Vertical Garden

It's been so long since I was last on here.  We had many projects come together during the summer. But, then the girl's started school and I was overwhelmed.  Both girls are now going either full time or part time. You'd think it would give me more time to write.  But to be honest, I needed time to focus on me. Time to hike and go back to yoga. Time for our poor dog Penny who gets whatever time I have leftover from the kids. She is patient but her sad face tells me when she's had enough. Also with the girls being in school comes 40 hours of mandatory volunteer time.  I love being a part of their school community but it doesn't come without it's additional commitments.  Anyway, here I am. I'm back.  I've missed this outlet. 

One project I complete was starting a vertical garden. As I've mentioned before, our west and north walls are very sun exposed.  The only plants successfully growing on the west side are succulents, and not all succulents can take the heat.  My plan, or dream, is to successfully grow edible plants vertically along the entire west wall so when I look out I'll see a wall of green. Here is the beginning of my adventure! 

I think part of what's harming the plants are the ceramic pots they're in. They only intensify the heat. So, I thought what if the plants are "hanging" and not coming in contact with the hot floor? I started looking into Wooly Pockets, which I've been eyeing for quite some time now. But, I wanted a product that was better priced. I want to cover a large space.  I found these on Plants on Walls.  They're 3'x2' and they have a drip irrigation line already running on top so you can plug it in.  I decided to start with one of these. With twelve pockets I could do an entire herb garden.  

Next, I had to figure out how to hang them.  To avoid damaging the fence I thought I'd configure another option.  I saw these palettes below at Whole Foods. It looked like a good way to go. I pulled out my tools and Dave picked up a palette I saw on the curb about a block away.  

I got to use my new Kreg jig and I love it. Can't wait to do more with it!

Construction finished! Mission accomplished! Now time for the gardening. I left that in P's hands which she took care of very well!

The finished product is up and running and doing well. Some of the plants aren't too happy in this spot. Others, like strawberries, are very happy campers. I'm considering doing this section with just strawberries. 

 

I like how the plants look pool side. It's much nicer to glance out from our dining table and see green, green we can eat.  This is the beginning of a good direction.

Finishing the Fence

This past November we had to rebuild part of the fence.  In February I finally got to staining the remainder.  However, there was a last bit that wasn't complete on our side. One could say it was the hardest part, the part behind the pool pump. 

When my mom came to visit in March she stained the remaining planks. She came again in June and I knew I needed to finish or else she'd ask what the big hurry was to get it all stained.  So here it is. I thought it would take me 1.5 hours to complete. It took me 3!  

Now, I need to get this entire pool pump hidden behind something pretty.  And that project is now in the works. 

What ugly AC unit?

 We're being audited.  The worst of the worst right?  I set days aside to get a sitter and coordinate with Dave's work schedule so I could focus on financial paperwork continuously. But before I was forced to sit for any extended amount of time I had to work off some of my agitation with a much needed project.  Cutting, painting, sanding would help me focus on the minutia of receipts. 

Our AC unit is ugly. I think everyone's is...right? And ours is smack dab in the middle of our backyard living space. It desperately needed a cover not just to be out of sight but to get shaded. It gets blasted by the afternoon sun, specially in the summer. Any shade will help it's efficiency. 

Although this was not a complicated thing to do I felt stumped for a really long time. First I had never used a saw, but I learned how when I built the side gate. One fear conquered!  But I'm still afraid to use a saw on a 4x4. I hear kickback is a bitch so I outsourced this part. I found a local lumber yard that cut the 4 pieces of 4x4 I needed. (Not shopping at Home Depot anymore!  They weren't able to do what I needed anyway! Surprise surprise!) Obstacle #2 conquered!  

The rest was pretty easy. I'll post again with steps and sources I used. It was actually so easy I did it with Gemma. You know if a 2 year old can help it's not complicated at all!  Our backyard living space looks so much nicer with this eyesore covered up! The most miraculous part of all was that for the first time in six years I was able to start and finish a project in TWO days!  

Mending Fences

Back in November, a week after we finished painting the house and staining the fence our dog, Penny, decided she wanted to play with Sam, our neighbor's dog.  Penny is a pit/pointer mix who digs. Sam is a St. Bernard, so a large dog,  who can head butt. Between the two of them the fence almost came down right then and there!  

