Sunday's small project

Now that the work bench and tools are a bit organized, it is way easier to tackle other projects. One project that has been on the list is to re-hang the mailbox, but to do so in a way that makes it more useful. Below is the vintage mailbox we have for our house. But "back in the day" they apparently didn't get Crate & Barrel catalogues and junk mail, so it's too small for most day's mail volume. So, using my jig-saw and work bench, I cut a frame for the mailbox to rest on and I removed the back. I'd say it's interior volume was increased nearly double. Exciting? Not really, but I'm sure the mailcarrier will appreciate not having to fold our mail like origami and jam it into the mailbox... at least most days.

Just a bit of paint and caulk and it's done. But it's too cold out right now for that.

The workbench

Eric worked really hard over the weekend and the last few days to finish the workbench. The crowning achievement of the basement organization. As you recall here's the space before:
For more drama, and an overview of the room another "before" shot (with the now-relocated doors):

And after:

All that remains is to hang our gazillion random screwdrivers, wrenches and random tools on the pegboard and to put in the lower shelf for....more storage!

Back to the basement!

...on the continuing tour of our overloaded basement. I didn't take this pic last time:
The comic book stash. It greets you as you enter the basement. We spent the majority of our Saturday down there and felt mighty accomplished. First, a glimpse at the space "before" the multi-boxed cabinet goes up. That concrete wall is holding back lots of dirt, and not very well.

In front of the brick wall above all of our leftover doors used to reside leaning up against the wall. First order of business was to move them to the middle room:

Eric assembled a nifty support system and voila! Lots of storage.

As I was emptying boxes and filling the cubbies with hardware parts I discovered that it was originally used in a hardware store after all! On the side of each box is a space where the description of what it used to house (nails, screws, etc) and the sizes are written!

The man and his masterpiece:

For "fun" we then put up a shelf for our supply of spray paint:

The shelf came from an old JoAnn Fabrics store that used to be in the neighborhood but went out of business years ago. I have a small obsession with retail fixtures (thanks to my first "real" job as a manager at a Department Store) so I scavenged the place when they were having their going out of business sale and thought I could use it to house my craft stuff (specifically coasters at ComFest). Instead it gathered dust and took up space on a shelf at the old house, but it seems to have found the perfect use at this one (thus encouraging me to continue to keep other stuff I've not yet found a use for). It's an odd assortment of colors that I really keep meaning to weed out and donate to some artistic cause (we have 4 cans of dayglo orange and 4 of boring gray for instance), but in the meantime we just move it around. The shelf really JUST FIT every last can of spray paint we own, so if we acquire more we'll have to get rid of at least a few cans!

Simple but satisfying

Here's one of those ridiculously simple tasks that once done makes you feel silly that you are so excited about it. Hanging the curtain and rod in the upstairs hallway:
Hypothetically the neighbors, if their timing was impeccable, could have been catching glimpses of skin as we dashed from bathroom to bedroom as one is occasionally wont to do. This was a dual project. Eric "fixed" the curtain rod we'd purchased on clearance somewhere. By the time we were ready to used it the cute crackle-glass globes that were the finials had genuinely (and dangerously) cracked. He replaced them with these industrial knobs that we'd acquired and intended to use for our kitchen cabinets, but they just didn't work out. The curtain may have originally been a sheet that someone else converted to a shower curtain that I found at a thrift store and loved the leafy green pattern. Its varying shades looked to be a good match for the hallway's trio of greens. Once Eric had hung the rod I grabbed some shower curtain hooks (it was even grommeted already!) and put up the curtain. Magically, it hung to the precise length and didn't even need hemming. We giggled with glee!

Hints of organization in the bowels of the basement

I'm one of those people who likes to peer into people's basements. I find it one of the more interesting areas of the house as it's not all "prettified" for daily living but purposefully (sometimes) organized for projects or cluttered with all the stuff that just doesn't "go" on the main floor and more likely than not should just go to Goodwill already. (Seriously, I've moved several boxes of garage sale stuff multiple times now). So I did a photo tour of our own basement to personally track its progress. Two weeks ago the place was barely passable, but Eric has been diligently building shelves from scrap wood and putting things in their place and now you can (more or less) walk through the rooms without fear of tripping. My main area of domain is the "wine cellar" (a glamourous name for the cave that I painted, tiled and outfitted with cheap IKEA racks slapped with a coat of stain and which will likely never hold a bottle of wine with a price greater than $14.99 (hey, we're simple people). If you want to see some original wine cellar and basement pics wade through here (http://martineaubungalow.blogspot.com/2008/03/how-it-looked-for-party.html)
Through trial and mostly error we learned that Eric's home-brewed beer does not work on the wine racks. Since it's only capped when placed on their sides the bottles tend to leak. So with leftover wine rack shelves I custom built E a rack with a ledge at the front to set the necks of the bottles up on an angle and a brace toward the middle to keep the bottles securely in place. And voila no more leaky beer bottles:
If you went through the old thread you saw the front room in the basement completely empty. It has not been that way in months and likely never will again until the day we leave (ha!). Here's the furnace camouflaged by stacks of our stuff:

