A room of my own… sewing, crafting and a desk. Part one.

I have always wanted a room of my own to just go hang out in, sew, do some journal writing, work on my computer… you know what I mean. That has finally come to pass. I love it. Here is the epic journey, from wallpaper, bad lighting, closet door to the ceiling…to this! We are getting there. 

BEFORE

As with most of the house. Striped wallpaper. 

Wallpaper and closets right up to the ceiling. Very confusing. 

Wallpaper removed and very bright yellow paint revealed. Lots of patching to do. 

The closet has been closed off to give it to the master bedroom. 


Last of the yellow paint!

Oh my gosh. Two months in….. wallpaper and glue cleaned off and ready to fill holes and paint.

I thought I had a week or two to remove wallpaper and be ready to paint. It actually took two months. I am unsure how many types of glue were used and some didn’t really seem to be wallpaper glue at all. And more staples holding up the wallpaper than I could count. But, here we are now. All finished. I cannot wait to see just one room painted in Benjamin Moore Gray Owl. But first, we have dozens and dozens of nail holes to fill and damaged walls to fix. Theeeen we can paint. We’re getting there. 

Our little sitting area when we are taking a break from working. The walls still need patching and repair, but the wallpaper is gone and walls cleaned. It is wonderful to sit in there and imagine what it will all look like soon. 

This is the room before. With wallpaper. 

I am very anxious to move to the next task. I think I need to plant something!!

First planting in the new garden… at the new house

I am so excited!! We spent a couple days putting together a new raised bed, of the many yet to come, so that I could get the garlic in for next July harvest. I prefer planting about September 15th, but will go as late as October 15th. So it needed to happen right now. The deer fence isn’t up yet, but the buried garlic bulbs should be safe until it is. 

This year I lost all of my old garlic to what seemed to be simply a failure to thrive. They were small and stunted and a lot had bright yellow cloves. So I disposed of the lot of them and just used the other garlics from plantings from the nursery and farms. Here is the bowl before they were separated. They are HUGE. Some are Music and I think some are Red Russian. 

This new raised bed is made with our usual formula. Small fallen alder trees in the bottom. A thin layer of soil. A sprinkle of Urea. A thick layer of soil. A heavy sprinkle of Fish Bone Meal and a tiny bit of Urea. Then about five more inches of soil. With a bit more Fish Bone Meal in the top layer. 

This year I have planted 45 nice big fat cloves. They are exactly 6” apart. I poked 3” holes with my dibber and positioned the cloves so that each had about 1/2” of soil over it. Some cloves needed a bit of soil pushed in the hole so they didn’t sit too low and other had to be wiggled in a bit further down as they were HUGE. All in all, what a fun day planting in the rain. I love everything about growing garlic. 

Precision holes poked

Laying out the garlic


Garlic planted and wire down to keep the wild turkeys from scratching in the bed

Old Mrs. Butterworth syrup bottles

I have a wonderful 5’ tall crawl space in this new house I bought. There was a small amount of stuff left in there by the previous owners. I found a treasure. I love old things like Pyrex. So these old wonderful Mrs. Butterworth syrup bottles remind me of my childhood just like Pyrex does. The largest is about 11” tall. The smallest about 9”. I always thought they looked like glass dolls. 

Yet another Leylandi Cypress hedge… gone! Beautifying the garden world one hedge at a time.

My new house came with a Leylandi Cypress hedge. You may recall my old posts about the hedge from hell at my Sidney house? That hedge (row of HUGE bloody trees) was my nemesis. Refresh your memory here. This one was only eight years old and were less than a foot tall when planted. They were already about 17’  tall and the largest trunk was about 9” across. So I immediately booked a backhoe operator as soon as he was available and our fire rating decreased so machinery was allowed again. That day was yesterday.

You can see the hedge through the window. It doesn’t look like it in this Realtor listing photo, but the trees are about 15+’ tall. 

Some of the branches trimmed off for chipping. 

A twinned fir tree that was cut down ages ago. 

Too heavy to lift and take way, but roots are out for us. I’m betting it will be slow tedious work with the chain saw.