Category Archives: Home stuff

The ottoman

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I finally finished the reupholstery projects I began last year.  I reupholstered two wingback chairs, one from my mother’s house and one from iPad aunt’s house.

My mother’s chair had a matching ottoman.

I didn’t like the way the top cushion was attached to the base as it was not secure and would wobble no matter how I many times I tried to straighten it.  

Plus it was too fiddly to try to recreate.

To give it the look of two cushions, I cut the side pieces a little bit longer than necessary and sewed a piece of cording about half way down.  Simple.

No progress pictures, just the final.

Working outside

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Mr. Aitch and I power washed, cleaned, and scrubbed the deck, deck furniture, and the patio umbrella last weekend.

We had a beautiful tree cut down last fall that overhung the deck as it was getting too big and close to the house. 

It provided a home for hummingbirds one summer and lots of shade but also lots of dirt.  Going to miss that shade.

You can see how close it was to the deck.  The branches were almost touching the back of the house.

I didn’t get a picture of the dirty umbrella when we began but this was a cheap nylon umbrella and for now, I just wanted it semi-clean. I ended up using some dishwasher detergent with bleach (I know that’s a no-no) until I ran out of it.  Had to save some for the dishes!  It’s not the best but it’s better than it was.

Now that the big oak tree isn’t hanging over the umbrella, maybe it won’t get as dirty.

I still need to get more plants.

Ready

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Mr. Aitch and I cleared most of the leaves out from the front flower beds on Saturday. 

If you look closely, you can see the silvery icicle garland strung across the railings to keep the birds from roosting and pooping there.

After looking at the pictures, it doesn’t seem like we did such a great job getting all those leaves out!

Those round “grates” above should keep my Balloon flowers from falling over.  I have a third plant farther back that hasn’t started to emerge yet so I’ll need to buy another one of those supports.  I should have taken some “before” pictures but when I thought about it, it was too late to get my camera.

I need to put some layers of newspaper down on the bare ground to keep the weeds from getting a stronghold before the tomato plants go in.  Yes, we plant vegetables in our front flower beds.  It gets the best sun plus that area has the best soil since it’s a raised bed.  Our property is mostly shale.  We had to truck in topsoil just to get the grass to grow. 

Oops!  We forgot to do this side of the house.  Maybe we’ll tackle that project today.

Yay! My lilac is starting to bloom!

 

Me vs the robins

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Part 2 of the robin saga.

So far the lion didn’t work.  Nor the fluorescent marker idea from some other websites.  Nor the picture of a cat.

Dirty birds!  They sit on the railing and attack their reflection through the screens.  Then they sit on the railings and poop then start all over again.

Waxed paper on the outside of the outside of the windows seems to work…until it rains.  Our front porch is covered so the waxed paper was still good but…

…not so much on the back window.

I went to our tiny town post office and decided to stop at one of the “dollar’ stores looking for mylar pinwheels to stick in some styrofoam in front of the big window in the back of our house.  No pinwheels but they did have a rubber snake and mylar balloons.

I scrubbed the back of the house and window sill before I placed my new friend there.  You can see the striped and patterned pillows in the window.  I was hoping they would be enough of a distraction to keep the birds from attacking the window.  Didn’t work.

Will this $2 trick work?  I hope so!