Tag Archives: projects

And the deck project begins.

July 10, 2020 Rivergirl 23 Comments

But not before another trip to the store to buy wood.

(Yes, I know the husband is wearing his mask incorrectly but his glasses kept fogging up)

Two perfect pieces for the top of the railing had to be found. And even though we were searching through the more expensive smoothed cedar boards?

They were rife with holes, chops, cracks and warty blemishes.

After 45 minutes…

We moved on to the 2×4’s.

Is it any wonder our small weekend projects turn into 3 month long slog fests?

So this is our deck, and those are the railings that will be replaced.

Hopefully by the end of summer.

Of 2020.

First step…. remove the old railings.

The first few were easy as they had been screwed.

Then it got harder with massive doubled rusty nails that didn’t want to let go.

Did I mention we picked the middle of a heat wave with record breaking temperatures to start this project.

How hot was it….?

Okay, not quite. Though it felt that way.

That thermometer was sitting on the table in direct sunlight.

It was actually this hot, in the shade.

And for Maine?

That is insanely frickin’ hot.

But progress was made.

And halted when rotting beam sections had to be cut out.

With 1950’s era tools.

Yes, I’m afraid so.

And you know what happens when you use power tools from the middle of the last century?

Nothing good.

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It’s just wood.

July 8, 2020 Rivergirl 21 Comments

No, not that kind of wood.

The kind that my husband wanted to replace this:

Our deck railings, which are rotting in a few places.

I’ve tried to talk him into ripping the whole deck out and putting in Trek composite…. yours truly is tired of staining every 2-3 years…. but no. He got half of the deck wood at a yard sale, for free.

It must be preserved.

Did it match the existing wider deck planks?

No. But you’re not supposed to notice that.

So…. we shopped for wood and different railings.

If you’ve never shopped for wood with my husband you don’t know what you’re missing.

He used to run a quality assurance shop for helicopters in the Marine Corps and he takes quality seriously.

Does it surprise you to learn that we spent more than an hour searching for 2 pieces….. and he didn’t find any he liked?

It shouldn’t.

But I did come home with new bronze deck balusters.

To be continued….

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Why is nothing ever easy?

July 6, 2020 Rivergirl 19 Comments

Take staining the deck for example.

I do it every few years, and that time had rolled around again.

So I went to Lowes and had them mix this color.

A nice warm chocolate brown.

Then I duded up in my paint clothes, gathered my brushes and hacked back the boxwood shrubs that were in the way.

All was well…. until I opened my can of stain.

And saw that.

Does that look like a warm chocolate brown to you?

It wasn’t even close.

And looked positively awful when painted on the deck railing. Like liquid peanut butter.

Blech.

Way too light.

Knowing I’d have to return it but not wanting to change clothes and drive 40 minutes to Lowes, I ran up to the local hardware store for a darker stain.

Of course they were almost out of stain and only had one choice…. which I bought, went home and tried.

Nope.

Way too dark.

I was beginning to feel like Goldilocks…

And trudged back to the hardware store to return the second can.

By the time I got back, the husband told me to hold off staining because he wanted to replace all the old rotted railings with something nicer.

Another project?

I’m not sure I have it in me.

And how long will I have to live with a multicolored railing?

Stay tuned for this and other equally as uninteresting answers.

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Well, he thought he was done.

June 24, 2020 Rivergirl 27 Comments

The baby barn.

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Now that we’d finished the h~~oly crap did it really take that long~~ construction and paint, it was time for me to begin the beautification process. This meant doing something with the empty flower bed and border.

The ground has always been uneven there… and when I mulched, it tended to wash downhill. So I gathered up a bunch of the old weathered bricks I love and started stacking.

While the husband was watching.

Best.

Idea.

Ever.

Before I knew it?

He was on his hands and knees telling me I was doing it wrong.

And while I normally don’t react well to that statement… if it means someone will step in and do all the work? I can swallow my pride.

In no time flat it was being done properly.

As he gleefully pointed out how my eyeballed straight line wasn’t so straight.

Look at him with his little level.

Isn’t that special?

I damn near burst out laughing when he started trimming the bush with a pair of scissors.

Who is this man, and what have you done with my husband?

Be still my heart.

He actually dipped into his sacred pile of dirt that’s been behind the baby barn since we built the big barn years ago and… look!

He even spread it.

I don’t mind telling you the rare sight of my husband gardening was positively orgasmic.

While he loves to mow the lawn and chop down trees…. anything resembling planting, weeding, mulching, bordering… aka gardening?

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It was a miraculous sight.

Unfortunately it used up a lot more material than I had, so I sent out an SOS for additional bricks.

