Day 5 -Arches National Park

I What we thought would be a short drive through Arches National Park turned into an all-day event when we took a ill-advised detour onto a trail that looked like a short walk.  An hour in, we actually had to turn around to retrace our steps to get back to the parking lot, although we did see some of the magnificent arches the park is named for!

Day 4 - Mesa Verde

When I was teaching AP rt History, I loved the early North American chapters. The cliff dwellings of the ancestral Pueblo Indians were haunting and beautiful.  We visited Mesa Verde National Park yesterday and were really blown away by the beauty!

Next up, we will visit Arches National Park in Utah--

Day 3 - Grand Canyon!

Up early and we spend the entire day exploring the Grand Canyon.  We hiked down the Bright Angel Trail (fun but utterly exhausting!), traveled down as far as Hermits Rest and the Watchtower.  It was a gorgeous day!

Day 2 of vacation

Wednesday, May 28 - we drove to Phoenix and enjoyed a lovely hotel with a great pool-- then we visited the Desert Botanical Garden.  Unfortunately, it was well over 100 degrees, so we were pretty wilted by the time we left there!  We then traveled to reach the Grand Canyon, and stayed in another very nice hotel and enjoyed our evening in the spa!

Vacation!

Soi We are driving across country, and doing a lot of sightseeing.  My daughter suggested I post one pic each day that shows something that we saw or did each day, and I think that's a great idea!

so I am going to start off with Tuesday, May 27, 2014 - we witnessed our best friends getting married on the beach before we took off across country!

Been busy!

Between finishing up the year at school, and planning for our next Big Adventure, we haven't made a lot of progress on any projects around the house. Which is a good thing, actually - meaning that I resisted the urge to start some ambitious plan that I have no time to accomplish!  Dale and I decided after we got the living room pretty much finished that we would STOP doing things until after summer, because I have big summer plans....

However, we did do a project (that like all projects we undertake, balloons out of control super fast!) that improved one previous project.  We had created our own patio furniture two summers ago - last summer, I refreshed the seats by painting them, and that has held up beautifully. So no repainting needed.  However, the sun is STRONG here, and I have just resigned myself that unless I buy sun-treated fabric (which I don't like the cost OR texture of!), I will just have to recover the cushions every year.  This is what they looked like a couple of weeks ago:

You can see how faded both the seats and the throw pillows are.  Granted, the three solid cushions were originally tan anyway, but even then, they're faded.  And the spotted cushions were much more colorful.  The seats were bright blue last summer:

ah, yea, a whole year of sitting in the blazing CA sun.

But on the bright side, our plants are looking good!

So, besides getting new fabric to cover the seat cushions, I wanted to plump up the toss pillows and make the seats even thicker.  Although the cushions above are comfy, they look thin to me and I just want to convey a larger sense of luxury.  So I doubled the thickness of the seats by buying a mattress topper and cutting it to size, which doubled the thickness of the cushions (foam by the yard is ridiculously expensive - there are better/cheaper ways rather than going to a fabric store to buy foam).
Then we went to our favorite fabric store, M & L Fabrics in Anaheim.  This crazy fabric store is worth a post of it's own -  all the people who work there are Russian and I am sure it's a front for the Russian mafia - but what I love about it and why I keep going back is that they have a HUGE selection and great prices.  If you are willing to invest a day and go through the huge stacks of flat fold fabrics, you can get beautiful designer stuff for 2.98 a yard.  I bought 11 yards to cover my seat cushions, so for 33.00 I got a great new look:

This fabric has gold printing, and a Klimt-look.  I picked up 1/2 yard of various matching or contrasting fabrics, many of them with gold printing, so I could cover my back cushions.  Now the seats are SUPER comfy, and they look great.  But I love this fabric so much that I don't want it to fade so I have the seats covered until we have people over - which we did for one of my finals.  I invited two of my classes over to my home and we had a potluck and social time, and these sofas were full of students.  We actually had the area looking really great, brought out a nice rug and tables (our yardstick tables), and it was a great place to sit and chat.  It was great that we were able to enjoy all the fruits of our labors with company over - we're not the most social people, but our house is really set up (now) for entertaining, so we need to do this more often.

In order to protect our furniture and give us a comfortable place to relax, when I get back from my summer job (more about this later) in July, we are going to build a covered pergola off the sliding glass door.  This should give us some protection from the sparse rain we get, but will give us a bit of a shadier spot to sit outside and enjoy the relentless great weather here without being overwhelmed by the sun.  I've been pinning some interesting looks, and here are my favorites:

I like the columns here, I think we're going to use columns instead of wood posts. I also like the dark wood trellis part, but I don't want the house to get too dark, so I'm not 100% certain there yet.

