Wednesday, July 25, 2007

repotting, replanting

I believe that I have figured out what is wrong with my camellias and unfortunately, I am entirely to blame. I decided today to dig out the Tom that is doing so poorly, thinking I would pot it up for a while and see if he recovered. When I dug him up, I noticed that the soil around his roots was not at all boggy and his roots looked very good. I also remembered that I had seen some exposed roots around some of my camellias and had added some dirt around some of them, after Bobbie had told me I should replant my one foundation holly that has exposed roots. I dug down around the top of this Tom, and sure enough, I had actually buried part of the stem as well as the exposed roots. I replanted him in the same hole, adding some new dirt to replace some of what I kicked out, the watered well trying to wash more dirt away from the stem. The worst it can do is kill him and he was headed that way fast anyway. There is a small chance it might save him and I've learned a valuable lesson... I also discovered that the branch of Margaret that was dying (I cut it off) was currently attached to the main stem beneath the soil line. I also tried to wash some dirt back from Margaret. I pushed back the mulch and a little dirt from around all my camellias and hopefully they will do better now.

After messing with the camellias, it was time to pot some plants. I repotted my small Endless Summer cutting into an 8" pot so it can grow up. I also moved my Carolina Jessamine into a pot that is really only deeper, but not wider than the pot it was in. I moved the spider plant into my remaining green hanging basket. It had HUGE thick fleshy white roots. No wonder it roots so easily. I also dumped the last of the pansies, added some fresh dirt and sowed my cilantro seeds. They are supposed to sprout in 7-10 days, so we shall see. My rosemary, sage and English thyme pot has needed help for a long time, especially since the sage has basically not grown since it was planted in April... When I went to unpot it, it was COMPLETELY pot bound. I was able to dig out first the sage, then the rosemary. Most of the roots were the English thyme. I then made the radical move of attempting to divide my English thyme. I could see that there were two major areas rooted in, that both had lots of roots. So, I cut through the branches that connected them and tried to tease the roots apart. The smaller part when into a 14" pot with the rosemary and sage and the larger piece went into its own pot. I figure in a week or so I'll either have 2 English thymes or NO English thymes. At the very least, it really needed to be repotted.

After the repotting, I harvested the last of the Tom tomatoes, as they were starting to get soft and didn't seem to be ripening any. I had figured I'd throw Tom away, but he surprised me by having some nice new green growth. So, I pruned off the dead looking parts and hung him back on his hook. Don't know if I will get any new tomatoe, but I'll watch the new growth and see what happens. I also harvested my first Better Bush tomato yesterday. It didn't look all that great around the top, but my mom was taking it to work to have with dinner, so I'll find out if it was edible or not. I have more peppers ripening, but they are still getting the weird light spots on them that someone said was slug damage. I just don't think slugs are getting in my containers and I'm wondering if it some sort of nutrient deficency.

Monday, July 23, 2007

decorating

carved trayYesterday when we were over in storage I went through a bunch of boxes and found some neat things to decorate the house. A few were things I was looking for, including a photograph my mom took when she was in college (she was a photography major) that I had thought was an Ansel Adams print. We also found a really neat wooden tray that was carved by my great-grandfather. After seeing it, I do remember it hanging in the dining room when I was a child. I have now hung it in the corner in our dining room.

south shore lineToday I finally got to Hobby Lobby again to look at their frames and see about their mat prices. Their mat prices are MUCH cheaper than anywhere else and bring it into the realm of affordable, so hopefully I will be getting some things matted soon. I had also recently rediscovered a poster I had bought on ebay back when we first bought the house. I had intended it to go in the dining room and it was my attempt to find something that was similar to the vintage looking prints you see for sale for big bucks on the Craftsman sites. I think the frame I found was just perfect and I am very happy about how it looks. I'll get it matted at a later point in time.

I am hoping that maybe soon I will be able to get Azali's Domain matted and on the wall. I also need to find some of the beautiful old ads I have and see what size I would need to mat and frame them as well. I had almost forgotten that I had planned to someday have them framed and use them to decorate my room.