Fortunately, we have great neighbors and the "mending of fences"was the most civilized, organized and helpful process I've ever experienced with anyone  Right away we started strategizing about what to do, what kind of designs, when to do it and how to move forward. Breakfast! Any project can move forward with food so we planned a breakfast to plan the fence rebuild!

Image courtesy of Seed Landscapes

Over waffles, eggs with chorizo, pan dulce, bacon, apple pancakes, juice and coffee we came up with a design, a budget, a start date, job tasks, etc.  We both loved the look of the concrete wall above but quickly realized it was outside both of our budgets and time limit.  It takes permits to build a concrete wall between properties, which equals money and more time. Our neighbors just had a backyard redo and we just repainted our house. Neither one wanted extended home builds or had more money to spare. 

We also had to think about the dogs. Seeing one another is Penny and Sam's motivation to knock down the fence. We had to build something that wouldn't give them even a crack of hope! It doesn't seem that hard except that any wood you buy shrinks with time.  Plus the dogs have ALL day long to find the one little crack that we missed. Then it's game over for the fence!  

Day after Thanksgiving was set as the demo day.  And so the process began on a rainy morning.  Both of our families have two girls.  Theirs are older.  Us moms and their youngest started taking down the fence while their oldest watched our two littles.  We did really well and the rain helped loosen up the posts.  Dave came home and continued with them to demo.  And then for the next two days the two dads rebuilt the one common section between both properties. The hardest part was keeping the dogs and kids inside away from the construction.  Well, the hardest part for me anyway.  Dave would tell you otherwise. 

The fence was built but we needed to finish putting up planks on our side and staining all the new wood.  Since November our backyard view has been of this:

Half the wood dark and half of it blonde.  I think what bugged me the most was that our neatly stained fence didn't last even a week before it was mangled and now it's been like this!  

On Tuesday I finally had had it.  I started staining the fence. How hard could it be?  Well, I got to paint for about an hour before I had to go in and hang out with G who needed lunch and some attention. I got this far:

Big difference huh?! Ugh!!!  I think I got through six planks.  In my defense, I was using a paint brush and it was going slow.  

Today I tried again with roller brushes and a little free labor. P joined me and within 20 minutes we got this far! The rollers made a huge difference!

Look at my girl go!  As with most of these projects they seem like fun at first and then they're not.  It wasn't long before she was complaining but she did get quite a bit done before she went back inside. 

 The part of the fence that's up is stained.  We still have the corner to go but we also need to build a cover for the pool pump.  Dave and I are still strategizing on how to do this.  And after staining the wood I realized I'd rather stain the next set of planks before they go in.  Staining them behind the pool pump would require a contortionist. 

At least the view is now like this:

It needs a second coat. It rained the day after we finished staining. The timing couldn't have been better!  We're getting there, one plank at a time!

The Difference a Door Makes

I love the new door to our garage!  It hadn't hit me how much I love it until I was taking pictures of the girls by the pool  I'm so use to shooting them from angles where the door would be out of frame because it was so ugly. I forgot how freeing it is to just take a picture without having to frame it just right.  

This is what the door use to look like. It's in the background.  I had to search hard to find this picture. Like I said, I did everything possible to avoid having that ugly thing in any picture! I don't even want to get into the details of how it got so ugly!

So, back to our pretty place!  I really love the door when I see a picture like this:

Or a picture like this. The door is not the focal point when it's pretty. It's a beautiful background feature but when the door was ugly. It became center stage no matter how in the background it was. 

The door is actually the same door that was there before.  The painters painted it white and then added the wood slats to match the rest of our wood fencing.  It's such a huge difference and the cost was minimal compared to buying a new door and minuscule compared to buying a new modern door. That was going to cost us a pretty penny;  in the $1200 to $2000 range! It wasn't just the door that needed help. It was the framing of the door that needed some major clean up work.  Fortunately, it was all taken care of when we had the house painted.  Note to self: when hiring a painter make sure they have a carpenter on staff or they know how to do great wood working.  

All Mine!

