we're up to our eyeballs in cucumbers! (but i ain't really complaining because they're delicious!)
Monday, August 25, 2008
cucumbers cucumbers cucumbers
for the past several weeks we have been getting many, many cucumbers like these.
we're up to our eyeballs in cucumbers! (but i ain't really complaining because they're delicious!)
we're up to our eyeballs in cucumbers! (but i ain't really complaining because they're delicious!)
Sunday, August 24, 2008
gardening class
while i'm waiting for our borrowed weed eater to charge up, i thought i'd post about my gardening class.
the county recreation commission was offering a free gardening workshop yesterday morning which i'd been looking forward to for a while. i originally thought it would be about veggie gardening, but about a day or 2 before the class it occurred to me that it was probably about landscaping, which it was. the biggest disappointment of the class was that it was held inside. and it was a beautiful day outside! but they held us captive inside a cinder block room and showed us power point pictures of outside. but it wasn't too bad. i did learn a little bit and mostly confirmed a few things i'd had hunches about.
but the best part was that i won the door prize*, a purple butterfly bush! i rarely win anything!
*ok, in all honesty they had 4 door prizes and there were only about 10 people there so my odds were good. but i got the door prize that i wanted! woohoo!
the county recreation commission was offering a free gardening workshop yesterday morning which i'd been looking forward to for a while. i originally thought it would be about veggie gardening, but about a day or 2 before the class it occurred to me that it was probably about landscaping, which it was. the biggest disappointment of the class was that it was held inside. and it was a beautiful day outside! but they held us captive inside a cinder block room and showed us power point pictures of outside. but it wasn't too bad. i did learn a little bit and mostly confirmed a few things i'd had hunches about.
but the best part was that i won the door prize*, a purple butterfly bush! i rarely win anything!
*ok, in all honesty they had 4 door prizes and there were only about 10 people there so my odds were good. but i got the door prize that i wanted! woohoo!
Saturday, August 23, 2008
success
this past thursday night was slow food columbia's first big event, a fund raiser to send 2 local farmers to terra madre, an international food conference hosted by slow food international. you may remember me mentioning the fund raiser event previously.
thursday night was a huge success. tickets sold out really quickly and everyone who attended (or at least who i talked to) seemed really happy with the night.
baldman and i were fortunate to have shared a table with the guests of honor. plus, we sat with some local big-wigs. so that was fun.
dinner started out with a really fantastic west african peanut soup with cilantro, followed by mixed salad greens with toasted pumpkin seeds donated by rosewood market. the entree was locally raised grass-fed lamb donated by five leaves farm, accompanied by anson mills's carolina gold rice and sea island peas. of course, we didn't partake in the lamb, but the fabulous terra staff made us a special veggie plate (even though we tried to insist that they don't). all the food was fantastic, as expected, and we were fortunate to have reached our goal in fund raising. so a success all around!
i have a few pictures that i took posted on flickr, but i didn't take many shots because there were a lot of other folks taking pictures too. i'll add them up there when/if they're posted online.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
yin and yang
we averted 2 near misses in the past 3 days and miraculously fixed 2 plumbing problems in under $15. how amazing is that!? of course, that was balanced out by the fact that the brakes on our car crapped out yesterday so we had to shell out several hundreds of dollars today to get that fix. sigh.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Thursday, August 14, 2008
love it!
i came home to find this surprise in my inbox last night. baldman loves fraggle rock. (hence, our 2 cats are named doozer and mokey.)
thanks noah!
thanks noah!
Tuesday, August 12, 2008
project runway season 5
i found this website where i can download season 5 of project runway to watch on my computer! this comes in handy since we don't get bravo (or any other channels for that matter). so far i've watched the first 2 episodes. i think i'm going to like this season. but i'm already tired of suede speaking in the third person. that's getting old really quickly.
make it work, designers!
make it work, designers!
Saturday, August 09, 2008
electric mayhem
this morning baldman and i woke up sorta early-ish to go to the nickelodeon for their first event in their family film series. for a dollar a piece we got to watch the muppet movie! man, it was good to see that movie again. i hadn't watched it since i was a really little kid. and it was even more fun to load up into a small theater with a bunch of kids to watch the movie. really, their laughter and comments throughout the movie made it even more fun. man, jim henson. genious.
following the movie, we had a really nice lunch with some friends in our backyard and we all rode bikes around our street. the weather was just beautiful today!
following the movie, we had a really nice lunch with some friends in our backyard and we all rode bikes around our street. the weather was just beautiful today!
