- Thread starter
- #251
Moolie - Happy Thanksgiving :)
- Thread starter moolie
- Start date
Marianne
Super Self-Sufficient
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rathbone
Lovin' The Homestead
Sending some love!- Thread starter
- #254
Hope all my American friends had a wonderful Thanksgiving!
R is doing much better, he has remembered his band-mates including my daughter, and also his buddies from football. He will be heading back to school soon as well--thank you for your continued prayers for him, I know his family are so thankful for all the prayers.
Keepin' on keepin' on in the everyday grind, we have had huge wind storms the past week (warm chinook winds) and yesterday we had a real doozy. "Category 1 hurricane force" winds took out windows on a high-rise office tower downtown, wreaked havoc on our LRT system, and pulled shingles off roofs and uprooted trees. We thankfully have no damage, but hubs had a long commute to work this morning without the LRT running all the way into downtown.
Earlier in the week when the winds first blew up the stick-on zippers on my hoop house came undone and the front doors were really flapping so we took the plastic cover off (folded it up and stored it in the garage) so as to not have it damaged, and after yesterday I'm really glad we did--the whole thing probably would have been shredded. As it was yesterday the frame was swaying a good foot or more in either direction back and forth. But it held together
We plan to build a 2x4" frame in the front and back pvc arches of the hoop house this weekend, creating a hinged door frame in the front and a hinged window frame in the back that will also be covered in plastic, for when we put the plastic cover back on in March or April. We're hoping that a real "door" will be more sturdy than the zippers, and that a window in the back will further improve ventilation. With the original two zippered doors we had good airflow, but if we go down to only one door we'll need the back window for a cross-breeze.
Hubs baked our regular whole wheat bread (from home-ground organic wheat berries) on Saturday, and also experimented with a "no-knead" round artisan loaf recipe that made a slightly heavy but very tasty French style bread. He forgot to lower the oven rack so the top is a bit burnt, but it's pretty nice for a first try
Almost finished with Christmas gifts, just need to stitch up some flannel pj bottoms for my girls and arrange some gift baskets of home-canned items for my SIL and Mom (although everything is ready to go, just not organized into the baskets). Kinda debating mailed Christmas cards or just e-cards this year, but I love getting cards so I think I will still send out the 15 that we usually send.
R is doing much better, he has remembered his band-mates including my daughter, and also his buddies from football. He will be heading back to school soon as well--thank you for your continued prayers for him, I know his family are so thankful for all the prayers.
Keepin' on keepin' on in the everyday grind, we have had huge wind storms the past week (warm chinook winds) and yesterday we had a real doozy. "Category 1 hurricane force" winds took out windows on a high-rise office tower downtown, wreaked havoc on our LRT system, and pulled shingles off roofs and uprooted trees. We thankfully have no damage, but hubs had a long commute to work this morning without the LRT running all the way into downtown.
Earlier in the week when the winds first blew up the stick-on zippers on my hoop house came undone and the front doors were really flapping so we took the plastic cover off (folded it up and stored it in the garage) so as to not have it damaged, and after yesterday I'm really glad we did--the whole thing probably would have been shredded. As it was yesterday the frame was swaying a good foot or more in either direction back and forth. But it held together
We plan to build a 2x4" frame in the front and back pvc arches of the hoop house this weekend, creating a hinged door frame in the front and a hinged window frame in the back that will also be covered in plastic, for when we put the plastic cover back on in March or April. We're hoping that a real "door" will be more sturdy than the zippers, and that a window in the back will further improve ventilation. With the original two zippered doors we had good airflow, but if we go down to only one door we'll need the back window for a cross-breeze.