The paint job spurred a few projects.  If you're going to go through the effort of painting you may as well do it ALL right.  Our side gate didn't get redone when we did the fencing around the house.  The rest of our property has a stylish horizontal fence but the gate continued with the old vertical wood. I decided to take this project on myself.  To be honest it took me 3 days to get it done but it took about 2 days of juggling to get materials and the gumption to use a circular saw. Well, I also must say that I needed to juggle the nanny and push off all other appointments (dentist) and needs (sitting at Pete's enjoying a good book and quality me time) to make time to build a gate.  It's not so easy for us stay at home moms.  Plus, we have a mess all around the house because of all the work.  I couldn't find things like my protective eye gear, working gloves or wood screws so easily.  I ended up buying new wood screws.  It's these stupid, redundant purchases that hike up the cost of projects. I hate buying anything twice. But in the essence of time I had to do what I had to do.

This past week I was finally ready: tools in hand, measurements done, nanny set and so I tackled the gate door.  I ended up asking our painter how to use the circular saw and I saw the look of fear on his face.  He did the cuts for me...out of pity, out of fear. I lied and told him I had less pieces to cut than what I actually did so I could cut some wood myself.  I do have pride you know.  And let me tell you it was the best feeling ever.  I still fear the saw like nobody's business but at the time I grabbed the bull by the horns and did it! As P says "easy peasy lemon squeezee"!

I started out the project having peaceful time to myself as Dave took the girls to school.  I got as far as making all the cuts before he returned with Gemma.  He gave me another hour but I knew he had to be at work so I felt under the gun. I hate working under a time constraint...specially when doing something new. I make careless mistakes.   But I did manage to get one of those anti-sagging tension things on the back side of the gate and 5 boards up before he came out and said I had another 15 minutes.  I got a another two boards up.  

The real juggle began as I continued putting boards up while tending to 18 month old Gemma. She doesn't wander off but she does want to do EVERYTHING I'm doing.  She was incredibly helpful;  she passed me screws and held the opposite side of each board as I screwed it in.  She was incredibly unhelpful;  she dumped out multiple boxes of screws into one giant pile and moved the drill bits around in the mud.  But through it all she seemed to have fun and like my dad taught me, building is not just for the dudes.  She is becoming comfortable with power tools.  I love that!

I finished the gate in one day.  Once I had all my ducks in a row it took about 2 hours.  It feels so good to know that as long as we are here I can say "I built my own gate".  I will look at that gate everyday and know I did that!  It's a great feeling.  

One of the painters cracked me up. He came over to tell me the gate looked good. And then he said "I didn't think you were really going to do it. You've been walking around that wood for days just looking at it but not touching it!"  I told him I had to face my fear of the saw and do something with the kid.  We laughed.   

The pictures here will give you a little sneak peak into the new color scheme of the house.  As of today the house is basically done. There are a few details....important details that will get finished next Saturday.  I also have a huge trek ahead of me to clean up, throw away and reorganize things outside.  And then and only then will I take pictures!

Bed Inspirations

 via Remodelista

 

David Kohn designs

via Remodelista

 

via Remodelista

These three beds are what I want.  Basically it's a box underneath the bed.  It works for us because for one it doesn't add inches to the width or length of the bed.  Two, and this is a big two, it looks easy enough to do.  Besides the bench project I've never built a piece of furniture from scratch.  I've refurbished furniture but never built it. Therefore, I want to work with a design I think I can handle. And in the event it fails and falls apart at least we won't have far to fall in the middle of the night. But I think I can make it so it's solid. 

See, this is what I mean about involving your kids in doing projects.  What on earth would possess me to build a bed?  Let alone when this pregnant?   Well, it was my dad. I remember asking him one time "how did you know how to do blah blah" ( I can't remember the specific project. It was something to do with plumbing or electrical.) And he said "I don't know how to do this but I know I can figure it out." I thought it was so brave of him to take on a challenge he knew nothing about.  Don't you?  

Anyway, so this is a quick picture of our bed and I want a box underneath it so it looks more refined.  I actually like how the bed looks right now but you should see the looks on some people when they see our mattress on the floor. I can just hear the thoughts in their heads "it's so college era". To me it's very European and simple.  I could use the 12-14" height though. I must say it's been a bitch to get in and out of bed while pregnant. 

E and K Vintage Wood

I'm finally getting to building a king size bed for us.  It's either now or in 2.5 years. That's what pregnancy will do to you. It lights a fire under your ass to get stuff done.  I have 8 weeks to go till my due date.  So it is on!