Also made vegan brownies with tofu this evening. I was hoping they would be more fudgy than the last recipe I made and they are. I would like to know why Mori Nu vacumn packed tofu has suddenly become an item that is VERY hard to find.

Sunday, July 22, 2007

camellia problems

camellia close-upI went out and watered this morning and I am having camellia problems again. One of my Tom Knudsen's is all wilted, but the ground around it feels moist. I looked in the Southern Living Garden Problem Solver, but couldn't find anything that looked like what is wrong with my camellia, and I can't see any bugs. I also have wilting branches on my Margaret and Debutante. I'm actually afraid I'm going to end up losing all three camellias. I am going to post on You Grow Girl and see if they have any good ideas. I'm hoping at least Margaret and Debutante will survive. I guess if worst comes to worst I can always replant another Tom this fall and add LOTS of compost.

Saturday, July 21, 2007

grow it, eat it- peppers & eggplant

Tonight for dinner we made Tofu with Eggplant, which used my homegrown eggplant, along with my chocolate bell pepper and several jalapenos and Thai hot peppers. I have done no work on the house today, in part because I did not stop at Home Depot on the way home for another knob for my closet. I am off all day tomorrow, so hopefully I will finally be able to get done with the window painting and add the other knob to my closet door.

I think I am going to buy some of the Cutter Bug Free Backyard spray, as I got bitten by more mosquitos today just opening the door for the dogs to come in from the yard.

Friday, July 20, 2007

working on the living room outlet

I have been planning to replace the wall outlet in the living room for some time. The actual electrial box was loose because the wallboard around the outlet was kind of crumbled away. I also bought a brown outlet, that I thought would go with the decor better.

outlet beforeThe plan was to remove the old outlet and box, replace the old metal box with a blue plastic box that would grip the wall and replace the old white outlet with the brown outlet. Sounds easy, but as always, there were complications. First up was the blue box itself, which was very hard to get the wires in. Once the wires were in the box, it held them pretty securely so there was very little play. As the wires are old, they were quite stiff, so that was not a good combination. I also had a surprise when I found that there were not two sets of wires, but THREE sets of wires, with two wires connected to one set of screws. Having two sets of wires, stiff wires and the blue box proved to be a combination that was pretty much unworkable. The final straw for the blue box came when I realized that the current hole in the wall was too small and that I was going to need to chip a larger hole. I don't think so...

outlet afterSo, out with the blue box and back in with the metal box (of course I had to disconnect the outlet again). I was able to get the metal box to screw into the wall pretty firmly, which meant this whole project actually could have been over with in about 5 mintues if I had just tried screwing the metal box in in the first place (of course I still would have had the white outlet but...). I did have more play in the wires with the metal box, but it was still a project trying to get everything hooked up. Finally got everything hooked up and screwed back into place and I was very happy when I flipped the switch and not only did the power not short out, but the outlet still works.


After that, I took one of the old baseboard registers out of my room and replaced it with a new one I had found in the closet. I have no idea how the newer baseboard registers are supposed to attach to the wall, maybe hang on srews? There is no mounting hardware or instructions included. Oh well, it is not in a place where it is in danger of getting bumped.

I still have not gotten back to work on painting the window, BUT they are calling for rain tonight. Maybe I can get that done tomorrow night or on Sunday.

cutting back the petunias

It is still quite humid out today, but I got a little bit of garden work done this morning. I started out by getting out the string trimmer and cutting back the grass in the front part of the back yard. I need to do the whole yard, but it is hard with the trimmer, so this will have to do for now. I also rearranged the vegetables and flowers up in that part of the yard, finally dumped a pot of pansies and repotted a small pot of petunias into a larger pot. I tried cutting back parts of my large pot of Big Daddy petunias, so we will see if that works or not. Currently that pot is only looking so-so, and if cutting back doesn't help, I may dump them and plant something else for August.

pepper and flower patch

I noticed that I have 1 red bell pepper (which of course has a bad spot) and at least 1 Roma tomato that are starting to ripen. I also have an eggplant that is getting larger, don't know when it will be ready to harvest.

