Breezeway

Hi!
We got some more snow! Yesterday was a snow day! Although, today the snow is melting away....
Tomorrow is a PD day off for the kids, so it's a long weekend.

 With the hot water and pressure tanks moved into the new utility closet, the breezeway is more cleared out now. But  goodnes, it's still a mess! 

I cleaned it up a bit,

Ha! It doesn't look much better!

Here you can see the tanks before. 

And now.

Top half.

Bottom half. 

So, there's still lots of work to do.  Our plan is to re-do the whole thing in the spring!

:-)

Dirty Laundry

Hello!

How's it going?  I'm still coughing away, but otherwise am fine!

Besides my wonderful birthday celebration on the weekend, I also got the fabulous gift of laundry in the hallway!

Ken got the machine moved on Sunday while the kids and I were in town for swim lessons.

I did the first load Sunday evening!

It's still a bit of mess in there. 

I'd like to have some shelves on the side, but it's so convenient! I can't believe it's moved after all this time!

Now, N's closet is even more of a mess. 

And this if after I "cleaned up" the floor! Yuck!  I hope the new laundry closet will not get so messy.

Anyway, the back half N's closet will hold the hot water tank and pressure tank (for the well) which are now outside in the breezeway in the "closet" behind the green "curtain".

It has always seemed crazy to have our water stuff out here in the winter when it gets so cold. 

Maybe we'll have some savings on our electric bill this year since the HW tank won't have to work so hard to heat the water. 

(HW Tank above)

(Pressure tank below) 

And, it'll be nice to have this space cleared out!

Have a wonderful day! :-)

Patio/Breezeway

Hi!

I've slowed down on my blogging... Not sure why exactly?  Maybe because I've got no new projects on the go and the things I'm doing are just the regular things I do every year....

Such as clean up the patio.

Here it is a couple days ago.

We had a great weekend, weather wise so I cleaned up all the dead branches, leaves, etc. from the back and front gardens.

I moved the little lavender plant (again) because it was getting crowded by the hardy oregano.  I moved it beside the sage and chives. 

I took our patio table  inside the breezeway for the winter.  It's in the above picture laying on its side, upside down. When I took the legs off, I remember thinking, "I must keep track of these nuts, so I'll put them in a little baggie".  However, now I can't find it and I'm wondering why I didn't just screw the nuts onto the bolts on the legs!

I cleaned out the breezeway.

This is the "After"! 

Inside the courtyard's pineapple door, is this little space that leads to K's office.

It's also cleaned up, but still, so much junk! 

The angled shelf is new.... 

And here is our crazy tool bench! 

I hung out our first load of laundry to dry on Saturday! 

We're a bit ahead of last year's weather, snow-wise.

There was no school on Friday for the kids and the same this week! N is sick today with a fever so he's home with me. ;-(

Hope you are healthy and have a great week! :-)

Snowy Tuesday

Mornin!

It's another snow day! We got around 12 inches of snow (30 cm) and there was a blizzard last night.  The snow has drifted and the back breezeway is dark because all the windows are covered!

Here's the breezeway on Sunday after the storm we got on Saturday. It was almost all the way to the top. For that storm we only got around 9 inches (25 cm) of snow.

In the back room, the window closest to the breezeway is covered with snow and the one next to it is almost covered!

Here's looking out that lefthand window.  You can't even see the breezeway.

Here's a pic of how it looked before, after the weekend storm.

The kids are no longer allowed to go on top of the breezeway, but here's a video of C sliding down the snowbank. She didn't actually go on top of the breezeway!

At the back door, the snow has drifted up past the doorknob!

Here's looking out the kitchen window towards the front.  The snow is just about to the bottom of the window which is over 6 feet high!

Here's looking out the back door towards our neighbor's barn on Sunday.

And here it is now!

(The fence is about 5 feet tall.)

Ok, one more pic, but this time it's not of snow-- it's of our cats!

Too bad the glass is reflection-y, but aren't they cute!