Hubs baked our regular whole wheat bread (from home-ground organic wheat berries) on Saturday, and also experimented with a "no-knead" round artisan loaf recipe that made a slightly heavy but very tasty French style bread. He forgot to lower the oven rack so the top is a bit burnt, but it's pretty nice for a first try
Almost finished with Christmas gifts, just need to stitch up some flannel pj bottoms for my girls and arrange some gift baskets of home-canned items for my SIL and Mom (although everything is ready to go, just not organized into the baskets). Kinda debating mailed Christmas cards or just e-cards this year, but I love getting cards so I think I will still send out the 15 that we usually send.
i_am2bz
Lovin' The Homestead
I saw some video on the news this morning showing a bunch of blown-out windows in Calgary, & wondered if you were affected at all...glad you're okay!
Do you have pix of your hoophouse showing the (zippered) doors that you're referring to?
Do you have pix of your hoophouse showing the (zippered) doors that you're referring to?
rathbone
Lovin' The Homestead
The homemade bread sounds lovely.
- Thread starter
- #257
Thanks for thinking of us i_am2bz!
The story and photos of my hoop house are here in my journal, starting on post #182 but here's the photo with the zippers installed:
(This photo is from before we attached the plastic along the bottom of the hoop house. The front middle section had a chunk of 1x4 stapled to the bottom so we could move it aside as we went inside the hoop house, the rest of the plastic was attached to the bottoms of the garden boxes inside with 2x4s and screws.)
The zippers are from Lee Valley Tools
The story and photos of my hoop house are here in my journal, starting on post #182 but here's the photo with the zippers installed:
(This photo is from before we attached the plastic along the bottom of the hoop house. The front middle section had a chunk of 1x4 stapled to the bottom so we could move it aside as we went inside the hoop house, the rest of the plastic was attached to the bottoms of the garden boxes inside with 2x4s and screws.)
The zippers are from Lee Valley Tools
i_am2bz
Lovin' The Homestead
Thank you so much, moolie!! 
- Thread starter
- #259
So rather than hi-jack the "we need a Shop section on the forum" thread, I'm posting about some home renos we did over the course of 10 years on our old home (we've been in our new home for 3 years now). I found a few photos as well, will look for more
We started on our home by removing the original kitchen cabinets and putting in new ones from IKEA (got the whole lot for only $2000 back in 1998) and then putting in a new vinyl floor over top of the original 1950s vinyl tiles (DO NOT remove any vinyl flooring from before 1986 as most of it or the glue used back then contains asbestos--you need to screw a new 1/4" to 1/2" plywood sub-floor over top and then put in your new flooring). We built in a bench for the table and also built in some lockers/cubbies for coats and shoes/boots by the back door. The kitchen took about a month, start to finish.
Then we removed a wall and put in a cabinet between two rooms. We had to patch up the drywall along the new end of the wall we cut. This job took a weekend plus painting.
Next we gutted and re-did the basement bathroom, which was scary old with crazy wallpaper and a cruddy shower stall. We framed the room a bit larger (stealing some space from the neighboring laundry room) and put in a new toilet, vanity/sink, and replaced the shower stall with a real bathtub. We put in a mosaic tile floor (old-school 1" hexagon tiles) and used tile board around the tub to make the walls waterproof (a product called "Barkerboard"--looks just like tiles but it all one piece on each wall). This took about a month, start to finish.
Then we divided a larger room in the basement into two bedrooms, one of which became our home "office" and the other our guest room with storage shelves along one wall. This was an easy one as we only had to add a wall between the two new rooms--we made it more complicated for ourselves by making the wall two closets, one for each room, but it wasn't all that difficult. This took about two weekends.
Next my hubs put in a wall of custom built-in storage in our main floor living room--two sets of bookshelves on either side of a tv area with drawers underneath for movies. It was beautiful and he's building a similar one in this house (we've only been here 3 years) in our basement family room. This took a month of weekends because of all the detail work--the photo shows the project not quite done, as the lower sections of the bookshelves are missing their cabinet doors and the drawers are missing their drawer fronts. You can also see green painter's tape along the window frame before we painted the trim white--all the trim in this house was brown leftover from the 70s when we moved in.
