More Gardening...

So this week we tried to get the first level of the house done. 

We cleaned and tidied up level one and Grant steam cleaned the basement carpets.

 So we are now ready to move in stuff from the garage into the basement.

We still have to steam clean the living room carpet, maybe next week.

Today we did some more gardening...don't worry we are almost done!

My stains arrived in the mail this week. Can't wait to try them out on the cabinets. 

Still need to decide on a sander though.

This morning we put all our plants in the sun and gave them some nutrients.

 We bought a few flowering bushes on that were on sale. We got three pink lilac bushes to put in 

the front of the house right below the window and two white hydrangea bushes to put on

either side of the driveway. And we just realised we forgot to plant the white lilac bush on

on the side of the house...it is still out there :) We will get to it sometime this week.

 We started the morning with mowing....It was a nice sunny warm day.

 

Awww just because they were sitting pretty in the sun.

My car turned 1 this May....Still loving it!

 Then we decided to continue working on our path to nowhere. We used the rake to 

pick stones from the mud. We made a good dent in the rock pile today.

We kept going till it was mostly mud and less rock :/ 

we might have to hand pick the rest of the rocks :(

 

 Then we planted...

 

 We got done around 9pm...In the pic below you can see the 2 hydrangea bushes on either 

side of the driveway. Well they are all small babies now, some day they will grow into bushes :)

  The 3 pink lilac bushes...can't wait to see them grow and bloom! This is what they should
look like grown and in bloom.

  Oh and we cut the half dead ugly tree and decided to make it more like a bush. In the pic below you can kinda see what it used to look like.

We will watch it and if it doesn't grow ...out of the ground it goes.

Our pathway is almost done!

Tomorrow is our day of rest.

Yaaaay for two day weekends!

Please Vote!

We have been wondering about which color we can add to the exterior of this house to 

make it look less blue and maybe a little more attractive.

I found a program that helps me change the color of different things.

We don't plan to repaint the blue siding, but we want to change the color of the 

shutters, the front door and repaint the trim. Oh and we

plan on replacing the roof so thats another color we can change/add.

Please vote for which of the four color combination you think looks best on our blue house.

If you can think of some other color that will look even better let me know and I can put it together.

Here is the house before

 #1

#2

#3

 

#4

Can wait to know what you'll think....leave your comments below.

Our path to nowhere continues...

Ok so I went outside to finish up the pathway Sunday afternoon, it was HOT!

We started with stomping out the mole's tunnel and then laid down the weed preventing layer

Then we had to figure out how we were going to not put the mud mixed in 

with the stones that we dug out into our pathway.

 

 So we started by washing them section by section...yeah i know it sounds 

stupid and a pain in the behind and it was...but we couldn't think of any other way! There I am with my little shovel carrying a shovel at a time back and forth (leg muscle development :)

 

We started laying them along the edges...

 We felt like laborers working in the gulf desert and like we would never get done

...just in time Grant came up with this brilliant plan :) ...

We took the aluminum mesh that was left over from the bird nest in duct ordeal

and cut us up a couple of sieves :) 

Just had to shake the mud out eliminated the whole washing process

...made things go a lot faster.

 

Not so good news...this is how much we got done. It was just too HOT!

Oh well there is always next weekend and every weekend after to get this done ;)

But it is coming along really well - it is going to look awesome!

 

Sunday night for dinner we decided to try out a supposedly easy recipe with some modifications.

Using ready made Pillsbury dough and making a chicken stuffing.

So just like patties (like we call them in India)

On goes the stuffing, overlap the dough, butter it up...

 Add some crushed crackers to give it some crunch. and in the oven they go...

 The came out looking and tasting pretty good...would make these giant patties again for sure

But would try a beef and pea flavorful filling instead!

Some other excited news....we ordered the stain to re-do our cabinets as well as an atomized paint sprayer.

They are in the mail...should be here soon. Can't wait!

:)

More landscaping...

We still like the squares on the dining room wall....here is what they look like all dry and in daylight - not light brown anymore :)

 

Yesterday we decided to work on the yard again...i think we just don't know where to get started with unpacking (so much to do) so we just end up in the yard :) We still have to put in our pathway/walkway so I guess we have a good excuse will we ever get done with the yard...who knows?

Yesterday on our way back from servicing my car we stopped at our fav greenhouse. They had a huge sale on their tropical trees, just what we need for our indoor plants.

So we picked up a dwarf banana tree, a palm looking plant and another modified tropical artsy looking plant (sorry don't remember their names :) Here they are I potted them in some pretty pots. Will leave them out till their roots grow a little before I take them indoors. (I have also identified some flowering bushes and some trees that are on sale that would be perfect for our yard....maybe next weekend :)

Then we decided to tackle our pathway-to-be...

this is how it used to look

 Then we marked out the pathway and killed the grass on it...helps with its removal.

 

Then we cut through the dead sod

 And pulled it out piece by piece

 The straight edge spade was great at cutting it out

 Half way done and our yard trash can is filled almost to the brim

Yaaay all done just that little edge to take care off now

 Check out our new little AMES dump truck perfect for carrying stuff around the yard

 Then we tackled that corner and decided that our garden needed
some widening so we had to re-do the edging for it.

 

We put in the edging, raked the soil to even it out then the stamper came out

 It worked really well...real workout for the arms

 Me trying it out...building my muscles :)

 Here is what it looked like this morning from the front door. PERFECT! don't you think?

Now just have to take out the railings.

 And look who came to visit, our stupid resident mole. Made a tunnel right through/under our walkway.

Oh well some more stomping and then will lay down the rocks.

 Here is Wiki wondering what we are going to be doing out today.

 

Ok I better get outside and finish up - Grant says we got to be done by 3pm cause there is a USA soccer match that is on :/ 

....so bye byee until next time :)