan of the pivot feature to change the roll!

Do the little, quick projects make anyone else as happy as they make me?

Pearl Jam Pillow

I love finding new uses for old things and creating new ways to keep memories.  This project came about because Shane had a concert t-shirt that shrunk and no longer fit him, but was still too big for me.  I suggested making it into a pillow.  This allowed me to dust off my sewing machine, received as a wedding gift a year and a half ago and not yet used. 

We had an old 12"x12" light blue pillow from Ikea laying around that I thought would work perfectly.  The problem with light blue pillows from Ikea is that they get dirty and stained over time.  This way, I was able to give new life to a t-shirt and a pillow!

 I started by cutting the front and back of the t-shirt into two 13"x13" squares, which allowed for seams once it was sewn together.  I had to use my fabric shears for a lack of better options, but I would highly recommend a rotary cutter (looks like a pizza cutter) and mat for straighter and better measured cuts and more ease in general. The jersey cotton used for t-shirts is a pain to cut as it's stretchy and you want to keep the fabric flat and somewhat taut to get the best cut and the right measurement.  Even with Shane's help, I think this was the most difficult part of the process.  We then ironed our two t-shirt squares to get them smooth and flat for sewing. 

 Once the squares were nice and smooth, I pinned the right sides facing each other on the inside and the backs facing out.  I then sewed 1/2" seams on three sides.  On the bottom, I left a gap of about 6" in the middle, to allow me to turn the pillowcase right-side out and stuff the pillow. 

 Once the pillowcase was flipped and the pillow was stuffed inside I then sewed the 6" gap closed by hand. 

 

 Here's one side of the finished product:

Portia models the other side on the couch:

I have another t-shirt project I'm planning on tackling sometime in the near future.  I want to make a quilt using t-shirts from college.  My Mom is going to lend me her rotary cutting tool soon, so I can get to work cutting up all those t-shirts I have taking up space in my closet.

Are there any other neat t-shirt craft ideas out there you want to share?

Murphy's Law and Dances for the Rain Gods

I'd like to speak with that Irishman Murphy about his law!

Before we got our rain barrel installed, we were getting rain practically every day.  I joked that the minute we got it installed, we would then experience a drought.  I happily believed that wouldn't be the case when the very next day after installation we had a big storm come through that filled our barrel to capacity.

Boy, do I wish we'd had some rain since!  Our area in metro D.C. is not experiencing a drought by any means - just our little corner.  We've only had about 5 minutes of a rain shower in the last 3 weeks.  At first it wasn't a problem as I hadn't quite figured out how to use my rain barrel water.  Now that we have flowers in the yard, a compost pile that needs to be kept moist and I'm trying to not neglect my herbs that I planted and it's been a bijillion degrees I now have quite a need for the water.

The downside is, the water in the barrel has been sitting more or less stagnant for the last 3 weeks.  Not only that, the barrel still smells like pickles and needs to be flushed out.  The result was some pretty smelly water.  It wasn't so bad at first, but as time went on it got worse - probably with the heat.  It got to the point where Shane refused to use it to wash the car because he couldn't stand the smell.  So late last week when the weatherman was forecasting thunderstorms Friday, Saturday and Sunday, we were thrilled!

As the weather turned one night with storm clouds and a cold front blowing in, we ran out to the back yard to empty the rain barrel so we could fill it up with fresh water.  We hooked up the hose and tried as quickly as possible to empty the remaining 50 gallons of water.  There was some decent pressure, but 50 gallons really is quite a lot of water when you're racing a thunderstorm.  We emptied about half the barrel before it got too dark.  Sadly, we went inside and the storm just blew over our area.

We finished emptying the barrel over the next two days, but both times closing the hose bib and going inside hoping for the expected rain to hit.  As of today, we still haven't seen any rain and the barrel is now sitting empty.

Any ideas for a good rain dance? Our front lawn is brown and I want to keep my pretty petunias alive!

Get Whirly Poppin!

It's the little things in life, right?