Thursday, August 07, 2008
darkness to light
i don't often talk about work but here's a bit.
i spent the day in chucktown today at a training. i am now an official facilitator of the stewards of children child sexual abuse prevention program put out by from darkness to light. i'm super excited about it because i think they have some great materials, the program has shown really favorable results, and, of course, it's a good cause. did you know that 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will be sexually abused before they turn 18? yea, that's right.
so let's do something about this. if you or anyone you know works with children, if you have children, if in any way you have any relation to children (hey, that means you) contract with me to do a training, or look here to see if there are facilitators in your area.
i spent the day in chucktown today at a training. i am now an official facilitator of the stewards of children child sexual abuse prevention program put out by from darkness to light. i'm super excited about it because i think they have some great materials, the program has shown really favorable results, and, of course, it's a good cause. did you know that 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will be sexually abused before they turn 18? yea, that's right.
so let's do something about this. if you or anyone you know works with children, if you have children, if in any way you have any relation to children (hey, that means you) contract with me to do a training, or look here to see if there are facilitators in your area.
Monday, August 04, 2008
global food aid
there's been a lot of talk in the media about a global food crisis. and certainly finances in the united states are not doing so well for many of us as well. so maybe we can see how things can be a whole lot worse in other countries where their economy and food supply is not as stable as ours.
when baldman and i visited tanzania 2 years ago (wow! has it been 2 years already!), we spent a few days in tanzania's capital, dodoma. we were generously housed by a friend of a friend. dickson chilongani was then a dean of a theological college on the outskirts of dodoma and his and his family's generosity to us at the time was so amazing.
even then we saw the devastating effects that no rain and a tentative economy could have on people. while we were in tanzania we saw acres and acres of dry and dead maze, and we heard on the news constant reports of dead cattle due to lack of food. dixon shared stories with us of having to raise money to buy food to send home with some of the college students during breaks and holidays. otherwise, he told us, most students would never come back after break.
we have kept sporadically in touch with dickson over the past 2 years. he has since been given a promotion within the anglican church of tanzania and we have heard a few stories about the great work that he is doing in the area. in any event, times have gotten really tough all over tanzania (as in all of africa and other developing nations), and with his new job, dickson has a larger scope of reference than he once had as dean at one college.
baldman and i were moved by the enclosed email and thought that maybe some of our readers might be in a position to help, either through prayers or monetary donations. if anyone is interested in helping financially, feel free to either contact dickson directly at chilonganid(at)hotmail(dot)com about the best way to get him the money, or leave me a comment here and we can coordinate our efforts into one check.
here's the email from dickson.....
Greetings from Bristol
Can you pray with me?
Recently I was transferred from being College Principal to Vicar General. I don’t like the title, but the position itself means ‘Bishop’s Assistant’, NOT ‘Assistant Bishop’. The job is mainly pastoral meaning being in charge of all pastors in the Diocese. In the Diocese of Central Tanganyika, a Vicar is in charge of up to 6 small Churches; an Area Dean oversees about 5 parishes; an Area Coordinator is in charge of up to 50 parishes, and the Vicar General i.e. me, I oversee 200 parishes.
The bishop has told all pastors in the Diocese that all parish, marriage and pastoral issues must come to me, and only if necessary I can forward some of them to him. The outcome of this delegation has been very wearing on my side. In fact, I now compare myself to Moses in Exodus who sat down all day every day solving problems. I am trying to find a way out from this problem.
But the one thing that strikes me, and which pushes me to write this e-mail to you as a friend is that our clergy really seem to live in a totally different planet. They have great commitment to the Lord, and they do wonders in their ministry. But they face difficult issues, the main two and indeed the most serious ones being food shortage and fees for their children especially from secondary school level upwards. I am trying to write to friends of mine to see whether we can support some of these children towards their fees because they are the future of the African Church as well as of our nation.
But I am writing to you as a friend to invite you to PRAY with me with regard to the FOOD CRISIS. Last year I raised 1000 (one thousand) pounds with which we supplied most clergy with sunflower seeds enough for one acre. Sunflower is the most recommended crop in Dodoma area because it tolerates drought and it would provide enough cash for clergy to pay fees for their children and purchase food. But the rainfall for the season that has just ended was not good enough so it failed to grow properly in many areas alongside other food crops like maize.