We are clearly in the part of the summer when it is impossible to get the watering right. I thought I had watered all my inground impatiens and coleus yesterday, but they were all looking wilty today. I gave them all a good watering and hopefully they will bounce back. I have a branch on my Debutante camellia that is not looking good and another part of Margaret Davis. I am hoping I get these camellias through the summer. And, as I haven't gotten a good answer on what is causing this die-back problem, I don't know what to do to fix it.

After working outside, I took a few minutes before lunch to install a new smoke detector outside my mom's room. We've had them ever since a co-worker gave them to me as a housewarming gift, but I've just never gotten around to installing them. I've had a smoke alarm outside my room, but I don't think it is functional. After installing the alarm, it was lunch time and lunch today was pesto pizza, as I finally got around to making pesto with all the basil I've been cutting last night. Yum! I am going to have to buy some good containers for the freezer and freeze up some pesto for the winter as I go, I will be in pesto withdrawl!

Thursday, July 19, 2007

hot and humid

It is hot and humid and my allergies have been acting up. Yesterday all I did was water and in the evening I tried to hang the photographs, which proved easier said than done as far as getting them actually lined up.

Today after work I got some different picture hangers and also a voltage tester, as I'd like to try to work on getting the living room light installed. I am going to try to take some photos and bring them into Home Depot and see if they can help me.

I was planning on trying out the voltage tester tonight, but so far haven't. I did bake a pan of vegan brownies, which were pretty good but were more cakey than chewy and mom and I both like chewy better. I finished off the night by finally getting the daylily photos hung in the living room. They look just like I had imagined, so I am quite happy with how this project turned out.

living room photos

Tomorrow I am off work. I would like to finish painting the outside window frame, get a price estimate on custom frames for a few prints and maybe try to plant one of the hostas I got a few weeks ago.

Monday, July 16, 2007

decorating dilemma

My walls are still bare in a lot of places in the house. I have several prints I'd really like to get framed, BUT they are non-standard size, so a pre-made frame is not an option as is. I originally thought it would be cheaper to buy a standard size frame and have a mat cut to fit my print, but mats seem to be quite expensive. I am now leaning toward looking into have custom frames made and see how that compares in price to custom mats, especially as custom frames (but not mats) seem to be 50% off all the time- what does that tell you about the mark-up?!

Of course, all that costs money. I still need to have my living room light installed, which will make that room look a lot better. So, what to spend my money on... not that I really have any money to spend right now, but still. I did splurge and get the $7 frames for my daylily photos, I am hoping we can finally get them hung on the living room wall later this week.

Did not water this AM as I figured that the rain took care if it last night. The pots did look a bit dry, but I will water them all in the morning. I harvested 3 jalapenos, including a RED jalapeno, a cayenne and some more Thai hot peppers. After reading that peppers can be frozen, I stuck a bunch of Thai hots in the freezer. I am planning Jerk Tofu for tomorrow night and figure that will use up some of either the cayennes or jalapenos. I may be sending my mom to work with hot peppers.

I also noticed that I have a bunch of baby bell peppers on several different plants. Let's hope I can get a few of them to maturity...

Sunday, July 15, 2007

POTS STOLEN

I was just outside taking pictures of my windows and TWO of my pots of plants have been STOLEN. I am SO UPSET I can't even think straight. Of course, now I don't know when they were stolen, but thinking back on it now I don't if I saw them this morning when I watering or not. Thinking back, I don't think so. I am going to drive around the neighborhood and see if I see them anywhere or see the pots smashed or anything.
stolen pot 2
stolen pot 1

still touching up paint

yellow peppermint stick zinnia
Watered the yard and did some light weeding this morning and also sprayed the rest of the can of bug spray down by the camellias. It did seem like there were fewer mosquitos out but I don't know if that was because it was cooler this morning or that the bug spray had worked. If I am still battling the mosquitos next week, I'm going to get some of that spray that mixes with water and try that. We did get a little bit of rain this afternoon. I don't know how much since I still haven't gotten a rain gauge.

