More Home Projects

I'm still plugging away at doing some improvements around the home with a fairly tight budget in mind. A while back I was feeling sick of the leather couch syndrome we've got. When hubby and I got married, we brought into the marriage 2 dogs each, 2 horses each, 2 kids for me and 2 leather couches in addition to everything else. Of course, regarding the couches, they didn't exactly match but we are make-do kind of people so no big deal. Well, kids have flown the nest, only have one of the original dogs from that crew left and after we redid the laminate floors this winter, the leather couches just seem so EWWWWW. Getting on my nerves. Leather wears out very slowly and while this is a good quality, you're stuck with it for a verrrrryyyy long time. But with the budget in mind I put my thinking cap on. First off, got a new rug from Costco for $70 on sale. Nice find with their coupon and it's nice and big. Brightened up the dark leather/wood floor thing we've got going on along with the newly painted light colored walls. OK, would make new throw pillows...cheap and I can choose just about any bright fun fabric. When I got into the fabric store in town, The Sewing Corral I fell in deep like with this Anna Marie Horner (if I remember right!) decorator fabric and it was on sale so came home and got started on covering the ottoman.  

See the difference in color tones of the leather? It seems more noticeable in this picture than in real life.

After the ottoman cover. Better huh? It's a start. Next are new throw pillows and curtains for that big front window. Got them done, just got to get pics. I had actually given some thought to recovering one of the couches but decided against it. These wipe up so nicely and we live on a farm so wipeable surfaces are pretty important. And I'm not feeling THAT ambitious...

So, here we are with the new pillows in lighter more modern fabrics. I can live with this. That's pretty much my option right now anyhow. : )

 Now...I have to show you a lamp I inherited from my Aunt Betty. You decorating divas will cringe but it's a lamp I love because it's so unique. However, I've had the shade that I found at Goodwill for $1 for about 8 years or so, as long as I've had the lamp! It's so ugly and with the whiter tone I've got going, I did recently replace it. Here's a pic of the lamp. It's a farrier or horseshoer. Ceramic. Don't know anything about it other than that as far as history of it. 

The shade actually fit the lamp pretty well I thought when I bought it years ago, but here's the new improved version, an Ikea shade we found on our trip a couple of weekends ago.  Now I am going to paint the pole part of the lamp black because it's in pretty bad shape. I won't mess with the ceramic parts of the lamp. It's a classic! : ) If Antiques Road Show ever comes close, I really should take this thing in and see what we've got here. Now you've seen it folks, the good, the bad and the ugly.

Happy trails until the next project is done...

Trip to Port Townsend

Enjoyed a weekend away not this weekend but last, for our anniversary trip. Each year we go to the ocean but this year it was actually Puget Sound which isn't actually the ocean but is saltwater!


Anyhow, Port Townsend was lots of fun with its quaint little downtown full of old buildings and fun shops, etc. Of course, we ate seafood (mmmmm) and did some exploring. 


Had coffee at a "beatnik" underground coffee spot that was super unique and fun! We played tourist. Went on a driving tour of all of the historical buildings throughout the neighborhoods including churches, the Post Office, courthouse and just houses too. The hotel had a map of them all with a bit of history written for each one. Some were now bed and breakfast type places. Also visited Fort Hadlock which was really interesting too just about 15 miles from Port Townsend. Not sure if i have pics of that. Sorry about the dark "thing" in the lower portion of the pics. I took these out of the sunroof of the car and the rack on top kept getting in the way.


Here are some of the neat buildings of which all were on some registry for being historical. Again, not sure which registry or if there's only one. They were just cool, okay? : ) At Fort Hadlock we saw these 2 eagles, a male and female (don't ask how I know that...just trust me, chicks are on the way) and they were very tolerant of people and vehicles. 

This is the courthouse, isn't it impressive? Spectacular. Can't remember the year on it, 1800's?

This one was spectacular as the lawn went right down to the water. Most of these were used as homes. Pretty cool huh?

The tour was fun. If you get the chance or need a weekend getaway, try out Port Townsend and area. Lots of fun and history in the area. I did not include all of the pictures. The self-drive tour takes about a half hour or so depending on how long you sit and "lookie-lou."

We had a nice getaway. Start lambing this coming Friday...got all of the sheep moved today and into the "drop pen" and we bagged up 52 fleeces into the big wool pool bags...and yes, we got 3 bags full! LOL.

