The Weekend List

This weekend started out with one of my favorite things:  a list.  

Andy has home improvement ADD, so as soon as he gets 75% done with a project, he starts another project, resulting in a lot of almost finished things.  We have a whole two sided list of these kinds of projects but since the weather was predicted to be nice most of the weekend, we picked some outside things to get wrapped up.

I got a head start on the list on Friday, lucking out with great weather and cooperative kids during nap time.  Last summer (or was it the summer before that?!?), Andy power washed our peeling red deck and put a coat of Behr Deck Over paint on it.  Deck Over is kind of a cool product that is advertised to help bring old decks back to life, filling in minor cracks and gaps.  First coat looked great and the new walnut color was much nicer than the old red.  According to the instructions, you must put on two coats but Andy moved on to another project and we never got around to doing the second coat.  Flash forward to Friday- I used a roller and went ahead and put two additional coats.  Our deck has some serious gaps that the paint didn’t fill in (not that we expected it to) but the Deck Over did a nice job of filling in the minor gaps and giving the entire deck a nice, matte finish that has a good grip to it to prevent slipping.

At F’s request, we started Saturday off with homemade waffles before tackeling more of our list.  Andy was on gutter duty while I was back on my painting station.  One of the most frustrating things about living in a small town is when you are just a few feet short of gutter, you can’t run to the store to pick up some more.  So, gutters are almost completed but we will need a trip to Menards before those can get finished up.

Andy also finished clearing all all the bedding from the chicken coop that had built up over the year.  To help keep the chickens warmer in the winter, you just add bedding all spring/summer/fall on top of the soiled bedding until you have 7 inches or so down.  Then in spring, all of this needs to be cleared out to start fresh.  Andy moved several loads of poop, which is compost gold to the compost bins and then spread the rest in our back 2 acres where the horses pasture.  It's a stinky job but very satisfying to see the floor of the coop.

Our powered wheelbarrow

It was too beautiful outside to work inside, so I set up a painting station outside.  We completed the renovations to E’s and F’s room in February but I wanted Andy to build a bookcase to go on top of the dresser in the room.  Wood was purchased months ago but Andy was able to get everthing cut out and dry fitted Saturday morning.  I painted all the shelves and shell the same green as I painted the dresser with.  

I wanted to do an accent on the back piece, so I painted this a dark grey-blue and then stenciled a design on it.  

I will do a post once the bookcase is totally done with details on how I did all this but it took a lot of math, chocolate cake and episodes of Friends on Netflix to accomplish.

 

Bookcase ready for face frame

What do the kids do while we are checking of items on our list?  “Helping”, playing in the yard, asking us thousands of questions, preparing snacks, you name it.

While working in the yard, we looked up to see our neighbor, Farmer Randy walking along our road. 

You know you have lived in the country too long when a person WALKING on the road causes a stir of commotion.

Andy spent Sunday morning living out his lumberjack fantasies, cutting out dead branches from two of the evergreen trees.  

At one point, my little squirrel had climbed almost all the way to the top of one tree.  

Where's Waldo? Andy edition 

It's a good thing we don't have any woods on our acreage or I would never see him again.

Worn out from playing out side the whole previous day, E was running a little fever and passed out on the couch. 

By the afternoon, she had recovered and prepared Andy a snack since he was working so hard in the shop.

I was able to get away and spent the afternoon on a kayak trip down the river organized by a local campground, Hutchinson Family Farm Campground.  We have on on canoe trips several times down the river with the kids but it was a ton of fun getting to relax and watch the scenery as we floated down the Upper Iowa River.

It was my first time in a kayak but it was super easy.  

I only got in to a bit of trouble once when I decided to dig into my bag for a muffin and got turned around, floating backwards down the river.  Luckily, a few strong strokes got me back on track.  Once we reached the end of our river trip, we had campfire pies and s'mores as well as a wine tasting from a local vineyard.  

So, smelling of bonfire (is there a better smell??) with a belly full of marshmallow and chocolate, I get to check a few more things off of our list and amble off to bed a happy women.