This is kind of the look we're going for, colorful and a bit bohemian.  We actually have a collection of pendant lamps we're going to hang, but nothing this cool.  Ours are various shapes/sizes, things we picked up super cheap/free with the idea we'd use them later in our outdoor landscape.

I love these over the top painted concrete rugs.  I am going to do something along the lines of this on the concrete, more like an area rug look.  Having rolled out a rug while we had company showed us how nice it tied everything together visually.  So, powerwash then stencil the floor.

We'll put something like this up there to give us more shade when we want it, and to pull back when we want more sun.  We'll make something ourselves here.

Dale wants curtains, I want a weather-proof top.  I'd prefer it to be clear or white translucent, however, not green.

So I've saved a lot of images on my Pinterest board here, and when I return from my summer adventure, we're going to make this our new big project.  Oh yea, and the yard, too.  We killed the grass (on purpose) so a major revamp of that is in our future. 

Grandson visit!

I was so happy to have my little grandson come and visit for a few days during spring break.  He's an action-packed bundle of fun, and we enjoyed having him out!

The things that grandma and grandpa let him get away with!  Here he is treating the fridge like monkey bars.

At home, one of his favorite things to play with is a paint roller, since his mom and dad are painting the living room.  So we cut one down so Parker had a Parker-sized paint roller!  he loved rolling everything with it.  He also dipped it into the pool in the backyard so he could drip it on everything.

We also cut down a swiffer to a Parker-sized swiffer, because that's one of his other favorite toys, but somehow I didn't get any shots of that.

He figured out that the table had a perfect perch at just his height!

He's such a happy little guy, and we had a ton of fun with him!

chasing bubbles around the backyard --

and of course, a visit to the beach!  The time sure flew by way too fast -- can't wait until I get to see him again in June!

Finally found a door for my kitchen....

I've been stalking Craigslist in order to find a good 10-lite or full view door for my kitchen - I needed one 30" wide.  The door we had in there, was 32" wide, and just barely cleared the island.  I wanted someting that would let a lot of light into the kitchen, give me a view to the backyard, and fit into my budget (as cheap as possible).  I've seen a couple on Craigslist free, but I've always missed out on them. But finally I struck it lucky and we picked one up yesterday.








It had a few dings in it, but  nothing I couldn't fix with a little bondo and filler, lots of sanding and general all-around touchups.  For my favorite price (free!), I don't mind at all putting a little work into it.

All we had to buy was a 2 x 6 to cut for the hinge side.  I removed all the trim carefully, and we reused the hinges from the old door.  Other than leveling the door, it went pretty quickly. 




It looks really great, even though I still have to paint it and patch the wall on the right side.

Just that extra 2" of space, a quick coat of plaster and a new coat of paint and it'll be good as new.

On the outside, Dale will have to fill the stucco and blend it in to the existing wall.  This would normally be a big deal for me, but since that's what he does, it's nice to know it'll look just fine.  He still has the bump out for the pantry to stucco, so it's good he can get this all done at the same time.











The cats, of course, were very interested.  They can now spy on things in the backyard and when we go out to do something, they have more choices of where to sit and meow at us.

So this week, I will get the inside patched, painted and get the door all painted.  I want to get my little curtain rehung as well.

I do have a great post that I'm working on with my adorable grandson - we had 5 great days playing with him.  Spring break was a success around here!

Ready for guests

This weekend I am off to a conference (and I am so looking forward to meeting up with my grad school friends and all my art teacher friends from all over the US!), and when I get back on Monday, my daughter and our little grandson Parker will be here waiting for me!

We really wanted to have the whole house ready so we weren't in mid-reno like we were last time they were out.  We still have plywood counters, we shopped for soapstone last weekend, but amazingly, we just couldn't find much to choose from and the one place that had it, the slabs were kind of meh.  So for what it would cost (around 3K), I think we are going to make our out concrete countertops.  If we like them, they'll stay around awhile, and maybe I'll find my dream soapstone in the future.  I think they'll cost around 500-600 dollars, which is a great solution and might be a great permanent one.

