Adorable Garden Signs

Okay, it seems like I am always doing work around the farm and home of 'stuff' that has to get done, well, Sunday I decided to work on a project just for me! :) I saw these cute little garden signs in a magazine, they only had 5 to go by of which 3 garden items I had in my garden so I used the shading ideas for those and let my imagination go for the others. Unfortunately I forgot to cut my board for my radish sign (which those aren't planted yet but still:) so, I have a pic of my little guy but he's waiting for his sign to go on. I love how they turned out....

Life Update

So, it's been awhile since I posted on here before today, since then I have had a full time seasonal job that ended in Jan. I have sewn items, completed wood storage boxes for my boyfriend's workshop, recovered a vintage bench that I saved from the dumpster, as posted below - worked to make our tennant trailer rentable, worked in my own kitchen, planted flower seeds inside for my flower beds, starting to get the garden ready, my dad died of cancer the middle of March(which I had not seen him in 4 years and because of a blessing of one of my dad's friends, my boyfriend and I were flown from PA(where we live) to Florida and I saw my dad - it was a fantastic visit, he was as full of life as he could be for being in the condition he was in - 52 hrs later he died. I've also been busy cleaning up in our barn tool room, taking care of our beefcows, and splitting and stacking firewood - thank goodness that is done for the year! I know there is more but - I just can't remember right now. Keith's off farm job requires him to work 24 hrs on site fracking gas wells, so it is total 29 hrs. he is gone awake time, home for about 18 hrs, and back to work to do it all again so much of the home and farm fall on my shoulders, but I am still looking for work again and Keith has had double hernia surgery last fall, bronchitis/numonia(spelling) in Jan/Feb and then passing blood in March/April - so he is still having testing and lovely stuff going on to find out what's going on. We will most likely have a new calf baby born by morning chore time, with hopefully all our momma cows expecting soon and kittens should be soon from at least 2-3 of our momma cats. I wish I had more time - I do get to watch 'girl' type movies on the nights Keith is at work - and I recently watched Julie and Julia - it inspired me to blog consistantly but to date I have not gotten there - so much to do and not enough time. I also watched the move 'Eat, Pray, Love'(I think that was the name) AWESOME movie for any person at all who has been through any type of hurt of the heart, whether it be a child, parent, friend, significant other, whatever - it was awesome. So, I will try and get more of my recent projects posted soon so I don't get to far behind.

Vintage wood Nail/bolt boxes turned shelving!

So, out in the wagon shed is a big pile of 'stuff' from when my boyfriend's parents sold there farm and bought a house in town. I hate having so much 'stuff' to organize and go through BUT I love the big pile of 'stuff' to be creative with. There are many of these vintage wood nail/bolt boxes so I thought I would make some shelving for the kitchen. AND the kitchen and I just spent 15 1/2 straight hours - yes, from 6 am - 10:36 pm(had to minus my chore time for the beef cows) in reformation. I had my first meal at about 10:50 pm - sat for 15 min. and went to bed til 5 am and started cleaning the kitchen back up. I wasn't able to strip the boards yet that are behind the shelving pictured here and that was why I explained some of my kitchen project - I will be posting pics soon of our kitchen. But back to the shelves...

Now, these were full of dust, dirt, old oats, old straw, nasty stuff. I used a paint scraper, a soft green dry scrub pad, a stiff paint brush, and the shop vac to clean these up. I carefully hammered in any nails or loosening dovetails. I also cleaned them all with liquid gold. I nailed them together with old, small nails from a time era when these would have been new(psss-the nails came out of the lathe boards that have been taken out of the house so far). I did use 3 screws to hang it on the wall, but I am so pleased with this. I have started putting on some of our 'older' items we have and I have one more I did to hang by the door for more items and keys and such. Now, once that wall is stripped and done natural it will all come together.

Tennant Trailer Renovation!

