"Made me think of you" gifts are the best gifts

My favorite gifts to give and receive are the ones that are not forced. When I see an item that makes me think of someone in particular, it's hard not to pick up. Bonus = when the item is on sale.
I was recently on the receiving end of an after-Christmas sale item that perfectly captured one part of my identity!

This is the new gift

This is also a gift, but one I've had for 6+ years

I immediately put it out to display, but it didn't seem quite right in that spot. While I was thinking about alternative locations, I also thought about what I wasn't getting to do this week as "dog mom." My mom, aka dog grandma, is watching him this week. [Sidenote - my house is lonely and I miss him.] One of the things I try to do regularly is take him for walks and jogs with his appropriately coordinated red leashes....💡💡💡💡 ←Brilliant idea forming here!

Hrmmmmm... a few hooks and thumbtacks would make my new gift a great decoration for an empty wall AND functional as a leash holder. Previously, his leashes lived on the floor next to the door or in a bag in the closet. A few screw hooks in the bottom, 2 thumbtacks in my wall, and a little help from my dremel resulted in this amazing addition to my living room. A thoughtful gift became a creative project for me. Wins all around!

#ruglife

A new friend and I were joking about our rock and roll lifestyles because of our recent purchases of curtain rod (her) and rug pad (me). Sarcastic enough for you?
Just after I told her that curtain rods have nothing on the rug pad I had coming tomorrow (ya know... because rug pads are WAY more rock and roll), UPS brought it a day earlier than expected! Here's our message exchange and her response cracked me up:

The impetus for getting a new rug pad was because the one I have had for years (see picture on left) was affecting my hardwood floors. Over the weekend, I moved all of my furniture in order to shampoo-clean my hardwood floors. It took longer than I thought it would because the old rug pad was leaving a grid residue. I was afraid the old rug pad would cause some the long-term damage. Plus, it wasn't very soft. I ordered an all-felt rug pad to replace the old one. I didn't need one to keep the area rug in place because the rug is so large and secured under the couch. Once I was done working today, I did even more furniture moving to put the new rug pad under my living room area rug. Unfortunately, the furniture in my living room is slightly too large to move entirely out of the way because it would have been easiest to roll the rug up. Instead, I had to move the couch back and forth twice in order to get the rug pad in the right place and the area rug back on top of it. I'll just count it as a workout. Hopefully, now the hardwood floors will be protected and even though it's not the thickest of rug pads, it's better than the old, grippy, grid one.

Rockin' and Rollin' Lifestyle!

Go ahead. Eat my pumpkins now, squirrels!

My garden hasn't had a huge yield this year. I have had pests like squash bugs and harlequin bugs. I had too alkaline soil. And the squirrels got some of my tomatoes. The only crop that had a ton of yield was my ghost pepper plant.

I was sad that I only had 2 pumpkins, but happy they were impressively large. Then I saw this happened to the younger of the two...

UGH! I hate squirrels. Luckily, my one high-yield crop is the perfect defense! I made a homemade pepper spray with a chopped up ghost pepper and hot water. I made sure not to touch the pepper so I wouldn't hate my life. I could smell the heat. The rest of the process was done on my porch b/c I didn't want to risk spicy vapors in my home. I poured the hot water over the chopped peppers in my measuring cup and after letting it soak for a few hours, I poured the water into a spray bottle. The soaked peppers went straight into my compost bin, where the squirrels also occasionally frequent. I thoroughly sprayed the pumpkins. The squirrels will better stay away or THEY will hate life. The exciting news is that I have at least 4 new, tiny pumpkins starting and they have been ghost-pepper protected too. I have some spray left to reapply as they grow or in case it rains. Hoping it works!

Bathroom Base Tiles

I continued my slow remodel of my bathroom by installing base tiles. Like many of the walls in my house, the walls in my bathroom were also in poor shape. I had some fun times with plaster as you can see around the venting. I had installed some of the tiles earlier, but couldn't get to the space behind my vanity without unhooking the water and moving it away from the wall. I've been trying to check items off my to-do list so I took a weekend to complete the project by doing wall repair, adding tiles, framing out the duct vent, adding a vent cover, grouting tiles, and caulking.

When I turned off the water and unhooked the hoses, there was still a slight drip. I had to come up with some innovative ways to contain the water while still giving me access to the wall behind them. I used rubber bands, bags, and buckets (see picture below). I was able to install the tiles in a day and used the next day to grout and caulk the tiles. Even though they will be mostly hidden by the vanity, they still look really good.

My phone camera is not great

Paint preserving trick!