I painted the first coat of white paint on the left window today, painted the outside of the door frame and used the small brush to touch up some ofthe left window. I think the door frame is done, since I had already put one coat of paint on parts of it. I am not sure about another coat of paint on the window since it already had the primer on it. I am going to wait a day and think. Due to the rain, I figure the paint is probaby taking a little longer to dry today. I also did not get back to the duct tape removal project. I am thinking about buying a thing of shop towels, as I think a cloth towel might be better than paper towels. I am thinking about buying some sort of siding wash, as the front of the house could definitely stand to be washed and all of the window frames need to be washed as well.

I have not done anything today as far as working on getting stuff hung up on the walls. I need 4 9 X 12 frames for one set of prints and an 18 X 24 frame and mat for my large Azali's Domain print. Getting a mat cut for it seems to be MUCH more expensive than I would have guessed and the person I spoke to at Michaels was downright rude. I did see some uncut mat board at Hobby Lobby for $6.99 and at that price we can try to cut it ourselves. Frames are also not going to be cheap, so that project may be on hold for a bit.

Saturday, July 14, 2007

this and that

Did a bunch of things today but didn't get anything all the way finished.

- sprayed 1 1/2 cans of Bug Free Backyard all over the back yard except down by the camellias
- harvested 5 tomoatoes off Tom
- harvested two small bags of basil off plants that are trying to flower
- potted up 6 coleus cuttings
- staked the red bell pepper
- used the string trimmer to cut the front yard, which just about killed me
- touched up the top of the crown moulding in the dining room
- painted around the front door frame, all except one part I somehow managed to forget
- touched up the front door and painted around the locks
- touched up the ceiling in the living room
- applied primer to the right front window
- spackled holes in the outside front door frame
- used WD-40 to remove some of the duct tape residue from the aluminum trim around the front windows

I am pretty tired, but still have tons I want to do. I finally found some frames for my daylily photos, so I am hoping to be able to hang them tonight.

Wednesday, July 11, 2007

dining room ceiling & crown moulding

orange daylily
This morning before work I taped off all the crown moulding in the dining room and repainted the edge of the ceiling, to paint over all the brown on the ceiling. I tried really hard to push down the tape and was hoping it would turn out as nicely as the line between the wall and crown moulding had in my bedroom. Unfortunately, it didn't work quite so well and I now again have a bunch of ceiling paint on my crown moulding. It is not too noticible, but it still bugs me. I am going to get a small still art brush and try to fix the problem maybe tomorrow or Friday after work.

We did not get our promised rain today, so I'm going to have to water tomorrow morning. I only did a bit of work in the yard today, cutting back the in-ground coleus that had started flowering. I think they should be okay. I have been too rushed getting off to work in the morning lately to get any of the coleus I have rooted up taken in and I'm still waiting on some other cuttings to root. I really need to cut back my two big coleus pots this weekend, as they are starting to look overgrown. I also think my Big Daddy petunias need to be cut back as well. They are still flowering some, but are getting leggy and not as lush looking. I may just go for it and hack them all back and move them out of sight for awhile. Hopefully they will start growing well again and if not I'll just dump them and put in some marigolds or something. I don't think the nemisia I cut back earlier this year is making it. It has tried to put out one of two little bits of growth on one stem, but the rest of it looks dead. Oh well, it was pretty while it lasted and it is not known as a plant that can really take the heat.

I am trying to start thinking about fall veggies, but I just don't quite know what I am going to do. I may just give it a rest and worry about putting in pansies and trying to get all my perennials in pots safe for the winter. I need to buy some more potting soil and I am going to repot my sage, rosemary and thyme pot, as the sage does not seem to have grown at, the rosemary doesn't seem to be growing either and the thyme just isn't looking so hot. Think the soil in their pot may just be worn out and they may be over crowded as well.

Monday, July 09, 2007

painting the door

I ran outside this AM and gave the veggies a quick watering. I am definitely finding bugs on my eggplant. Of course, when I was a Big Lots today I forgot to look for a sprayer. Maybe tomorrow... This evening we had some badly needed rain, so I am hoping I can get away without doing any watering in the morning. My tumbling tom is getting ready to go. He has a whole bunch of almost ripe tomatos right now, but no flowers what so ever, so once those tomatos ripen, it is curtains. I want to stop by Country Boys and pick up another Tom if they still have any. I think I should have time to get another plant and crop in before the frost, just hope it isn't too hot for flowers to form. But, my other tomatos are still flowering, so that is a good sign.

