In The Trenches

Since the patio pouring was a no-go on Saturday, we decided to take advantage of the cool weather {I think I heard we had record lows for August} and spent the rest of the morning {5 hours} connecting the rest of the PVC for our sprinklers. It was amazingly fun. And after we turned on the water to test them we only had minor fixes to tend to. It appears that we can finally fill in those puppies. Plow ‘em over. Stompety stomp.

After a quick lunch we scurried to the basement for a six hour session of cutting, drilling, hammering, and screaming at the moulding. We are just about done. So close. But sheesh I couldn’t believe how little we got done in that amount of time. And I had to have Easy walk on my back for a while afterwards.
Then we went swimming.
And since you’re here, I do have one tiny project to show. It’s in the laundry room. It took me seriously about ten minutes. Total. Check it out.

I just love it when everything comes together. I got the framed urn at Savers and used my trusty **teen year old flowers from our wedding reception {I know!} and hung the fabric with a little spring rod, didn’t finish the bottom just hot glued the little trim to it… wah-lah. See?

If I were a teensy bit taller I would have already finished the one for over the window. But I can’t quite make it up there to hang it. Well, only on one side. I can stand on the washing machine, but the other side will require some height intervention. So stay tuned for that.
If you have any inclinations whatsoever toward decorating you really owe it to yourself to check out the Nesting Place.

Still. No. Patio.

Saturday Morning
6:00 am: Got out of bed {yay} to get ready for the cement to be poured at 6:30.
I had to tape up some stuff over the foundation to keep the concrete splashes from sticking to the plaster. But the beautiful morning weather cheers me up. And the idea of *finally* having our patio puts a little spring in my step.

6:30 am: Pump truck arrives and starts getting situated. {This is an extra $200 truck we have to use so they can pump the concrete *over* the top of the house. Driving a cement mixer truck up the driveway would result in a broken driveway.}

7:00 am: Wondering why the cement truck isn't here yet. Or our cement guy. But he's usually been late before.

7:15-7:30 {this is where things start to get blurry} am: I look up and see the pump truck hanging over my head. I think I should go get my camera and take a picture of this momentous occasion. But wait, just then the pump truck guy comes to the back and says, "It looks like you've been cancelled and nobody told you. I'm on the wrong job." What the??

Confusion soon turns to anger. The Professor gets on the phone as I watch the pump truck slowly pack up and drive away. Goodbye.

So then we find a message on our voicemail. Concrete guy called and said there was a chance of rain that morning so he was going to cancel and move it to next Saturday.

And apparently the pump truck guy didn't get the message either. OK, so the good news is that we didn't have to pay for him showing up and not pouring. But in some ways I think that made it all that much worse since the truck was *here.*

Incidentally, I love the fact that our phone doesn't show us any kind of indication when we have a message. It drives. me. nuts. But it's not like I thought at 6 in the morning to check my messages. The guy had been at our house Friday night, for crying out loud.

And it didn't rain. All day long.

Goodies

I got a catalog in the mail yesterday and couldn't order these beauties fast enough! {Especially with their $25 coupon.}

There were several others I was eyeing, but I had to summon up some restraint. Hey, did you know deer don't eat daffodils? Just an added bonus.

Stuck in the Middle

It seems like we have been stuck in the middle of a few projects lately. Like the patio. And the sprinklers. And the basement. And other stuff. Why does stuff take so long?

Our patio guy was in a huge hurry to get the forms set up. {This was taken before the trenches were added to the mix.} Then it was supposed to be poured last Monday. Then last Saturday. Now this Saturday...And our basement was going to have beadboard on the bottom to avoid having to deal with the putty. Obviously we changed our minds. After we cut all the beadboard...{don't worry I'll use it eventually.} This room will be for my little sister. {She already moved in.}

And the sprinkler parts came on Saturday. But someone ordered a few wrong parts. So we will wait again. No hurry.

In the meantime, we decided to seed the yard instead of sod. {I always wanted to do seed, I was just patiently waiting for someone else to decide it was *his* idea.} So there are some advantages to being "slow and steady."

My taxes at work

Our water conservancy district has a test garden nearby where they show you different plants that don't require much water. Tonight we went to visit and I was surprised with how many plants there were that I really liked.

