Next Ornery loaded up the lumber we bought last weekend to return it while I started the laundry. I used my new soap nuts that arrived in the mail on Friday. It was timely since I am almost out of regular laundry soap. Hopefully these soap nuts will last until my enzyme cleaner is ready to use in January. We returned the wood to the lumber yard and priced cinder blocks for the raised beds while we were there, but neither of us can get real excited about laying those.
After returning the wood, we went to Lowe's to buy some lag screws to hang an antique drill press we brought from the farm. We were supposed to get other things too, but we got waylaid in the garden department (ostensibly there to price the cement stones for a garden bed) where I found two African violets for my bathroom window on the clearance rack, and a 2 gallon pot of Nikko Blue Hydrangeas for only $6.42. I had been eyeing them at the grocery store, but just a little quart sized pot was $19.98, and I just couldn't justify spending that on a plant. Now, if it was a tree, maybe...
On our way home I prayed that the Lord would show us a way to build the garden beds for little to no money. I kept feeling funny about buying a bunch of new lumber or cement blocks. We talked about building some forms and making the beds with cement, but didn't get very far into it. One of the things we had wanted to do this weekend was to work on the rain catchment system with the two barrels we bought a few weeks ago. I looked online for how-to information and discovered that it would not be a good idea to use the rain from our asphalt roof on our vegetable garden. Bummer. So, now we had two barrels with no use... unless we used them as the garden!
There is a ton of information on container gardening and the more I looked into it the more excited I got! So, we plan to buy more barrels and saw them in half, then put them in the area we had designated for our garden and plant in them! It is the best way we have come up with to keep that obnoxious Bermuda grass out of the garden. They will be high, so weeding or tending should be easy. We will put handles on them to make them mobile enough to move around as they need to be, and we will be able to control the pH of each bed individually based on the plant needs in each one. We won't have to pay so much for dirt, and in fact will probably just buy bags to fill them up. The barrels cost $15.00 each, and for the area we had planned we will need about 10 more. I think I will even be able to grow my asparagus in them!
Before dinner, Ornery installed the cabinet door handles I bought when we first moved in. The washing machine lid opens up flush with the bottom of the cabinet door and every time I do a load of laundry, I have to close the washing machine to get the soap out. Minor inconvenience easily remedied. He would have also hung up the paper towel holder in there if I could remember where I put it... We finished off the evening doing idle pursuits--reading and talking and listening to the thunder, rain and hail!
Sunday we returned the last of the items we had purchased for the garden boxes. We went to Atwoods and Lowe's. We ended up exchanging the lag screws we bought yesterday for a different size, then bought a sheet of Masonite (hard-board) for the backs of the living room book cases. Ornery got to use his table saw to cut them to size, then I painted them Orange Vermilion to match the ceiling.
I know this is a terrible photo, but it is the best I could get, and it does show the new inserts. Next, I fine-sanded the baskets I had sealed last week, then put the final coat of finish on them. While I worked on that, Ornery finished sanding and gluing the last set of three baskets. I put the first coat on two of them, but the third wasn't ready yet.
The next project was the aborted rain-barrels turned garden containers. Ornery used his circular saw to cut them in half while I fixed dinner. Here they are in the garden area on the south side of the house.
One other thing we did this weekend was take down the shades from the pergola. They are rotten, and falling apart, and we had meant to take them down from the beginning of the summer but never had done it. Here is a picture after we took them down. You can see in the corner of the yard the remains of the holly we took out last weekend--we never did get back out there to finish it this weekend since it was so wet and muddy from the rain--as well as the poor oak tree I hacked at mercilessly. Elizabeth said it looked like a little kid had gotten hold of a pair of scissors and given himself a hair cut. Hrmph.
One last thing for the day was the news of another sale on my etsy shop! Another of Ornery's little airplanes will be winging its way to a new home--this time in Milwaukee, WI!
This week I plan to get my end table painted and reassembled, plant the hydrangea, and start editing the eBook I should have already finished. It is just over four weeks until Thanksgiving, and I am already making plans to fill the days my sister and brother-in-law are here with all sorts of projects! Meanwhile, I have a lot to do to get ready for the ornament exchange and their arrival. The days sure seem to be flying by!
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