This evening, I did a little bit of painting. I started by touching up the crown moulding in the dining room, getting in the little areas between the ceiling and crown moulding where you could still see white. I did get more brown on the ceiling, but right now I am at the it has got to look worse before it can look better stage. Tomorrow I will start working on taping off the crown moulding and touching up the ceiling. I am hoping I can get the dining room looking as good as my room.

living room door- 7/9/07Then because I still have some brown paint left over, I started working on painting the inner door frame. I got that painted and STILL had some brown paint and then I started painting the door. Of course, that required filling my pan two more times, but I got a first coat of paint on the door. I will need to actually OPEN the door to finish painting the inner frame. That will have to wait for decent weather, when I can put the dogs outside.

I also stopped at Home Depot to discuss the plans for painting the window mullions. Think I'm going to clean them off lightly with some Simple Green and let them dry, then prime them with the Zinser 1 2 3. I will at some point have to attempt using the silicone caulk I bought last September to work on the laundry room window, which still badly needs to be caulked (and of course repainted...). I think working on the windows will be my weekend project. I'm off work both days this weekend, so I should be able to make some progress. Working on the dining room ceiling won't take as long (not moving any furniture) so it is my after work project.

My major cooking project of the week is going to be locating and cooking a recipe with my homegrown eggplant. I finally found Sriracha hot sauce that about a million recipes call for today. So, that should help. I did find a Chinese inspired eggplant and squash recipe that sounded like it could be good. I may work on whipping that up.

I have a bunch more coleus that are rooted up and ready for new homes, as well as some more mints. I think my mom and I will take them to work on Wednesday, when we both go in late, which will give us more time to organize the plants. I have enough basil for another batch of pesto, so I think I'm going to make some more pesto for myself. I should buy another pack of pizza crusts and use up the last of my old pesto making pesto pizzas to take for lunches at work. I also still have 1/2 a recipe of mint chocolate chip cookie dough that isn't getting any younger. I need to cook that soon or toss it.

Sunday, July 08, 2007

new house numbers up

The new house numbers are now up. I ended up sticking them in with wood putty instead of the construction adhesive as the directions recommended, as they seemed to be staying pretty well without any help. I think the new house numbers look a lot better than the old ones, and it is nice to make the change, even though it is not much.

house number before
house number before
house number after
house number after


I got all the tape down in my bedroom and got the whole place put back together. It is looking really nice now. I did get the hole drilled in the closet door, but as the knob I bought was actually a cabinet knob, the screw that holds it on is not long enough, so I will have to go to Lowes or Home Depot and get a longer screw before I can actually attach the knob. There is always something...

bedroom

I actually did a lot of work this weekend, but as most of it was touching up here and there an little things, when you look around you can barely tell I did anything! Oh well, some of the places where the window frames needed to be repainted that bug me will now no longer bug me, and I don't have to look at ANY blue tape on the walls or at the crown moulding with splashes of pink paint on it. A bunch of little stuff I should have taken care of long ago, but got sidetracked with cold weather or gardening have now been done, so that makes me feel good.

My next big house project I would like to tackle is repainting the mullions on the front of the house. I do have some white exeterior paint, so maybe I can work on that project next weekend. There are also some more window frames I want to touch up inside with the brown paint. My next major touch-up job will be working on the ceiling in the dining room, which got too painted when I was trying to paint the crown moulding. I think I amy be able to do it all without moving any furniture, except the part over the desk, and I can't move the desk. We will probably have to live with that part...

more work around the house

Started out the morning in the yard as ususal watering. Everything is looking pretty good. The eggplant lost several more leaves overnight and on the back of one of the leaves I could see dead insects. Someone suggested the problem could be flea beatles and said the plant shouldn't die if it loses some of its leaves. The newer growth at the top is still looking okay I guess. I dead headed some of the zinnias and pulled some dead stalks out of the daylilies and removed some dead leaves. I also spread used coffee grounds around my Wide Brim hosta to try to keep the slugs away and some more around my hydrangea as fertilizer. I did get some new mosquito bites despite using the Cutter wipes and wearing citronella bracelets. However, guess the prednisone is doing something as I am not itching as much today.