Then we gutted and re-did our main floor bathroom. We took the old cast iron tub out (pink) and had it re-coated professionally to make it white. We put the tub back in, did another Barkerboard tub surround, put in a new vanity/sink and toilet, tiled the floor, and finished the walls and ceiling. This took just over a month, because once we got the tub out we had to wait to do anything till we got the tub back--that took two weeks.
Finally we took up the carpet on the concrete floor in our basement family room and put in laminate flooring over a new subfloor. This took an afternoon/evening. Would have gone quicker, but old houses are NOT square so we had to do a lot of cutting. This was the only project we did with thoughts to selling the house, as we had pulled up a section of the carpet when we had a minor flood a few years prior and never got around to replacing it. Our realtor told us that laminate would really sell the space, so we went for it and it did pay off as the buyers loved the basement family room and the fact that the entire basement was fully finished
We started on our home by removing the original kitchen cabinets and putting in new ones from IKEA (got the whole lot for only $2000 back in 1998) and then putting in a new vinyl floor over top of the original 1950s vinyl tiles (DO NOT remove any vinyl flooring from before 1986 as most of it or the glue used back then contains asbestos--you need to screw a new 1/4" to 1/2" plywood sub-floor over top and then put in your new flooring). We built in a bench for the table and also built in some lockers/cubbies for coats and shoes/boots by the back door. The kitchen took about a month, start to finish.
Then we removed a wall and put in a cabinet between two rooms. We had to patch up the drywall along the new end of the wall we cut. This job took a weekend plus painting.
Next we gutted and re-did the basement bathroom, which was scary old with crazy wallpaper and a cruddy shower stall. We framed the room a bit larger (stealing some space from the neighboring laundry room) and put in a new toilet, vanity/sink, and replaced the shower stall with a real bathtub. We put in a mosaic tile floor (old-school 1" hexagon tiles) and used tile board around the tub to make the walls waterproof (a product called "Barkerboard"--looks just like tiles but it all one piece on each wall). This took about a month, start to finish.
Then we divided a larger room in the basement into two bedrooms, one of which became our home "office" and the other our guest room with storage shelves along one wall. This was an easy one as we only had to add a wall between the two new rooms--we made it more complicated for ourselves by making the wall two closets, one for each room, but it wasn't all that difficult. This took about two weekends.
Next my hubs put in a wall of custom built-in storage in our main floor living room--two sets of bookshelves on either side of a tv area with drawers underneath for movies. It was beautiful and he's building a similar one in this house (we've only been here 3 years) in our basement family room. This took a month of weekends because of all the detail work--the photo shows the project not quite done, as the lower sections of the bookshelves are missing their cabinet doors and the drawers are missing their drawer fronts. You can also see green painter's tape along the window frame before we painted the trim white--all the trim in this house was brown leftover from the 70s when we moved in.
Then we gutted and re-did our main floor bathroom. We took the old cast iron tub out (pink) and had it re-coated professionally to make it white. We put the tub back in, did another Barkerboard tub surround, put in a new vanity/sink and toilet, tiled the floor, and finished the walls and ceiling. This took just over a month, because once we got the tub out we had to wait to do anything till we got the tub back--that took two weeks.
Finally we took up the carpet on the concrete floor in our basement family room and put in laminate flooring over a new subfloor. This took an afternoon/evening. Would have gone quicker, but old houses are NOT square so we had to do a lot of cutting. This was the only project we did with thoughts to selling the house, as we had pulled up a section of the carpet when we had a minor flood a few years prior and never got around to replacing it. Our realtor told us that laminate would really sell the space, so we went for it and it did pay off as the buyers loved the basement family room and the fact that the entire basement was fully finished
- Thread starter
- #260
Here's another view of the kitchen, showing the coat lockers/cubbies and a tiny bit of the bench (lower left corner), as well as the cabinet that replaces a wall we took out between our basement stairwell and the kitchen which made the kitchen feel so much larger