Schools are on a system-wide shutdown, which means no one has to go -no teachers or principals who sometimes have to go even if the students don't.  We're still waiting to hear if K's or my work is cancelled for the day.  Right now they're both cancelled til noon with a further announcement by 10:30.  They pulled the plows from the roads about an hour ago because of blowing snow, so it's looking like we'll have the whole day off!

Enjoy your day! :-)

Back Door & Breezeway Steps

Hi! I still have to do a post about our vacay (maybe Mon?), but here's a little project K did last week to prepare for my dad and stepmom's arrival.  They flew into Moncton last night and my FIL and C drove over to pick them up.

When we got home from our vacation, K was motivated to do a couple little projects that have been waiting to be done for a while.  He picked up the lumber last Friday and got to work even though it was kinda raining!

Here's what he did.

He put a step down from the back door!  (Notice above the pool is gone.  We took it down before we left on vacation and may not put it up again as it's kinda cool outside!) Here's how it used to look with just a couple cinder blocks for a step. 

Here's a closeup of the step- with a rail even!

And a side view.

We only did one rail just to kinda test it out.  We may do another later...

We also got a step down in the breezeway. 

(Why haven't I finished cedar shingling the lefthand side of the door? you ask.  Well, the door wasn't installed properly- just sorta tacked in place with a few screws.  I'd like to get the door more situated before I put cedar shingles right up to it.)

Here's the before. See the cinder block under the door?

Both these steps are kinda temporary.  We want to build an extension for a screened room off the back door and do some kind of sloping deck in the breezeway, but they are definitely better than before.

It's blueberry season and my FIL has been picking frequently.  Here's what C made me for a dessert. (It spells "Mom"! 

Enjoy your weekend! :-)

Paint, Paint and more Paint

Hi!

Summer has gotten off to a great productive start.  N is at camp this week, so C decided to paint the playhouse.  Here's how it looked before.  

It came to us a barn red (maybe 6 years ago) and I spruced it up with some leftover paint from our old red front door.  

Here's how it looked inside.  There's a broken green chair and a yellow chair and plastic patio table on the back left side.

Here's looking up to the little loft on the front left.

The right front side.

And a kitchen set on the right back.

 Plus, I stored the fire pit in there last winter and there was soot, dirt, spiders, etc.  Yuck. 

I cleaned it up, put screens on the windows, made little curtains from leftover fabric, and put in the leftover vinyl flooring from our bathroom.  C put a little bed out there. Here's how it looks inside now.

This is the left back.

  Left front.

 Right back.

 Right front.

C picked a super bright green to paint the outside (CIL Ext. Latex Satin with built in primer- Crayon Green from Canadian Tire) and had a friend over to help her start painting.

We bought 1 quart of paint because I remembered that's how much we had for the door, but the back never got done.  I figured that would be enough paint for the front and the sides and we'd just do the back another color.

However, it became apparent that bright green over dark red, would need more than one coat.  In order to stretch the paint I added white.  C was very upset about this because you can see below on the side, it turned out yellow.

(See all the junk in the yard?  That all came from inside the playhouse!)

So, since Tuesday was a holiday- Happy Canada Day!- we waited til Wednesday to go back to the store to get another can of paint.  I only wish I'd thought this thru because I could've used some old exterior light blue paint + primer for the base coat and then I think we could've gotten away with one quart.  

Here's how it's looking with the 2nd coat on the front. 

Here's a close-up of the window screen.

So, what else did I paint?  The breezeway windows! (They also got caulked.)

Here's the before.

And the way before.

I like how the breezeway windows sorta match the windows and door on the back of the house. 

Should I put window boxes under the breezeway windows? 

Notice we have the pool out.  We're thinking we might need a bigger one!  It's been really hot the last few days- up to 29C (85F) with a humidex of 36C (97F).

  Meanwhile, in the front there's more painting going on!

I touched up the shed trim.

Here's how it looked before.

Then I decided to go ahead and paint the front trim (? Is that what you call the rails, spindles, etc?).

Anyway, because I had a shellac based primer to seal knots, I started with that.  Here is the spotty primer look.

 I also caulked the seams on the corner posts. 

Here's how it looks all painted.

And here's how it looked last fall!

Much more welcoming now!

Lotsa painting going on!!  Enjoy the rest of your week! :-)