The Garden is Doing Fine Without Me.

And I say that only because during the day it's too stinking hot to stay out there for long, and in the evening the mosquitos make it impossible. Look at my teeny, tiny cucumber though!  All my plants have little veggies on them, and yes, I know, people grow this stuff all the time but as I am not the sort of person who spends countless hours and money on her garden, I'm always impressed when stuff actually grows.  This year I didn't even get around to buying any fertilizer, but things seem to be going along very well in the garden without it.  I never use any pesticides, but so far this year the bugs have been minimal.

I did spring for some hay, and it's all mulched and looks pretty (yeah, I know that's not the point of mulching your garden, but it's a bonus), and smells of hay which I love.  Here's the potato experiment, going quite well also.  Preston says that's a lot of work to go through for a few potatoes, but I'm hoping it'll be more than just a few this year.  The stacks are now 4 tires high, and that's as high as I'm going because to shovel more dirt into a stack 5 tires high even seems like to much work to ME.

Still working on the table, although it's Powwow time so it's been forced to take a back seat for the time being.  This was a disappointing experience with painter's tape, it's not supposed to bleed under the edges but clearly it did.  Fortunately, in a RARE show of foresight, I had set aside some of that pale green paint (It was a color I had mixed up myself) just in case this might happen, and I was able to touch i all up so all that featheriness is gone now.  Once I took the tape off and looked at those stripes, I realized they needed to be a little fancier, so as you can see I've marked off squares so I can do the checkerboard thing.  I'm going to use the dark brown I used for the apple seeds, black seems a little harsh for this project.

And now, off to my real job for a little while.

Stairway to Heaven

Many thanks to Kathy for letting me know about this incredible performance.  I had to share it with you; maybe you'll enjoy it and maybe not, depending on your musical taste,  but I just found it riveting. In spite of the fact that the song was cut short of its original 8 minutes, it's still pretty impressive.

When Stairway to Heaven came out I was 8 years old.  Not only wasn't it the kind of music that was played in my house, but I was too young anyway to appreciate the genius that was Led Zeppelin.  Indeed, I didn't appreciate them until I was way older; all weird chord progressions, cryptic lyrics, and Jimmy Page. Now I listen to them a lot, and my band covers a couple of their songs.  We have DVDs, and there is concert footage on Palladia frequently, from when they were young and beautiful and millions adored them and their whole lives lay before them. They broke up in 1980, when drummer John Bonham tragically drank himself to death and the rest of the band decided that there was no replacing him. 

Bonham, Jones, Plant & Page; a match made in heaven.

It is, of course, fitting that Heart should be the band to perform the epic Stairway;  Heart covers many of Zeppelin's songs in their live performances.  It was also gratifying that Jason Bonham should pay tribute to his father, who has been referred to as one of the greatest, if not THE greatest rock drummer of all time.  Jason, obviously, is no slouch either.

But the best part of this video, for me, was watching the surviving Zeppelin members as they watched the performance.  Now aged from 64-69, it's hard to imagine what might have been going through their minds.  Looking back to 1971, you have to wonder if they had any idea what they had wrought or how many people they would touch with just this one song, which stands as the most requested rock song of all time. 

Apple Table Update

It's only a small table, the top measures about 18" x 30".  But such potential!  Like most of my projects, the idea for its final design has changed several times since I first got it  First I was going to paint a vine growing up one leg and continuing across the top.  Then I was going to paint koi fish on it.  Then I found a picture I had clipped from somewhere with sliced pears making a decorative border.  But one thing has remained the same, there had to be stain on that lovely maple butcher-block top.  As much as I love to paint stuff, I also love the look of wood grain.  So here, I'll have the best of both worlds!  I finally decided on apples, not pears, for the borders. I was going to paint an off-white stripe as the background for them, until it occurred to me that the sliced apple would be white.  That's way too much white and not enough color. So I mixed a shade I liked, and that's what you see here.  Then I wanted a darker shade to do the edges of the green, the apple leaves, and the table legs; but mix as I might, I couldn't get a shade that worked.  So today it's off to the local home improvement store to buy something I like.  I didn't want to get a full quart, because I'm cheap and I don't need that much, but I also know what I want and even if I have to pay $8 for a quart of paint, the table will look the way I want it to look. So there.  It's Monday, so I have an attitude.  Doesn't everyone?

