DIY – Page 8 – Dust Bunnies and Dog Toys

Our New Rock Garden

Published on June 17, 2016June 18, 2016 by Jenna1 Comment

We’ve been working on one of my big projects for the summer over the past several weeks and although it’s still a ways away from being completely done, it’s finally at a point where I can share the progress. Check out the new landscaping around our back deck! It’s been an intensive project, especially since we’re sourcing all of the rock from else where around our property, but that keeps cost low. Here’s how the space looked just after the Hubs tilled it right before Memorial Day weekend.

Talk about a blank slate! But I had a vision and have evolved the plan as we’ve put it together. The biggest break in this project came when I spotted some boxes on the side of the road with some green sprouts sticking out of them. We were on a schedule to get somewhere so I didn’t dare ask the Hubs to stop to investigate and when we came home later that day we used an alternate route so I was sure they had likely been claimed. Luckily, the next day we drove by again and they were still there so this time I made the Hubs pull over and quickly stashed this amazing haul in the truck!

Big beautiful columbine plants! And there were lots of them too! I could have filled this whole bed with them, but I didn’t want this area to be all about one thing, so a few of the larger ones went in this bed and the rest found homes in the gifted garden and the rain garden. Here’s how things were looking mid-way through after I’d planted the columbines and a few other plants, including a spirea I weathered over in the pot from the end of last season and a couple new plants from a local charity plant sale.

And here’s how things are looking these days. I’ve still got a lot to fill in along the edge of the deck and plan to put more rock a bit under the deck to complete the look, but I’m super happy with how it’s looking so far.

Here’s a view of the far side where the Hubs added steps so we no longer have to walk all the way around the deck to go feed the chickens!

I’ll be sure to share the finished project when it’s all done, but until then enjoy this before and after! From a mess of weeds to a defined space. What a difference!

Any guesses what I’ll be working on this weekend? 😉

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DIY Metal Planter & a Peek at the Garden

Published on June 14, 2016June 14, 2016 by Jenna1 Comment

Today I thought I’d share a quick peek of our veggie garden and a quick DIY planter I installed. We had a red and white onion sprout in the pantry so I figured I’d give them a shot in the garden this year. With all the spots in the garden boxes full I decided to add a secondary planter at the end of the box.

I originally envisioned using an antique wash tub and stand, but just wasn’t willing to pay $100+ for a planter. So I used my DIY skills to create something similar starting with this metal stool we’ve had for several years. You originally saw it on our balcony at the rental house. It’s since been painted over and the hubs was using it to position the fan for his big green egg, but now that he has his table he doesn’t use it any more, so it was available to be repurposed.

I added this large metal tub on top of the stand to create a planting space. The Hubs drilled a couple of holes in the bottom of the tub for drainage since this sits just under the edge of the roof.

I used empty pots to add additional drainage space and reduce the amount of garden soil needed to fill the tub. Luckily, I had quite a few to choose from!

And here it is filled and planted. I’m not sure if this little experiment will yield a harvest but it’s interesting to give it a try.

It looks pretty cute next to the main garden box, which I decorated with two lemon cypress trees on either side. I’ve been wanting some of these and finally spotted them at the nursery so I snagged two. They are supposed to be natural mosquito repellants so that’s a nice added bonus, especially since the windows are right there.

In the box we’re growing peppers, lettuce and cherry tomatoes. We’ve already harvested some of the lettuce for salads several times and the tomatoes have tiny buds on them. The peppers are the same as the ones in the burlap planters I shared previously, which sit next to the large whiskey barrels on either side of the slider to our Master Bedroom that hold 4 more tomato plants, although those are a “patio tomato” variety I haven’t tried before.

Between the garden box, onion planter, wheel bed and the strawberry gutters we should have a good crop of fresh produce to use for salads, meals and desserts this summer! 🙂

Purdy-ing Up the Chicken Yard

Published on June 8, 2016June 18, 2016 by Jenna8 Comments

Part of my plans for the yard this year included adding flowers around the new chicken yard. I placed cinderblocks around both sides of the yard so I’d have a built in row of planting spots and picked up a couple flats of lobelia at the nursery just for this area.

Tequila stood chicken watch while I planted. Things were looking so pretty that even the hubs commented on the new flowers and I was feeling pretty happy with the project. That is until those fluffy cluckers attacked said flowers and had picked them down to the base before I finished planting the other side! I quickly placed boards against the fence so the chickens couldn’t see or reach the plants anymore in a desperate attempt to save those that had been hacked.