Across from the furnace is a wardrobe unit we crammed down here that now holds my craft supplies:

Lacking Eric's ingenuity to assemble shelves from old door jams and such I cheated and went with the Gorm IKEA rack to house my Comfest tubs:

In the waaaayyy back room that has been dubbed the workshop here's the shelf Eric built out of old door jam pieces with shelves donated by our friend Rick:

Across the room is my former shoe rack (from the old house) converted to tool storage. We barely squeaked that one down the crazy stairs (after it sat in our dining room for months because we feared it would never make it, but didn't bother to actually check until we finally got sick of it and needed the room back for Thanksgiving), but we made it and what a diffence it makes!

Another view of the same shelf (and our glass block window that replaced the plywood). Where the wire table sits Eric intends to build a workbench:

My parents bequeathed to us (after much pleading on my part) an old library card file system (silly me I don't have a photo of it here) that in my childhood home used to hold all kinds of things. The tags on each little file label say things like: pencils, brushes, washers, nuts, nails, emery boards and stones(?!). It's an awesome place to stash all the crazy little hardware pieces we have collected over the years as it's got 96 drawers! We hemmed and hawed and negotiated about where it should live and Eric gets credit for the idea put it here where the bags of concrete and mortar are resting:

There are about 7 inches of brick shelf there to stabilize it (it's only 15" deep), and just enough room across to fit it between the cubby shelf (left) and the post on the right. We'll add legs to the front end which will leave us with shallow storage underneath, it will block the nasty dirt-filled crawlspace behind it, and put the drawers at eye-level for easy access! Wait! If you look closely in the photo below you can almost see it underneath the sled:

The shelf above came from the basement in the old house. Eric created it using our old futon frame for the shelves. He had to dismantle it to get it out of the old house and reassemble it in our basement where it holds bicycle equipment, boxes of Christmas crap, cleaning supplies and who knows what else right now. We've still got many shelves and a workbench to build before we will declare the basement "organized"!

Sweater Party Pics

So, in case you didn't know Eric and I are sometimes silly people. When we bought "the house" at the end of 2006 we threw a get-together to show friends and family what we were getting into. Since we survived the demo/reno and have moved in we thought it would be fitting to throw another party to prove that we really are living there and actually even have furniture! But we also like to be goofy so we decided to theme it a sweater party, not knowing those would be all the rage this year, so don't credit us with too much "hipness." I hit the thrift stores and gathered us a stock worthy of shuddering, we took a frightful pic expressing our feelings about holiday sweaters, plastered it on an evite and we were off! The photo that started it all:
(Rumor has it there are t-shirts with this image on it out there somewhere). Some of our first arrivals, Jon and Missy sported frocks that Missy crafted out of wrapping and contact paper:

We even gave out cheesy prizes for cheesy themes. Bru won "most ho ho ho-ish" &
Amanda made us want to put on sunglasses just to look at her:

Barb and Doug were tastefully matching and looked like they were apres-ski ready!
Goofy Dave (bouncing up in the background) wore a big furry sweater to match his lamb chops but you can't see that here:

The always-adorable Clark and Anne:

Anne's handcrafted sweater featured a tree with googly eyes and when she lifted her arms her sweater would SING! Our neighbors Billy and Michelle went for a white trash en vogue look in their holiday colored sweats. They flank other neighbor Clint in his woodsy themed attire:

Patrick and Patrick won "most crafty " with their ornament-al sweaters:

Amber and Nand should have won most festive:

Mark's home-slashed snowman was priceless...do note the creative use of "yellow snow":

The Best Kind of Night Lights

Are holiday lights. And this is just half of them. Eventually the porch columns and railings were decked out too!
It's hard to get a non-blurry photo at night. Sorry!

Halloween horrors!

Eric and I like to have fun in couples costumes when possible for Halloween. We've been Zorro and his lady love, Storm and Cyclops of the Xmen and one of the more goofy/ingenious creations: the Verizon wireless guy (can you hear me now?) and Eva Save-a-lot. This year we went with Amy Winehouse and husband Blake Fielder-Civil. It might be our most frightening combination yet. Do you have any idea how time-consuming it is to apply that many (realistically researched) temporary tatoos? Or the crazy eyes? Behold the power of wifebeater, fake fur and bouffant beehive hairdo:

Eric gives a worthy cracked-out look:

The duo:

We went to a party at the Adam's famiily household and shared couchtime with "Sheriff Aggie":

MUCH earlier in the evening we were visited by the too darling Reno clan:

Amy Winehouse was a far from original costume as there were three others at the party we attended. But Ivan had to be one of my favorites:

Bru and Amanda came with us. Amanda makes a mean Sarah Palin. She met her running mate at the Halloween High Ball:

Angela B wins for most realistic portrayal of Amy Winehouse. I think that's even her own hair: One may question who is the drag queen in this photo:

And it would be a legitimate query!

