Snowmageddon 2012

 Okay. So picking up from my last post which was so cute and happy and sentimental over the fresh powder and a snow day at home with my honey...well, let's just say that I'm so over it. At first, the snow was pretty. I admired the intense blue-ness of it out our kitchen window as night set in and I loved the whole cozy-cuddle factor it inspired. And then...excuse my language...sh*t went downhill rapidly from there. First of all, approximately an hour after snapping this blue-snow picture, the power went out. Which was okay...at first. I'm from the country, yo. I can deal with a power outage. Instead of griping about it, we simply made use of the hot water still in the tank by taking our showers by candlelight, then called it an early night.

 But in the morning, we woke up to this. Notice something wrong? Yeah, my butterfly bush (which wasn't my favorite plant, I admit) looks like Mike Tyson beat it up somewhere between 10pm the night before and 8am the next morning. It's so sad! And since we STILL had no power, instead of tuning into the morning news to see what was going on, we were forced to entertain ourselves by heading out to inspect our own damage.

 Overnight there must have been some pretty terrible freezing rain because Denny's truck looked like someone had replaced it with a rippled glass version. It was entirely encrusted in ice.

 (FMF is a race brand, by the way, and Denny's subtle rebellion against having to drive a Ford.)

 And Denny's truck wasn't the only thing totally covered in ice. Check out our poor Japanese maple and our arborvitaes. Then, the day continued to get worse, as more freezing rain moved in (still no power, by the way). Our trees went from iced-over to iced-obese.

 What started out as a couple of centimeters of ice quickly turned into an inch-plus!

 Branches began dragging and, in the case of our Baby Tree (which is what I call the rowan we planted this fall), the entire then practically bent in half.

 As Denny worked in his office, I kept myself busy by carefully breaking all of the ice off our Baby Tree. Of course, it wasn't that hard because entire chunks came off at once, sometimes retaining an oddly branch-like shape.

 By the time I was done, both the Baby Tree and the maple looked so much better. I swear that I could practically hear their whispery, little tree-voices thanking me.

 As the day wore on and we still had no power, we did the best we could to stay busy and to feed ourselves. You never realize how much you depend on electricity for good food until it's gone. As it was, we made do with sandwiches for lunch then soup heated on our barbecue at night. Oh, and hot chocolate, of course.

 I cannot even express to you how freaking cold it was in our house. Eventually we retreated to Denny's office since it was the smallest room and thereby the warmest. A couple of groups of candles provided light and Denny and I sat down to read for a while until we thankfully retreated to bed (where we slept under a total of six blankets and still froze).

 We woke up early the next morning to (still no power and) what sounded like breaking glass outside. The wind was kicking up pretty good, but we were really grateful to see that none of our windows were actually broken; it was just ice falling from the trees and shattering on the ground like broken bottles. Nice, huh?

 We were actually pretty lucky. Wait...make that extremely, incredibly blessed. Because while we did lose some pretty good-sized branches off of our trees, we didn't incur any major damages. The two large branches that did fall missed both Denny's truck and our large window, and nothing damaged our roof. Also, our trees actually survived the storm, which it turns out was a miracle in and of itself. Because as the roads began to get less terrible and we began to get more cabin-fevery (three days of snowed-in, power-out-ness will do that to ya), we both ventured out of the house. After working to de-ice his car for nearly an hour, Denny left to go to his real office and I left to charge my laptop and cellphone at the nearest Panera (and to eat hot food and have real coffee, let's be honest). 

As I drove down the road, I was sad to see sights such as these EVERYWHERE. I think most people's houses made it through in one piece (not counting all the fridges full of spoiled food, of course) but the trees took a major beating. It looked like some nasty giant had gone around and just stripped all the trees of their limbs. Looking at the damage that was done to everyone else's trees, I feel incredibly blessed that ours (which we were just gushing about a few days before the storm hit) survived. 


Anyway, this was all to say that Snowmageddon sucked. And to say that LA (you know, the one in southern California where the worst weather conditions include incessant sunshine and the occasional sprinkle?), and which had the nerve to call us "clueless wimps," can suck it. Hear me, Los Angeles Times? I'm personally inviting you to make a trip up here and SUCK IT. 


Ahem. That is all. 


PS: We did eventually get our power back. After living without warm food or water for three days in a house that never got warmer than 44 degrees, we're very grateful for it, too. It makes us much less grouchy. -A

Hello, Blogosphere! Remember me?

Alright. So this is a little awkward. You know, since I haven't posted anything in...oh, roughly a month and half or so. Maybe longer. And I should have given some kind of indicator to you all (assuming there's still anyone reading this blog) that I still exist. However, I am not in the least bit kidding when I say that the past two months have been so busy that I have barely had time to sleep, much less write anything for my own lovely little blog. Between countless school projects, working two jobs, making most of my family and friends' presents by hand this year, and attempting to do normal things like spend some time with my husband, it's been kind of crazy.