But this was NOT the look I was going for. The hodge podge of boards constantly got knocked over and landed on the plants themselves which was just as damaging as the chickens pecking them. So what’s a chicken momma to do?

Well a crafty chicken momma makes protective curtains! I dug out some thick sail cloth material I had in my fabric stash and cut it to size to fit between each of the posts. A couple of simple slits along the top gave me a spot to use a zip tie to attach it to the panel and keep things taunt.

It’s not the fanciest option, but it looks and works better than the piled high boards. And it didn’t cost me a cent!

The curtains are just low enough that the chickens can still see out when standing on the ground and just high enough that Brinley can’t see in unless she stands on the blocks. She can still see through the door so that’s become her new viewing spot, which keeps her out of the plants as well.

I did have to replace a few of the plants, but now things are looking pretty good. I didn’t make a curtain for the small panel at the back, since those two blocks will hold grass that I’ll let grow just for the hens. They are temporarily blocked with two small boards, but once they establish I’ll take them down periodically so they can enjoy fresh greens.

I also got the walkway along the chicken yard cleared of the rock piles that had been there (hint, those are being used for another project that I’ll share soon). We’d like to put down pavers or some other permanent pathway from the deck to the gate, but that’s probably a project that will happen next season. For now having a clear established walkway functions just fine.

I’m sure the chickens don’t appreciate my crafty genius solution, but that’s ok. I plan to take the curtains down at the end of the season and let the cluckers have at the remains of the plants since they are annuals anyway. Then I’ll wash the fabric and store it away for next year.

I’d love to hear what you think of my little project to pretty up this utilitarian space in our yard, so leave a comment below!

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The Wheel Bed

Published on June 7, 2016 by JennaLeave a comment

I finally put that amazing rusty metal wheel the Hubs dragged home for me forever ago to use! It’s now the centerpiece of our new garden bed where the two metal bed frames I found junking recently also found homes.

The wheel will serve as a support structure for two cucumber plants and the bedframes will be perfect for the peas to grow up and attach to as they climb.

Above all this rusty goodness is a Kokopeli figure, who used to be cloaked in an obnoxious multi-color western pattern. Nothing a coat of spray paint can’t fix! Now he compliments the rest of the metal tones in the bed. And hopefully he works his fertility magic to make these plants grow large and strong to produce a good crop!

I created the bed using some stone edger blocks and backfilling over the grass with dirt left over from the chicken yard install, topped with garden soil. I added a few marigolds and lobelia along the front of the bed and finished it off with two metal ~~pieces~~ sculptures I found when I salvaged the bed frames.

Now I just have to water and wait until everything becomes an amazing lush harvest! Luckily, this is a low spot in the yard so it should get extra watering from runoff. Hopefully that will mean we don’t have to wait quite as long. 🙂

Burlap Pepper Pots

Published on June 3, 2016June 22, 2016 by Jenna8 Comments

Hi everyone! I’m feeling quite a bit better and am back to the usual routine, albeit a bit slower than normal. Today I thought I’d share this quick project I did over the weekend to create planters for some extra pepper plants that didn’t fit in our garden box. I originally saw the idea on Pinterest but it didn’t have a tutorial so I just kinda made it up as I went along. These cute pots are actually 5 gallon buckets.

This is how they started life. Not quite the look I was going for. So I dug out some burlap I’d picked up last season and did a test fit to see how it would work. Since my pieces were fairly large I folded them in half, which worked well to block the blue color and store logo on the bucket.

To finalize the fit I laid out the burlap on the ground and wrapped it around the bucket until I was happy with the placement. Then I cut pieces of twine and tied it around the bucket at the top and bottom to hold the burlap in place.

I fiddled with the burlap on the first bucket, trying it both pulled tight and leaving it loose. I ultimately decided I like the loose option which made them look like old grain sacks just filled with dirt. Here they are tied and ready for plants.

The Hubs drilled a couple of drainage holes in the bottom of each bucket and I filled them with soil. Each got a single pepper plant so that when it grows I can add a support stake or cage.

And here’s the finished line up. The Hubs was actually pretty impressed with how nice they turned out – and I know this because he commented on them unprovoked! Since I took this shot the other day Brinley decided to ‘help’ with the gardening and pulled the pepper plant on the right out of the soil. Luckily, I caught it quickly and was able to put it back in and give it some extra watering to revive it but I’m not sure it will make a full recovery.

But even if it doesn’t I’ve got the two others in buckets and three more in the garden box so hopefully, we’ll get quite a few peppers to enjoy this summer! I’ll be sharing more of our garden starts next week so watch for that. Until then have a fabulous weekend! 🙂

Shared on Knick of Time’s Talk of the Town #24.

