The Last Day of "Winter"

Well, Ikea let me down...again... (raise you hand if you're surprised!) They now say that the counters I'm waiting for will be in on Thursday.  I hope it's true, but I'm not holding my breath.

Ikea aside, the last day of winter was a productive and shockingly summer-like kind of day.

I did indeed make an eggs for sale sign, and it worked too! Not 2 hours after hanging it, someone who had never bought eggs from us before knocked on the door and said "If that sign's for real, I've got $2".

Sorry about the glare, I said it was sunny yesterday!

Feet First

Ok, so i stopped blogging a month and a half ago because I woke up one morning and didn't feel like it.  It's my blog and my prerogative, and I really can'y provide any explanation beyond that cuz im not sure there is.  Then I woke a couple weeks ago determined to start up again, but each time I sat down to type, I was kinda overwhelmed by the thought of catching ya'll up on the things you missed (not blogging doesn't necessarily mean doing nothing).  Therefore, I'm just gonna jump back in feet first, no looking back.  If any of the new additions wind up in future posts, I'll try to update you then.

That being said, today has two missions:

Chicken Update

Most of our girls are holding their own against the cold, but our poor easter-eggers seem to be having a little more trouble, or at least I think it's the cold.  They seem to be going bald.  Not in the shaggy, messy, moulting kind of way, in the patches that look like something you got at the butcher's counter kind of way.  

Tile-Time

Once our counters were in, we gave ourselves a week of rest and dove into tiling.  I won't lie.  I was so scared silly by this project that I got quite a few quotes to have it done.  In the end, the "friends and family" rate i got from one person wasn't any better than Lowe's standard rate.  It's just as well.  We never learn anything if we don't try it.  

The first thing I did was sand the walls to scratch the paint up so the adhesive would hold to it better.  Apparently, at one point our kitchen was painted purple.  

Then I applied adhesive with a notched trowel.  Basically you just smudge it on and scrape the wall with the notches, leaving behind just what slips through the notches.  

Brrrrr...

You know it's cold outside when you find this:

... in the chicken coop.  And to think I just told my mom we'd never had one freeze!  It's a shame the shell cracks and gets the good stuff inside dirty, or we could have eaten the thing :(.

Tada!

Hey folks. Sorry for the long absence.  I almost didn't realize it had been so long between the holidays and a pretty incredible head cold (which still refuses to go away).

On Thursday, after work, Nick and I removed our sink (always an unsettling prospect) and old counters.  Its a little unnerving to do something that's so hard to reverse, I won't lie but being brave enough to do it is what gives us the opportunity to make things better.

One last look

You have to undo the plumbing... 

...before you can remove the sink

And you have to remove the sink before the counters can come out

Naked cabinets!

Friday after work, we stuffed ourselves with Chinese take-out (no counters or sink) and set straight away to cutting our counters.

Once we installed a carbide-tipped finishing blade to our circular saw, the straight cuts were simple enough.  After the primary cuts were finished, we put all the pieces in place inside.

We wanted to cut the sink hole inside because we were afraid of  moving it and breaking it afterwards.  We made a cardboard mock-up of the counter so we could measure and cut the sink hole without fear of destroying our counters.  

Even so, we cut the hole a little smaller than it needed to be at first, and widened it from there.  We drilled a hole to allow the blade of Nick's new jigsaw to get started.  

Looks almost finished, right?  Well, then we disassembled it all for 2 days of waterlox application.  My only disappointment with the waterlox was that the lambswool applicators, which are what the can said to use, left fuzz in the finish giving it a little bit of texture, so its not totally smooth when you run your hands across it.  

Yesterday, we screwed the counters into the cabinets, actually installed the sink (plumbing is much easier than I thought it'd be) and caulked the seams.  Both the counters and caulk are dry, but "curing".  Aka: we can use them, but are best to be as gentle with them as can be for a few more days.  

Tada!

Now it's time to start learning how to tile for our backsplash!

A Christmas Flop

Easter is our holiday to host. For the rest, we go to other family members homes. Being a good little girl, I call everyone to see what I can contribute to our meals.

My assignment for Christmas dinner this year is "a pie or two". I like that kind of assignment. It's specific enough that I'm not lost in my options (like if someone said dessert) but broad enough to play. Also, in most cases I can whip up a pie from stuff I have on hand.

My game plan was a persimmon pie (yay a chance to try the persimmon paste) and something more classic in case it turns out poorly or folks are leery of something new. I have canned apple filling, frozen zucchini filling and a couple cans of pumpkin left over from thanksgiving. Nick voted for pumpkin, so pumpkin it is.

Linda, neighbor and american persimmon guru, had tried the recipe before and swore it baked long enough to cook the tannins (which leave you feeling like you've eaten chalk) all the way out. Long story short... Not in my case and I was left with a pie and tart that were completely in edible. The goodish news is the chickens really enjoyed them.

Oh, and speaking of chickens, it appears that our 2nd Easter egger and a second Australorp are laying now. Sometimes well get 7 eggs in a day. Our Easter eggers both lay green eggs, but one lays blue-green eggs and the other lays yellow-green eggs. Crazy, no?