Got my room done I hope. I'm currently waiting on the last of the wall color touch-ups to dry. I did the bathroom touch-ups and applied some Zinser 1 2 3 before painting to one area where rust kept bleeding through. Hopefully this will help keep it looking good for longer. I also touched up the one window frame I had sanded and got the formerly crooked blind rehung straighter I hope (though it still looks slightly crooked). Also did a few other touch-ups here and there with the brown paint.
living room view
I started working on the numbers. After lots of measuring and pre-drilling, I got the holes drilled and of course they didn't quite match up. The wood was quite difficult to drill through in some areas and it was literally smoking! I'm glad I have my drill but as hard as some of the wood is in this house, sometimes I think I need a professional strength drill!! Currently each number will only hang by 2 of the 3 posts, but they seem pretty secure. Then I spackled in the other holes and also kind of spackled the whole post. I am waiting for the spackle to dry, then I will repaint it and have to wait for the paint to dry. I figure I will probably be hanging the numbers tomorrow night.

The living room is all put back together except for all my clothes from my room that are currently on the couch. I need to work on getting them hung back up. Then, once the last of the paint is dry I can move my computer desk back and my room will be back together. Figure that is something for after dinner tonight. Just remembered that I wanted to drill a hole for the correct placement of the knob on my one closet door. I might go see about working on that now.
fireplace

Saturday, July 07, 2007

mostly painting and a sick eggplant

peppermint stick zinniaToday I set my alarm for 8, even though I was off because I had a lot I wanted to do. First up, I watered the plants and when doing that, I discovered that my eggplant has taken a terrible turn. Earlier this week I had noticed what looked like a bug infestation and sprayed it with a homemade mixture of soap, oil, baking soda and water that I had previously used on my mallow. Today a bunch of the leaves have yellowed, some have fallen off and others have gotten dried out around the edge. I am afraid that it now has a disease on top of the insect problem. On the plus side, the insect problem seems to have gone away?? I posted photos and my troubles on the You Grow Girl forum hoping someone might have a suggestion, but so far no one has, but I'm hoping. Other than that, the plants look about the same. I have a yellow bell pepper that I think is getting close to being ripe. I'm trying to check it each day.

three coneflowersI put the coleus I had potted up on Thursday night outside to live in the big world. I then potted up the two fishnet stockings that had rooted and also finally my little baby hydrangea cutting that has please me so by rooting. So far so good for the baby hydrangea, who is still indoors. I will keep him indoors for a least a week I think to make sure he is doing okay, then start getting him used to the outdoors. I am still trying to root the piece of Joe Pye weed my dogs broke off the main plant. I think it is thinking about rooting. Time will tell.

My doctor prescribed a course of prednisone for me due to all my mosquito bit allergy problems. I started that today and am trying to stay out of the yard for a few days to try and prevent any more bites. I did take a few pretty pictures today and later in the day got 5 of my daylily photos printed up as 8 X 10 at Walgreens. I am planning on looking for (cheap I hope) frames tomorrow and then hanging them on the wall probably in the living room.

Most of today was spent painting. I got almost all the crown moulding in my room painted, except for a small part I'll need to move the computer desk to reach. I also got the wall color touched up in the bathroom and the laundry room. I took down the crooked shade and spackled in the holes. I'm going to redrill the holes in the correct place tomorrow, then repaint the top part of the window frame and probably rehang the shade on Monday. I have some other touch up work I want to do with the brown paint on a few window frames, hopefully I can get to that tomorrow.