There's nothing quite like getting Christmas gifts in June, so we finally used an e-bay gift card we received for last Christmas and purchased a couple things we've really been wanting for awhile.  Shane used his half of the money for his favorite video game.  After his X-Box died and he replaced it with a PS3, he never replaced his Oblivion game.  He happily found a copy on e-bay and got that last week. 

I really wanted to use the gift card for a Whirly Pop Stove-top Popcorn Popper - so I did.  My parents got a stove-top popper last year and kept telling me how great the popcorn was and how the microwave popcorn just doesn't compare.  We actually purchased one for Shane's mom for Christmas along with some movie favorites on DVD and had the opportunity to sample the popcorn while we were visiting.  I was totally sold.  It's just so fresh and delicious and without all the gross chemical additives.  Our Whirly Pop arrived the other day and we couldn't wait to get poppin'!

Since we didn't have any popcorn kernels in the house, we were happy to see that our Whirly Pop came with a "Real Movie Theater Popcorn" kit.  After seasoning the popper by heating some oil in it for about 30 seconds and then wiping it out, we were ready to go.  With the kit, all we had to do was dump the kernels and the packaged seasonings into the popper together.  (We have since bought our own popcorn to pop, so next time all we have to do is add a little oil and a cup of kernels and whatever seasonings we can imagine).  Then you place the popper on the burner and turn the crank to keep everything moving and heating evenly inside.  In about 3-4 minutes you have wonderfully delicious popcorn! It's going to be movie night in the Hanley Household every weekend now!

Pink Petunias make me Happy!

Thanks to a generous gift card, we were able to add a little bit of color to our front yard with flowers from Home Depot.  Hooray!

We went to Home Depot last night to pick out our flowers and some planters to put them in.  As much as I would like to purchase some perennials and get a good garden going over here, our yard just isn't prepared for it.  The garden in the front of the house would seem like a decent start, but the weeds are terrible and the soil is worse.  Just digging around to pull weeds, I have found so much building debris like broken tile and trash in the garden, I'm just not ready to tackle that project yet.  Thus, we thought the planters would be a much better option for the time being.  Plus, we can always move them around to different locations once our ultimate plan for the yard starts to come together. 

I potted the flowers this morning, and in under an hour we had a few splashes of color in the front of our house.  I should've snapped some pictures this afternoon because the plants were still looking worse for the wear from a lack of care at Home Depot when I potted and photographed them this morning.  Oh, well.  I was smiling walking up to our house this afternoon to see the pretty flowers out front.

I was so excited to  have such a choice of flowers - all I could really keep on our apartment balcony were impatiens because of all the shade.  Now the front of the house gives me enough daylight to choose flowers that work in full sun.  Oh, the choices! I couldn't decide on what colors I wanted, so I decided to just do two different things.  Why not? In the first pot, I planted a Cordyline Red Star (that's the purple spike), two things of Celosia (which are apparently great for cutting) and a Marigold (a favorite of my youth).  

I filled the other two planters identically.  I started with Dracaena Spikes, added pink Petunias, Dusty Miller (a silvery leafy plant I loved when I was younger) and finished with Lavender Skies Supertunias (a Petunia hybrid that will trail over the edge of the planter).

It's not much, but it's a start and it makes me happy.  That's what it's all about, right?  What gardens or containers are you all planting this year? Any favorite plants or flowers from childhood?

To Do List

Sadly, we haven't really tackled any projects around here the last couple weeks.  The past two weekends have been filled with family get-togethers and youth group activities with the high school kids we work with at church.

However, I tackled the monster of projects by trying to come up with a list of all the projects we want to work on in the hopefully near future.  I came up with the following list:  (The items in red are big priorities for us right now, and the items in bold face red are super priorities). 

Exterior

• Replace locks on front and back doors (We recently learned how bad our locks on our doors actually are and need to take care of it ASAP!)
  