But this week, we got almost all the finishing touches done - still a few art pieces here and there to hang, but it's definitely presentable.  I hung some family pictures in the hallway:

I had set up a gallery of pictures previously, but Dale was feeling under-represented in the family area, so we went through his family pictures and found a few to add in.  I also hung a few things over the fireplace, which meant we had to use our hilti-gun again:

OMG, so glad we bought that.  I am SICK of drilling/placing anchors in concrete.  The wall above the fireplace looks like drywall, but it's concrete.  So that stuff aint going nowhere.  Ever.

I also arranged a gallery wall over the sofa -- I still have a couple of empty frames, but I can come up with a fun project here and there --

I don't know what I'm going to put on that pedestal bracket.  I'll find something.  And now that I look at the Mexican blanket on the sofa, well, that's a big mistake.  I'll remedy that ASAP.  Just trying to add some color into our rather neutral furnishings.

I ordered a nice, large kilim rug that should, Lebowski-style, "pull the whole room together", but it hasn't gotten here yet.  I'm getting a bit frustrated, hasn't been shipped yet, and I need to call next week to see what's up.  It's already been 2 weeks and it should at least have been shipped out of the warehouse.  So for now, we have a smaller area rug.  That rug is 5 x 7, the new one is 7 x 11, so I am hoping it will help the room read as a unit. 




On another wall, I have a small table that I want to do a fun paint job on.  I also have a few empty jars that I am once again going to make an attempt to create terrariums in.  My last attempt was foiled by Mercury, who reached in and pulled all the plants out.  This time, I have a big one with a lid, and I'll figure out something for the two open topped jars.



I'd also like to get some orchids, and I think this would be a good place for them to get bright, indirect light.  And maybe I can get my cats to leave them alone....






One of my favorite things is this curtain rod. I was really frustrated before with our curtain situation - we have 3 panels (instead of 4), and because of the length of the run, we had to have a center support, which meant that we couldn't evenly space the panels when the sun comes in during the early evening as it's setting.  So originally, I was thinking I'd install a pipe from the left wall to the fireplace wall, but when I went to Lowe's to price that out, I was a little shocked. 

So I went over the curtain rod area to see what they had, and since the span is right at 12', I didn't think I'd find anything.  But -- then I saw this rod with built in clips with wheeled runners ---

and the center bracket holder was open on the bottom -- score!  exactly what I needed!

so now I can put my two panels on one side, one on the other, and when I need to, they roll easily right across the entire area.



These panels are from Ikea, and they originally had tab tops, but since these rods have clips, I cut and re-sewed the tops to a plain hem, then finally hemmed the bottoms to fit.  I've had these panels for 3 years unhemmed, so it's nice to see them all finished.  I do really like the curtains, and they're a great deal at 19.99 per panel.  I just didn't want to have to buy a third just so I could meet the sets in the center.



Another sewing project this week was to re-do the bench seat in the kitchen. I'd gotten this great fabric at Mood while I was in NY, but once i got the cushion covered, it was just too much.  I love the fabric and I will make pillows for my sofa or another area with it, but it wasn't working in the kitchen. So I was out and found this fabric with a busy, tapestry look that had the same greens as the wall in it, and I make a replacement cover for the cushion.  I like it so much better --

So there it is - all ready for company!  Next post will likely have an abundance of grandson pictures!

Small Projects

We finally got the walls done in the living room - although I still need to get the artwork hung and I'm waiting for a new rug to be delivered....So this morning, I went out to the garage, intending to spray paint some old frames that I have in order to put together a gallery wall over the sofa, and I saw one of our three nesting tables there.  The old top was peeling, and I had intended to take it apart and paint the base, so I started there.  And halfway through painting the base, my spray can clogged and would not clear, so....down the drain goes my plan of painting frames. I found another can of black paint, and finished painting the base, and then I figured I might as well get the top done, too.  I had already reworked two of the tables awhile back, but I wasn't happy with them for two reasons:  I didn't like the metal top on one of them, and I had cut the top about 1/4" too big for the ruler one.  So, learning from my earlier mistakes, I cut a new table top for the largest of the three tables (they looked like this before I started):

Cleaning out another one of our classrooms, I found another cache of old wooden yardsticks, which I brought home and had set aside to work on the other table tops.  So I cut a top out of 3/4" plywood, of which I have a TON of scraps leftover from the bookshelves and cabinets. 

I painted the bases black, and created a different pattern for each table top.

I am really enjoying the way they look!

I love some of the old advertising on the yardsticks. I do have a couple of newer ones in there, but I really like the charm of the older ones.