Next door neighbor to the rescue.

They have a lovely old farmhouse with a huge 3 (4?) story barn.

Which the husband was scoping out while I loaded bricks into the truck.

She had enough to let us (and by us, I mean him. All I did was take pictures and moan with pleasure) finish.

And I’m quite pleased with the results.

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Behold the majesty.

June 22, 2020 Rivergirl 40 Comments

The majesty (and the God damn miracle I’m not divorced) that is the completed baby barn remodel.

And yes even though it’s as small as a shed, there was a horse living in it before we moved in, so it’s a barn.

A baby barn.

And I have the hay holder thingies to prove it.

Please note ‘hay holder thingies’ may not be the correct equine term, but I was born in Jersey. The only thing I know about horses is who placed in the fourth at Belmont.

We started with this….

And finished with this….

Looks a little better than before, eh?

No comments on the empty garden bed, that has yet to be redone.

Before….

After…

Before….

After….

And to think it only took us a 10 mere months.

Which shouldn’t be a surprise.

We started it’s larger father in 2012…. and haven’t really finished that yet either.

rush

Yup.

That’s our motto.

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I needed a holiday from the holiday.

June 19, 2020 Rivergirl 19 Comments

Our last day of the long Memorial Day weekend meant a morning of yard work.

Tag team mowing with the husband on his new toy and me slogging along with the old push mower.

It was a gorgeous day.

The pear tree was blooming.

The mallows I’d planted were thriving.

And everything had finally turned green.

Except the baby barn which I decided to start painting that afternoon.

Let me preface this by saying I used to love to paint.

I used to.

Until I had to use an artist’s tiny brush around all the nooks, corners, flashing and crooked angles on that beast.

Did I wear some paint, get covered in dirt, rip my pants, tumble off a ladder and work until almost 8:00 at night?

Yes I did.

But paint was applied.

And covered a multitude of sins.

Three sides done, one to go!

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Back to the nightmare.

June 17, 2020 Rivergirl 32 Comments

Oh, you thought the squirrel eviction was the end?

No, that was merely a side story.

The nightmare was the hole.

And the decades worth of squirrel nests concealed there in.

Appropriately masked, the husband approached.

Pulled a panel and…

How’s that for an action shot?

Man, you would not believe how much stuff he pulled out of there.

It was, in a word…. disgusting.

And landed everywhere.

If that isn’t enough to make the husband pay attention when I wave the honey do list in the future?

Nothing ever will be.

So now we had an empty hole.

A big empty hole with a badly installed spotlight fixture.

And a momma squirrel… who even though she found and moved her babies… still wanted back in.

So as the husband worked, with an audience, and stomped my geraniums to such a pulp I had to temporarily relocate them…

Momma squirrel was watching.

Many frustrating hours later, just as I was willing to admit defeat and use this-

It was done.

Hole plugged.

And momma red thwarted. We think.

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Nightmare continued.

June 15, 2020 Rivergirl 25 Comments

So…

Momma squirrel was not happy we’d disturbed and scattered her children.

Not. At. All.

Matter of fact, she was downright pissed. And as the husband was working on fixing that awful hole…

She was positively manic, running to and fro….

Climbing….

Perching..

Even trying to get in the house.

It was crazy.

But what she really wanted was back in that hole.

And as the husband worked, she watched.

See her up top?

The longer it went on…. the braver she got.

There were times I thought she would climb right over the husband to get in there.

She was one mad momma.

To be continued…

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What a nightmare.

June 12, 2020 Rivergirl 28 Comments

Saturday morning on Memorial Day weekend we planned to finish the baby barn remodel. But that didn’t happen, because I started hearing the scritchedy scratch every homeowner dreads.

Squirrels in da house!

I thought they were in the attic, then the walls… but finally pinned it down to the eaves. And I was certain I knew how they got in.

Please look at the upper right hand corner, behind the lights.

It’s been like that since we moved in…. 18 years ago. The previous owner’s gerry rigged spotlight installation.

Naturally, ‘Close Hole’ has been on the top of my honey do list for 17 1/2 years because birds have been nesting in there.

So the husband grumbled, and cursed, and got a ladder to deal with it.

Which is when I heard the scritchedy scratching…. somewhere else.

In this corner, under the hanging plant.

So we yanked back the bushes, grabbed a pry bar and started pulling off decking and lattice….

To discover the noise was coming from inside the vinyl siding corner post. I pounded and knocked and banged on that post like a wild woman and before long?

Baby red squirrels were tumbling out of it like a clown car. They were terrified, and scattered to the 4 winds… so we plugged up the holes and called it good.

Mission accomplished.