Doin the garden aerobics!

It's that time of year again.  Time to begin the process of preparing the garden for the upcoming season.  We've had a few mild days in the 60's and so I'm taking my opportunities when they come.  Let me tell you building raised beds with concrete blocks is a workout!  Unlike building with boards, concrete blocks require preparing a spot with each block and adjusting as needed.  Especially when you have to remove excess mortar from the blocks previous use.  Such is the case with these.  Lots of lifting, hammering, shoveling, etc.  Then when you finally get everything set, you need to prepare the soil inside the bed.  In my case I'm adding some sand, chicken manure, and organic material to each bed, mixing in with a shovel or pitchfork as I go.  I finally finished building the latest bed, and started the second..  I counted the blocks I have left and have enough for two more beds of like size (One of which I have now started).  This will give me a total of seven concrete beds.  There are many advantages to these beds.  Like regular raised beds, it allows me to work in the garden without having to trample the area around the plants.  This will cut down considerably on the amount of tilling I'll need to do.  It also makes weed control easier.   Less water will be used as well.  It will also cut down on the amount of conditioning/fertilizing needed because instead of having to cover the entire garden, I will only have to do each bed.  In the fall I plan to only have to cover the bed with black plastic to put it to bed.  Between each bed I'm laying down black plastic and covering that with rocks for a walkway.  Here is a pic from last years garden when I just had 4 beds.  This will give you an idea of what I'm taking about.  I can't wait until I have my entire garden in raised beds, but it is a bit at a time.

The new bed is now located to the left of the left front bed seen in this picture.


The blocks I got from a friend, but then I think you already knew that!  The rocks for the walkway are ones I have dug up over time as well as some broken concrete block and the mortar that I've knocked off.  My goals is to one day have my entire garden as raised beds.

The point of the title of my post is obvious.  Anyone who says I did not get exercise today is delusional.  Every muscle in my shoulders, arms, and hands is at the end of it's functionality and I'm sure to be sore tomorrow.  My legs aren't as bad, but I can tell there was plenty of squats and lifting going on.  One does not have to get on a treadmill to get a workout.  Just be active!  Move each day.

So feeling sore and tired, but in a good way, I anticipate  the upcoming gardening season.  Still more to do!

Frugal Interior Design

Did you guys think I wasn't posting today?  I know it's late, but I wanted to get something finished before posting about it here.  So here we go!  I finally got around to repainting the mirror from my dad's childhood dresser.  What do you think?  By the way, I avoid selfies at all cost so this picture is taken where I am not in the mirror.

I don't know if you guys remember my dad's dresser.  When I got it a few years ago it looked like this:

I set to work to refinish and repair it.  The bottom left side was cracked and had not been repaired correctly.  I had to take everything out, line it all up correctly, and glue and screw it back together.  Unfortunately I found there was too much pitting to be able to remove all of the paint.  Instead I opted to paint it and it became my sewing desk/table.  That's it on the left below.

I wasn't using the mirror with the dresser and so it sat for a long time in my closet waiting for my attention. I was finally able to get to it.  I love having it in my dining room as a wall mirror.  I am happy to say the mirror redo was done with spray paint and hardware I already had on hand so my cost for a little pep in our interior decor was minimal.

Also, I have been able to finally recover two chairs from my dining room.  I bought these for $12 a piece at a thrift type store during my Mom/daughter birthday excursion a couple of years ago.  The fabric was also a purchase from goodwill a while back and I've had it on hand since.  I got it for like $1 a yard or something.  I'm hopeful I have enough to make a runner for the table later.

As you can see from this last Christmas Pic (complete with cat), I have three different pairs of dining chairs, but they all seem to go together.  I have the two I just recovered, 2 really solid wood chairs that match, but are not original to, the table, and two green wrought iron chairs that match my bakers rack (not seen here).  All of them are thrift store finds.

I guess my point of this post is part "Hey look what I did!" and part "you can do this too".  Thrift stores, yard sales, and your own creativity can go a long way toward making a house a home.  The important thing is to surround yourself with things you love, things that mean something to you.  My home has need of many repairs inside and out.  We're working on it as we go, but it's a home.  It's our home.

Hello again!