I am aware that as soon as I return to Dodoma next month, my office will be flooded with clergy with requests for support towards food and I have nothing in my pocket. I have picked 50 pastors from the most severely affected areas and with big families. I am just wondering whether you would kindly join me to first of all pray for them, and if possible raise a small amount of funds to support these families. Four (4) bags of maize 15 (fifteen) pounds each should be enough to sustain a family to the next harvest season, i.e. in May next year. The total cost would therefore be as follows:
50 families x 4 bags of maize each = 200 bags
200 bags x 15 pounds sterling each = 3,000 pounds
Transport approximately 3 three pounds per bag x 200 - 600 pounds
Total 3,600 pounds sterling
Please pray with me, and kindly pass on this information to your friend or your Church. I am glad that we are ONE in Christ, which means we can pray for each other and support one another.
With prayers,
Rev. Dr Dickson Daud Chilongani
when baldman and i visited tanzania 2 years ago (wow! has it been 2 years already!), we spent a few days in tanzania's capital, dodoma. we were generously housed by a friend of a friend. dickson chilongani was then a dean of a theological college on the outskirts of dodoma and his and his family's generosity to us at the time was so amazing.
even then we saw the devastating effects that no rain and a tentative economy could have on people. while we were in tanzania we saw acres and acres of dry and dead maze, and we heard on the news constant reports of dead cattle due to lack of food. dixon shared stories with us of having to raise money to buy food to send home with some of the college students during breaks and holidays. otherwise, he told us, most students would never come back after break.
we have kept sporadically in touch with dickson over the past 2 years. he has since been given a promotion within the anglican church of tanzania and we have heard a few stories about the great work that he is doing in the area. in any event, times have gotten really tough all over tanzania (as in all of africa and other developing nations), and with his new job, dickson has a larger scope of reference than he once had as dean at one college.
baldman and i were moved by the enclosed email and thought that maybe some of our readers might be in a position to help, either through prayers or monetary donations. if anyone is interested in helping financially, feel free to either contact dickson directly at chilonganid(at)hotmail(dot)com about the best way to get him the money, or leave me a comment here and we can coordinate our efforts into one check.
here's the email from dickson.....
Greetings from Bristol
Can you pray with me?
Recently I was transferred from being College Principal to Vicar General. I don’t like the title, but the position itself means ‘Bishop’s Assistant’, NOT ‘Assistant Bishop’. The job is mainly pastoral meaning being in charge of all pastors in the Diocese. In the Diocese of Central Tanganyika, a Vicar is in charge of up to 6 small Churches; an Area Dean oversees about 5 parishes; an Area Coordinator is in charge of up to 50 parishes, and the Vicar General i.e. me, I oversee 200 parishes.
The bishop has told all pastors in the Diocese that all parish, marriage and pastoral issues must come to me, and only if necessary I can forward some of them to him. The outcome of this delegation has been very wearing on my side. In fact, I now compare myself to Moses in Exodus who sat down all day every day solving problems. I am trying to find a way out from this problem.
But the one thing that strikes me, and which pushes me to write this e-mail to you as a friend is that our clergy really seem to live in a totally different planet. They have great commitment to the Lord, and they do wonders in their ministry. But they face difficult issues, the main two and indeed the most serious ones being food shortage and fees for their children especially from secondary school level upwards. I am trying to write to friends of mine to see whether we can support some of these children towards their fees because they are the future of the African Church as well as of our nation.
But I am writing to you as a friend to invite you to PRAY with me with regard to the FOOD CRISIS. Last year I raised 1000 (one thousand) pounds with which we supplied most clergy with sunflower seeds enough for one acre. Sunflower is the most recommended crop in Dodoma area because it tolerates drought and it would provide enough cash for clergy to pay fees for their children and purchase food. But the rainfall for the season that has just ended was not good enough so it failed to grow properly in many areas alongside other food crops like maize.
I am aware that as soon as I return to Dodoma next month, my office will be flooded with clergy with requests for support towards food and I have nothing in my pocket. I have picked 50 pastors from the most severely affected areas and with big families. I am just wondering whether you would kindly join me to first of all pray for them, and if possible raise a small amount of funds to support these families. Four (4) bags of maize 15 (fifteen) pounds each should be enough to sustain a family to the next harvest season, i.e. in May next year. The total cost would therefore be as follows:
50 families x 4 bags of maize each = 200 bags
200 bags x 15 pounds sterling each = 3,000 pounds
Transport approximately 3 three pounds per bag x 200 - 600 pounds
Total 3,600 pounds sterling
Please pray with me, and kindly pass on this information to your friend or your Church. I am glad that we are ONE in Christ, which means we can pray for each other and support one another.