• Paint front and back doors
• Weatherstripping around front and back doors
• Replace storm door
• Install new light fixture in front
• Paint mailbox
• Purchase new shutters for front windows

Dining Room

• Purchase new to us dining table and chairs
• Purchase new to us stools for breakfast bar
• Purchase “hidden” desk for under front window (Incognito Desk by Crate and Barrel, preferred)
• Rug for under dining set
• Hawaiian maps and frames for gallery wall above dining table
• Bamboo matchstick shades in three windows
• Additional lamps for lighting - maybe a fixture over the dining table to replace the boob light (that's a real term!)
• Refinish bar cabinet
• New cushion for papa san chair

Kitchen

• Install mosaic tile back splash
• Seal granite counter tops
• Install cabinet to cover dryer vent
• Bamboo matchstick shade in kitchen window

Utility Room

• Replace water heater - preferably a tank-less water heater

Family Room

• Fabric window treatments - probably valences above the wood blinds
• Hang pictures and art work
• Plan and install shelving on empty wall
• Storage solution for music equipment
• Heating solution for winter - probably a space heater (our baseboard heat in the addition is not going to cut it in the winter)
• Install ceiling fan
• Custom wood bench along empty wall above where the duct runs creating awkward space - creates storage underneath

 Stair Closet

• Install one or two shelves for additional organization
• Install hooks to hang brooms and mops
• Screw bag dispenser to wall
• Install light

Linen Closet

• Install shelves
• Sand door so it will close properly

Bathroom

• Sand door so it will close properly
• Install floating wall shelves above toilet
• Install dual flush tank converter on toilet
• Purchase rug
• Replace trim around window in shower (they put wooden trim in a shower - it's already causing a fight against mold and mildew!)
• New light fixture over vanity

 Our Bedroom

• New bedding
• Window treatments - probably Roman shades
• Custom storage bench under window
• New hampers (I want these Umbra hampers)
• Frame and hang Cherry Blossom painting
• Full length mirror
• Additional art work for walls
• Jewelry box for Allison’s dresser
• Install organizer in closet for ironing board, etc
• Clean out clothes and donate
• Nightstands
• Lamps for additional lighting

Backyard

• Clean up fence
• Install rain barrel
• Install deck/patio
• Purchase and install shed
• Build compost bin
• Dig up ginormous dandelions
• Till, fertilize and plant grass
• Remove old and rotted wooden shed pads

Front Yard

• Remove chain link and lattice from fence?
• Remove paint from walkway
• Edge sidewalk
• Re-do retaining wall along driveway
• Level out ground and replant grass (It's oddly mounded and completely unlevel - a pain when mowing it with our reel mower)
• Remove old garden under front window and extend front steps to create a small patio
• Create garden along fence with neighbors

This is what we have in store for probably the next year or so.  I really hope that we can make some real progress.  I always work better when I have a list - there is nothing more satisfying to me than being able to cross something off a list! Hopefully by posting it up here, it will help hold us accountable to what we want to accomplish with work on our house.  I still need to go through and identify those items that we're going to have to save for so we can plan when we would like to cross them off our list. 

Barrels of Fun!

Two weekends ago I went to a workshop hosted by a local organization to build a rain barrel for our house. In college I took a class on Watershed Sustainability Science and knew about the purpose and function of rain barrels, but I hadn't seriously considered building one until I saw on Young House Love that they had attended a workshop to do just that.  So I Googled rain barrel workshops in Northern Virginia and was pleasantly surprised to find Arlingtonians for a Clean Environment that host the workshops with partnerships from both Alexandria and Fairfax County.  It was a great deal.  For $52 all I had to do was show up and they provided me with the barrel, hardware, tools and instructions and in 90 minutes, I had my very own rain barrel to take home.

It really didn't take all that long to put together either.  The workshop consisted of a 45 minute presentation that reviewed what I had learned in my watershed class in college, tips for installing the rain barrels once you get them home and demonstrating what we would be doing.

The rain barrels are 50 to 60 gallon food-safe plastic barrels that were previously used to ship peppers, pickles and the like.  In its previous life, our barrel was used for gherkins. 