I know!  A whole two weeks have passed, but I have not been idle.  We have had some wacky weather here; massive amounts of rain, or warm weather, or extremely cold weather and that was in one week!  You know what they say about Georgia weather.  If you don't like it wait a second it will change.  In between the extremes I have been attempting to do a little gearing up for the upcoming gardening season.  It's right around the corner.

Our truck has been in the shop, fortunately with only an "under Warranty" repair and when out of the shop weather wasn't permitting outdoor activities.  Finally this past weekend we had both a truck and good weather.  So Dh and I hopped in our truck and headed on over to a friends house (only a mile away) to collect some concrete blocks.  You see they had an old house on their property which had been demolished.  As a result there were several salvageable blocks to glean.  We paid for these blocks in trade.  A rooster for concrete blocks.  The rooster was their dinner and the blocks will help us grow our dinner.   We collected enough to put two layers of block front to back in the truck bed.  Not too shabby.  Honestly I don't think the little truck could have handled another block.  We headed home, ate some  lunch and unloaded the blocks.  Unfortunately we got stuck in the mud in our back yard due to the recent large amounts of rainfall.  Fortunately for us these friends also have a 4 Wheel drive.  Thanks to them we were saved!  It's good to have neighbors!  They also regularly buy bread and granola from me and so as a thank you the rest of Feb is covered.  Since that time, I have used some of these blocks to do another raised bed, this time for my strawberries.  I still have enough to do at least one more raised bed.  I also thinned out and cut back my original blackberry patch, adding a new support because my makeshift one had collapsed.  I need to get out and prune my fruit trees.  I may do that this week.  Sadly though one of my peach trees is dying.  We need to cut it down.  I would like to see if I can save the other one, but we will see.  Right now it's fine.  I'm happy to say my blueberry babies from last year and another one I had potted have survived being moved,  They're still too small to bear much fruit, but they'll get there.

On the home front, the handyman coming to repair our floor and ceiling will be here Thursday;  I CAN"T WAIT!  Just like I said before, this repair will be paid for and we will continue to save for the roof replacement.  So far so good.  We have opted to keep the opening for the dishwasher in case we ever sell the house, but I am in no need of another dishwasher for myself.  Instead, I will make a little curtain and will use it for my bulk food storage (wheat berries, sugar, flour, etc).  This will be a treat because right now those items are stored in my bedroom walk in closet.  When I am needing to make bread, or grind flour, I have to go to my room and lug these heavy buckets into the kitchen.  This will have them readily available.

Pretty proud of myself right now.  I will tell you why.  A few weeks ago I got a bee in my bonnet and started rearranging/reorganizing rooms in the house.  I first started with the Gym/Man cave.  In order for my husband to see the TV while using the treadmill, we had to have it on top of an entertainment center.  Cheapo entertainment centers are not created to have a heavy object on top, but rather in the middle.  A a result the top of the center began to sag.  Plus in order for those working out to hear the TV is had to be crazy loud.

Above is the layout, but this picture was taken prior to the addition of the entertainment center so you can't see the sagginess.

This is the new layout.  I like this much much better.

 I managed to completely rearrange the room so that the TV was right next to the treadmill and I was able to totally disassemble the entertainment center.  I love it!

Then the next day, since I needed to flip the mattress anyway, I began to rearrange the master bedroom.  Our master bedroom has very few options when it comes to arrangement, but I managed to make it work.

I love the fact the fist thing I see in the morning is the view outside my window.  Not too impressive in the winter, but come spring and summer it will be a joy.The one thing I've always wanted was some kind of storage (trunk, shelf) at the foot of the bed,  but I've never allowed myself the purchase because other things take precedence.  Well I didn't allow it this time either.  Instead I took the now disassembled entertainment center and created my own end of the bed storage.

 It makes a great area for storing my boxes of newly created doll clothes as well as some extra baskets I use for storage.

Speaking of doll clothes, I was happy to see I had sold my first item on ETSY!  These cute little diapers

So there you have it.  All my little goings on here on our little homestead.   I am in the process of re vamping my blog here.  I'm currently looking into other topics of interest to you guys and so in the future you might see some different things here.  I hope this post finds you all well.  So what cool things are you up to?