My least favorite thing about painting is the clean-up process. My friend Steve was lamenting that he had a lot of painting to do and it's difficult to find a chunk of time to do it all. [BTW - Happy Birthday Steve!] Who wants to spend an hour or two painting followed by 30 minutes of clean-up just to have more painting to do the next day? I recently filled him in on a tip I learned when I was doing a lot of the painting in my house. When I perused my blog posts on painting I didn't see it. I can't believe I haven't shared this yet!

This tip come from my friend Cori who was a huge help when I was painting my house! In addition to doing a lot of the painting (including ceilings which she does FAR superior to me), she showed me that you can wrap rollers and paint brushes with plastic wrap to keep the paint wet if you need to do more painting the next day! 

Steve can attest that it works. In fact, here's an email I got from him the other day:
"I finished painting a bedroom yesterday.  Your plastic wrap suggestion worked like a charm.  Thanks for the advice."

Baseboard finishing

Sometimes I just need to blog so I have a reminder about the little things I have done around my house. I may have mentioned before that this blog has been really helpful when I get overwhelmed with all that I have left to do. I go back through my posts and realize,  "wow! I have done a lot" and then I don't feel so bad.

This post is one of those situations where I don't have much to say about my experience caulking the baseboards and filling in nail holes with spackle. I spent a Saturday in June doing that for all of my baseboards downstairs and used a full tube of caulk. On Sunday, I used up another tube of caulk doing that for the baseboards in my bedroom and around most of the doors that I installed upstairs. I have gotten better about caulk.  One tip that I may not have shared before is have rags and a little container of water nearby. Smoothing caulk is much easier if your finger is wet.

A few weekends ago, I installed the shoe molding in the little landing/hallway upstairs, so that area is pretty much done. Making progress!

Closet makeover

In one room, I removed the whole closet. Meanwhile, in the other room, I decided to use the space more efficiently by making it a mini walk-in closet. The original layout had a single rod stretching 5 feet across the back of the closet and one shelf above that (see picture below).

I was in town over labor day weekend and had an extra rod after demolishing the other closet, so I spent one day adding an extra foot of hanging storage and special storage spots for my hats and my luggage. It only took 1 trip to home depot! I had to get a labor day present for myself (that's a thing, right?). I got a large set of spade bits. All of the ones I already owned were too small. These were on sale though!

My carpenter friend gave me some scrap boards that I could use to add trim to the front of the closet. I cut it to size, drilled holes, cut the rods, and installed the pieces all together. I realize that I could have bought brackets for the rods instead, but drilling holes directly in the trim seemed to be the most secure option. Besides, it gave me an excuse to get more tools that will come in handy later. :) Here are pictures of the new rods... well, technically old rods, but newly cut.

Next up, was hanging my ball caps. They had been hanging on a hook that was much too small for 4 hats. I used the space above the rod on the right side of the closest and a few small nails from my hardware stash to put a spot to hang each hat. [Go Nats!]

Up next... and my greatest success... was using the space above the rod on the left for my carry-on luggage. Previously my luggage sat on the floor, but it's light-weight and I'd rather use that floor space for my hiking, rain, snow, black, and brown boots. I used more of the scrap wood to make this little bracket. I installed a small wood piece above the original trim in the closet with drywall screws and screws. Then, I cut 2 triangle pieces that I fit over some nails that I secured into the small piece. In case you were wondering, yes, I did use another spade bit to drill the holes into the triangle pieces. :) To finish up the bracket, I secured the bottom to the original trim.

Even though it only took a day, my closet feels much more open and organized now. I still want to find some cool hooks to hang my belts, so I'm hoping Habitat Restore will have some in stock.

Repurposing ugly chandelier parts to make a new light fixture

Saturday was one of those unique days where I got to be creative AND handy.

My chandelier had been held up with painter's tape for almost 7 years so people wouldn't run into it in my tiny dining room. The chandelier was ugly and dated. I wanted to replace it for quite a while and recently took a stroll through the light section of Home Depot. I didn't see anything I liked. I knew I didn't want another chandelier because having a light hang low in such a small room didn't make much sense to me. The flush mount light fixtures were ok, but kind of boring. I figured I would keep working on other projects and eventually would make it over to Lowes to check their light stock. Until then, the ugly chandelier stays. However... as is often the case... my plans changed. One of my great friends, Kelli, was visiting me and suggested we take a trip to Habitat Restore to check for light fixtures. I had not been to the Restore since it moved 2 miles from my house, so I was long overdue to check it out. Plus I had some stuff to donate. It would be a win no matter what we found there. Well, I found inspiration!!!

On the left - ugly chandelier. On the right - you'll see the new light fixture that I created. I found the brown lamp shade for $5 at restore and thought, "I'm going to find a way to make this work." So, Kelli and I made a trip to Home Depot for the other supplies. I was hoping to find something already put together (ceiling mount, connectors, light bulb socket, wires), but that would be too easy. Instead, I came across the lamp-making section. I found a ceiling mount that I liked and from there it was like a puzzle to figure out what else I needed. I grabbed a package of zinc plated nipples (no, I'm not making that name up) and some sockets... and suspected I'd need to make at least one more trip to HD for this project (spoiler alert - I didn't!).