We went to Home Depot today and they had some really nice looking house numbers. They were about $6/number instead of the $12/number of the ones I had found online. So, bought the house numbers and also some white outdoor paint to paint the column under where the old numbers were, as that area was not painted at all when the repainted the columns! I got the old numbers pried off and repainted that one part of the column (will probably need to repaint the entire thing at a later date) . Tomorrow I will try to actually get the numbers mounted.

right window- midpoint 7/7/07Spent a decent amount of time today scraping paint off the glass on the front windows. When we had originally looked at the house, the mullions on the front windows were painted black. Sometime before we bought the house, the painted over them with sticky white paint. One of my early projects on the house was trying to strip all the paint off of one of the windows. This turned out to be a lot more difficult and time consuming than I expected and I never got around to removing the paint that had pretty much been slopped all over the glass. Then, it got cold and we didn't want to work outside, then it was spring and there was so much to do in the yard and so on. So, today I finally got almost all the slopped on paint off the window. Before they painted, they had also used some sort of clear silicone let's hope it was meant to be caulk on the windows. This too got all over the place. So, removing this mess from the windows was part stripping, part cutting off this silicone. It took a few hours, but I think both windows look a lot better now. I had originally wanted to paint the mullions a dark green on all the windows. Now I am trying to decide if I just want to paint them green, repaint the black (matches the shutters) or just repaint the one and leave the others white. Decisions, decisions...

Thursday, July 05, 2007

tape down in the laundry room

laundry room- 7/05/07
The blue tape is FINALLY down in the laundry room, for the first time since I think Christmas. The single coat I put on the woodwork yesterday seems to be doing well. I might move the dryer all the way out again and try to paint the baseboard back there, but that is all. The baseboards behind the washer can't be seen and the washer is much harder to move than the dryer and won't move out as far. With the shelf up, the dryer cleaned off, the woodwork painted and the tape down, the laundry room is really starting to look good. I'd like to get some different sort of cabinet to hold the towels and sheets, as they will not all fit in the little chest of drawers I have in there currently. I have seen one that I think might work at Target in the past, but that will have to be on hold for right now.

I was worried about how the painter's tape would come off, since it has been up since Christmas-time I think, but other than a few areas, it came off really well. Since I still have some of the buff paint poured out, I think I will try to paint the crown moulding in my bedroom this weekend, then all the tape can be down in my room as well. I also need to touch up a few areas of wall color in the laundry room and also in the bathroom.

It is nice to be painting again, I've got some more touching up to do at various points in the house. Touching up the area were the crown moulding meets the ceiling in the dining room will be a major job, but something I might tackle once I get my room finished. And, I still need to repaint the top part of the crown moulding in my mother's room.

Right now, I have so many mosquito bites that they are actually making me sick. I tried burning citronella candles while I worked in the yard yesterday, but I don't know how much good that did. Between the heat, humidity and the bugs I am not much for yard work right now. I could stand to get out and cut some on the grass again with the weedeater this weekend, but we will see how I feel. This time of year there isn't a bunch to do, other than try to keep up with the weeds and the watering. I do think that slugs are attacking my Wide Brim hosta as it looked kind of eaten today. I need to put down some coffee grounds and see if that solves the problem.

Wednesday, July 04, 2007

painted the woodwork

I got the woodwork in the laundry room painted this evening. I just had a little bit that wasn't taped off from long ago, so I taped the rest of it off and then painted everything. The only way I was able to reach part of the crown moulding was to stand on the washing machine. The washing machine seems to have survived the ordeal. I am going to let the paint dry at least until Friday I think, then take down the painter's tape. Some of it has been on there for so long I don't know how well it will pull off. I already have some touching up to do of the wall color from where there are extra holes from trying to install the shelf. I am hoping that by Sunday the laundry room will be completely finished and better organized.

Lots of people in my neighborhood are setting off fireworks tonight. Luckily we have had a little rain lately or I'd be really worried about fires.

odds and ends

Today I was off work because of the 4th. I had wanted to paint the woodwork in the laundry room, but it was cooler outside today, so I spent the morning and early afternoon watering and weeding. I also decided that the Roma tomato needed to be staked, so it now has a 6 foot stake in its pot. I think this was a good idea.

Finally got a good picture of the large beautyberry today, now that it is leafed out and looking better.
Big Beautyberry- July 2007
Large Beautyberry- July 2007

This is a far cry from how it looked back when it was first planted and I wasn't sure it would even survive.
Big Beautyberry- October 2006
Large Beautyberry- October 2006

I did buy 2 new knobs and changed out the nasty looking knobs on the bathroom cabinet. It is a little thing, but sometimes just doing the little things that bug you can be nice. We also bought a tool caddy, which I have put all my gardening tools I keep around the house in and it fits on the new laundry room shelf. The dryer is finally cleared and cleaned off. We are slowly making progress here and there.