Proof Possum-tive

Have ye no doubt in the power of the peanut butter and pretzel sticks bait. Case in point...on the fourth setting of the trap on the following morning we find Mr. (or Mrs.) Possum lounging in the cage:
He/she was fairly unimpressed with our closer investigation, but still not nasty enough to warrant anything other than being released.

It waddled its way over to the neighbor's house (sorry Renos)! And the scoreboard has been updated.

Batting 1000

After capturing a raccoon last week I set the trap the very next night. We caught a possum. Since he was a gentleman (meaning he didn't hiss or growl at me) and I have no evidence that he is residing somewhere he should not, I set him free and he waddled off down the alley. Then we took a few nights off from what Eric refers to as "land fishing". Last night I set the trap again with our tried and true bait- pretzel sticks and peanut butter. Let's say I did that about 9pm. Just for fun I checked it about 10:30. Lo and behold...I found this guy:
We think he's number 2 of 3 who lives in the neighbor's roof (make that LIVED in the neighbor's roof).
So far we've not set the trap and NOT caught anything. Kinda funny and kinda frightening. I decided more funny and decided to keep score on our chalkboard in the kitchen:

Let's hope I don't have to add any other faces to the board. A squirrel wouldn't be bad...and there's the ground hog spotted in the shed. Luckily so far we haven't seen (or smelled) any evidence of skunks! I have no idea what we'd do if we caught one of those.

Oh Brother Where Art Thou?

Along the way we picked up our own humane animal trap. It's been sitting in the back yard with the wrought iron fencing pieces. Since we put up the fence yesterday it gave me impetus to also clean up and set the trap. I used our tried and true bait of pretzels and peanut butter (after all, if I love them, why wouldn't the raccoons?) But let me give you some background information. Since we moved in we've thoroughly enjoyed our second story porch. We like to sit out there with a glass of wine and watch the comings and goings in the alley. Before the seasonal skeeters (mosquitoes are thick down here by the river) chased us back in the house we became acquainted with a trio of raccoon siblings who would ramble about during dusk. We think one got a little too comfy in our yard back in June http://martineaubungalow.blogspot.com/2008/06/old-friend-returns.html

That was when they were tiny and pretty cute. Now we've determined that they are all grown up and living in the neighbor's roof where it overlooks our house. We discovered this twofold: once while I was lying in bed Bogart suddenly became rapt with something going on outside. For visual effect, imagine Bogart calmly lying next to me in bed one moment getting his ears scratched then jumping up and "pointing" to something intriguing outside (and, effectively over my head). A raccoon was peering over the neighbor's gutter into the bedroom windows of our house. Further outside investigation with a flashlight led to the determination that the usual suspects (all 3 masked siblings) were foraging in the gutters. Another recent evening E was returning from a stroll with the hounds when he witnessed one of the now larger raccoons prying its body out of the hidey hole in the roof. Note: Eric is aware of the hole because he's been up there on a ladder cleaning out our neighbor's gutters (a task they do not see fit to accomplish themselves) in an effort to keep our basement drier.

While putting up the fence we mentioned the furry tenants to our neighbor who owns the house and who was on her front porch. She seemed entirely unfazed with the news as evidenced by this comment, "Really? Oh, I knew I had a squirrel living in there, but I didn't know anything about the raccoons!" Well, alrighty then! Keep in mind that an enormous branch from the tree in her backyard that was blown over during the "hurricane" back in mid-September is still attached to the trunk and lying across the backyard. We suspect she'll address the animal issue with the same urgency.

So, just for "fun" we set the trap out by the van. And early this morning found it occupied with one of the bandits. At first we weren't sure whether it was one of our familiar trio, but then the evidence mounted. I heard something on the neighbor's roof and saw a single raccoon "watching" us investigate the trap. Then we heard something clammoring through the bushes (we thought on the other side of the neighbor's yard). Until Eric shouted, "Mary! He's on the tree RIGHT NEXT TO ME!" Once spotted he decided to go a little further up the tree (but he was originally only about 8 feet away...um...maybe fewer)

When I started taking photos of him he sought refuge in the crook of the tree:
We decided he was trying to spring his bro (we're assuming gender here, we didn't check). He failed and his sibling will now reside....elswhere.