#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