The Queue

We seem to be in a phase with projects planned and materials purchased, but not enough time to complete the project. Three projects are coming up soon, but I don't know when they're going to happen due to our spring travel schedule.

1.) This box contains the O.'s headboard for his big boy bed. We need to assemble it, stain it to match the bookshelf, finish, and install.



2.) This is the wood the Mom and Dad brought down several weekend ago, which will become O.'s castle. Fortunately for us, we will have help for this project (Dad and Mom again), but the weather needs to improve so that the help will travel.



3.) I don't have an actual picture of the last project, because it's just a cardboard box next to the garbage in the garage, and I think you can imagine that without a visual aid. Instead, here's a photo of where the box's contents will go. A storm door will be installed here, plus painting the front door white.


Until we have some time to tackle these projects, I'll leave you to ponder these mystery plants: What the heck are these, and why are they there?

These two plant appeared this spring in a hanging basket pot that held a Eucalyptus plant last summer. I left the pot outside all winter next to the house.




And this one? It appeared where the tarragon grew last year, but it's not tarrgon.

Easter Weekend

A blustery Easter weekend, but it's not raining, so we'll take it.



A lego kit was the big gift this year.



O. is learning about letters right now, so this special egg below was a big hit.


O. and I made an Easter cake yesterday. O. is my sous chef in training, and doing well. He can break eggs with the best of him. He's best at tasting though.

(don't worry, the lotion was not an ingredient)

A bit sloppy, but not bad for an inexperienced cake decorator who was fending off a monkey from eating the cake on the spot. However, he was heartbroken when told that no, we wouldn't be making the rest of the cake rabbit, ie the arms and legs and bunny tail.

Teaching the Old Chairs a New Trick

We finished reupholstering the dining room chairs last weekend. I think two months, five days for project conception to completion is our new personal record.

After much debate, we chose the Ebbtide patina print, at $45/yard. I had to order two yards instead of the measured amount, so it was a bit more than I wanted to spend. At least there was a sale for upholstery fabric when I ordered in January. Plus, Dad lent us the staple gun, and I don't think I used enough of his staples to put a dent in his supply, even. I think the whole project cost $62.



And $62 dollars well spent, I think. This dining set will be ten years old this summer, as it was purchased with wedding gift money. The table was the perfect size for our apartments of the past, but it's a little small for the current space. Some day we'd like to replace it with something bigger. But what? We don't know. That choice depends on the hypothetical flooring replacement, and there's no sense in trying to replace the dining set until we know what we want in the rest if the dining room/living room. And with the exception of the stained seat chairs, the set has held up well. Heck with the new seat covers and if you turn your head sideways and squint, from a distance, the set looks new again.

I tried to get a photo with accurate coloring, but I'm not having much luck. It looks grey/brown in the photos, but at home, in our light, you see more of the greens. In fact, I think I've subliminally chosen a fabric similar to the Dad's college chair fabric.



The new chair covers have been popular with cats and children alike. The photo below shows O. and E. sharing a chair and the warm sunshine. Neither are happy about having to share, but tolerating it well.


And finally: I've learned that Murphy's Law also applies to chair reupholstering. In the two days since I've finished his chair, O. has spilled most of a glass of milk on the chair. Twice in two days. I can't remember the last time he's spilled that much. Oh well, now I know that the extra fabric that I had to buy will be used eventually.

Signs of Spring

I'm always impressed by opportunistic plants, like these crocuses. One week ago, these were freezing beneath an inch of ice and a couple inches of snow.


I stamped the first two robins of the year. And I hear frogs in the creek. I don't think spring is here yet, but at least it's around the corner.

Ice Storm of 2008

I hope it's not too early to call this one THE Ice storm of 2008. There is still the rest of February and March to go, plus October, November, and December. But I'm confident that if nothing else, I can come up with additional nomenclature. And it was a doozy after all. Schools everywhere canceled for days, even the university and local government was closed for a day, thousands without power even still.

Dogwood tree.

We have about two inches of ice on the ground, I think. Very little melting so far, though today may change that.

Giant bonsai tree.


One of the nandinas.

Owen is having a great time checking out this alien ice world. He asks to go outside and go ice breaking. That involves snapping off every single icicle he can find and throwing big chunks of ice on the ground to watch the impressive shattering.

O. inspecting the damage to a dwarf crepe myrtle.

Castles, Houses, and Trains

We have quite the little builder in the house. (A rare still photo, with Great Aunt B.'s doggie ("Hannah") and "picture truck." There are ice cream trucks, cement trucks, and fruit trucks. This one has pictures on it, so it's a picture truck of course.)


O. needs some help with assembly, but he's definitely progressing in home and castle design. Notice the careful application of roofing to "Aunt M.'s house."

Aunt M.'s house, complete with Aunt M.'s car.


The blocks made by Grandpa have inspired some truly unique castle designs. Here we see a neoRoman/Escher structure. Unfortunately it is more for looks than function.



The blocks also have enabled adding another height level to the trainset. Sadly, derailment is a frequent problem.



And the trusty duplo blocks are seeing a high level of use these days. We call this one Orthanc.


And like all skyscraper designers, you have to know when to stop building upwards.


Still working on that.

Conquering the To-Do List

Well, not so much "conquer" as "scratch off one item": rearrange the bedroom wall decorations into something more presentable. This process was assisted by the generous stocking stuffer gift from my parents, which is now the central framed print. (Kathy--it's beautiful! Thanks for making such a wonderful work of art!)