Mission (sort of) Accomplished

The patio is done!  Well, almost.  Preston swept the sand into the cracks like you're supposed to, but somehow every time it rains the sand jumps OUT of the cracks and makes piles on top of the pavers.  I don't think it's supposed to work like that.  So there's this stuff called "polymer sand" and what it does is after you sweep it into the cracks, you wet it and it hardens and it never comes out.  I think we'll have to get some of that.
But the last step was to spread out that huge pile of dirt and plant some grass seed, which we did over Memorial Day weekend, once again with Frank's help.  That's a lot of dirt to move.  The ugly table ended up in the scrap pile, and Sparky bought a nice new one.  I had all good intentions, but the new one looks really good and was relatively inexpensive AND I didn't have to sand it.










Now we can sit on the new patio and watch the grass grow.

Our resident Rock Star came home for a weekend last month, and found a few minutes for a photo op with Sparky.  The reason she has that look on her face is because she absolutely hates to have her picture taken, and I believe at the time she was making threats to my person and my camera.  But as you can see, it didn't stop me.  I'm such a brat. 

Sparky and I took a trip to her new doctor's office the other day, and on the way out I spotted this in the window of the office next door.  I couldn't resist snapping a pic, sometimes I wish I could do this!!  I have been taking some time away from the shop lately, but it wasn't by choice and it sure wasn't for pleasure...I had pneumonia, and of course I infected my poor husband who, unlike myself, required medical attention.  We're recovering, but it sure does drag on.                                              

Mint Juleps on the Patio...any minute now.

Building the forms for cement to connect the sidewalk to  the patio

Progress!  The patio pavers are all in, and Preston decided to pour a border of cement around the edge to keep them from shifting, instead of the usual plastic edging which you don't see anyway, and which gets to be very expensive by the time you go all the way around the patio.  So now all that's left is to sweep the sand into the cracks, spread the dirt back into the yard and plant some grass seed.  NEXT project: getting all the firewood out of the garden so we can plant!

Well done, mother nature!!

I don't think I posted this pic before, but here's why we have firewood in the garden.  When Sandy hit, a tree that was in our neighbor's cow pasture fell on my Little Shop of Chaos and our neighbors generously cut it up and let us keep it, since they don't use a wood stove and it was in our yard anyway. Minimal damage to the Shop, all that had to be repaired was the electrical wire going in.  The garden is to the right of the shed.
 I have been in touch with Tom the rototiller guy, and so all that's left is to clear out the wood.  I am excited to try the potato-and-tire trick, since we have an unknown number of old tires hanging around.  I've always wanted to try this, because we don't have a whole lot of garden space and a lot of that is taken up with beans, tomatoes and squash, but in years past my springs have been taken up with...other obligations...and I never seemed to have enough time to play in the dirt.  Last year was the first time in years that we had a garden at all, and it was just more wonderful than I can tell you to be able to do that.
 We are having an actual spring for the first time in...well, I can't remember the last time.  Usually we go right from freezing to sweltering but it's been just beautiful here for several weeks and a lot of people I know have already planted their gardens. All the birds and frogs and various critters are out and about.  I've lived here all my life and never knew we had dung beetles..also never knew how beautiful they are!!  I wish the colors showed up better, he (it's a he) is the most striking metallic green and copper I've ever seen. Preston found him floundering in Myah's water dish.  His feet are built for digging, not for swimming, so we rescued him.

On the sewing front, we are smack dab in the middle of prom season.  Thankfully, I was able to buckle down and work my behind off and get all the Junior prom gowns done and picked up by Wednesday night, so I took Friday off to spend with The Boy, who came home for the weekend to attend the wedding of an old friend.  I've got to stop calling him that, the old fart is going to be 30 at the end of this year.  But he'll always be The Boy to me.  Anyway, senior prom is this week and I'm always so glad when proms are over for the year.  I did finish the funky turquoise-and-mustard dress set, for better or for worse!  I think it's cool and really different.  Because I no longer have any sense of what colors go or don't go together.  It's complete anarchy in my brain. 

Yard Crashers

Prep work:  turns out the yard is not level. Who'd'a thought.