When I got home, I turned off the breaker to the dining room electricity and got started by removing the chandelier. I realized that this ugly chandelier may actually be useful... in pieces.

talk about a puzzle...

I disassembled the whole thing and realized that it had a nipple that wasn't entirely threaded (in other words, one that would look better). It also had some other pieces I could use... and I could save some $ by returning the unused ones pieces to HD. I took the wires out of the chandelier, scavenged some of the connectors, and began reassembling.

I attached the socket to the nipple that I got from the chandelier and threaded the wires though both. Using wire cutters, I stripped the ends of the wire to reveal fresh copper and I twisted ends. I attached the exposed copper pieces to the socket screws and slid the lamp shade over it all. Then I had to attach it to the ceiling mount. I ended up taking the bracket on and off a couple of times because after I put it up, I realized it would be easier to attach the nipple to the bracket before screwing the bracket into the electrical box, but eventually got everything situated.

I'd like to say it that was the end of the installation, but this morning Kelli and I both realized it would look better if it were slightly lower. I pretty much took it all apart, added more connectors from the old chandelier, and reassembled. Now it spreads out the light more and gives a better view of the ceiling mount... but it is not too low to knock most people in the head. My unusually tall brother may graze the bottom because it's now 6'7 from the floor, but he's used to ducking lights, so I'm not worried.

I may get a brighter light bulb for it at some point, but for now it's great!
I suppose I will have to take another trip to HD to return the unused nipples and extra socket, but I don't count that as an extra trip for this project because the returns aren't necessary for completing the project. Especially because I'll be back over there soon enough for my next project, I'm sure. Once I return the items, this project will have only cost me around $16!

Sidenote... at Restore I found some "retrofit recessed lights" that came with LED bulbs. I ended up getting 5 LED bulbs for $14 and I may be able to used the recessed light pieces in my basement eventually. SCORE!

Fence Panels

I've had fence panels for a couple of years, but had not gotten around to putting them up because of other house projects and yard work. A few of my friends insisted that I get that done this year and have offered to help me install them. The timing is good because my dog and one of the new neighbor dogs behind me haven't been the kindest to each other through the chain link fence. I took my friend Stephanie up on her offer to help last Saturday. We got a break from the rain long enough to install some fence panels along the back of my yard. It's rained most days for the past few weeks. I normally like rain in the springtime because it helps the plants, but there has been a LOT. The plants (and most of the people I've talked to about the rain) need the sunshine too! At least there have been a few dry breaks when I could dig holes and put up some fence posts... and I suppose a benefit of the rain is the ground was pretty soft.

I knew the back of my yard would be challenging because there is a large root coming from my neighbor's yard. Luckily there was just enough space behind the root to dig a hole for the post. However, the fence panel did not fit as-is. My handy skill saw made it easy to cut the bottom of some of the pickets on the far right fence to fit over the root.

The others required some leveling of the soil and removal of some monkey grass before I could attach them to the posts. I split some of my large hosta plants and transplanted them and some monkey grass in front of the fence. I also moved some periwinkle up there too. I want to prevent erosion as much as possible. Since I have tiered the back yard with some landscaping bricks, I contemplated getting a mulch dump from the city to fill in some of the places that need more soil. However, I still have 5 fence panels to install, so I suppose that will need to wait until next year!

Such a difference!

Here's some inspiration... Love this!

Such a cool kid.
Sassy too:
"I'm not here to give you shoutouts." 
hahahaha

Demolition

It's big project time again! I lost momentum for a while, but spring is bringing back energy and motivation. I was hoping to dig more post holes for fencing in my backyard yesterday, but "they" were calling for rain all morning (it didn't... see one of my favorite tweets to the right).

Instead of working in my yard, I decided it was time to get rid of the built-in shelves in my spare room/office. They're too deep to be convenient storage and there's a ton of unusable area above the top shelf. Eventually, I'll put in a large closet so the small closet on the left had to go too.

There's something satisfying about demolition. It creates a clean start and opportunity to make something better. Plus, if you have any pent up aggression, kicking drywall is a great outlet.

I had a lot of quality time with my hammer and pry bar. I started with the closet because once I removed the drywall next to the shelves, I knew they'd be easier to remove without entirely destroying them. I was making enough of a mess as it was. I used a hand saw to help remove the last 2 wall studs. One of the other great things about demolition is that it requires fewer tools (and, thus, fewer trips to my basement) than other house projects.

I haven't cleaned out all of the junk, but here's the newly opened space and the result of my hard work.