With prayers,
Rev. Dr Dickson Daud Chilongani
Saturday, August 02, 2008
beer
when we first moved into this house, one of the things that really bothered baldman was the fact that the word "beer" was written in the cement at the entrance to our driveway. but it's just been one of those things that you don't feel like doing anything about and you get used to.
today, for the first time after living in this house for 9 months, i pulled into the driveway and noticed that that there was something written on the side of our mailbox with those sticky, gold-type letters. so i got out of the car to investigate.
"beers," it said.
i showed baldman and he said, well, if that was the name of the people who lived here before us, i don't feel so mad about beer being written in the cement.
today, for the first time after living in this house for 9 months, i pulled into the driveway and noticed that that there was something written on the side of our mailbox with those sticky, gold-type letters. so i got out of the car to investigate.
"beers," it said.
i showed baldman and he said, well, if that was the name of the people who lived here before us, i don't feel so mad about beer being written in the cement.
Wednesday, July 30, 2008
what our child will look like
gosh, i hope not. no offense, honey.
there is no way to convey how funny this moment was. most of the family was down in the basement playing poker and c got to putting on the mannequin wigs. i was upstairs at the time. so c came running up the stairs and walked into the living room with the wig on but like nothing was wrong. i don't think i've ever laughed so hard in my life. so, of course, after this everyone in the house had the opportunity to try the wig on. unfortunately (or fortunately?) i don't have pictures of that. but maybe i will in the future.
more pictures of the weekend at my flickr site.
slow food fundraiser
for anyone who might be interested. this event promises to have really good food, a great atmosphere, and the funds will go to a good cause. this is our first big event but for sure there will be more to come.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
thanks be to God
baldman and i took a quick trip to western pa this weekend for the annual furgiuele family reunion. there was lots of chaos as 16 people (of the same (crazy italian) family) all tried to squeeze into one tiny house. but there were a lot of laughs and hilarity ensued during several notable moments throughout the weekend. i'm awaiting some choice photos to publicize some of the funniness. but for now i thought i'd post this letter which was historically interesting and caused quiet a chuckle and many references throughout the weekend.
so the story goes like this. my grandmom volunteers for a book sale at her church every year(i'm pretty sure it's at her church). this year when she was sorting books she came across some books from her previous (irish) priest (who here shall remain nameless, per grandmom's request). this priest is now deceased. inside the book she found the following typed letter to the priest from his cousin in ireland:
County Cork, Ireland October 1, 1940
Dear Cousin,
Your welcome letter received and me and your aunt Bridget thank you kindly for the money sent. We have seven masses said for your Grandfather and Grandmother. God rest their souls.
You have gone high places in America. God bless you. I hope you'll not be putting on airs and forgetting our native land.
Your Cousin, Hughie O'Toole, was hung in Londonderry last week for killing a policeman. God rest his soul. And may God's Curse be on Jimmy Rodgers, the informer, and may he burn in Hell. God forgive me.
Times are not as bad as they might be. The herring is back and nearly everyone who has a heart is making ends meet and the price of fish is good. Thanks be to God.
We had a grand time at Pat Muldoon's wake. He was an old blatherskite and it looked good to see him stretched out with his big mouth closed. He is better off dead and he'll burn till the damned place freezes over. He had too many friends among the Orangemen. God curse the lot of them.
God bless your heart, I almost forgot to tell you about your Uncle Dinny. He took a potshot at at turncoat from in back of a hedge, but had too much drink in him and missed. God's curse be on the dirty drink.
I hope this letter finds you in good health and may God keep reminding you to keep sending the money.
The Brennens are 100% strong around here since they stopped going to America. They have kids running all over the county.
Father O'Flaherty, who baptized you is now feeble-minded and sends you his blessing.
Mollie O'Brien, the brat you used to go to school with, has married an Englishman. She'll have no luck.
May God take care of the lot of you and keep you from sudden death.