Shearing 2010

Got behind in my blog posts. Been BUSYYYYY. Sheared the flock, went on a sewing extravaganza girls getaway and then an anniversary trip to Port Townsend over the weekend. It's the calm before the storm of lambing when I am homebound and can't go anywhere for a while. Great fun though! Oh, and a first birthday for my nephew, River, too! Gosh, it was just too much fun.


I have pics from shearing. Martin is a great shearer. Now I have 50 fleeces in the garage waiting for some attention. They are bagged and labeled but not skirted or washed yet. If anyone wants to purchase a fleece, now is the time before I put too much time into them. You can do the work and get a very good deal. $20 each, I'll quick skirt them and you can do the tedious stuff. They seem very clean to me with not nearly as much vegetable matter as you might think. 

BEFORE

STERLING WATCHING OVER HIS GIRLS

THE DREADED MACHINE!!!!

MARTIN DOING HIS THANG

NOW THAT WASN'T SO BAD WAS IT?

"Tin" Backsplash, finished?

Ta-da, wa-la! It is finished. Took 2 coats of the paint and shines pretty well when the lighting is good but when it's gloomy it's kind of dark....so, jury is out on if it will stay as-is or get a makeover....as in a lighter coat of paint matching the walls and "wiped" over before it's dry for an antique effect. I think it would look nice with the tin color showing through the paint making it look old and worn. We all have more character when we're old and worn, right? 

Here's mine.  In triplicate.  Not sure if it needs a coat of polyurethane (acrylic) or not for some wipeability? We'll see. I have more home improvements to show you but got a busy week going with work and preparing for shearing this coming weekend. They'll wait for now. 



Here are the tiles you can buy and I see these are cheaper than the ones I saw at Dome Hepot, but I'm happy enough with the Paintable Solutions solution. No big commitment and it was a fun project. Happy trails...

"Tin" Backsplash Day 1

As you know by now, I'm in full swing on doing some updates to the house. This all started out with the laminate/wood flooring we installed throughout the main living area of the house this winter. We had 2 colors of carpeting which included the dining room and old mobile home type linoleum in our kitchens and baths, so the new floor was a big undertaking for us. It was worth it...I really like it a lot. While the carpet was torn out and we were prepping for the laminate (which we installed ourselves), DH said "do you want to paint the walls while the floor is torn out?" Why, sure...all while my mom was ill....


So, I painted ahead of hubby laying the new floor. My mom was a "doer" type of person too so she enjoyed listening to our project progress during each visit. That would be her first question..."got the floor done yet?" We would laugh and say "nope, not yet." I brought her pictures on the digital camera to show her our progress. Once the floor was all laid, we took a hiatus on the baseboard trim. We're waiting for warmer weather to paint it all in the garage. So, here we sit with bare newly painted walls and a clean slate so to speak. We went from colorful, deep chocolate and wallpaper bordered and sponge-painted walls (in different rooms of course) to "fresh linen" eggshell finish paint. It's off-white and everywhere! Aaahhh, simple and fresh. The kitchen needs SOMETHING more but not much. I fell in deep like with the tin backsplash panels at Dome Hepot and decided they cost too much at about $31 a pop (18" x 18" I think). I was thinking "backsplash" in the kitchen. Hubby's raised eyebrows made me rethink that one...no way Jose. We just put in new floors and painted. No budget for a fancy backspash. 

Enter Stage Right (yes sitting on the new floor too!).....Paintable Solutions and Ralph Lauren's metallic paint! An 11 yard roll of this paintable embossed, self-pasted wallpaper cost a mere $12, yes. The paint cost more than the paper at $12.99 a quart! That's enough paper to backsplash my whole kitchen and then some. 


The paint mixer lady at Dome Hepot helped me choose a color and told me "I had thought about doing that...tell me how it works out." So, doubt she knows about this blog, so she's probably out of luck. 


Here's what I did on Day 1 of this project and keep in mind, I'm doing a test wall first...straight shot with one outlet to work around. If I don't like it, down it is coming and we'll do a Plan B. But here's what it has taken so far. First, I did a swatch sample on the wall to make sure the pre-pasted glue would be enough to stick to the eggshell paint finish which is pretty slick. It worked fine.  Then I took a square of the paper and painted it to see if I liked it even a tad...I did. Moving on....

Measured the wall area. Paper is 20" tall or so. My backsplash area between counter and cupboards is almost 15". Length was 84" so I cut 87" and will cut off the excess. Since the paper looks like a square tin, there is a whole tin that starts at the bottom and I wanted that to be at the counter top edge as I would end up with a partial square due to my measurements up toward the upper cupboard side. 

