Major Project finished!

So, we have been busy. Our guest bathroom had no shower, and with an increased population here at This Old Blog, that was not going to work.

Starting with an old bathroom, we removed everything, down to the studs, rebuilt it, and now have a nice new bathroom with a shower. We also put in a new window, new lights, a fan, a dual flush toilet and much much more. "Why do things by halves?", we always say here.

Many thanks to Mrs. House's Dad's Cousin, who helped with pretty much every step, and did the plumbing and electrical work.

The total project took over a month, many many hours of labor, and several thousand dollars (thanks tax rebate!). I even "got" to go under the house for the first time!


Next time... fencing. Not the kind with white suits and pointy metal. (or maybe it will be gardening, wiring, painting, or other projects)

P.S. I hate the way that blogger inserts photos uploaded. Why must they always go to the top? Why?

Theres a storm a blowin' !!

Well we had a big (for Sacramento) storm this week which caused everybody to go into a panic like it was the great flood. Fortunately for us this meant that Mr. House was able to leave work early because they shut down his whole office early. So we are going home and I am thinking - "oh how nice! Come home early. Rainy outside. Curl up on the couch with my hubby." etc, etc. However when we pulled up at our house we found this waiting for us.



A big big branch from our tree fell. Luckily it didn't hit anything important except a rose bush that may or may not make it. The wind and rain had made a mess of a bunch of other things so instead of my getting cozy ideas we had to suit up and try to fix a few things in the middle of the storm. Removed leaves from drain and gutters, fixed fence, collected things that had flown about the yard, and take a damage report of the tree.

That night it was still too rainy to do much about the tree, although by the time we got home we already had numerous business cards from tree service people in our mailbox and people knocking on our door offering their services. Last night as soon as we got home Mr. House went right to business with his little bow saw (apparently we don't believe in chainsaws in this house - even when cutting apart huge branches from a 50 year old tree.)

So he is cut, cut, cutting away and eventually some neighbors come knock on our door saying how they just feel so bad to see Mr. House out there with his hand saw and could they please help us out with their handy chainsaw. Very nice.

Tonight hopefully we can finish the job. I am hoping to stack some wood up to dry for firewood someplace. Hey, we've got to make use of what we've got, right?

Bathroom update

Well if you have noticed we have been pretty mum lately. We have been going full force on the bathroom and not getting much else done. Luckily the tile is almost completed now and it looks really great. Mr. House finished painting last night and now all that's left is the finishing details like putting in the sink, toilet and all the fixtures . . . you know minor details like that. We are really looking forward to having it all done! It already looks much better in there but I don't want to post a picture until its all finished! Guess you'll have to wait!

Before I go here is one question for you. What would you do with nearly 5 feet of leftover granite with a finished bullnose front?

Leading contenders are:

1. outdoor kitchen (my vote)
2. super deluxe garage laundry area counter (Mr. H's vote).

Thoughts?

Portulaca Oleracea

Thanks to a very clever identification of our blurry weed picture by Josh, I have now determined that our main garden weed (aside from grass) is Portulaca Oleracea or Pursline. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Portulaca_oleracea)

Unfortunately, wikipedia also indicates that it is edible! Not only edible, but nutritious, and a source of Omega 3 fatty acids.

So, I have inadvertently thrown out over 10 gallons of our most productive vegetable!

Well, something to keep in mind for next year.

Adventures in gardening

Being able to walk out to your backyard and pick something fresh to eat is just an amazing concept to me. I love that we have been pretty succesful on our first year of gardening.

We started out way back in February where we sprouted some seeds on our window sil.

Then we prepared the spot where we wanted to plant the garden by digging up all the overgrown stuff that was there, turning over the dirt and covering it with a garbage bag.



Our poor little seedlings waited so long to be planted, they got very big in their little cups.



We finally got them in the ground in early june.



Then we watched as many of them died. We planted more plants where the old ones died. The plants that survived where the tomatoes, tomatillos, cubanelle peppers, and basil. We started off with, well, much much more than that. Here is what it looks like now.



Overgrown and full of weeds. I don't think we did too bad of a job though.





We also had some volunteers sprout up. We have some melon/squash like plants that are doing well that came up from some seeds from the compost. We also had some chard like greens that came up that must have been planted there a long, long time ago.

What started out as a seed is now a thriving plant that provides food for us. Simply wonderful!