Your Devoted Cousin,
Timothy
P.S. Things look bright again. Every police barracks and every Protestant Church has burned to the ground in County Cork. Thanks be to God.
P.S. Keep sending the money.
so the story goes like this. my grandmom volunteers for a book sale at her church every year(i'm pretty sure it's at her church). this year when she was sorting books she came across some books from her previous (irish) priest (who here shall remain nameless, per grandmom's request). this priest is now deceased. inside the book she found the following typed letter to the priest from his cousin in ireland:
County Cork, Ireland October 1, 1940
Dear Cousin,
Your welcome letter received and me and your aunt Bridget thank you kindly for the money sent. We have seven masses said for your Grandfather and Grandmother. God rest their souls.
You have gone high places in America. God bless you. I hope you'll not be putting on airs and forgetting our native land.
Your Cousin, Hughie O'Toole, was hung in Londonderry last week for killing a policeman. God rest his soul. And may God's Curse be on Jimmy Rodgers, the informer, and may he burn in Hell. God forgive me.
Times are not as bad as they might be. The herring is back and nearly everyone who has a heart is making ends meet and the price of fish is good. Thanks be to God.
We had a grand time at Pat Muldoon's wake. He was an old blatherskite and it looked good to see him stretched out with his big mouth closed. He is better off dead and he'll burn till the damned place freezes over. He had too many friends among the Orangemen. God curse the lot of them.
God bless your heart, I almost forgot to tell you about your Uncle Dinny. He took a potshot at at turncoat from in back of a hedge, but had too much drink in him and missed. God's curse be on the dirty drink.
I hope this letter finds you in good health and may God keep reminding you to keep sending the money.
The Brennens are 100% strong around here since they stopped going to America. They have kids running all over the county.
Father O'Flaherty, who baptized you is now feeble-minded and sends you his blessing.
Mollie O'Brien, the brat you used to go to school with, has married an Englishman. She'll have no luck.
May God take care of the lot of you and keep you from sudden death.
Your Devoted Cousin,
Timothy
P.S. Things look bright again. Every police barracks and every Protestant Church has burned to the ground in County Cork. Thanks be to God.
P.S. Keep sending the money.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
what we did with our weekend
gosh,i'm so happy to have this new storage shed. but i really am done with house-improvement projects!
by the way, look at this cutie as he's about to get to work.
Friday, July 18, 2008
thoughts while riding
i've been trying to get up early several mornings a week to ride my bike. here are some random thoughts/sightings i had while riding:
why are there so many loose dogs roaming my neighborhood? i have never seen so many dogs just walking loose. i have learned that if you are chased by a pack of dogs while riding a bike, stay calm and keep riding at the same speed. however, do not, i repeat, do not look back.
i saw a huge bird, i think was a hawk. it was hard to keep sights on it because i was trying to watch where i was going. i first realized there was a big bird somewhere overhead because i heard it flapping its wings. cool.
i've been riding past a construction site and i finally realized what it is. what will this do to the neighborhood? though we already have some major sports attractions to my neck of the woods, so...
would anyone notice if i took figs off the really big fig tree on the outskirts of someone's property? i'll wait till their ripe to find out.
i think i saw scruffy. i know he 's been missing. and he is one to live the tramp life, but do you think he could really find his way from mississippi to south carolina? probably.
why are there so many loose dogs roaming my neighborhood? i have never seen so many dogs just walking loose. i have learned that if you are chased by a pack of dogs while riding a bike, stay calm and keep riding at the same speed. however, do not, i repeat, do not look back.
i saw a huge bird, i think was a hawk. it was hard to keep sights on it because i was trying to watch where i was going. i first realized there was a big bird somewhere overhead because i heard it flapping its wings. cool.
i've been riding past a construction site and i finally realized what it is. what will this do to the neighborhood? though we already have some major sports attractions to my neck of the woods, so...
would anyone notice if i took figs off the really big fig tree on the outskirts of someone's property? i'll wait till their ripe to find out.
i think i saw scruffy. i know he 's been missing. and he is one to live the tramp life, but do you think he could really find his way from mississippi to south carolina? probably.