DIY Tiki Torches

Published on May 27, 2016 by Jenna1 Comment

As we continue to spruce up the yard and prepare to enjoy it all summer, keeping the bugs at bay was a top priority. If you’ve ever visited Alaska you know that our mosquitos are massive and excessively numerous. We did some DIY tiki torches last year using wine bottles based on this Pinterest idea, but since we wanted them near the deck and didn’t have a spot to hang them from we created some simple stands with a closet rod and tuna cans like this tutorial.

The wine bottles fit perfectly in the tuna can and were certainly pretty, but I was constantly worried that the dogs would break the glass and as the temps cooled in the fall the fluid started to freeze overnight. We took them down when we closed up the deck for the season, but left a few of the stands out over the winter. The stands didn’t fair well with the weather and were looking pretty beat up by the time spring rolled around so I knew we needed a better option.

That’s when I spotted this idea on Pinterest. I showed it to the Hubs and he liked it so we picked up the supplies we needed on our next trip to the hardware store and used the handy cutter from our recent Insulator Garden Art project to cut the pipe as needed. Everything went together very quickly and soon we were ready to add the wicks and fuel.

The Hubs did swap out the clamps we’d used to secure them to the deck since the copper pipe was a much smaller diameter than the closet rods had been. But we were able to reuse the wood blocks he’d attached to the deck to keep them flush with the deck boards.

We both like that the slimmer profile of these torches help keep the view open and there’s no glass to worry about. We have found that the design doesn’t hold much fuel so they do run out every few days, but we keep the tiki fuel on hand in the BBQ table so it’s easy to refill.

We placed several around the perimeter of the deck to create a “no-fly” zone for bugs, which seems to work fairly well. Hint – there’s a sneak peek at two of the projects I’ll be working on finishing up this weekend in the photo below! 🙂

What do you think of our new and improved tiki torch design? They will certainly get plenty of use this weekend!

Our Budget DIY Wedding

Published on May 24, 2016 by Jenna5 Comments

Summer has arrived and along with it come wedding season. Since our wedding was before I started the blog I’ve never shared it here but I thought you’d enjoy seeing our budget-friendly DIY details, so here’s a quick recap.

We chose a restaurant in Boulder, Colorado as our venue because they had a beautiful garden area where we could host the ceremony. Rather than spend money on decorations that would only be seen briefly we kept things simple and let the focus be on us and the lush backdrop.

I ordered bouquets for myself and my sister who was my Matron of Honor from a local grocery store’s floral department and added burlap wraps with ribbon and a rhinestone pin to each. Since the hubs wore his uniform he didn’t need a boutonniere which was an additional cost savings to not having to buy a suit or tux. We requested his best man – who was his brother – wear a navy suit, which was readily available in his finance VP wardrobe. I gave my sister free rein on her dress selection just asking her to pick something navy blue as well, so she found an option she can wear again at a reasonable price. My mom paid for my dress, which we found at David’s Bridal for around $900. I had a local seamstress add a purple sash I bought online to the waist to customize it a bit. I found a rhinestone headband and simple veil online for a good price and bought shoes I could wear again to complete the look.

The reception was held in the restaurant’s upstairs dining room where the tables were arranged in long rows. We placed a simple burlap runner that my mom made down each and sprinkled river rocks from the dollar store (if I remember correctly we cleaned out their inventory! LOL) between the frosted votives provided by the venue. I ordered a bunch of daisies from the same vendor we used for the bouquets and snipped the heads off so they could be added in randomly among the rocks and candles.

The venue provided printed menus customized for us as part of the package price. They were simple but worked well with the tone of everything else we had going on.

Our favors were photo tile coasters I made with modge podge and my own Alaskan photography. The place cards on top were tied with simple jute twine and the symbols notified the wait staff which entrée each guest had pre-selected.

Our guest book was made of pre-cut card stock in our wedding colors where guests could leave a note and slip it into slots in a scrapbook. I later added photos of each guest next to their cards to finish the project. I found the scrapbook on clearance for around $15 and used a coupon to buy the card stock as 12″ x 12″ sheets that I cut down so the total cost with the photo prints came to around $30.

The frame we had nearby held the day’s schedule printed on our wedding stationary – left over stock from a DIY kit I picked up at Michaels with another coupon to make our own invitations and response cards. The frame later became décor in our home and now holds a recipe for a good marriage which I toasted the hubs with at the reception printed on some left over stationary.

