. After a VERY busy Thursday/Friday,I set myself a few early spring yard work chores for today and finished one of them: deadheading all my sedum Autumn Joys. May not sound like much but it took 3 trips with the wheelbarrow to dump all the clippings at yard edge down at the far corner of the yard.
Now just relaxing with a cup of green tea and dark chocolate. I hope to make a transition from drinking black tea and sometimes green and white, to green and white entirely, due to the health benefits of the latter. I love my teas!
I had a contractor over this morning to look at a double-hung window I'd like to replace with a garden window, aka greenhouse window. It's in a short hallway on the first floor in kind of a dead space, with a bathroom door to the left and a closet door to the right. A garden window in this spot would receive both southern and western light and my cacti/succulents would love it (not to mention Luther), and it would free up my bathroom, which is where most of my plants spend the winter.
He's also going to give me a price on installing a pergola. Found one on Amazon (12 x 12') that was the same model as one I saw at Lowes, but $600 cheaper. It's maintenance-free white vinyl. My biggest concern is how it would stand up to the occasional high wind hurricane.
I also got prices from my mason for several different jobs, but his prices are so high, so I want to shop around, and truth be told, I'm not even sure what my priorities should be this year.
For instance, I should really beef up my attic insulation. I had an energy audit done 8 years ago and was told i had about R-22 insulation when I should have R-49. I just never got around to it.
I'll probably make that the first priority and maybe do one other thing, either the garden window or the pergola.
Took my car for an oil change at dealer, and replaced the battery.
Saw my dad yesterday and baked him a lemon pistachio quick bread at his place, which came out super dry and not very good. I've never used his oven before, plus I made several substitutions, so I'm not surprised.
Is anyone else having problems once again posting photos? I can't seem to get it to work. I get the image code but I don't see the image itself anymore.
Beautiful Saturday
March 30th, 2019 at 06:14 pm
March 31st, 2019 at 02:59 am 1554001143
March 31st, 2019 at 08:04 pm 1554062665
Sounds like you have been busy in your garden. I'm sure all your hard work will pay off come summer.
I also like teas and try to drink more herbal than black, but I read that black also has some good health benefits. There's something special about having a cup of brewed tea in a lovely tea cup.
We bit the bullet a few years ago and had extra insulation in our attic as well as our crawl space. It made a difference on our heating and cooling bills. I don't think the first year we would have gotten our money "back" per se, but it seems like our furnace runs less in the winter and the a/c in the summer. We had to stay at a hotel overnight when they did it because they said it wasn't safe with the fumes.
March 31st, 2019 at 11:41 pm 1554075661
Nice to be able to focus on making home improvements. I have things I'd like to do, but pretty much anything that is not an emergency is being deferred until I lower my debt, the one exception being the gardener, whom I've decided is worth the cost.
Glad you were able to get some R&R and see your dad.
April 1st, 2019 at 11:04 am 1554116691
I didn't know you were hiring a gardener!