This process was also aided by the purchase of the metal bee ($2.50!). It was found on a recent trip to an unfinished furniture store while looking for another project that we don't have enough time for. The remaining framed objects are prints from J's hometown, a print of a sketch my mom's friend made (the house is my childhood piano teacher's), a doily I crocheted a few years ago, and a random print thrown in because it matches the general style.

The grouping concept may be getting a little tired, however, and at least in my house, it's looks like I appear to be obsessed order and symmetry. But really, I'm not.

Bedroom, North wall

Bedroom, South Wall

Obsessed? Who me?
Dining room, North wall

Living room, East wall

I swear, not obsessed!
Bathroom

Well, maybe a little. Plus a healthy dose of trying to incorporate the small scale things that I loved that I collected while on a grad student budget with the larger scale of the new house. But I think the grouping 5"x7"s is tired, in the future, I think I should resist the obvious but worn-out solution to the scale problem.

Re-upholstery project

I'm thinking about reupholstering the dining room table seats. The fabric has thinned out considerably, it's been stained and cleaned so many times, and one chair is beginning to split. The fabric is 10 years old, and it served us well, but it's time for the fabric to go to the great sewing machine in the sky.

I've decided that I'd like to go with something different than the original fabric. The original fabric was offwhite in an striped pattern. It was chosen because it was neutral and would match almost any apartment. But lately I've noted that all of the neutral things I've chosen over the years for the apartment reason look like cream of wheat together.

I rented four fabric sample for the week, and I haven't decided if any of these are on the right track.

Robert Allen Home, Bristol Stripe in Seafoam, $40/yard. This one looks better up close than it does from a distance. It goes to off-white, and the seafoamy colors look too beachy with the wood in the chairs.



SMC Designs, Sequence 88, Ebbtide in Patina, $45/yard. This is the current front runner. The greens in this match the greens and reds in our house, and it goes with the tones in the wood. I wish the fabric was a little heavier though, it may not wear as well as some.



Platinum, Elsbeth in Juniper, $60/yard. I like the idea of this, but not the execution. I like the idea of of having the single stripe down the middle (we'd have to be careful to buy enough to do this). The colors aren't right with the room or the wood though. The green, I think, is the problem. Too much celery, not enough broccoli.



Waverly, Garden Ottoman, in Sage $45/yard. Another fabric that looks lucious up close, but goes to mush from afar. The green isn't right here either, although I think the fabric is substantial enough to do the job.



Two more photos of the fabrics, taking a couple of steps back.





I don't think we've found the right fabric yet.

First Snow

Our first snow of the winter arrived on Sunday.



This snow was much earlier than last year. We don't even have all of our fall yardwork done.

Snow doesn't last long here (in fact, it has already melted, three days later), so sent O. outside. Unfortunately, the precipitation before the snow was an inch or two of rain. O. found the minipond in our backyard, and he quickly broke through the ice. And the minipond quickly became a mud landing strip. Those sweatpants he's wearing in the picture below used to be light grey.



Sure was fun though.

December

Woooosh. That is the sound of our autumn that just flew by.

We now have a three-year old in the house.


Because we are those parents who exacerbate their child's car fetish rather than curtailing with gentle discipline, he received a semitruck that serves as a car carrier. He loves it.


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Only a few house-related activities have occurred recently. We put up the Christmas tree yesterday. We placed it in a different spot from last year. It's beside the fireplace, which means we need a tall, skinny tree. We also decided we needed more red in the tree, because the tree last year looked too brown and dull.



O.'s tree decorating skills improved this year. He was able to hang ornaments this year, though he doesn't have a good sense of spacing them, yet--I keep finding four ornaments on the same branch.

Japanese Maple, Take 2

My mom and her sister visited this weekend, and we visited a local nursery. We found a Japanese maple within my price range and my specifications, so I decided to go for it.



It is Acer Palmatum "Bloodgood." It matures to a size just a tad bigger than I had targeted, but I think we'll jump over that bridge if we come to it. The burgundy leaves are supposed to remain the color all years, which should look striking against our brick. I still need to mulch it, as I expect a hard freeze this week on Tuesday, but it is watered and well-fed.

Keep your fingers crossed...

I am Memphis' newest fan.

We had a good trip. The conference was fine, J.'s meeting was fine, but Memphis was cool. Or maybe we were just starved for city-type activities? Regardless, we enjoyed it more than we expected.

We were downtown for most of our stay. We used the trolley for transportation down Main Street. For O., the trolley was a Big Deal, and he loved riding on it.



We walked on Beale Street and enjoyed being in a mixer of music.


We saw the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King was assassinated. O. ate at his first Hard Rock Cafe (so-so food, but the memorabilia was worth it--the Blues Brothers suits, hats, and sunglasses were my favorite).


J. and O. also visited the Memphis Fire Museum, and O. went ape over the fire trucks, which he could climb all over.

We could have stayed at least another day or two. The Children's Museum and the Mud Island River Park looked interesting with O. in mind. We drove by Graceland, but didn't have time to tour it. I would have liked the Civil Rights Museum and Sun Studios.

O. has been talking about the trip off and on ever since. Sometimes he tells the story of riding the elevator in the hotel ("Door open. Push the button. Up, up, up, ding, ding! Door open again. Down, down, down, ding, ding! Lobby!") And sometimes he speaks mournfully to all of the things he say "Bye-bye fire trucks. Bye-bye elemater. Bye-bye trolley train."