Home Improvements

swissdrunkfooltour, originally uploaded by Sandra Maynard.

After receiving a tax bill that made our hair curl, and then looking at our maybe too ambitious home improvement projects slated for this year, Jon and I decided to cancel our 10 year anniversary trip to Puerto Rico. We are going to use the vacation time ( and money ) to help get some of these projects done.

We have all ready had the side fences in the back repaired. They look almost brand new! The bill = ouch.

The trim around the house has been repainted a darker color - I'm not completely sold on the color but it beats the worn out yellow it has been. The bill = not so ouch but still ouch.

The columns on the porch have been replaced. The bill = ouch.

The vines that covered the back fence in our yard have been completely removed along with some small trees and varying weeds. The bill = ouch in the sense of that poison ivy makes you all itchy.

We now have gutters in the front, hooray! And it was so rediculously non-ouchy I'm very sorry we didn't have it done when we first moved in. We paid someone to do it and it cost less than $300.

Still to do: Repairing the concrete around the pool (big ouch), replacing the back fence to something people can't see through now that the vines are gone (moderate ouch), adding a sprinkler system to the front lawn (moderate ouch) then sodding the lawn (a huge honking ouch).

So I took one of the saved vacation days yesterday and prepped the area in front of our house for new plants. I'm determined to have a damn hobby so it's going to be gardening.

First thing I did was attack the area ( 32' by 5') with a mattock. You want to get in shape? Swing one of those puppies for a couple of hours. I managed to loosen the very clayey soil and murder many earthworms. I then mixed the topsoil with about 12 bags of humus to make the area more hospitable for plants. That was a lot of raking and howing.

I know, you are saying why the hell didn't she just rent a rototiller? 1) Noise, and 2) it's my damn hobby.

After a quick nap I made my 2nd trip to Lowe's and tried to decide on some plants. I ended up with 2 gardenia bushes, 3 hostas (I love hostas) and a leland cypress tree. I still have to plant my hostas. The area, because of the bigassed oak tree in the front yard, might not get enough sunlight for the gardenias to bloom (and that would be a damn shame) but the hostas will be happy. The cypress tree is for the very end of the area and it gets plenty of sunlight. I still have to lay mulch down.

I should have taken another day off to buy and plant some more stuff, plus I have to lay down some mulch, but I decided to go into work today to get some rest.

This photo from Switzerland a couple of years ago is here because we have a houseguest. Mic, the dark haired gent on the left has been here for the last 2 weeks. He's helped remove some of the stumps out back and he's cooked dinner occasionaly. My kind of houseguest! He is one of the friends Jon base jumps with and he's here getting his skydiving tandem rating.

Photos of home improvements soon come.