when the boyfriend's away...i get to use the whole garage

I went to my new favorite antique/resale shop in Orange City last week with Baby Bird and her mom.  Since they're out of school for the summer, we've been able to hang out a bit more- I had them over for lunch before we went and tried getting into Hawaii mode with some marinated grilled chicken and tropical rice.  I made up my own recipe for the rice since I couldn't find one online that incorporated ingredients that I had on-hand.  Easy-peasy recipe at the end of this post!

Anyway, I had a laundry list of items I've been looking for- a luggage rack for my guestroom, a chair to replace the Chair O' Death at the desk (more on that later), an oval standing mirror, and a magazine rack.  I had great success, actually- found everything!  Well, except a luggage rack but I got a low bench instead and figured I can fix it up and it can do double duty.  After we crammed everything into 2 cars and BB's mom headed out for another errand, BB and I drove up to Deland to kill some time.  Wandering around the historic area of downtown, we came across a candy store that was giving away free Italian ice (surprise!  yum!) and a formal/bridal/flower shop that was advertising formal dresses for $25.  Now, normally I'd just pass it up, even though I DO need something to wear on our cruise in September.  But with Baby Bird with me, I was feeling braver so in we went, preparing to be underwhelmed.  

I FOUND THE MOST PERFECT BLUE FORMAL GOWN FOR $25, YA'LL!!!!!

It was great to have BB there for a second opinion and I joyfully left with my purchase.  Pics to follow once we go on vacation!

Anyhoo, the reason I was getting in quality chick time is that Scot was working in Punta Gorda (Southwest FL) for the week.  I decided that, since his car was gone, I could spread out all my new finds and get to work in the garage.  

The luggage bench was first- it was an ugly blonde pine color, but check out the after!

BB's mother let me use her sewing machine (which I hadn't touched I think since 7th grade HomeEc class) to make the cushion.  I sanded (with the electric sander!), primed, filled in the screw holes with spackle, and painted it from the same can of white I bought for the hutch.  Love it! 

And now the chair- Everyone who sits in the office desk chair we have in the game room leans back and the whole thing damn near tips over.  It'll send your heart into your throat for sure and, rather than risk a broken neck, I decided to replace it.  Again, I sanded, spackled, primed, painted and recovered the chair I bought at the antique store.  BB picked out the perfect fabric to cover the seat and, over the course of the week Scot was gone, I pain-stakingly fixed it up.  Take a look!

 Before- ugly!

 After- super awesome!

Close-up of the fabric- it's so...Me!

Here's the breakdown for both projects-

Bench: $11

Fabric: $6

Paint/brushes: free (already owned)

Spackle/sandpaper: free (already owned)

Total for luggage bench: $17!

Chair: $4 (I'm not kidding!!!)

Spackle/sandpaper/paint/brushes: free (already owned)

Fabric $6

New foam pad: $9

Total: $19!

Sidebar- this does not include the staple gun- technically I found one in the garage and could not figure out how to use it, load it, or what size staples it took (I guess I still need him lol) so I bought a new one with instructions included which set me back about $15.  I'm still annoyed about that.  Overall, I'm very pleased with my week's progress.  The magazine rack i bought was kind of a brass, swirly design and ugly as sin, so I painted it the same glossy purple I used on my light-globe flower vase a month or so ago.  

The biggest project- the chandelier over the dining table is still sitting there, taunting me.  When I get brave enough to take all the crystals off of it and paint it, I'll post about that.  If I survive.  

Anyway, just got a text from Scot saying he's 30 minutes out and can't wait to get home- it's been a rough week down in PGD.  Maybe I'll greet him in my new $25 princess dress :)

nail polish? nah, i paint my nails with Behr Premium

On a whim while we were in Tennessee last fall for my birthday, I decided to start collecting pottery.  I suppose I was feeling especially country, what with all the fall leaves and Dollywood and hiking and all.  Anyway, I fell in love with Pigeon River Pottery and purchased a couple pieces that spoke to me (or rather, screamed my name and begged me to take them home.)  I've obtained a few more pieces since then, for Christmas and in Key Largo, all varying shades of blue and gray.  It feels very grown-up and turned out to be the stress of my latest DIY project.  So, here we go-

I decided I needed a corner hutch to display my pottery pieces in, so I started hunting.  It took me about 2 months of frequenting every Goodwill, ReStore, Salvation Army, and thrift store I came across before I found what I was looking for, at a price I could handle.  I discovered my new favorite shop- an antiques dealership in Orange City.  The place is probably 4x the size of our house and is filled with treasures!  For $104, I picked up a solid pine hutch and painted and glazed it.