The venue was able to make simple cakes so I requested a two tier Chantilly cake with berries for a garnish, which was DELICIOUS! (FYI – We’ve since discovered that Whole Foods has a Chantilly cake that is practically identical so we order one whenever we’re in Portland to celebrate.) The rhinestone monogram topper was another Michaels coupon bargain that ran me around $5. It later became an ornament for our Christmas tree with the addition of a ribbon hanger so now we can enjoy it every year.

My mom picked up these little treat bags on clearance and added some of her favorite candies. We borrowed a basket from the venue and set them out next to the cake with a few extra daisy heads and a votive to dress them up a bit.

We also saved by not hiring a DJ. Instead we put together a playlist of music for both the ceremony and reception. A friend helped make sure the right song was selected for the first dance and other important moments, which only took a few moments away from her enjoying the event.

As a photographer myself, I knew the importance of having a visual memory of the details of our wedding, so we made photography a priority with a chunk of the budget (photography credit for all photos to Nicole Nichols Photography). The other big expense was the food, but it was very good and well worth it.

I don’t have the exact figures anymore but the final total came to around $8,000 thanks to our budget conscious shopping and DIY choices. That didn’t include the rehearsal dinner which was covered by the hub’s family, but that was something that had been saved and planned for in advance.

I encourage couples planning their wedding to prioritize what they want and compromise on the things that aren’t as important or don’t have as much of a lasting impact. It is possible to have a dream wedding on a budget, it just takes planning and determination. 😉

Vintage Insulator Garden Art

Published on May 20, 2016January 5, 2017 by JennaLeave a comment

While we were in Portland to pick up Brinley we stayed with my mother-in-law and since Mother’s Day was the weekend we were there we decided to create some unique garden art for her gift using some of the vintage glass insulators we got from her sister’s ranch in Colorado. You might remember some of them from our kitchen island pendant lights.

The entire project was super simple. We started with various lengths of 1/2″ copper pipe, which the hubs cut right in the store parking lot so it would fit in the truck. He used this nifty little tool we found in the plumbing section.

Back at the house we added some pipe sealant tape to one end so the insulators would have a bit more grip.

Next I chose where I wanted each pipe to be in the garden and pushed it down into the soil. Then you just put an insulator on the top. Repeat a few more times and you’re done!

While the copper and glass combo is quite interesting, we used varying heights on the poles to create additional interest.

And here’s the finished project! Simple and sentimental, that’s my kind of mother’s day gift! I plan to create a similar display in our garden as well, but have a bit more prep to do before we’re ready for that.

And the project took was so easy I had time left over to appreciate the garden including some amazing iris growing nearby! I was able to bring home a few bulbs from both of these plants so hopefully later this season I’ll have blooms like this in my yard!

Shared on Knick of Time’s Talk of the Town #24.

Two Metal Hearts

Published on May 18, 2016 by JennaLeave a comment

I finally found a spot for the metal hearts I picked up at the Alaska Chick’s Vintage Market a few months back! I toyed with several spots both indoor and outdoor but decided they would work best as a compliment to the flowers in the front beds.

The rusty metal color plays well off our neutral siding. And it only took a couple of nails for each to get them to stay just how I wanted.

Although the flower bed itself is still in progress, the hearts look great above the blooms and since they sit under the eave of the house they should remain fairly protected from weather.

Now anytime someone comes to our front porch they’ll see these rusty hearts. Plus we can enjoy them every time we’re out on the porch to watch the dogs play.

I haven’t decided if I’ll leave them up year round or take them down for winter. We’ll see how they fair over the summer and make a choice when fall arrives. Until then I plan to enjoy them regularly! 🙂

DIY Strawberry Gutter Planters in 4 Easy Steps

Published on May 17, 2016June 18, 2016 by Jenna1 Comment

The hubs and I tackled several projects over the weekend thanks to some glorious weather. I’ll be sharing them all in due time, but here’s one of the ones I’m most excited about – our new Gutter Strawberry Planters!

The install was pretty simple, just 4 easy steps:
1. Install boards across the space to hang the gutters from.

2. Hang the gutters from the boards.

3. Add end caps to each side of the open gutters.

4. Fill with dirt and strawberry plants!

It took longer to find the materials at the home store than it did to install and finish this project! The hubs may drill holes in the bottoms of the gutters to allow for drainage, but we’ll see how it goes for a few days before he finalizes that thought.

I love that they are high enough to be safe from our berry picking dogs and because they are behind the shed they are protected from the moose. Plus this spot gets full sun for a large chunk of the day which is what makes strawberries sweet. Hopefully the plants like their new home and start producing sweet success soon!

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