I spent the last two Friday's at E and K Vintage Wood. It's the same place I picked up the reclaimed wood when I did the bench project, except they've moved and grown. Man! Have they grown! The first Friday I went by myself to their showroom on the Westside near Venice.  They have some amazing European Chestnut that was gorgeous....but out of my price range.  All of their wood is amazing actually and their showroom is inspiring.  I stuck with the same Douglas Fir I bought when I did the bench. I was interested in the thickness and width. I was looking for 2" thick and a width of 12"-18".  They had it at their warehouse so I did a pickup a week later.

This last Friday I kept P out of school and the two of us hauled across town to pick up the planks.  I love doing projects like these with P.  I think it's important to involve kids because they pick up so much just from being there.  If anything they gain a familiarity with DIY projects that I believe gives them a confidence to try new things as they get older. Maybe not! Who knows really, but I know it's what I got from tagging along with my dad on his home projects.  And here I am trying to pass on the same to my kid.  

I would have loved to look around their warehouse more.  I'm so in love with all of the wood. Even their scraps look like amazing material for unique projects. But, when you're 7 months pregnant the last thing people want is for you to walk around a warehouse that has nails, etc all over.  And much less with a 4 year old in tow. I remember walking around the original warehouse back in Sun Valley when P was 2. It was a fun juggle but I totally get it seems crazy to others.    

 

We now have our four planks! The guys loaded them up in the car! I drive Ford Flex, which I love, and love even more after this adventure.  Four 7.5 foot planks fit comfortably on one side while P rode on the other behind me.  The front seat folded down nicely so the wood laid flat from front to back. Loving this Ford Flex more than I ever thought! 

  

I have a bed design in mind and I've talked it over with Dave. The only thing that might change is the headboard.  I didn't plan on having one. He would like one. Easy enough.  

My only issue so far is that since I'm pregnant I can't sand the planks.  All that wood dust would not be good for me right now.  It's a lot of wood to sand.  Fortunately Dave has some friends who have industrial sanders and he's going to try get them the planks this week. In the meantime I'll be doing some drawings so he knows what I want.  He's going to be doing most of the heavy lifting. I'm looking forward to doing this project with him. I figured we made it through a bunk bed we can make it through this....I hope!

Back to the drawing boards!

So....... we got a new mattress! It's a king. We moved up from a queen.  I had a bed design ready to go and was ready to build,  but with the bigger mattress in the room my design has gone out the window. 

Even though the mattress is bigger the room feels bigger.  Odd right?  I think the bed frame is to blame.  The bed was quite elevated and it had both a headboard and foot board.  Both ends of the bed had a curve design that put the actual mattress about 5 inches away from the wall.  A king and queen bed are the same size in length so I just gained at least 6 inches in the room.  And with the mattress on the floor I gained about 3-4 feet of overall visibility.

Now, I don't want to lose any space. My original design would add another foot to the width and another 6 inches to the length of the bed.  Plus, I can see us all hitting our shins on the boards for at least the first month.

None the less, I'll show you all my amateur drawings of my bed design.  I've never built furniture like this before so simplicity is essential.  I've always been attracted to simpler pieces anyway.  My friend's husband does this for a living. He gave me suggestions on how to make this design more structurally sound but still keeping it easy to build.    I have yet to learn any of the CAD programs. I'm old-schooling it with hand drawings.  My mother, a former architect of long ago, would be proud....I think, my perspective is still off.

First the base, the frame. It would have measured 88"w x 80" l x 6"h. I was suggested to add brackets at each corner to make the bed more stable. One crossbar down the middle would not have been sufficient given the width of a king size bed.

Second, the headboard would attach.

Third, a bed of planks, each about 12"wide would lay on top of the frame. The dimension of the whole "plank bed" would have been 100"w x 92" l:

I envisioned each plank stained in very slight variations of a walnut/caramel color to give it a little depth and richness. Not a color that covers the wood. I'm thinking of a stain that brings out the personality of each plank so to speak. 

The bed would have been sort of like this one below except without the two foot boards, the entire thing would have been made out of wood (no metal work), the headboard would have been a single plank and the tones of the wood would have been varied. So, similar but different. 

Now I want something more like this, seamless mattress to boards without sticking out at all. I'm not giving away one inch of space more in either direction. 

 

 Anyway, it's back to the drawing board.