But I'm back now. And I just wanted to let you know that although I may not be reporting in as often as I used to (you know, before I fell off the face of the planet), I'm going to start writing again. My goal? One post and project a week. Because, you know, sleep is way overrated anyway.

The Return of Privacy

So, as promised, here is the long-awaited update of our fence-rebuilding project! As of yesterday morning, this is what our fence (and our giant pile of dismantled-shed/fence/trash) looked like...

As you can see, we had three posts up and set in concrete, as well as four panels in place. Since we knew that we had a busy day ahead of us, we got up early and dove right into working to get the rest of those posts up. In no time at all, we had that fourth post set, but since we needed one more to finish our line, off to Home Depot we went-- where we accidentally bought a too-short post. Which we didn't find out until we put it up temporarily to measure the spacing and (in the words of Homer), "DOH!"

See? 10' post...10' post...8' post. Fail.


So back to the Depot we went to buy the right one. We exchanged the 8-footer, but were barely able to get it into the ground and concreted (is that a verb? oh, well-- it is now!) before we had to leave the house. Thus ended our fence-building for the day.


Today was another early morning, not to mention a freakin' cold one! Seriously, when we got up this morning to continue working on the fence, the ground was frozen solid, the panels were covered in tiny ice crystals, and my body instantly began arguing with my mind, telling me that this was just plain stupid and we should go back to bed immediately. Luckily, though, was able to ignore those words (of wisdom) and I dove right in to helping Denny, who'd already been up for a half hour and was busy loading up our borrowed trailer with shed and fence debris. 

After a couple of trips to the transfer station, our pile went from unwieldy and hideous to manageable and...well, still kind of hideous, but on a much smaller scale. :) In fact, it was so manageable that we were able to pop up another panel before I even had a chance to take an "after" picture of the mess. Aaah! To be rid of that garbage!


So our next step on this Odyssey-of-a-project was to finish that last little gap at the end. Now, this may seem like no big deal, but let me just say this: 1) the gap was an odd length (not an even 8 feet, but closer to 10 feet long), 2) we had no desire to shorten the line of fence (it would have put it at odd angles with the line of the house), and 3) they don't make 2 foot fence panels. All of this combined to make A Challenge To Overcome. Our solution (by which I mean, Denny's creative and utterly-genius solution) was to buy a small "gate" panel and to modify it to fit the gap between our last full-size panel and the final post. We elected not to put in another post between the full-size and the modified panel since they're super sturdy and were going to go on level ground, next to a large, solid end-post anyway.


First, Denny took some very precise measurements, and then to be safe, he measured again. And then one more time.

Next, he made some initial cuts at the structural points, then flipped it and repeated the cuts (since the circular saw wouldn't go all the way through the first time), then he finished the rest of the line and popped the gate panel into two pieces. In order to finish off the newly-cut side, we simply took a matching piece of red cedar 2"x4" and screwed it to the side, then cut the extra length off. Easy as pie.


After a few minor adjustments, we put up the full-size panel and then fit the modified one into place.

As you can see, the daylight was fading fast (thanks, stupid winter hours...) but we managed to get it in. Voila! The gap is gone. We officially have Privacy. 

Of course, there's still a bit left to do. Those posts? Yeah, they're not always going to be that tall. And they still need "hats," as Denny calls them. We also still need to fill in the holes around the fence posts with dirt and tamp them. But at least until then, we won't have to look at the houses across the street the whole time and they won't have to look at our pile of whatever-else-we-decide-on-a-whim-to-demolish. Like I said, good fences = good neighbors.


PS: Yeah, I know there aren't any pictures of the full-length, semi-completed fence. What can I say? It got dark fast. So, the third (and hopefully final) installment of this story will just have to wait until I can get some daylight hours for picture-taking. Say...Wednesday? Alright, it's a date! See you then! -Ash

No Boundaries...Around Our House

Okay, so you know how we recently tore down the shed? And I didn't actually give you guys a photo of the end result? Did you notice that? Well, that's because immediately after tearing down the shed, we started on this little project...

Look at that leaning, wobbly, gonna-fall-down-at-any-second crap. Not pretty. So it should be no surprise that the instant we got a decent stretch of sunshine we --you guessed it-- demolished it.

We started out by prying out the worst of the panels. 

It began with one...

And quickly turned into three...

Then all of a sudden (it seemed), there was a huge gap in the fence and our backyard looked like this. Which just won't do. As you all probably all know, we're very much in the Northeastern opinion that "good fences make good neighbors" (oh, Robert Frost, you smart, smart man), so we did what any sane person would do: we immediately began rebuilding. In short, we rented a truck, bought $400 worth of panels, some posts, some hardware, a stud gun that could shoot nails into concrete...huh. Not that short. Nevermind. Moving on.

Yay! One panel up! But then...

Insert four-letter expletives here. Yeah. That's &%$@ing concrete. And despite our best attempts to mount post hardware into it (which usually works), all we succeeded in doing was chipping that...blasted concrete foundation to...heck. (See that amazing restraint?)