All the veggies and herbs are still growing along. I am hoping that maybe by the end of the month I will have some tomatos other than the cherry tomatos. I will probably need to either pull up and replace or try to root a piece of Tumbling Tom when the tomatos he currently has are all ripe as I have not seen any flowers for weeks. Guess he is finishing up for the year...

perennial bed- July 2007
Perennial bed- July 2007

Monday, July 02, 2007

grow it, use it- peppers again

This evening I made another dish from Garden of Vegan. This one used 1 cup of basi, which was actually a mixed cup of basil from the cutting back I did the other day. I actually had 3 different types of basil, all of which I have grown from seed: sweet basil, purple basil (not very purple yet) and the Summerlong Sweet basil (which despite supposedly being a late flowering variety is already trying to flower...). The recipe also called for a hot pepper, so I used one of my Thai Hot pepppers. Today I harvested 2 jalapenos, 1 cayenne and 5 Thai peppers. I need to find another recipe that uses hot peppers.

I bought a packet of cilantro seeds at Home Depot yesterday and got 2 packets of seeds for one of my co-workers. I am going to pull the pansies out of one of the pots and sow the cilantro seeds in that. Probably a task for the 4th.

laundry room shelf

Yesterday morning I went out and did some weeding, pulling a bunch of bermuda grass out of my beds. I also decided that the pansies just had to come out NOW as they probably should have come out a month ago and were looking terrible. I went to Country Boys and got some impatiens and I also decided that the snapdragons needed to leave as well. They had all pretty much fallen over and were barely blooming. Still, I felt terrible pulling them as they had such nice long roots. Oh well, I'll get some more this fall and put them in and stake them come spring... I think they did pretty well and I'm happy that the two I waited so long to plant survived and bloomed. Of course when I was putting in the impatiens, half of the area was getting more sun that I had counted on. I'm hoping they will last until frost, then it is back in with the pansies and snapdragons.

laundry room shelfI had purchased the shelving to install a wire shelf in the laundry room the other day. I figured this would be another quick project like installing the shade. Boy was I wrong. I got all the holes drilled and of course ran into studs trying to drill the holes for the clips along the back, so then I was going to be 3 clips instead of 5. Then I measured and installed the support bars. This is where the problems started. I managed to drop on of the wall anchors behind the washing machine. I retrieved that and got the right side anchor installed. When it came to the left anchor, I could not get the shelf to stay up no matter how I positioned it. We finally got the shelf to seem like it was staying and installed the left bar. So far so good. I put soap on the shelf and the whole thing fell. Then I realized 2 things: 1) I was supposed to put the plastic part of the anchor OVER the metel support bar and 2) the bar system SUCKS.

So, at this point I started thinking more clearly. There is another way that involves attaching the shelf to both walls. In order to do this, I would need a custom cut shelf. So, called Home Depot to make sure they custom cut the stuff, which they do. Then, tried to get batteries in the stud finder, but it flat out would not open. So... off to Lowes to buy the wall anchors, which I figured I could use the existing piece of shelving, push it all the way to one side, mark the wall anchors, then push it to the other side. Got the wall anchors installed without too much trouble. Then back out to Home Depot to take back the shelf I had and get a custom shelf. Got that home and it installed just fine. It definitely makes the laundry room look neater. I do need a tool caddy or something to keep the few gardening tools I like to have at hand. Then we can totally clean off the dryer and the whole place should look really good. My goal for the 4th is to paint the laundry room trim. Again something that I have been planning to do for many months, but got side tracked.

Currently it is raining outside and has been raining for over an hour. I decided to sleep in this morning, and that was good choice as I was going to get up early to water, but now I don't need to do this. I would be happy if it rained all day. We could certainly use it as all our other promised rain lately has pretty much amounted to a few sprinkles that get the road damp but don't do a thing for the plants. Not much "rain" when your impatiens look wilted right afterwards.