You can see a hint of the wall color here. It's a light gray - "Pelican" by valspar.  I am liking these tables as you enter the room -- before, we had them tucked away behind the recliners, because they were so unsightly, but now that they all look so good, I am all for bringing them into the limelight.  I did have some older end tables on either side of the sofa, but I might be willing to get rid of them since this table set looks so finished.

So I hope to have some more of the artwork up this week - I've got a busy schedule at work so I can't get much done until later in the week, but I wan to arrange a nice gallery wall.  I've hung a couple of our pieces, but I have a lot still to go.  And I want to get the curtains up again as soon as I can get a decent curtain rod. 

Now that the heavy lifting type work is done, it's nice to have a lot of smaller, more manageable things on my plate!  I am especially looking forward to having no projects for a bit so I can enjoy my guests coming in the next couple of weeks!

Kitchen artwork

Our kitchen, with the travertine tile and stainless appliances - could easily look a little sterile.  This week, I've been adding all kinds of personal touches with artworks that we've collected.  Yesterday, I took everything down and finally painted the ceiling a fresh coat, and the walls got the final coat of green.  Other than a few major details -- like soapstone counter tops and replacing a window and door, the kitchen is close to finished.  All the colorful artwork makes it a cheerful and happy place:

First of all, I got the seat cushion covered.  I am about 90 percent happy with it - I might take it off, put a layer of batting over the foam (I bought it but thought I wouldn't need it).  

Wow, the table looks like it's skewed in this picture - it's perfectly straight.



























On this wall, where there was previously a door, I hung some of my many many many Chinese checkerboards.  Above them is a mosaic snake that I made for my classroom when I still lived and taught in Indiana.  He's a fun art piece and I enjoy seeing him here!

On the window wall, I have one of two masks (the other one is on the other side of the window) that I made while teaching a unit on masks. I like making art with my students.   Below that is a great cat collage I bought while at a conference in Florida.






The color is a bit off in this picture -- but this is the other mask to the right of the window.  I also hung my awesome little kit-kat clock, and beside it are two of my small paintings from my dear friend Doris who passed about 8 or 9 years ago. 



Below the mask is an image from Lynda Barry's work - I printed it on transparency and then hand colored it in from the back.  It's in a vintage frame I found at a garage sale.







Above the ugly air-conditioner window, I hung three lizards.  The one on the left is a Mexcian carving I bought while at a conference in New Orleans, where Dale and I went to a street sale.  The one on the right was a gift from a student while I was teaching in Indiana.  The one in the center is one I bought in Pismo Beach.




Over the kitchen door, we hung a set of cow horns that were mounted by a friend who has a ranch in Colorado.  We were glad to find a place for these, they're fun but not the kind of thing you can just put anywhere! 


I hung a curtain I made from fabric strips over the window.  I made this for the first house we rented here in California - it was in the bathroom there, but I love how fun it is.


Under the clock are the small portraits of Persephone.  Don't worry, I'm working on a set of Mercury paintings, too.

Over the greenhouse window is a ceramic replica I made of one of my very favorite pieces of Medieval art -- the Magi Asleep by Giselbertus. 

The angel is waking the three magi (who are all sleeping in the same bed!), and pointing out the star.  Her single finger waking the king at the top, whose eyes have popped open -- I love this piece and am glad to have it in a place I can see it all the time. 

So - we are still waiting to find the perfect door (at the perfect price), order a window and buy countertops, but the kitchen is very liveable and lively.

In the meantime, while I was painting and hanging artwork, Dale was skim coating the fireplace --

We started off by putting a board that will act as a bit of a "mini-mantel" - a divider between the wall and the fireplace below.

We bought a hilti-gun (actually, the cheaper, hammer activated piece) that uses a .22 caliber shell to shoot nails into mortar.  We got sick of drilling anchors, and this tool works super well (and super loudly).  

Then Dale coated the part above with a bonding agent, then mixed up a mixture of plaster and cement.  He did one coat, and it dried faster than he had expected, and had time to put another coat on yesterday.  This morning, he's doing a finish coat and cleaning up the corner.  It looks really dark right now, but as it dries, it'll lighten then we'll see if we need to add a skim coat of plaster, although the way it's looking right now, it might just be fine as it with primer and paint.

Eventually, we want to retile the brick below - a nice ledger stone perhaps, but for now I am just going to paint it with the same paint I've used on the cabinets, so it will all blend together. I need to get a new fireplace cover that fits, and it will look super nice.  This has been one of those problem spots in the room - it was from the first minute we saw the house, but I think between all the cabinets, and smooth-coating the top, we might have actually managed to minimize this space so it works for us.