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Planking – what NOT to-do
It is no secret that I am an avid admirer of just how clean planking looks and how it has the power to transform a small misshapen nook of a dining room into a light and open space. Four years ago, we decided to embark upon our first DIY-Planking escapade and two years later, with a lot of breaks in between, we were finally able to enjoy our success. Was it perfect? Far from it but from the picture below, it’s hard to see the imperfections as they just added to the charm. Despite the unexpected issues we came across, after thinking ourselves newfound experts thanks to endless blog tutorials…
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Roll Up Your Sleeves: Reclaiming the Yard Pt. 2
April showers bring May flowers or at least that’s how the saying goes. Around here it’s been rain, rain, and more rain punctuated by a few sunny days. After a week straight, we have sun and I managed to slip out and get a few pictures of our now nice-looking garden beds.
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Our One Year Farm-iversary!
Hello hello, everyone! So… there’s no getting around it, I have been quite the absentee for months now. Things around the farm have been beyond a bit crazy and have left us working double-time in what free time we have to keep things moving smooth”ish”. While I may be a month behind in posting this I’m beyond excited to finally feel I’ve the time to blog again. As of March 31st, we’d officially spent an entire year in our budding little farm. The amazing thing is how much has happened over the course of one lil’ ol’ year too! Looking back and considering what we’ve learned,…
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It’s That Time of Year Already: Reclaiming the Yard (Pt. 1)
Yes, it’s that time of year again. Spring is in full swing with summer close at its heels. Which means it’s time for us to roll up our sleeves and dig in. First stop: the lawn. The patchy, crabgrass-and-weed-ridden lawn that has been a sore spot the last few years. And if you’ve been following along thus far, you know all too well of my lawncare gripes and my lack of a green thumb. (I did not get that gene despite having several family members who are fantastic gardeners.) As far as the yard goes, we’ve done little lawn care this last year except spreading Scotts Weed and Feed when…
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The Good, The Bad, and The Okayish: Musings on Four Years of Home Ownership
In April, we’ll have been in here for 4 years. It’s crazy how time passes us by. It feels like it was only last week we signed the papers and received our keys. Saying that we’ve had our share of ups and downs would be an understatement. If you’ve been following our journey thus far you’ll understand why. But looking back on where we’ve been and where we’re going, I’d like to share a few thoughts with you. In hindsight, we probably shouldn’t have bought this particular house and instead waited for something that would have been less work. But with most of the houses in this area being too…
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Problem-solving on the fly – Not this again!
“Do you ever have déjà vu, Mrs. Lancaster?” “I don’t think so, but I could check with the kitchen.” -Groundhog Day – 1993 It’s always nice when things fall neatly into place, but quite often it seems that will not be the case because the house throws you a curveball or three and suddenly it’s as if you’re stuck in the Groundhog’s Day of home remodeling. Since we started on this house 3 1/2 years ago, we’ve learned more than our fair share of lessons the difficult way. Not for lack of trying mind you, more so due to … what we will call a lack of information.…
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The Adventure of a Second Pasture
Adventure: [ad-ven-chur] Noun. an exciting or very unusual experience a bold, usually risky undertaking; hazardous action of uncertain outcome a commercial or financial speculation of any kind; venture Back on point, the Mr. and I had come to the realization that we would need to build a second pasture for our horses pronto. With limited time, the weather hinting at winter, and our endless ‘honey-do’ list of repairs on the farmhouse…we realized we didn’t have much time to do this one ourselves. Moving forward, we enlisted the aid of a fencing company. In fact, due to the professionalism and quality finish of our last pasture, we elected to go…
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When the situation changes, queue the back-up plan…
Morning everyone! It seems like only yesterday we were walking the acreage as we mapped out the locations for future horse facilities on the farm. As our horses are only stalled in inclement weather, planning out the location and size of our pastures was our first priority. I am delighted to report that we have been positively ecstatic about our CenFlex pasture that was completed mid-summer last year. It has proven itself a very reliable and horse-friendly material. But in retrospect I have found only one fault, its size. Let us consider this from another viewpoint: Cause & Effect. By permitting too many horses to be kept on a pasture…
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Paintbrush in hand and here we go!
It’s been a busy few months for us at Parkside. Life just keeps rolling by (brakes anyone?) and we’ve been hard-pressed to keep up with everything going on. At least now that the holidays in full swing, I have a moment, albeit a very brief one, to stop and play a bit of catch up on all these projects. Our biggest update to the house in recent weeks has been painting. It’s only taken 3 years to get to this point but it’s finally happening! That’s right – we PAINTED. I’ll let you have a moment to let that news sink in. (Technically we did paint a couple years ago…
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Where perfection has to settle for practical: Ready, Set, …no??
Evening all, Apologies for the absence in posting but as we all know, life just keeps on happening. Darnedest thing, that. So…the short of it is that we’ve done quite a great many projects over the past months and I am at least three months behind in writing this. Moving on! …or is it forward? Let’s settle for onward! (See…I just -knew- there had to be a compromise there.) For those of you that may have forgotten my rough canvas, and I use that word very very very …very literally, here it is once more, what I had to work with: The to-do list: (does anyone else…
