I'm in love with a stripper

And not the Chippendale kind. Or the kind T-Pain sings about. Nope, I'm talking about the kind who made our linen closet door look like this:



We've literally been elbow-deep in bathroom painting this week, trying to finish the bathroom remodel we started several months ago (see Involuntary Bathroom Remodeling Part I and Part II and stay tuned for Part III). Last night, as I was painting around the linen closet, I asked Joe if he thought it would be easier to just take off the closet door so I could paint around it. He agreed that would work best, took the door off, and took it out to the garage to get it out of the way. I thought that was the end of it. Next thing I knew, in Joe's typical let's-take-this-to-the-next-level fashion, he was back inside explaining to me that the door really needed to be stripped, primed, and re-painted and telling me that he'd already scraped all the paint off the perimeter of the door. OK then. I guess we're stripping and re-painting the linen closet door. This is similar to the way he had to take off a little bathroom trim to put in the tiled shower, then decided that needed to be stripped, then decided that the rest of the trim also needed to be removed and stripped, and now has decided that the trim around the doors needs to be removed and stripped...you get the idea. Now, a huge part of this bathroom project involves removing, stripping, priming, reattaching, and repainting trim *insert huge sigh and "will this ever end?" facial expression here*.

So I'm officially in love with a stripper. And, no, he's not the Chippendale kind. But I think he's pretty cute, don't you?





- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Home Improvement FAIL

After a bit of downtime on our home improvement, I figured tonight was a good time to continue work on our bathroom project.  In particular, we need to paint the ceiling.  I prepped the area, then went to the garage to get the big bucket o' paint.  I picked it up, and realized that there was a leak and that goopy white paint was now on my concrete garage floor.  Thanks a lot, Home Depot.

Undeterred, I figured that, instead of painting, I would continue removing the trim from the baseboard.  I went to go pry off a small piece in the corner, and in all the pulling, twisting, and bending, my 3" putty knife--probably my second-favorite home improvement tool behind my 1.5" putty knife--snapped in half.*

  *Yes, not only do I have a favorite home improvement tool, but a top 5 list regarding same.  The order: 5. Lineman's pliers, 4. Rotary sander, 3. Circular saw, 2. See above, 1. Ditto.  I love me a good putty knife.  I can't believe I'm actually saying (writing?) this out loud.

To top it all off, as I write this Kendra is outside trying to fix a leaking hose in our hand-pump sprayer-thingy to spray the weeds in our gravel driveway and patio.  This is one of those days when I think I should rename the blog, "F*ck This Old House."  Cocktail, anyone?

Follow-up to yesterday's post: our first tomato of the season

I discovered this little guy today.




Our first tomato of the year. A Cherokee Purple heirloom.

It's official. Summer is here.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

How does your garden grow?

This is my garden.





If you would have told Kendra from 4 years ago that she would have a garden, she would have laughed in your face. As I've mentioned before, Kendra from 4 years ago couldn't even keep a house plant alive and had never so much as dug a hole in the ground. Now she has a garden. With green things growing in it. I'll be damned.

It's not much - probably just about 6 by 12 feet or so - but it's enough for 3 tomato plants, 3 cherry tomato plants, 4 heads of lettuce, 4 heads of broccoli, 5 various pepper plants, and some spring onions this year. More than enough for our little family of four.

This is the third summer I've had a garden, and I've learned a little bit every year. The first year, I learned you can love your garden a little too much. I watered my tomato plants every 1-2 days, and ended up with huge, green, vine-y plants but very little fruit. Last year, I learned that little cages (and some putrid spray called "liquid fence") are necessary to keep rabbits and raccoons from snacking on young plants. The plants were salvageable, but I ended up with some plants that didn't produce any peppers until very late in the season.

This year is off to a great start. I've watered (but not too much), applied the liquid fence, and protected most of the plants with cages. The spring onions are almost ready, everything is growing, and we even have a tiny pepper growing on one of our jalapeño plants.

No it's not much, but I've grown pretty proud of this little sliver of our yard. And one of the best parts is that Max enjoys helping in the garden, so it's something we can do together. I hope Charlie will be able to start getting his tiny hands dirty next summer. It's perfect, really, because I've found that gardening is a lot like parenting: full of hope & frustration, surprise & disappointment, exhaustion & reward. You sow the seeds not knowing what you're gonna get, but you tend those little plants the best you can.  When you mess up, you hope the damage is reversible.  And you learn as you go.

Kendra from 4 years ago would be amazed at what it's all become.




- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad