This past weekend, Eric put me to work helping him weed and do general clean-up duty around the yard. He only has a small window of work time with me because once the mosquitos get bad, I am inside for the rest of the season!

On Sunday, we tackled the brick patio that had slowly been shifting due to a tree root growing where it wasn’t supposed to.

I will cause you and your guests to trip and fall. Ha! Ha!

a super-highway system of roots under the patio

Of course, the root coverage was a lot more expansive than we had originally thought so a lot of bricks had to come out. But, the bonus was finding a ton of earthworms and transferring them to my raised bed. Another bonus was that we could do all the work in the shade during this time of year.

hooray for hatchets and other sharp garden tools

Eric put his focus on the difficult task of fixing a sunken part of the patio near the house and one section in front of the grill while I put the main part of the patio back together. It’s not perfectly even, but it looks way better than it did and we are no longer tripping on the bricks.

smooth and (mostly) flat

A very satisfying weekend despite my snarky post title. :)

Like much of the Eastern US, we’ve been getting more than our fair share of snow this winter and although it’s fun to play in (and get snow days), we have decided enough is enough and we booked a trip to Puerto Rico next week. From snow and cold to sand and sunshine!

Most of this has melted by now, but it’s supposed to snow again tomorrow.

Over the summer we were approached by a pest control guy walking door to door trying to sell us a service package. He explained that whatever they sprayed would kill all the bugs and eliminate the numerous spider webs we had in corners and eaves. Noticing our dog, he added that all these chemicals would somehow be safe for Riesling to walk through even if she licks her paws. (Suuuuure.)

We politely declined and sent him on his way mostly because I happen to like spiders and it’s not like all those chemicals will form a mosquito net around our house. (Although, if that technology ever becomes available, sign me up!)

The truth is, those chemicals don’t know the difference between the good pollinating insects and the bad biting insects so it’s just not for us. Plus, then we couldn’t get photos of this beautiful orbweaver spider…

She’s pretty large; her abdomen is the size of a nickel. We like her there because she catches and eats all the other kinds of bugs. :)

We have been wanting to replace the old light fixture in the kitchen with a ceiling fan for awhile now, but other projects took priority, you know, like three bathrooms worth of wallpaper removal.

Three visits to Lowe’s in the last several weeks and we couldn’t agree on a ceiling fan we both liked, so after church today, we wandered by the lighting department to see if anything looked good.

We picked up a 42″ 3-blade modern-ish fan with a light kit included and were pleasantly surprised to get a rebate receipt when we checked out. Because we bought this fan on this visit, we got a $20 gift card rebate. Score!

See how procrastination can sometimes pay off?  :)

old light – not our style (a swag chain, really?) and doesn’t cool the room effectively

new fan – lights the room and creates much needed air movement

No worries about the fan blades not matching the other wood color because one of our next projects is going to be refacing the kitchen cabinets!

Eric’s birthday present this year was a lovely new Weber grill. Folks on both sides pitched in and we can’t wait to get it dirty!  :)

(three hours of assembly by a PhD required)

(with a side burner for sauces and steaming veggies!)

On Monday we finally got that new roof that the home inspector told us we needed three years ago when we bought our home. We didn’t have any leaks or major problems, but we were living with an original roof that was 23 years old and needed to be replaced.

The quote for the roof was reasonable, so we decided to have them replace the garage roof as well. Lots of banging and a few grand later, we have a lovely “weathered wood” roof.

Pup was reasonably well-behaved but didn’t like all the roofing debris that was flying past the windows. We stayed downstairs during the whole ordeal because you could barely hear yourself think with all the noise in the office… not to mention people walking by the windows!

As has been in the news, Tropical Storm Hanna passed over the Carolinas today. We started getting rain yesterday afternoon, and overnight, the main portion of the storm passed over the Triangle. The wind wasn’t too bad, but we did get a bunch of rain, and eventually woke up to this:

Most of the front yard was under water, especially the drainage area along the road:

Now, this doesn’t look like much, but it’s at least 4+ feet deep in the middle! In fact, I was standing in about 6″ of water while standing on our driveway taking this shot.

The backyard has a small “dry”creek that flows during heavy rain conditions, and this is the most water flow I’ve ever seen.

All of our gutters are connected to a drainage network that carries water away from the house – at the low part in the front corner of the house there was too much water pressure from all the other gutters, sending the water shooting up the drainage. In this shot I pulled it away from the house to let the water flow away from the house a bit.

We didn’t get any pictures of Riesling in this, but needless to say, she was a wet mess after going out in the morning and was not amused.

The day after we got back from Christmas, we bought this coffee table during a huge sale at Nowell’s Furniture. That would be January 3, 2008; we were hoping to have it for the Superbowl.

We just picked it up yesterday.

The furniture store called to say it was going to be an extra few weeks, but it took four months. Granted, the delay wasn’t entirely their fault, but they could have made more of an effort to ease the frustration. Like, say, free delivery? Instead, we got excuses, shrugging and transfer of blame. Because of this, I’ll definitely think twice before buying any big ticket items from them in the future.

With that out of the way, look at our new coffee table! Hooray!

We have been looking forever for a small glass coffee table (under 24 inches in diameter) that would fit with our sectional couch. The nice part about this one is that it swivels out to reveal three levels of glass that more than doubles the amount of table space when we need it.

And Eric says it makes the living room look bigger. :)

I’ve been eying a new receiver for our home theater for the last year, and after a good bit of research, I decided to get an Onkyo (TX-SR705). Of course, I needed to get a good deal on it, so for the past two months I’ve been watching a number of websites for deals and discounts. This past Tuesday I saw a price I liked at Circuit City and brought my new baby home!

Leandra helped me with the initial install last night (she’s getting quite good at cable stripping) and I’ve got all the major parts working. It sounds good already, but I’m sure I can get it better with a bit of tweaking and optimization.

Unfortunately, this upgrade means our our master Harmony 880 remote is temporarily out-of-sync, so we have to use individual remotes until I get a chance re-program. I’d forgotten how much the Harmony remote had automated things and I can’t wait to make it the only remote again!

We had to turn the heat on for the first time in months when we returned from Florida as the house was a cool 62 degrees in the middle of the afternoon. Eric is the designated “pilot-light-turner-on-er” as I refuse to crawl under the house because it looks like this…

The furnace is in the middle of the house, which I’m sure helps the heating process, but it also means one has to crawl for a bit to turn the darn thing on. I’ve been under there exactly once to help Eric clear out some decaying wood that was left under there along with about a case of empty beer cans. Ick.

When we first moved in, it was March and the house was freezing, I think it was about 50 degrees inside. For some reason, the previous owners let the pilot light go out under the house, but we had no idea and just thought the heat wasn’t working. In a mild panic, we called them and they casually told us what to do. Easier said than done… poor Eric had to light the furnace with a taper candle and a flashlight in the dark. I’ve since bought him an automatic lighter. :)

We have an adjustable thermostat so that we can save money by keeping the house a little cooler during the day. This means that I have to wear socks and pup finds other ways to keep warm.