I wiped it down with wet rags, took the doors off, and lightly sanded it.  I chose 2 colors- a white and a yellow paint/primer in one.  Still, I kid you not, they both took like 6 coats.  I painted on that thing for 3 days.  Admittedly, it was on days I was working, so I'd get home and do a couple coats, let it dry til the next day, and repeat.  After the paint was dry, I mixed my good ol' brown glaze that I've used on the red chairs and the garage sale cabinet and toned it down a bit.  I found some really cute little yellow glass knobs at World Market, reattached the doors with new hinges, and TA-DA!
Here's the breakdown-
Hutch- $104
Paint/Brushes- $20
Knobs- $5
Hinges- $6
Glaze- already owned (free!)
Grand Total- $135 (not too shabby!)

 BEFORE

AFTER!

finally, by some miracle...

It's been a while since the last post (in which I whined about the non-progress of the pool) but GUESS WHAT???  It's finished!  I have some lovely before and after pics to share-

So classy!  So grown-up!

We (well, the fence people) also put up that white fence you see outside the pool screen.  It's like our own mini-resort now and I just love it!  We hosted around 15 friends for a pool party last week and it ended up raining all day because Tropical Storm Debby decided to blow through.  I suppose it turned into a hurricane party of sorts, but we still got in that pool, rain and everything!  Overall, All Seasons Pools did a great job on  the remodel, even if it did take freakin' forever (about 2 and a half months).  I'm just happy to finally be able to park it on the swing with some new, overstuffed pillows and just enjoy it all.   

 

(Gratuitous cat-lady pic...sure, I chose the color palate to match my animal)

the waiting pool

I mentioned a couple posts ago that Scot turned 31 in April and we went to Key Largo.  Well, on that 31st birthday, he bought himself a new swimming pool.  Well, sort of.  We'd been talking about renovating the pool and back deck for a while, and we finally settled on All Seasons Pools to do the job.  We (meaning, I) picked out the new waterline tile, new pavers for the deck, and the new interior pebble finish.  Scot dropped the first check off on April 4th, and 2 weeks later, the pool was drained and the new tile was up.  15 business days, they said.  It'll be done.  One month later, and here we sit with a big empty hole in the ground with some nice tile on it!
Now, I know they're busy and all but the thing I miss the most is actually using the back porch.  We had to remove the swing and all the chairs and store them (after applying fresh coats of spray paint, of course!) so the only thing out there is the cat and the garden hose.  I loved sitting on the swing on a cool evening after the thunderstorms passed through.  Now I'm kinda stuck inside.  I could utilize the new bench on the front porch I guess, but I'm in my ratty pajama pants now and a proper southern lady just doesn't sit on her front porch in her pajamas.
Anyway, back to the pool crisis...the new pavers FINALLY showed up on Tuesday but...BUT the coping (the part that actually goes around the pool, like an outline) was the wrong style.  Not like, ugly-wrong style, but cover-up-half-the-tile-we-had-put-in-wrong style.  Turns out the manufacturer of the pavers does not even MAKE the style we ordered for our renovation, so they just changed the order and sent us something else and did not confirm with the pool company.
So now, we have an empty hole in the ground in the back yard and 10 pallets of stone pavers sitting in the front yard.  Klassy.
The paver crisis has yet to be resolved.  It's looking like an additional 3 weeks of waiting if we have to order all new stones to get the proper look.  What I'm most upset about is that, silly me, I thought that if we gave All Seasons a check the first week of April that we'd have a renovated pool by the end of May.  I was planning to have a Memorial Day BBQ/pool party like we did last year but the 1/2 inch of water sitting in the deep end from the rain that just passed isn't going to fly as a fun time.
Although, the cat has gotten pretty used to jumping in, wandering around, and jumping out of the empty pool.  God I hope I'm home when she tries that after it's finished and filled up.  If only for the laugh.
Here's a look at the lovely view from the kitchen at the moment.  I'm kinda getting tired of looking at it.

