Picking Garden Wall

For the past year, we've been talking about taking a bunch of the rocks from around the property and using them to make a wall around a picking garden (similar to the flower bed we made- just bigger)

The reason for the picking garden?  Mike does all of the gardening/landscaping... but then I feel bad picking the flowers!  I wanted a garden that could be used just for flower bouquets- without the guilt :)

We selected a location on the side of the garage.

We had a LOT of rocks to work with!

In Progress
Reverse side-looking towards the back of the house

 And the wall is complete...

Mike removed the bush that was at the front corner of the garage & replanted it along the front field fence.

Next steps:
-getting the excess rocks out of the center of the garden
-roto-tilling the ground (once it stops all of this snowing- ugh!)
-do some planting (we just started researching for deer-resistant flowering plants)

St. Patrick's Day

Saint Patrick's Day has long been one of our favorite holidays.

I've already posted about a couple of decorations... (here and here) 

We usually have an Irish dinner for Saint Patty's day 

(the post from last year is here).  

This year with it falling on a Sunday, we decided a brunch would be fun for a change!

We didn't want to be cooking the entire time,
so we got a crock pot buffet from Bed, Bath & Beyond.  

Couldn't find any Irish wine...
so just went with green labels :)

Photo frame coasters,
with shamrocks put in the cut outs,
made great spoon rests!

I used this tray

(yard sale find) 

for the menu, & used 

2 of the vintage pins!

It was a cold day, so we had the fireplace going too!

A big thank you to my sister-in-law for taking a bunch of photos!  

Without her, there wouldn't have been much to show today  :)

Catching up- March 2013

Here are a few random odds & ends that have been going on around here...

I ordered more prints to go in the downstairs hallway frames... the ones currently showing are in shades of green for Saint Patrick's Day :)

Wall fix- in progress

We also had a small wall repair in this hallway... for Christmas the boys had received a Hot Wheels set that had a track that attached to the wall.  Somehow, it pulled off the paint... ugh!
So, spackle & painting completed here!

More spackle & paint happening to the stairway ceiling as well... this mark was left from an old fire alarm.  (Don't worry, there's a newer one located in the hallway, just 3 feet away).
The spot irked me every single time I walked down the stairs!  Mike patched the two holes, and painted it up.



The dumpster has been picked up, and the pile of scrap metal is gone!  We posted the scrap metal on Craig's List for free, and it was claimed & gone in a day.

And lastly, the lattice work under the front porch is back in place.  We need to get out there with paint this spring!

Vintage Saint Patrick's Day decorations

Check out these vintage Saint Patrick's Day items...

They're two button pins, and three shamrocks
(which may have attached to a ribbon that hung from the button pins?)
I think they're from the late '40s- early '50s.

I found them years ago, under the drawer liner inside a vanity that I had bought at an estate sale!

I'm not quite sure how to display/decorate with them... 

they're small & the shamrocks are kind of fragile.

I was going to put them on the wreath, but they just didn't "go" when I tried it out.

We'll see what else I can come up with instead. 

St. Patrick's Day Wreath

I found this old wreath out in one of the barns... it's seen better days!

But I knew we could do something with it, so I cleaned it of it's beat up autumn decorations...

...spray painted it white, and added some Saint Patrick's day ribbon and a little hat.

I decided to hang it on the back door... 

I like that the wreath is "finished" enough on both sides that we can enjoy it through the glass!

From the back porch

From inside

As for the spot on the basement door... right after Valentine's Day, my son came home with a ombre heart he made in art class.  Lucky for us, he chose to make it in green, so it's hanging around a bit longer!

A Welcoming Sign

I found this hanging sign on clearance at TJMaxx for $1.50!

It had some goo on it that I was thinking would clean off, but I didn't have much luck scrubbing it.

So I decided to spray paint it with oil rubbed bronze spray paint that I had left over (can't remember what from!)

I was going to hang it from the hooks in the foyer, but I have some Saint Patrick's Day decorations that will be going there shortly... so I put it out on the porch, next to the front door.

It's perfect for this feeling of being in between seasons right now... I'm tired of the winter decorations, but can't call it spring yet- especially with snow still in the forecast!

Behind closed (garage) doors

Here's the dirty little secret we've been hiding in the barn...

Lots & lots of debris.  Quite embarrassing!  

We had all this garbage accumulated from the bathroom renovation, the foyer ceiling collapse, cleaning out the second floor of the barn, the trampoline & random damage from Hurricane Sandy, and other odds & ends we've done around the house.  Better in here rather than in full view outside, but still... It was time to call in the dumpster!

We ordered a 30 yard dumpster (22 ft x 8 ft x 6 ft) which arrived on Friday morning.

By Saturday afternoon, it looked like this...  Pretty much full!

Not to mention the pile of recyclable metal that we separated out:

We spent Sunday double checking the basement, attic, and other barns for any other items to toss in.

The best part, is that the garage side of the barn now looks like THIS:

Well, okay, I'll admit that there's now a couple of items in there... just some yard sale stuff that was too "good" to get thrown in the dumpster... mostly kids ride-on toys, etc. which will be sold this spring.

We now have the room to fix the broken window & door on the right side of the photo.
We also need to replace that ugly/broken pull down garage door.  We're thinking we may build them, like we did for the horse barn... but we'll need to see if it's worth the DIY effort or if it's better to just buy them.

Quick Spray Paint Fix

There are a bunch of radiator pipes around the house that weren't really "finished off" where they entered the floor.







The couple of pipes that did have the floor rings around them, looked like this... Not pretty!

So, we bought some new rings, which needed painting so they wouldn't be bright, shiny silver.

We used Oil Rubbed Bronze spray paint and painted some old ones, while we were at it...

A couple of hours to dry, a few minutes to snap them into place, and we were done!

It's not a huge difference, but something that was irking me for a while now.


In other news... today we got a roll-off box delivered to get rid of all the debris in the barn.  You know what we'll be doing this weekend!

Lots of not-so-glamorous-yet-very-necessary stuff we're working on!