Okay, so, our tennants bought a home and moved out the end of January, 2011. I got busy right away. I wish I had gotten more before pics but this will have to do. At this point I am finishing up the hallway, the master bathroom closet, the master bedroom closet, and the small bedroom. Here is the progress so far, many many hours later...
Here we can enjoy the lovely trailer wallboard in the kitchen along with at least 3 different colors of paint on walls in the kitchen and dining area. YUCK! Also a lovely piece of hard, cloudy, non-see through plastic on one window for privacy, a rusty, sticker ladden fridge, drywall that needed patching, and a bay window in the dining area that needed the old drywall taken off, 2x4's replaced in the wall under the window and new drywall put up.



Now, I scraped, sanded, and spray painted the fridge an ivory, I used a tan(looks like dark coffee with cream) on the bottom walls in the kitchen and all the walls in the dining area, a creamy ivory on the top in the kitchen and around the bay window in the dining area, and a purple/burgandy paint for the trim boards(which were given to me a year ago and I wasn't sure what I was going to do with them!). I bought ONE curtain(it contained 2 panels and a valance), and I made my curtains to fit the windows in the kitchen and dining area --- I really was going for a homey/coffee house feel. I had to sand and paint the fan vent sheild over the stove as once upon a time I think it was just stainless steel but it was mostly rust color when I saw it. I also replaced the hard nasty plastic atop the window with my good standby---limosine window cover(about $12 at an auto parts store and I have enough to do at least 4 or more lower windows in the trailer for privacy) As you can see in the second pic down - you can see the dog fence and everything outside, but you can't see in -in the day and at night anyone outside can only see shadowy type images when lights are on inside.


I also added an oak board under the window shelf as there a sad piece of thin damaged board under before I tore off all the wall under the window and replaced inside framing under the window. I also put new wood base inside the middle window for the inside sill(as I did for the living room and need to for the kitchen and bedrooms-not done yet) and I only had to paint the other two inside sill parts for a clean crisp look.


So, here is a small look at the hallway(which does not show the parts that had holes to be redrywalled) and the lovely bathroom with that lovely trailer wallboard, a curtain that didn't fit or cordinate, and a shower curtain that was of a different pattern altogether. The medicine cabinet was rusty, so I sanded and painted that too! I still have to hang the towel bar and split and sew the window curtain - again, I bought ONE curtain that had 2 panels and a valance - I used the valance for over the shower curtain and am making my curtain to fit the window. I tried to cordinate my color scheme with something that would compliment the floor tiles.

Okay, the hallway - from the end by the bathroom and washer/dryer area it is the tan from the dining room/kitchen - the hall to the bedrooms is the creamy ivory from the kitchen. I had to replace some of the corner molding and almost all of the bottom floorboard molding(which I made myself by cutting thin pieces of wood to width and length to compliment the best I could with what was there) Oops - I still have to clean the light covers and put them back on but I am still working on the floor in the hallway. I also made a really cool coat rack as there is not really a place to put coats.

Okay, now.........the master bedroom and master bath - okay - wow, there is that lovely tailer wallboard again in both rooms and an access panel of just plain greenboard! After Accessing the rooms I decided that the floors were really the only thing I couldn't change - sooooo, I planned the color schemes around those! Don't you love that peach counter in the bathroom too?!? NOT!
As you can see - I chose a foamy type sea green, a fancy boarder, and green sheer curtains for the master bedroom(I still have things on the floor since I am currently working in the closets for both rooms).

Now, for the master bath ---- I had black/white marble floor tiles I needed to cordinate around - soooooo, I painted the peach counter black, all the outlet covers, soap dish, etc. black, the handles, hinges, and edging on the cabinets black to make them pop!, again I bought ONE curtain that had 2 panels and a valance and used the valance to go over the other new shower curtain I bought, I used more of the molding to go around the room as I painted the walls all white but then sponged black on the lower half to pull it all together.


This is turning out so great. The old tennants have had to come get jugs of water still to date and LOVE what I have done. I still have to tar some of the roof, tar over the bay window, finish the floor in the hall, finish the two closets in the master bed/bath, and change the front door - whew! I will be glad when this project is done, But it is well worth all the time I have in it and with being creative and using what I have for much of it and buying on-sale curtains and making them to fit(much cheaper than buying curtains made for the trailer windows and shower valances) I ended up spending about $200 on paint, curtains, boarder and such.- we are hoping to have it rented for May!