Well Bless Me! Has it Been a Week Already?

Time flies when you're having fun or in my case sewing, and sewing, and sewing.  You'd think with all the sewing I've been doing I would have more to show for it in my Etsy shop, but alas all I've managed to add to my store is one little outfit.  Most of my time has been spent with two winter coats I'm working on for baby dolls.  Take today for instance.  I have spent the last 4 hours ripping out stitches on one of the coats in order to redo the whole thing.  I've almost got it done but had to take a break because something went wrong.  It was either take a break or set the thing on fire.  Sewing is a task for patient people and I am not a patient person.  Don't ever pray for patience cause God will not just zap you and you will be patient.  Instead he will put a desire in you to take up something, like sewing, that teaches you patience.  I have many more outfits cut out and ready to go, but these coats have become a challenge so those outfits are on the back burner for a bit.

Anyhoo, what has gone on in my neck of the woods lately?  Nothin to write home about, or in my case, write here about.  The truck over heated on the way to my Dh work the other morning.  It was only slightly stressful because I don;t want to have to use our car fund, but less stressful because we do have a car fund.  Yay!  But the good news is the repair is under warranty from the engine replacement back in June.  The repair and towing will cost nothing!  Love that one!  Because of that my Dh asked them to look at the power steering to see why it's leaking.  They may not make the repair right now, but he figured might as well take a look now since it's there anyway.  Hopefully we'll know something Monday.

On the home repair front, we got the estimate for repairing the floor in the kitchen and replacing the damaged ceiling in the master bath.  Not to shabby at $550.  We have it!  Once that's taken care of we'll go back to roof replacement saving, but at a slower pace.


Now.  I will leave you with a pic of hopefully what one of the coats will look like once finished.  This is a coat and hat I made for my moms doll.  The one I'm working on will be similar, not identical

Ode to my Big sis.

I am one of 6 children, 4 girls and 2 boys.  4 of us are still earth bound.  Of the 4 of us, I'm closest to my big sister.  I really can't say she's a big sister anymore.  She's rather small now, and I'm not about to call her oldest.  She's just Debbie.  I'm the middle child.  My sisters were before me and my brothers were younger.  In other words I'm the youngest daughter.   Debbie is a twin.  I never got a chance to know that sister.  She died 3 days after her birth.  They were identical and I have to say the thought of two of Debbie would have been cool!!!!!  I miss the thought of her.  Growing up Debbie always seemed larger than life.  She was 8 years older than me and seemed to be able to do all the cool stuff.   Poor thing used to have to babysit the rest of us, Bless her heart!  I know my younger brother and I gave her heck.  But you know what?  There was never a time when I wasn't welcome into her totally awesome room!  It had a huge stuffed "Luv Bug" worm and a pink fuzzy 78 record holder.  She still has that record holder by the way.  She would tell us Bible Stories and use voices.  She taught us camp songs and said funny things.   I even got to go see her and spend the night when she was in college, but I threw up all the junk food I had been eating and had to go home.   Having an 8 year difference in age meant I didn't know her as well when I was young.  She was practically grown by the time my memories started.  I just knew I loved her, and wanted to be like her.  I didn't know until I was about 18 how much like her I was.  I would tell people I was going to go to Russia and convert the KGB.  I just happened to speak that out loud at a talent show I was participating in and my mom said what few hairs my daddy had left turned grey.  Apparently Debbie had the same thought.  Its a funny story to us anyway.  As a new mom I watched how Debbie cared for her kids; Cooking from scratch, Homeschooling, Sewing, Crocheting.  She even knew that beans and grains made a complete protein!  WOW! Lol. In my eyes she was a way better mom than I was.  So just like before, I aspired to be just like her.  I was a single mom and she would watch my Baby Diva while I worked, but on my off times I was still over at her house.  We would sew, shop for fabric (A lot of fabric), go to the grocery store together, break down in the middle of drive thru with a car packed to the gills with kids and groceries.  What that hasn't happened to everyone?.  We laughed and laughed.  We had a yard sale together once before.  I think we would have made more money had we not shopped from each others stuff. Lol.  All my adult life, just about, we have been thick as thieves.  The sewing, baking, Thrift store shopping (that's our main thing right there), and marathon phone calls have been a staple of our life.