the latest addition

As we were discussing plans last week for our next "Monday of Projects," Scot decided that he'd tackle a simple one like, oh, painting the garage.  I figured I'd pretend to help a little on that one, but my focus sat on The Cabinet.  The Cabinet has been sitting in the garage for maybe 2 months now-I saw it in a garage sale down the street while on a run so, after I did my laps around the block, I swung by as the guy was closing up shop and offered him $5 for it.  The Cabinet was a hell of a lot heavier than I thought it would be (turns out it was real wood) but I managed to lug it 4 houses down to home.  I bought it mainly because of how freaking UGLY is was, thinking surely I could give it a new life.

Anyway, Scot bought some cabinets to replace the teetering, sagging shelving in the garage and built and installed them by about noon on Monday.  I did help a little, especially when he got to the painting part.  The garage looks so fresh and clean-I'm actually impressed we got so much done in one day.  I mean, we spent 3 months renovating each bathroom and now we've completed 2 big projects in 2 weekends!  Big accomplishment for sure!

As for The Cabinet, it got its makeover from me between the shifts I was helping out in the garage.  I wiped it down and cleaned it up and actually used paint stripper and a real electric sander to clean off and smooth out the top.  The whole project took me about 8 hours to complete but here's what I did:

-Sanded down the rough patches and dirt that just wouldn't come off-this thing had 2 coats of paint on it from before
-Doors removed, spray-painted main cabinet Heritage Red, 3 coats.
-Sprayed a light coat of the Hammered Dark Brown spray paint we bought for the back porch swing (that was a whole 'nother project!) on the screen fronts of the cabinet doors
-Used olive paint from the can we used on the house exterior to paint the doors and the inside of the cabinet.
- Used Minwax to stain the top of The Cabinet, wiped it down 20 minutes later, and sprayed it with a clear gloss coat
-Mixed up glaze I used from the Cheery Cherry Chairies and glazed the cabinet and doors.
-Replaced knobs and hinges.
Price Breakdown: Cabinet... $5
                            Heritage Red paint... $4
                            Hammered Dark Brown paint...already owned
                            Gingko Tree Exterior Latex...already owned
                            Minwax...already owned
                            Glaze and paint mix...already owned
                            Knobs and hinges...$10
TOTAL: $19 for a beautiful piece of furniture!

 BEFORE

AFTER!

OH!  And a detail on the purple vase there- it was an old frosted while light globe cover from the hallway light!  I spray painted it a glossy purple and I think it looks awesome.

key lime dream

Scot turned 31 earlier this month (I know, I'm next, shut up) so I surprised him with a weekend down in Key Largo.  I used my Trip Advisor app on my Kindle to plan the whole thing, from where to stay to where to eat and what to do.  He still insisted on driving-there were doubts as to whether or not my car would make the trip and back alive- so I just plugged the hotel into the GPS and we were off.  6.5 hours later, after an unintentional scenic route through Miami (stupid construction!) we made it.

The first evening of our stay, I'd booked us a sunset sailing trip on a pirate ship.  Turns out, no one else had booked that evening so we got a private cruise for ourselves!  We got to help hoist the sails and steer the boat and maneuver all the sails and lines around-it was so cool!  It was interesting to get back in to "learning mode" because learning to sail a boat is what I think about when I get a little burnt out on flight instructing-when I think about how my students know just as much about flying as I do about boating, it reminds me to take care in my instruction and explain everything simply and clearly.

As the sun set, we got to blow the conch shell (pronounced KONK).  Traditionally, you blow it to signify the end of the day and to drive away any bad spirits, similar to the way you'd blow a trumpet.  It sounds a lot like a boat horn, low and loud.  Youtube it sometime, it's pretty cool.

