I have had a list of to-dos for a while now and just about all of them had to do with the outside of the house. So far we have made a good dent in them and I have a few more ideas/wants that I plan to accomplish hopefully soon. After I get the house and garden the way I want them it's time to fix Peggy Sue to my liking. I started a bit of demolition on the inside yesterday but will wait to post those pictures another day.
I've been wanting to either pull out all the bushes in the front of the house or trim them back or something so we did both. The previous owners planted these holly bushes and let them get way too tall and they really took away from the house. We trimmed them way back over half of the previous height was cut down. They are now just sticks and will take about a year to get their fullness back but once they do we can manage them and keep them at bush height instead of the previous BRUSH look. After we trimmed them we pulled several up to clean up the look a bit more. The pulling part was what I was worried about because these bushes had been here for over 10 years. I knew that their roots had to be deeply planted and wanted to be sure to get them all. I also didn't want my yard rutted up but both of those worries were laid to rest when Lincoln came into the picture. He pulled his truck to the front of the house hooked the chain around the bush, ran it OVER a tire, and then hooked the other end to his truck. I was in charge of holding the tire steady as he got the chain tight and then hauling butt out of the way as he slowly and EASILY pulled out the bushes. I couldn't believe this little hair brained idea of his worked but it did.
Since the chain was ran over the top of the tire the pull was more upward instead of directly forwards which pulled all the bush out of the ground instead of breaking it off at the base. (what I was worried about ) I was very impressed. I told him good job and wondered how he had come up with that but he said he You tubed it! Amazing! The man loves YouTube! I'm learning to never doubt his methods.
This video is pretty much exactly what we did MINUS the dummy proof instructions....who wouldn't know how to hook a chain around something? Geez!
Hercules is still inside but his wound is a ton better. He can go without the cone now and his wound isn't bandaged. He goes outside more than in the past few weeks but he is still sleeping inside and has to stay locked up when we are gone so the other dogs don't open his wound back up since it's not fully enclosed! This is a picture Lincoln sent me the other day! Hilarious!
His message read..."If this isn't the definition of sitting on your ass then I don't know what its" definitely correct. LOL
Tuesday Lincoln built the chickens a yard. They have had free rein the past year that we've had chickens but they started wondering further and further. The past couple weeks they were tearing up the neighbor's yard through the pasture so they had to be contained. Now they have a happy little place to tear up that's all their own. Lincoln did a great job and all in just an afternoon! He's so handy.
Speaking of chickens we have some how dwindled down to just 4 hens and a rooster. With summer coming up it's the perfect time to get more chicks so he bought 12. They are growing so fast and are being kept separate until they are big enough.
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| This was 2 weeks ago and they are double that size or bigger now |
Probably in another 2 weeks they will be big enough to go to the big coop with the others. Moose is also growing big! He chews on EVERYTHING and is so cute and playful. We are working on teaching him manners and he seems to be doing well at this point. He minds really well.
I have pretty much neglected my front porch since I've moved into this house. I mean it's just hard to get motivated about it. We don't have a lot of visitors and no one ever uses the front door WHICH I HATE! But seeing that the rest of the house is in tip top shape I really wanted to make the front of our house inviting. I'm on the hunt for some free pallets to make flower boxes out of...sort of like this....
In the meantime I painted the front door black instead of the all white.
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| before |
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| after |
I also got 2 ferns for my hanging pots Friday at Lowe's (more on that in a bit) and put one in the front and the other in the back. My ferns from last year did great and lasted all the way until after the first freeze. I think they are so homey and country looking. On top of the black door, the newly hung fern, and my 2 vintage chairs the front porch is coming around!
Once my flower boxes are done I will place one on either side of the brick step and I think we can call it good.
So Friday night Amber and I headed to Sulphur Spring to run some errands after we ate adult mac-n-cheese from Cibovino!!! OH MAN it was good. I had to go by Atwood's to get some peanuts for a friend's baby shower next weekend and then after we headed to Lowe's to get paint for the above door, ferns, paint supplies for the trim painting I planned on doing, and also 4 knockout rose bushes. I accomplished getting all those things plus some. ;) I thought heck while we are here let's check out the cabinets because I need one for Peggy Sue. I found the perfect one and went ahead and loaded it up. Across from the cabinets was counter top and how convenient that Peggy Sue would also need that but not at $86 no thank you! An associate came over and asked if I needed help with anything and although I didn't need help I did have a question. I told her I was looking for counter top options but I didn't want to spend a lot of money seeing it was for my little camper and only needed a small amount. She said they don't carry scraps and cutoffs but they do have damaged merchandise. My ears perked up...oh yeah...let me check out these damaged goods. I ended up getting a full sheet of Formica at a regular price of approximately $75 for a whopping $20! Can't beat that.
Seeing there was no room for anything else and I went in wanting to spend a certain amount and was nearing doubling that I figured we better head out with what we had....
So we checked out and headed to my TRUCK Corolla to load up and head home. Will it all fit....OOFFF COURSE!
Yesterday I planted my rose bushes. 2 on either side of my A/C unit on the East side of my house.
I got so much accomplished yesterday. I started painting the trim like I wanted to do before I get my gutters installed but once I did a little swipe I knew that I would never do a good job if I could do it without killing myself or someone in the process so I gave up that job and as I type now a nice man named Armando is out painting my trim for $200. TOTALLY WORTH IT! Now the painting will be done and tomorrow I will call to get my gutters installed. It has been a productive weekend and past couple of weeks. We are growing and improving! Today I plan on trying to make a couple outdoor cushions and maybe working on getting my garden ready. I'm not very motivated on the garden this year but I do need to do it. The savings are just awesome and I've learned some great ways of freezing pretty much anything so I don't have to worry about wasting my harvest.
I hope you have a great Sunday afternoon!
Love the door!
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