Monday, July 14, 2008
really local farmer's market
so there's a church up the road that apparently partners with a local farmer (or farmers) and every week they hold a market to sell produce. i'd never gone because, honestly, i'd forgotten about it. and once i remembered i didn't have the opportunity due to work or being out of town every saturday morning. so this week i finally was able to go. it's just a small affair, but i'll tell you! that stuff is cheap. cheap. cheap! how much do you think this would cost:
3 yellow summer squash
a pint of blueberries
12 peaches
2 cucumbers
4 ears of corn
2 1/2 pounds of okra
....
you don't know? ok, i'll tell you. $10! what the what!?
of course, there was the problem that i realized later of what am i going to do with all this produce because i had all this, plus the continual supply of stuff coming from our garden*, plus the farm share. so i'm trying desperately to use everything up.
so lesson for next week--buy more blueberries but less of everything else!
*we just ate our first big eggplant last week. yea, baby!
3 yellow summer squash
a pint of blueberries
12 peaches
2 cucumbers
4 ears of corn
2 1/2 pounds of okra
....
you don't know? ok, i'll tell you. $10! what the what!?
of course, there was the problem that i realized later of what am i going to do with all this produce because i had all this, plus the continual supply of stuff coming from our garden*, plus the farm share. so i'm trying desperately to use everything up.
so lesson for next week--buy more blueberries but less of everything else!
*we just ate our first big eggplant last week. yea, baby!
Wednesday, July 09, 2008
csa season again!
yea! today was the first day for our summer csa. this is the third year that c and i have done this. for the past two years we've belonged to five leaves farms and we have been nothing but completely thrilled with the experience. the experience, that is of signing up for a share in a local farm. for those new to the csa idea, you can read all about it here (and once you read about it, you can use the same website to search your local area to find a farm near you to join!).
i'll be honest and say it does take a little time in the kitchen each week to be creative and figure out what you're going to make. and sometimes i just don't want to be cooking in the heat of the summer. but it does turn out to be really fun and it gets my creative juices flowing and helps me get out of the rut of eating the same-old same-old. plus! it supports local farms and gives you fresh, usually organic, and sometimes heirloom varieties of foods. so i'm excited to get our first harvest of yukon gold potatoes, greens, barbosa onions, tomatoes, and scallions. hmmm, i wonder what i'll make with them??
i'll be honest and say it does take a little time in the kitchen each week to be creative and figure out what you're going to make. and sometimes i just don't want to be cooking in the heat of the summer. but it does turn out to be really fun and it gets my creative juices flowing and helps me get out of the rut of eating the same-old same-old. plus! it supports local farms and gives you fresh, usually organic, and sometimes heirloom varieties of foods. so i'm excited to get our first harvest of yukon gold potatoes, greens, barbosa onions, tomatoes, and scallions. hmmm, i wonder what i'll make with them??
Sunday, July 06, 2008
fourth of july construction
happy belated fourth, everyone. hope you all enjoyed your burgers, beers and fireworks.
c and i didn't do any of that this weekend. instead we went into action to try to knock out the rest of the closet work that i mentioned we started the other day.
good thing we went out to indian food to treat ourselves on thursday night because we were in for quite a weekend!
friday we spent most of the day at home depot buying everything we would need (or so we thought) for the project. we rented their truck, hauled everything home (luckily we were in hd for so long we missed the afternoon rain storm), unloaded everything and drove the truck back to hd. we rewarded ourselves with krispy kream and a home-cooked meal for the fourth.
saturday we started bright and early with great optimism and energy. "we're going to just knock this out," we thought. we'll definitely be done by sunday afternoon. anyways... i started out by painting the new screen doors while c finished the framing on the closet. then, came the drywall. here's where our problems started. nothing too major, but we had to do a bit of rethinking because our drill wasn't working and the house is all lopsided, thus every time we cut drywall it didn't fit because everything is lopsided and uneven. so we had to do a lot of cutting and recutting. but by the end of the day we did, indeed, have the looks of a closet.
sunday we went to early church so we could get another relatively early start on things. we had one more piece of drywall to lay, and then we were to start the spackling. except, we realized we needed a few things from the store, so i spent about 1 1/2 hours going to 2 hardware stores to get what we needed while c cut out the wood we'd need for the shelving. the rest of the day i spent in a close relationship with spackle. as of tonight, everything is spackled at least once. we still need to sand and respackle, sand again, install trim on the inside and outside around door, install door, and paint. oh well, so much for getting it done this weekend.
all in all, though, we're very happy with what we've accomplished and how it looks. oh, plus we got the screen doors painted and c got one up (which sounds easy, but with our old house, that's a lot harder than you might think;).
