Adventure day

Hubby rolls into the middle of my bookkeeping moment (that had dragged on far too long) and wants to know if I’d like to go on an adventure with him. Hmm… bookwork or adventure of unknown qualities? Yup, definitely the door with adventure behind it. Bonus, the pup gets to come along with us. 

So, what’s the adventure? You guessed it, a trip to the wonderful, balmy and lush Miami! No, no, NOT the beachy Miami of Florida in the good ol’ US but Miami in Canuckland. Huh.

But first a trip to the city for a sweet, nice chiropractor adjustment… for both of us. Then onward and bumping across the lovely, somewhat sketchily maintained roads. Besides the road conditions it wasn’t a bad way to spend the morning together. Numerous errands and a stop at the atv doctor (bonus new tires) and the morning was about gone.

A quick stop at the home base, aka the farm, for a nice bowl of chili and then we were off. To where, well that part was a little unclear. I had my two travel mugs of coffee with a shot of the cinnamon dulce coffee syrup from one of my fav little coffee joints. Scoots was busy mumbling and whining about being stuck in the back seat (versus the front seat, where I sat). Hubs was happily cruising down the road. And I was enjoying the sun and the scenic hills.

So it turns out that we were going to pick up an auger. I use the words ‘pick up’ loosely, very loosely. Seeing as how it was an eighty-two foot long auger and wide as the entire road.

Scoots went shopping

It was a nice drive and I got to tease the hubby by pointing out the some of the bigger field rocks that we could ‘stop real quick and pick up.’ Those rocks were more of the four-man-pick-up-and-a-loader-to-assist bigger field rocks. 

Somehow we made it around the numerous corners and ducked under low wires, driving granny style in hopes of not bouncing the auger to the heavens. Back up, park and ready to clean. The previous owner apparently decided to not clean out the now nasty, stinking grain once he decided to sell it. I did the wave, blow a kiss, love ya hun, and sprinted into the house. I've ventured into the muck and been covered in the smell of well-aged and wet grain. Yeah... you know what I'm talking about. Ahh, bookwork… who knew it could be such fun, eh?

An excellent Friday (not just good)

Good Friday was an excellent day. In unrelated to farming news, my niece was born! First time auntie right here, now I just need to buy the t-shirt. 

Back to farming, as the old farmer’s tale goes, the weather on Good Friday will determine your weather for the next month and a half. Well… we had gusting winds, rain and generally mucky weather. I can see it now, we’ll be planting between the rain drops. Imagine a large planter (or air seeder) racing between rain drops like Ben Hur and chariot racing. If you don’t know Ben Hur, please help me help you and google it. 

Then I called down south to talk with my dad to discuss the planting schedule and the best time for my arrival to work there. Turns out he had about similar weather but with more sunshine and less ick factor to the weather (he still had some rain though). Scooter had to join the convo and insist that he gets to ride along in the planter or tractor ‘n’ disc combo. Silly pup. 

I was going to go mowing (in APRIL!) but thankfully that crazy notion was shut down by a passing rainstorm. Then I had the thought of picking up all the sticks and branches the trees around our place don’t seem to need anymore and so thoughtfully left on the ground. Just for me, yay. 

But I think I hear the coffeepot calling my name. Coffee time it is.

On a hot streak

I may not be the best carpenter around but I really enjoy making things myself. It started last winter when I was bored. I had painted all the rooms I felt direly needed paint and then I discovered Pintrest and all its glory. And all the ‘totes cool’ DIY thingies.

At some point my little heart just HAD to have an ottoman bench so I could store blankets or movies or whatever. Upon scouting around and pricing out these little buggers, my wallet about fell over in shock to see that on sale these benches were a hundred bucks. Not on sale… don’t even get me started about the audacity of price-gouging merchants. 

So I went to my little friend Pintrest and seriously started investigating the ‘how-to’s’ and DIYing ottoman storage benches. Somehow I managed to find a blueprint and a list of all the wood and lengths needed for this project. It can’t be that bad, right? 

I dragged myself into my local lumber hardware store and ordered what I thought would be enough wood. Turns out a sheet of 3/4inch plywood goes a looooooong way. Somehow I measured, cut and screwed together (after learning that pre-drilling does pay off) this diamond in the rough bench. There’s still the legs, hinges and the actual covering of this thing to do yet. So my time estimate was a little off. Okay, fine, it was several days off. Maybe it shouldn’t include the time it took to pick just the ‘right’ fabric, foam and batting. I can do that. I’m the one in charge of all this. I’ll call it creative license. Yup, sounds good. 

Finally… the bench is padded and covered. It turned out pretty good if I do say so myself. It was about this time that my mother in-law saw it and asked if I could build her one. And then she bought a king size bed but didn’t want to chip out the cash for the accompanying king size head board. So she asked if I could build a king size head board as well. Me, in my high of building accomplishment glory, said sure. 

Face palm! I mean, what was I thinking?! I mean, obviously, I built a bench for her like mine but not like mine. Make sense? It was exactly what she wanted. Well, anyways. Also at that time, I’d decided to redo my garage. Do the whole insulate, drywall and paint thing; did that last summer. 

I managed to get off my procrastinating duff in the last two weeks and finished the garage project. I put up some simple 1x4 spruce trim around the windows, 1x6 as the base board. All were sealed with a clear varnish. Then to hide where the drywall didn’t quite square up with wall/ceiling (the house shifted? Or else the builders just failed back when it was built ten years ago.) I put up a simple spruce molding also sealed with a clear varnish designed to handle high humidity. I think it turned out pretty darn good. 

And while I was building a headboard for the MIL, I decided to keep up the hot streak and build two for my guest rooms. The one room has a height limit for the headboard, hence why it's shorter. 

I may even have just enough time for another little DIY project before planting.
 

Guest room headboards with first coat of stain

Getting that window trim done!

Window trim and ceiling molding up

Holding up to pesky promises

You know those days when you wish you really hadn’t opened your mouth? Yeah, there’s a cure for that. It’s called don’t open your mouth and let those pesky promises verbalize! 

They really can be quite a ‘debby downer’ or ‘bummer dude’. And that promise(s) haunt you because people remember those things (but they can’t seem to remember to pay you back). Well, that’s what happened to me when I promised my mother in-law I’d build a bench like mine but not like mine for her. And then she added on an additional request of ‘please build a king size head board for me.’ 

Those aren’t huge requests in the grand scheme of life but they are time-consuming and her mind changes on details like sizing, stain color, style, etc. like a dandelion puff floating on a fickle breeze.

I do hold to my word once I give it (unfortunately, dang it!) and even though it was a full calendar year from when I had promised to when I actually got it built, I follow through. This week we finish off the final detail of the headboard by padding it and covering it. Then officially done! More on this later. 

It took a bit of sketching and mental math to figure out a few of the dimensions but it turned out pretty good! I don’t have a photo of the finished bench but she stained it an antique walnut and then put a three inch foam pad covered in a teal sky blue color on top. Underneath she has her requisite Ikea boxes to hold her scarves, mittens and such. I really loved the wood grain that came out in the 1x4s on the bench top. Yes, I did build this in my garage because it was cleaner to stain the bench and headboard legs there than in the shop with all the dust flying around.

The bench in pieces

King size headboard and the completed bench.