The next day, we set out for some snorkeling.  At the same dock our boat left from, the actual boat used in the move "The African Queen" was being kept and refurbished.  I had to grab some pictures, because I adore that movie, starring Katherine Hepburn and Humphrey Bogart.  The African Queen herself looked amazing- I remembered that pesky boiler that Charlie Allnutt fought with the whole way through the movie, the tiller that Rose handled to steer them through the rapids and falls, and the newly replaced canopy, no longer tattered but a pretty red stripe.  I was in heaven!

Snorkeling was fun, of course.  The water was a chilly 77 degrees but we managed to hit 3 sites along America's only coral barrier reef.  We were 10 miles off shore and saw tons of amazing tropical fish and beautiful corals.  We also saw what's known as the "Christ of the Abyss"-a Jesus statue about 20 feet underwater, intentionally sunk for your diving pleasure.  So cool!  We got seriously sunburned on the hour-long ride back to shore because we, uh, kinda forgot about the need to reapply sunscreen after swimming in the ocean.  My legs are burnt so bad I can't even bend them to put socks on.  It's pathetic.

Upon arriving back at the hotel, all I wanted was a shower to get all the saltwater off.  Not happening, since the water pressure was gone!  Apparently the hotel was working on the pipes so we just went down to the pool to trade seawater for chlorine.  By the time we got back, water pressure was back up and we were able to get ready for dinner.

After a delicious meal followed by the best key lime pie EVER at Mrs. Mac's, we headed to a bar called the Pilot House, which has a glass floor.  You can totally see the water below and even feed the fish through a hole in the floor!  I had a key lime martini which was basically pie in a glass.  Freakin' awesome ya'll.
Sad to say we had to leave the next morning but we managed to purchase some key lime chocolate and a baby key lime tree on our way out of town.  I officially have a new favorite vacation spot, though.  And soon I'll have the homemade pie to take me back...at least for a brain-cation when I need it!  Enjoy some pics :)

 The African Queen!

 Sunset sailing

 The sign reads "Watch for falling coconuts"

 Feeding the fish at the Pilot House.  They eat oatmeal

 Snorkel friends

   Chillin' with Jesus

no gnomes allowed

It's garden time again!  Early last month I picked up some new veggie sprouts and seeds to give agriculture another go.  Last year I had a hell of a time battling with squash bugs (yes, that's what they're called) and diseased tomatoes after a good first batch.  Let's hope I learned something because this year we've got the following:
Squash
Zucchini
Tomatoes
Green beans
Corn
Bell peppers- green, red, and orange
Herbs

So far everything looks okay, I even picked my first squash off the plant this evening.  Nothing around to cook for dinner so it looks like I'll be having a squash.  And another glass of Keel and Curly Winery's Tangerine Tango Zinfandel.  If you're here in Florida, go get a bottle from Publix.  I'm usually not a red wine drinker (Lakeridge's Sunblush is as dark as I'll go) but this stuff is awesome!  It's like juice, only better.

Back on track now...

About the squash bugs- I've sprayed enough chemicals on those plants to kill every bug on the block, let's hope it works. 

Oh!  I also dug up my strawberry plants from last year and moved them to a box inside the screen.  Turns out the only reason I wasn't getting any berries at all was that the birds were getting to them first.  Admittedly, I only really get about 1 or 2 a week but they're a nice suprise and, after a quick shot with the garden hose, I eat them right off the plant.  We also planted a pineapple in a large pot.  Whether or not this is going to work is TBD because we bought one, ate it, and planted the top part that we cut off.  No Google research on this or anything but we're hoping in 2 or 3 years we get a result.

The herbs are in good form, as usual.  My rosemary plant is turning into Audrey II and that stupid mint I planted last year and then dug up because it started spreading and taking over the whole right side, has found its way back from the dead and started sprouting in the herb box.  Note: If you want to plant mint because you're like, "hey mojitos are awesome and now I can make them whenever I want!" STAY AWAY.  Or plant it in a pot where it can't get out.  I've been trying to track down some sage because I think it's sophisticated and plus I saw a really good looking pork recipe on the cooking channel that I want to try and I need sage.  Haven't had any luck finding plants though.

Anyway, here's a look!

Other than this, we've been crazy busy painting the house and relandscaping.  That'll be my next post, so until then... :)