 To start, we drilled a hole near the bottom of the barrel, for the hose bib, which we installed with a couple washers, a lock nut and caulk.  Then a second hole was drilled near the top for an overflow hose.  We then installed the hose connector again with washers, a lock nut and more caulk.  The last step was to unscrew the lid on the barrel, and place a fine mesh netting across the top and screw the lid back on again.  This prevents mosquitoes from getting in and turning your rain barrel into a breeding ground.  It was really pretty simple, although I was not the biggest fan of crawling inside to install the hardware. When I got it home, this is what it looked like:

The thing sticking out on the right side is where the overflow hose connects.  This barrel is a "righty" because I made it to drain out the right side when it is full.  Apparently, just one rain event will usually fill the barrel to capacity if not beyond.  This is because when it is installed, it gets all the overflow and runoff from your roof and doesn't just sit and collect the inch of rain that falls directly above it.  

We didn't get the barrel installed until yesterday.  We started work on Saturday so we could get the rain from upcoming storms, but ran into some trouble.  The previous owners were really wacky with the backyard and we can't figure out what they were really going for back there.  On Saturday, we took a trip to Lowes to pick up a shovel that Shane needed, the 1 1/2 inch sump pump house for the overflow on the barrel and some cinder blocks to sit it on.  (The higher above ground, the more water pressure you will get when you connect a hose to it).  We got home anxious to begin work and Shane was simply going to level out the ground under our downspout in the backyard before we placed the cinder blocks.  While Shane worked on that, I installed the overflow hose on the rain barrel.  The hose came 24 feet long, which we could have trimmed down to about 10 feet, which is recommended.  Once we had the barrel in place though, we realized the full 24 feet allowed us to direct where the water would flow and keep it away from our foundation, which was the problem we had with that downspout and the grade of the backyard in the first place.  This is when I decided we should name the rain barrel Snuffleupagus.  I feel like there's a resemblance there. 

The previous owners had a deck at some point and there are still wooden posts in the ground that supported the deck.  One of these was in the way of where we wanted to place the rain barrel so Shane thought he would dig it out real quick.  That wasn't the case.  We found all kinds of things in the dirt, including a cement drainage stone placed under the downspout and a good 4-6 inches of dirt.  Shane managed to dig down 8-10 inches and the stupid post wouldn't budge! We called it a night since the mosquitoes were feasting on us anyways. 

 

 

 After a trip to Home Depot on Sunday for a sledgehammer and bug spray, we were prepared to tackle the rain barrel installation again, but were defeated by sleepiness from a busy weekend.  Shane was kind enough to finish the install on Monday afternoon while I was at work.

 

I guess the original curved white piece of gutter didn't fit once the downspout was cut for the rain barrel, so Shane improvised for now with another piece of drainage hose we had.  We'll probably change it out to look a little nicer soon with the matching white gutter spout.  As for the barrel, when we finally purchase paint to paint our front and back doors, I plan on painting it a solid color to match and maybe stenciling something garden-y like butterflies or flowers to make it look a little more attractive.  

The real question...will it work? 

The answer...YES! A huge thunderstorm came through just before we got home this afternoon, although you wouldn't know it looking at the clear blue sky when we arrived.  Not only was the rain barrel FULL, but the overflow hose had some serious work taking care of the overflow.  Looks like a success! I guess we'll have to wash the car to use up that water before the next storm!

Realtime Plumbing Emergency

We're halfway through dinner tonight and as I'm gazing past my lovely husband's eyes into the kitchen, I see the following:

I should qualify that the bucket was not on top of the dryer when I first noticed the water damage on the ceiling.  But that's definitely water damage, and puckered drywall on the ceiling...right underneath our bathtub.
Ahhhhh, the joys of home-ownership.  I guess I can't call the management office and complain about this one!

After a few brief moments of panic, I gained control of myself once more, and Googled "plumber" along with our zip code.  Michael & Son's popped up.  They seem pretty reputable, they sponsor the Time and Temperature on ABC-7 and I know a guy that works for them lives down the street (I've seen his van parked there many times).  Of course, since my Dad didn't answer my frantic plumbing emergency calls right away, it seemed like the best option.  I wasn't really interested in waiting until sometime between 10am and 2pm tomorrow since it looks like part of the ceiling may be getting ready to fall down.  So, I will be paying for emergency plumbing services tonight...whenever the guy can get here.  (Can you just hear the enthusiasm?) I really hope I don't have to stay up all that late tonight, although it's already been an hour since I called.