here's the pictures as of tonight.
there are three shelves and a bar for coats
kitchen wall, which was the hardest part to do, so i'm proud of this! the little spackle on the left of the pict is an imperfection in the wall the we're trying to smooth out.
i'd say we'd put our construction skills out for hire, but there ain't no way i'm doing anymore housework for a long time! (hopefully)
we're all tired after all of this work!
the new door on porch, we had to move the 2x4 on the left and we added a 2x4 on top because there wasn't one before. new screens to come soon.
more pictures of our process at my flickr page.
c and i didn't do any of that this weekend. instead we went into action to try to knock out the rest of the closet work that i mentioned we started the other day.
good thing we went out to indian food to treat ourselves on thursday night because we were in for quite a weekend!
friday we spent most of the day at home depot buying everything we would need (or so we thought) for the project. we rented their truck, hauled everything home (luckily we were in hd for so long we missed the afternoon rain storm), unloaded everything and drove the truck back to hd. we rewarded ourselves with krispy kream and a home-cooked meal for the fourth.
saturday we started bright and early with great optimism and energy. "we're going to just knock this out," we thought. we'll definitely be done by sunday afternoon. anyways... i started out by painting the new screen doors while c finished the framing on the closet. then, came the drywall. here's where our problems started. nothing too major, but we had to do a bit of rethinking because our drill wasn't working and the house is all lopsided, thus every time we cut drywall it didn't fit because everything is lopsided and uneven. so we had to do a lot of cutting and recutting. but by the end of the day we did, indeed, have the looks of a closet.
sunday we went to early church so we could get another relatively early start on things. we had one more piece of drywall to lay, and then we were to start the spackling. except, we realized we needed a few things from the store, so i spent about 1 1/2 hours going to 2 hardware stores to get what we needed while c cut out the wood we'd need for the shelving. the rest of the day i spent in a close relationship with spackle. as of tonight, everything is spackled at least once. we still need to sand and respackle, sand again, install trim on the inside and outside around door, install door, and paint. oh well, so much for getting it done this weekend.
all in all, though, we're very happy with what we've accomplished and how it looks. oh, plus we got the screen doors painted and c got one up (which sounds easy, but with our old house, that's a lot harder than you might think;).
here's the pictures as of tonight.
there are three shelves and a bar for coats
kitchen wall, which was the hardest part to do, so i'm proud of this! the little spackle on the left of the pict is an imperfection in the wall the we're trying to smooth out.
i'd say we'd put our construction skills out for hire, but there ain't no way i'm doing anymore housework for a long time! (hopefully)
we're all tired after all of this work!
the new door on porch, we had to move the 2x4 on the left and we added a 2x4 on top because there wasn't one before. new screens to come soon.
more pictures of our process at my flickr page.
Wednesday, July 02, 2008
donate money without donating money
if you want to do something good for a good organization and you have a little free time on your hands, visit palmettobizbuzz and review a business in south carolina. when you submit reviews you can choose a non-profit to donate to and bizbuzz will donate $1 to that organization. my office is signed up as a potential recipient, if you'd like a suggestion of a place to donate. hint hint.
as to where to review, that's entirely up to you. i found it a little daunting at first because i didn't know where to start. but now i can't really stop myself. i think i've reviewed like 15 places so far (restaurants, bars, vets office, roofers, my bank, etc)! each individual can only donate to up to $25 to your organization of your choice (and they have to be local). but of course, you can review as many places as you want.
so check it out.
as to where to review, that's entirely up to you. i found it a little daunting at first because i didn't know where to start. but now i can't really stop myself. i think i've reviewed like 15 places so far (restaurants, bars, vets office, roofers, my bank, etc)! each individual can only donate to up to $25 to your organization of your choice (and they have to be local). but of course, you can review as many places as you want.
so check it out.
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
summer what!?
i'm not complainin'. just wonderin'.
when i rode my bike this morning it was actually cool outside! i mean, i was a bit chilly in my shorts and tank top. i was lovin' it!
when i rode my bike this morning it was actually cool outside! i mean, i was a bit chilly in my shorts and tank top. i was lovin' it!
erica and fuzzy helped produce a barenaked ladies video!
the new barenaked ladies video for pollywog in a bog was finally released. erica and fuzzy's friend noah was the major mastermind behind the project, and e and f helped produce it. great job, guys!
fun stuff.
fun stuff.
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