Spring Wish List: House Version

Hi guys.  It's been a while.  I've been at the gym instead of DIYing.  But I am so ready for spring and I have some ideas/plans.

First up is our yard.  This is hopefully a spring break project, assuming the weather cooperates.  We need the ground to not be frozen solid.

 

We're hoping to fence this portion of the yard.  Coming out from the east (left in the picture) and making a big square out to the pond (which is behind me when I'm taking this picture) and then around the west (right) side of the house.  That way our crazy dog can go out and get some exercise more often.  And maybe the neighbor dogs will quit carrying off his stuff.  We have plans of how we'll do it, the weather/ground just has to cooperate.

And then there's living room art.  Guys, I'm just not feeling it.  In general I'm just not in love with the stuff we have on our walls.  I feel like it's just blah.  This is what we have going on above the couch right now.

 

I mean it's okay, but it's just not doing it for me.  I'm thinking a big canvas of a sandy beach and maybe some other stuff.  It's a big honking wall and it needs some attention.

Next on the chopping block is our bedroom.  It's a super disaster.  We don't have enough storage and our bedroom is pretty tiny.  Especially with our king sized bed.  In my dream we have two six or eight drawer dressers.  One for each of us.   I'd also like to get rid of our hulking old 32" TV (which would also mean getting rid of the stupid TV cabinet that the bathroom and closet doors slam into at least once a day) and replacing it with a nice sleek flat screen to hang on the wall.  In a dream world I would also ditch those doors for the bathroom and closet, maybe with barn doors.  We have three doors in a row on one wall, terrible design plan.

I also have some plans for our hall bathroom.  We have towels that just hang in there.  They match the bathroom.  No one uses them.  It's ridiculous.

 

It's completely my fault.  It was my decision when we bought the house.  New plan:  get rid of the towel bar.  Put a couple of hooks on the back of the door for actual use.  Put those green towels in the linen closet for actual use, what's the point of having them if they just hang there.  Replace the towel bar with some built in shelving.  Also, buy a new shower curtain.  That one's fine but I'm ready for something different.  I don't know what, just different.

 

And then my last thing on my immediate fix it list is our laundry room.  Oh holy cow.  My organization is not efficient.  The layout is not great, but for the time being cannot be fixed.  The washer is on one side of the room, the dryer is on the other.  And I just don't have the right storage.  The dream is to build (have my dad build) a laundry basket dresser.  With slots for four laundry baskets:  jeans, towels, brights/darks, and whites/lights.  And along with the laundry basket dresser, I'd like a cabinet with a door to stash some of those crazy things that have no home.  Two wrought iron (ish) four tier cake stands anyone.  And maybe on the very end of that cabinet some built in storage for snow boots.  Right now they just get dumped in the laundry room doorway, it's ridiculous.  

So, that's the current house wishlist.  I think I have my work cut out for me.  I was just starting to feel like our house might be done.  And now I'm laughing at myself a little.  It's never done is it?  What are you guys working on these days?  Anybody else seriously overcome with a case of winter blahs?

 

If a tree falls...

And no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

I know, I know.  We had a huge storm early Sunday morning.  My husband headed out early to go dove hunting.  I was wide awake when he left.  At 4:30.  I finally went back to sleep and then was wide awake again at 7.  Horrible.  I fully believe in sleeping in on my days off.  I prefer to be able to sleep until nine or ten, especially when the hubby is out hunting.  But, there I was, fully awake at 7am on a Sunday morning.  I flipped on the TV to check the weather, of course the satellite is out because the wind is blowing like crazy.  So I went and grabbed the iPad to check to see if I was going to blow away.

Um, 50mph winds.  We were under a wind advisory.  Who even knew that was a thing.  It was for our whole county.  So I texted my husband to let him know he might blow away soon.  And then called my dad to see if I needed to head to the basement.  Turns out I was fine, I'm just a little freaked out by storms.