Great progress is being made in the front yard!  All the research Preston did stated that even if you do this the RIGHT way, there are only 5 steps:  Dig the hole, lay the gravel, top it with a layer of sand, lay the pavers, sweep sand into the cracks.  Done. But it's kind of like when you use the Chilton's manual to fix the car;  remove the old part, replace it with the new part.  Done.  Except they don't explain that you have to remove three other parts to GET to the old part, and there's always a bolt that will break off, and you need a special tool to get the part out, which your local auto parts store will have to special order, etc. etc....when installing the patio, there are drainage issues to consider, and leveling challenges, and whether or not to square the patio with the house or the sidewalk or the driveway (none of which are square with each other), and what kind of gravel to use, and whether or not Home Depot has enough of the pavers you picked out, always something.  But so far, and we are coming down the home stretch, it's been fun and I think it's going to look fabulous.

Preston taking a turn with the tamper-downer. 

After you get the thing all planned out and put the gravel in, you have to tamp it down.  There's a machine people can rent to do this:  these people do not have Frank.  Frank had WAY too much fun with the manual tamper-downer-thingy.  Also he has a big truck, so that made transporting the sand and gravel way cheaper.  I too have a truck, but I doubt its ability to carry 2 tons of sand without getting a hernia.

Screeding the sand

 Anyway, the weather has been stunning-right up until yesterday when it rained, but not for too long-so even though we have to do the patio in between working, we've been able to make great progress.

This part goes pretty quickly, but we ran out of daylight!

 Preston started laying the pavers last night, a back-breaking job if there ever was one.  More back-breaking, for sure, than having to carry them from over from the pallet.
Those suckers weigh 33 pounds apiece.
So I guess it's almost time to repaint the ugly green patio table!

Yuck!

Sunday, Sunday, Sunday!!

Ah yes, a day at home with absolutely gorgeous weather and so many things to do!  Of course we never accomplish everything we want to, but what does that really matter in the long run.  It'll all get done, or it won't.  The plan today was to continue with my bureau and table projects (I finally got the long-awaited burst of inspiration for the table), measure out the space for Sparky's patio that we decided we need to construct, and then split the wood that's taking up space in the garden.  So I put on my Sunday pants, which are colorfully adorned with various shades of paint, grass stains, hair dye and motor oil, and started out.

This is the back of the bureau; as you can maybe see, it's pretty bad.  The luan on the back is beyond repair but I can replace that easily enough. The rest of it is made from thicker pine and other than a few digs that I repaired with wood putty, is in good shape. 

The table, which I've also had for a couple of years, was a real find; it's maple with a butcher block top, and while it's not expensively made, it's sturdy and it's MAPLE.  Very pretty top, and I paid a whole dollar for it.  After turning over several different ideas in my mind for what I wanted it to look like, I finally decided to paint the legs and support bracket and stain the top.  Not an original idea, but what comes after that will set it apart.

I don't know if the thing originally had wheels on it or what, but the bottoms of the legs had these metal      insets with threaded holes.  They had to go, I'll just use some of those non-scratchy felt-bottomed furniture feet  I've got stashed somewhere.

So next, we started measuring out the space for Sparky's patio.  She and my dad had talked about it, but never got around to doing it.  So Preston and I are going to tackle it, and give her a nice spot to sit outside and entertain.  Preston, who I thought had built at least one of everything in his lifetime, has never done a paver patio before, so this will be a learning experience for both of us.  It seems pretty straightforward, but then everything does until you actually try to do it.  I said I was going to do the digging myself, but on seeing what a 12x12 space actually looks like, I took Sparky's advice and called our neighbor, Captain Bobcat. True to form, he said "I'll be right up".  And sure enough, 1/2 hour later we had a large hole in the yard.

Preston says if he had a Bobcat, he'd never leave the yard.

This week, as long as the weather holds, will see a bunch of stone and sand, and oh yeah...I guess we'll have to go get pavers at some point.  Of course this means I will have to repaint that ugly-ass table.  I guess at some point my dad must have hit a sale on obnoxious green paint.

We never did get around to splitting the wood, but there's time before I need to call the rototiller dude.  That's one thing Captain Bobcat doesn't have, a rototiller.  Surprisingly enough.  But that's ok,  that's why we have Thomas Reilly, #749-5296.  I went on and on about him after he tilled our garden last year, so I'm not going to do it again; just trust me, if you live in RI and need your garden tilled, he's your guy.