I rolled out the paper, paste side up and marked 15" from the edge I described above (whole square) at regular intervals in pencil. Then I used a yardstick to join the marks and make a straight line. Then I cut with sharp scissors on this line. This particular brand called for a 5-second soak in water, unroll out of this bath and "book" for 10 minutes before hanging. I just used my kitchen sink instead of a wallpaper water bath thingy. Booking the paper is folding it paste-side together in the middle from both sides equally and then upon itself a couple of times. Like this (above.)

BEFORE ABOVE --This is a pretty long piece to work with all at once but I didn't want any seams showing. But guess what? When this stuff gets wet it's pretty fragile. I ripped it unrolling it. Oh well, we'll see how it dries and I won't quit now! Nor waste the paper to start over. Started on the corner wall and kept the paper very even with the counter top edge. Went up great, fixed the tear fine (it was up top toward the cupboard so no worries) and here it all is drying. Note that it is darker than its dried state and it's sort of cool looking like this but about 3 hours later it was all white again as in when we started. Day 2 will bring the paint job. Wish me luck! AFTER ABOVE RIGHT


Oh, by the way, while working the wallpaper up on the wall, I use a clean small paint roller, paint pads and sponges. I couldn't find my wallpaper brush tool so improvised. Worked great to "burp" out the air pockets with the paint pad. I worked the bottom edge up towards the cupboard edge burping out the air.

Pre-Lambing Ewe Care

ewesfeeder
Originally uploaded by cookecreeksheep

The Baa'dgirls are fed hay throughout the winter months but don't start getting grain until the last 6 weeks or so of their pregnancies. We do this for 2 reasons - 1) They are getting so full of babies that their rumen cannot hold enough hay to give proper nutrition to the growing lambs especially with multiples and 2) grain really helps get a nice full bag of colostrum built up for the lambs. In lambing, colostrum is what makes the world go round. Like breakfast for humans, it's the most important meal of a lamb's first day of life.


Back to the grain story. Well, even though the Baa'dgirls are used to being fed hay, the addition of this grain the last couple of weeks has shown their "grain is chocolate" side. Now, whenever anyone goes outside near the gate to their pasture and feeders, they all look over and if they are out in the field, they come a'runnin! These girls can be bought....the hussies are easy, let me tell you! Here is a pic from the other day when this very thing happened. Unfortunately, I didn't get my camera quick enough to catch them all running in. Just caught the hard stares and the "where's the bucket" query.


This weekend we're giving pre-lambing shots to the Baa'dgirls. We give the shots 6 weeks out from lambing (although it's really only about 4 1/2 right now so we're late this year) so that the colostrum will carry the immunities through to the lambs. It really works well.


So, busy weekend here with sheep. Tess the border collie extraordinaire will love it...she gets to moooove sheep. She loves that!
Happy trails...

A good use for a pop box and thoughts on decorating

Found this old Pepsi case in our storeroom and I saw this idea on another crafty blog and thought I'd try it out. All of my craft paints fit in the 12 partitions of the box and I've got it sitting on an antique Singer sewing table with drawers (no machine inside, yet) so I stored all of the brushes in the drawers. It is a good use for the box. One more box of "stuff" organized! I can step into my closet now but still got a bit of a ways to go until it's back to a walk-in closet! : ) 

I've been reading lots of blogs on crafts and decorating lately trying to get inspired for some of these updates I've been doing. Though they are all inspiring, as it's always fun to look at decorating ideas, many of them are too fancy for my taste or just plain too expensive to do the projects. Also, the beach house look is cute, but not my style either and this seems to be the new style at least on these blogs. I was asking a friend the other day what a simple farmhouse style is with not a lot of stuff sitting around to dust. She told me it's called Modern Country. Go figure. I'm going to call my style Modern Jami cause it's not a total style in and of itself...it's borne of pure laziness in my desire to not dust so much stuff sitting around. Floors and furniture I can do...a bunch of knick knacks...not so much! We don't have A/C so in the nicer months we have our windows open for fresh air and cool air and have I mentioned we live on a farm???? It's windy, dusty, dirty, sometimes smelly and downright farmy. Gotta dust almost every day. Honestly, in the nice weather, I'd rather be outside in the garden or yard or on a horse, so I'm over cutesy little stuff sitting around gathering dust while my stone has no moss on it. Ya know?
Well, I've rambled on enough today. I'm painting an old wooden fruit box tomorrow that I will be using for maybe a shelf or something. I'll include you in on the process just in case you've got some old wooden box around that you can transform into something useful that you're not embarrassed to have people see. : )


Happy trails until next time.