Mostly we were going to check out a couple of different kinds of lawns. We really liked the bio turf, which is supposed to use 25% less water, and the liesure grass we might use in the back yard. I didn't like the look of it as much, but it has really skinny blades so it was nice and soft to walk on in my bare feet. They also had some RTF fescue grass that is greener and self seeding, but costs twice as much as the others.

We saw a hummingbird there, which the kids thought was fun. I thought it was fun too. Unfortunately, at that *precise* moment my camera battery died. Seriously.

But these are some of the pretty ones I did get pictures of before that happened:

that one looks almost tropical

Buttered Popcorn Daylily {he he he}

{Desert Willow}

Not a great pic of this one, it was not really in its prime at the moment.

I want to use the Boxwood to make a small hedge that borders our planting beds/lawn.

{Maybe I will find a picture to illustrate that later.}

The name of the flower that the hummingbird was drinking from is the rupestris hyssop. {however in the world you say that! Yeah, and that's not even the scientific name.} I did not see it drinking from the hummingbird flower, go figure.


Oh, and the lily at the top I am pretty sure is the Bama Music Daylily. But the tags were kind of askew.

Then you take the gravel and you spread it, you spread it...*

This is how we spent last night and this morning:

Here is the patio and over there is the driveway extension/basketball court.And this is what's left of our gravel pile. I missed getting a "before" shot so just imagine it much bigger. We used up more than half. And of course the pile is in the front of the house and had to be moved by the wheelbarrow-full to the back where it will be used. The delivery guy didn't want to crack the driveway. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but man I wished he had dumped it in the back...

*Alternate title: Oh, my aching back

This was not a test

Just out of curiousity, how many of you can tell me what this is for?


Because I had to learn real quick on Wednesday.

Here's what happened....

A friend of mine from Kansas was in town {on her way back from living in Denmark and Germany for a few years} and came over for a visit. It was great to see each other, since it's been like 4 years. Our kids were playing together as kids can do when they don't really know each other but just play anyway. And we were chatting and catching up on things as two friends who haven't seen each other in 4 years do. It was getting toward dinnertime. The kids were out on the trampoline with their popsicles.

Then the kids came inside in a hurry. Amid the shouts of "It's broken! It's broken!" I noticed that the sprinklers in the front yard were on. {We had been out in the front yard the night before scraping off all the dead grass to prep for our new grass. And in the process Cuddles had observed his Dad turning on and off the sprinklers.} I shouted to Cuddles to turn off the sprinklers. Again they said, "It's broken!" Hmmm....what, I wondered could be broken??

As soon as I stepped out of the door I noticed *all* of the sprinklers were on and there were two conspicuous streams of water coming out from the little green control box. Mystery solved, I knew what was broken...And then I came to another startling conclusion: I had absolutely no idea how to turn off the sprinklers. Even non-broken ones.
And the panic began to set in.

The Professor was still at work, so I picked up the phone to get his advice. No answer. That man *never* answers when I need him to.
OK, think, think, think.

I went into the garage to try the programming thingy. {Yes, I am quite familiar with all the sprinkler system terminology} But the button was already pointing to off. I moved the dials around a bit just in case. But, no luck.


Back outside I went. {Well, somewhere in this story Cuddles was sent inside for a bath. And to "wait until Daddy comes home..." But that's a bit of a blur.}
And I'm still trying to reach The Professor at work. And he still doesn't answer. I'm hoping that means he is already on his way home. Then I take another look at the sprinkler control box and try to plug back in the little devices that seem to have been removed. But my strength is no match for the geysers that they have become.

Soon The Professor drives up and figures out what all the commotion is. He knows what to do! We just need to get the key thingy to go down the long skinny hole in the ground that turns off all the water. Minor detail: we ain't got one.
We try to borrow one from the neighbors. Nobody who is home at that point has one.
{Speeding up the story...} The Professor zips to Home Depot to buy one of those key thingys. Tiffani and her kids leave {after someone gets a car door closed on them} and finally some how the sprinklers get turned off.
My estimation is that the sprinklers were on somewhere in the vicinity of an hour. {The ground was still damp this morning.}

And that is why I forgot to take pictures of them coming to visit.