This morning, while going through some drawers and organizing stuff, I found a letter she wrote me last Christmas.  She had bought me a serger.

This Serger was (and is) awesome, but the letter is the treasure.  "When I am with you," she wrote "I face the world with a smile and a bit more fearless.  At the beginning, I was the big sister and you were the little sister, but now you are my best friend".  I sat on the floor and read this letter again this morning with tears running down my face.  She is one of my greatest blessings.  I could not and would not ask for a better big sister.  She is my best friend.

The Power.....of Priorities

So update on our saving money.  So far so good.  If we hold true and don't falter, we will have money enough saved to replace the roof.   Yea.....about that.... See we are holding true, but it seems our focus is having to change.  I know reading this blog can sometime impose a fear of...WHIPLASH.  I don't mean to, but things change.  You gotta ride the roller coaster so to speak.  Hence the title to my post.

With the skylight removed now and that part of the roof repaired, (knock on wood) we don't have any other leaks currently in our roof.  What we do have is a rather large area of floor damage in the kitchen where the dishwasher used to be as well as a damaged ceiling panel needing to be repaired in the bathroom where the skylight used to be.  The ceiling panel is the least expensive of the "needs repair" list, and with no other leaks in the roof right now, the floor in the kitchen takes precedence.   It has to.  This is a structural thing rather than cosmetic, and, until we are actually having trouble with a leaking roof, we need to address this first.  So while we are still saving money, it's purpose has changed to repairing the floor. We are still going to have and contribute to a roof fund.  Let's face it, we will need to replace the roof one day soon, but for now that repair,I believe, is on hold.

In a different way, my priorities have changed in that I am motivated to make more little doll outfits.  This is due to the opening of my new little Etsy shop.  I need to stock it.  If you have noticed my
"Doll Clothes" page is gone.    If you want to see all the cute little outfits I've been creating (Well if I do say so myself. ) you can go to Tea time Doll Clothes to see what I have.  The creation of these little cuties has taken precedence over...ummm...cleaning?  Lol.  Just deep cleaning.  Laundry, Dishes, baking, etc is still in the fore front.

Today, for instance, is a kitchen kind of day because I have an order to fill for bread as well as other odds and ends for us.  If I get caught up with that, as Cinderella to the ball, I will get a chance to work on some more doll clothes.

So there you go.  That's what's going on with us.  What about you?

I just had to put this in here cause I thought it was a good example of priorities, and a chuckle.

Party Pooper

"Every Party has a pooper that's why we invited you.  Party Pooper!".  That song still at 48 plays in my head.  I can still hear my mother sing it to one of us when we were not wanting to join in in family activities or other fun things.

I bring this point up because all day yesterday I heard about people ringing in the new year and/or spouting their New Year's Resolutions.  DH and I don't do resolutions.  After a month of rich, high calorie eating, I may go back to our normal healthy eating, but that's the extent of it and usually happens as soon as Christmas is over.  This year I looked back and asked myself what would I choose as a New Year's resolution.  My Answer?  Nothing.  You see my life is a work in progress.  I look back at my twenties and see how far I've come.  Shoot I look back to my early 40's and see how far I've come.  Know what?  Many of those changes in my life or my maturity level came during the year...on their own...without a resolution.  It's a constant work of God in my life.  " Being confident of this that He who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion until the day of Christ Jesus".  (Philippians 1:6).   I am not what I was, but I am still not who I will be.  Best thing about it is, just as a master sculptor see in his minds eye the finished work of his hand, so does Jesus.  He doesn't see me as I am now, but sees me as I will be.  My job is to keep my focus on Him and be receptive to his leading.  This is my daily prayer; to be more receptive to God's voice.  I do look back over this past year (which, sadly,  has gone by so fast) and see the good and bad.  What this makes me realize is how blessed we are.

As for the parties and such.  We are very low key.  We all stayed home in our Pj's, had pizza, and stayed up til Midnight to toast in the new year.  Pretty much it.  I rang in the year with 3 of my favorite guys, feeling blessed.  I couldn't ask for more.