So what did we do? And what's that thing Denny is holding, you ask? That, my blogosphere friends, is a mini-jackhammer. Yeah. We keep one on hand for just such occasions (uh, not really; it was rented, just like our panel-hauling truck).

Denny decided that the best thing to do would be to simply blast away the concrete wall where we needed to put posts, then pour new concrete to secure them. Not only will the posts be guaranteed to not rust at the bottom (what happened to the last posts), but they'll also be sturdier. And if you're gonna build a fence, you might as well do it right the first time.


So that's what we did last weekend. A lot of demolishing the concrete wall at eight foot intervals, a lot of picking out the giant chunks, a lot of digging away smaller chunks...Basically Sunday was a bust (haha). The good news is that now that we have all that done with, we can move on to more exciting things, like rebuilding our lovely wall of privacy (which I will fully document and then put on the internet...just doesn't make much sense, when you think of it like that...huh...).

WWTGS (aka: What Would Tim Gunn Say?)

Last weekend, I decided to tackle my plain-Jane curtains. So while Denny was doing this,

I was turning the lower living room curtains into something slightly more impressive than they were. Which was this:

As I said before, I had this idea of putting some kind of ribbon border along the edge and fancifying it up (like that word?—yeah, I just thought of it now). So I went to Joann’s and came home with several different spools of ribbon, ranging from an extra-wide, white “lattice” pattern to thin, old-fashioned, pale-teal ribbon with a loop border. In the end, though, I decided on a ½” bold teal. It contrasted nicely with the color of the curtains and wasn’t too…quaint? Is that the word I’m looking for? I suppose. The ½” teal was the only one that didn’t look too countrified (a word which I decidedly did not make up but which fits the situation perfectly). So, on it went!

I began by laying out my curtains on the floor in front of the TV with You’ve Got Mail playing (is anyone surprised?) and used some double-sided “Peel’n’Stick” to start laying down the ribbon along the seam at the bottom. I simply took the tape, cut it in half, and pressed it along the ribbon, being careful not to get any outside the edges. However, once I got it finished with the first row, I realized that it needed a little something more, so I got out the 2” painters tape left over from the cabinets and used it to create an even spacer along the entire first ribbon.

The next step is exactly like the first step, except…well, I used double-sided Scotch tape on the ribbon. This is due to the fact that I had to cut the other stuff with scissors to get it to the right width (it was about a ¼” too wide) and therefore gummed up two sets of scissors by the end of the first curtain. However, for the second curtain, I was a little more innovative. Instead of using double-sided tape or trying to cut the “Peel’n’Stick” adhesive with scissors, I got out a box cutter and cut it directly on the roll to the size I wanted. Easy-peasy.

Next, I continued to carefully lay out the ribbon in straight lines with the Peel’n’Stick (which I recommend over the Scotch tape), then finished off the rows neatly. To make it look less like…well, taped-on ribbon, I made sure to line up the edges of the ribbon with the hem lines and also made sure the edges were carefully cut and not frayed. Now that I think of it, I should go back and add some non-fray glue to the ends…

And there you have it! A chic, simple addition to plain-Jane curtains! Of course, I didn’t stop there, though. After hearing about Mom’s new curtains, which have tab backs and thereby a nice pleated look, I decided to create a similar effect on my own curtains. I decided to be resourceful (aka: cheap) and use the extra Peel’n’Stick and ribbon to create hanging tabs on the back of the curtains (thanks for the inspiration, Mummy!).

Again, out came the blue painters tape (I love that it gives me a consistent and removable guideline). Next, I Peel’n’Stick-ed a bunch of four inch cuts of ribbon along the edge of the tape, using a piece of cardboard as a space measure.

I then laid out my curtain rod along the ribbon tabs and used more “permanent” P’n’S to attach the other end of the ribbon (those quotations are sarcastic by the way—can you see where this is going?).

Simple, right? But right away, there were problems, because although the top looked mighty spiffy…

…the hem was just a wee bit shorter than I liked.

And it got worse, because by the end of Sunday night, the whole thing looked like this:

Yeah, “permanent,” my butt. Oh, well. I guess that’s what you get for going the lazy route and trying to tape your curtains up. So, now they look like this:

And, while that is still an improvement over the ribbon-less curtains of a few weeks ago, I just can’t get the memory of those nice pleats out of my mind. Sewing isn’t an option (because I don’t know how to sew them on in such a way that the seams won’t show through the front side) and it’s clear that adhesive simply won’t do the trick. Oh, well. I guess that leaves me two options: either get over it, or get my Project-Runway on and “Make it work.” Which leaves me to wonder, what would Tim say about the tape fiasco? No doubt he’d give me the chin-holding-elbow-propped-stare-down, then shake his head in disappointment. I can just see it now…(and you can, too, right around second 22 of this clip!)