So, once the storm finally passed, I checked out the damage.  Up close to the house, nothing major.  Our plastic Adirondack chairs blew across the deck, no big deal.  But, we had some pretty big limbs down.  And our maple tree, my favorite tree in the whole yard, got struck by lightning.  It took out about half the tree.  Ug.  So, we spent a good portion of the rest of our Labor Day weekend cleaning up tree limbs.  Get ready for lots of pictures, our yard was a mess!

Sad, broken tree.

A huge tree limb I was getting ready to drag off

A big branch fell on our neighbors fence, it didn't really damage it though.

Branch down.

Getting ready to clean up.  It was lucky I was the only one home, we'd had people over the night before.  If we'd had extra people, or even my husband had been home, it's quite likely someone's car would've been damaged.

My dad was sure lightning couldn't have hit our tree.  I think he was wrong.

Ug, it looks terrible.

Another tree in our yard lost a big limb too, just wind damage on this one.

Getting my arm workout, cutting smaller branches off the big ones.

We hauled at least four truck loads of branches.

I am super skilled with my loppers.  Don't mess with me!  

That's just a ridiculous amount of branches.

So, it's mostly cleaned up at this point.  The big limb is still there because it's partially attached to the tree.  And our chainsaw is in the shop.  My husband cut all the smaller limbs with the pole saw attachment on his weed eater.  That last branch was just way too big for it to handle so it will have to wait for another day.

What did you guys do over your long weekend?  We meant to relax, but apparently mother nature had another plan for us.  

Yard Work

It was unseasonably cool in Missouri this weekend.  And perfect.  Last year it was already in the upper 80s and 90s.  Sunday it was like 72.  Perfect for yard work.  If you can imagine, our yard still needs tons of work to recover from the old owners neglect.  We are finally whipping it into shape.  And I think we have a plan.

We have flower beds that line the east side of our house.  To the left of the kitchen door there are shrubs.  I have a serious hatred for these shrubs.  They suck.  There was a dead one right in the middle when we bought the ho use.  We've totally chopped out the dead shrub so now there's just this little gnarly stump.  Not attractive at all.  The ultimate plan is to rip out the old shrubs and put something different in.  Probably some other kind of bush that is hardier.  I guess the old ones are fairly hardy, they are original to the house, they're just in bad shape.

To the right of the kitchen door are flower beds that stair step down to our lower patio.  The top one is filled with lava rock and used to have a tree growing in it.  Technically the tree is still there, I just keep cutting off the live parts and spraying it with weed killer.  I am obviously good at landscaping.  Want me to come to your house?  Eventually, I'm going to rip the whole tree out.  Then the plan is to put in hydrangea bushes.  If they'll live on the east side?  Hydrangeas are my favorite, we had a whole row of them on the north end of our house when I was a kid.

(source)

I'd like to plant other things in the other two flower beds, I just don't know what.  I think this summer we're planting our zucchini there.  Yes, you read that right, zucchini.  We're not big gardeners and there's already good dirt there.  I'm totally okay with this.  I need zucchinis in my life, especially right outside my door.

We also have plans to redo our front side walk.  It's completely crumbled.  That's what the pavers stacked beside our garage are for. 

This will also mean replacing the stairs the lead down to the back yard.  We're thinking making the edge of the stairs out of something like a parking curb and just replacing the crumbling concrete with gravel.  And maybe some cute edging.  This will also mean redoing the flower bed edging.  Right now it's wood that is rotting.  And that our dog so sweetly has partially ripped out.

The last big landscaping dream is to add some sort of bushes in the back yard.  We have a stone wall the separates the yards and is a huge step down.  We want to add some bushes on the upper level of that so that no one accidentally falls over the ledge.  It's a good couple of feet down and would definitely hurt.  There is also a clump of trees growing right behind the rock wall that we need to rip out before they ruin the wall.  Even though they provide amazing shade on the deck.  

I also still have plans to build a fence around the a/c unit to make it more attractive.

So, what did you guys do this weekend?  Anybody else have big yard overhaul plans?  Or have cheap suggestions of how to pretty up my yard?  This weekend I had quality time with the weed killer while my husband mowed, weed ate (?) and trimmed trees.  It's looking so much better and I can't wait to get more done on it.  I almost bought my first hydrangea plant but the price was mismarked and I am cheap.