Projects

My parents came over Christmas and really helped get us into project mode. We've had a big list of to-dos for a long time now and have been very slow at crossing things off. My parents helped give us the motivation we needed.

We finally sanded and refinished the high chair. 

We got it off Craigslist and it was pretty worn and had a lot of dents and scratches. It was also cherry colored and I wanted a more espresso/dark wood to match our table.

It took all three Lord of the Rings and one night of Parks and Recreation to sand it down, but I am so glad we did it.

Almost there. I love the smell and feeling of freshly sanded wood. It made me want to become a woodworker.

Ahhh, much better.

My dad built an arbor for our grapes.

I think it will look really good with some hanging planters in it. Oh, and maybe I should finish sanding and staining the other bench.

One of our grapes was so excited about the arbor that it went from being a dead branch to this in less than a week. (Update: it's now about three times this size).

We finally moved the chickens to the side of the house and built a fence to keep them in. Michael's dad came over for a day to help me get started with the gate. 

And when my dad came he taught me how to build these stairs.

What would we do without parents?

The other task I had written down for my parents was to deal with this sink. I forgot the "before" picture, but just imagine a green tap with spider webs all over it, a linoleum-like backing, an old dusty mirror, and a rusted old sink. Oh, and the tap didn't work. It's amazing what some spray paint, a dremel, and a little elbow grease can do. Thanks mom. I use this almost every day now!

We finally took out the juniper trees. They were taking up way too much room. Originally we were going to replace them with fruit trees, but I don't think that area gets enough sun so we're going to plant some vines.

Above: the trees before we moved into out house

Below: 3/4 of the way through takedown

The finished product looks a little bleak, but once the vine plants grow it will look better. It's amazing how much more space we have.

And thanks to the amazing ladder Craig and Marilyn got us for Christmas we were able to "shave" the palm tree 

My dad was really into cutting things down, so he took out this tree that was partly on our roof. I kept forgetting to take "before" pictures, so this is half way through. 

And to conclude our tree killing rampage, remember this tree?

I hated it. I hated that it would look like this unless kept under control. I hated that in order to keep it under control Michael would spend hours on Saturday cutting each individual branch. I hated that it had leaves that needed to be raked. And I hate that even in it's death it still haunts us. Not only was it almost impossible to get the stump out, but months later we are still filling our yard waste garbage cans with its branches. The branches are so spread out that you can only put a few in the trash can at a time, so it has taken forever to be rid of them. Well played tree, well played.

After lots of digging and mattock-ing Michael and my dad tried several different methods to get the stump out.  

Thomas was helping, of course

Eventually my mom went over and asked our neighbor if he would pull it out with his truck. Even that was a close thing. The truck skidded for a bit but eventually got it out.

Goodbye forever poof tree

And in it's place we planted a wonderful Valencia orange tree. Here's to a future of Saturday's spent squeezing orange juice instead of cutting branches :)