I'll keep y'all updated, once I have more to go on.  I really was intending on posting tonight on other events in the past two weeks, but that may not really be happening now.

UPDATE:

The plumber arrived at about 8:45 tonight.  Not too bad, considering I called at just 7:00pm.  Currently he is simply repairing the obvious leak on the cold water pipe through the access in the back bedroom for the bargain price of $343 (eek!).  We considered cutting open a hole in the ceiling to check for additional leaks, but the additional $150 for that (not counting the money to repair the drywall) talked us out of it for now.  Hopefully this will be it, and we can just tack ceiling repair onto our To-Do list for the house down the road.  Fingers Crossed!

Why can't HGTV crash our yard?

Yesterday, we finally made a good start at tackling the problem of our yard.  Our house is a flipped foreclosure.  The great thing is, the seller we purchased from renovated the entire inside.  There are definitely odds and ends projects on the inside (like installing shelves to make our linen closet functional), but nothing truly major that needs work.  That just leaves the yard as our one giant project.  Since it's a duplex, our front yard is pretty small but lacking in curb appeal.  The previous owners also had a weird obsession with green.  The entire fence along the driveway is painted green as well as the giant cement pylons at the end of the drive.  (I don't think we'll ever be able to get rid of those).  It also appears that they had painted the front walkway green, but now it's all chipping away.  In addition, the chain link fence directly in front of the house that separates our yard from the sidewalk and bus stop is spray painted a different shade of green with some green wooden lattice added for good measure.  It's all gotta go.  Here's video from a couple weeks ago of the front drive.  My Mom named the dog Blanco; he's now sitting in a pile for the dump. 

 

The backyard is a great size, but currently consists of 85% dirt and 10% weeds with the other 5% gravel, rotting wood and trash from the contractors that worked on the house.  Here's another video so you can get a feel for it:

The previous owner also appears to have some weird privacy issues, if you can't tell by all the extra scrap wood and corrugated metal screwed onto the fence.  Shane started to pull down the extra pieces yesterday to reveal a decent looking fence.  It'll probably need to be replaced sooner rather than later, but it's at least something we can work with. 

This is the before, with all kinds of extra boards on the fence. 

Shane's after with all the extra stuff pulled down.  Some of the wood seemed pretty decent still, so we're going to try to save and re-purpose it somehow.  Quite a difference, no?

More of Shane's handiwork from yesterday.  We couldn't get the gutter extension to drain out and away from the front of the house because of the cement lip edging the driveway.  He knocked it all out and got everything to fit so at least the water isn't all sitting right at the foundation.  Just in time too since we've been getting so much rain lately!

For some reason, there's no photo evidence of my hard work in the yard yesterday.  I tackled the dandelions and weeds that were trying to take over our front yard.  Good thing the ground was soft and damp because those dandelions were deeply rooted.  Seriously, I don't think I've ever seen dandelion roots that big - we're talking 8 inches to a foot long roots! After all the weeding, I got a lesson in adjusting the height on our new 14 inch reel lawn mower.  I'm not going to lie - I love the whirr it makes as it cuts the grass! Let me tell you, it's not easy work pushing that thing.  Between the unseasonably warm temps yesterday and really having to push that thing over our long grass I was a sweaty mess by the time I finished.  I also learned those things are terrible at edges and corners.  I had to take some grass shears all along the edges and corners, not to mention the really long patches of grass that were so tall they fell over before I could go over the lawn again with the mower.  Lucky for me our front yard isn't more than 20 square feet.  I'm starting to seriously consider purchasing a weed-whacker for all the edges around the fence and stuff.  Of course to do that we need a shed to store our outdoor tools in, and to get a shed we need a solid, level surface to place it on... etc etc.
I'm learning as a homeowner that you have to do three (four, five) different projects to tackle the one that you really want to address.  Sheesh!

I did fill a planter with a few of my favorite herbs (basil, oregano, rosemary & mint) yesterday.  It makes me happy since it's the only stuff growing in our yard that's not weeds or poor quality grass.

As we spend more time outside, we're starting to brainstorm ideas for what we want our backyard to look like, what kind of patio we want, etc.  I'll share some more of that with you all soon.