Handy Andrew

In case you're wondering why I didn't label the post with the seemingly more obvious choice of "Handy Andy", it simply because no one calls Andrew "Andy".  It just wouldn't seem like I was talking about my husband!

So I'll start this off by saying this is an example of a rare occurrence where Andrew was right and I was wrong. Very rare.  He called me at work and told me he wanted to install a shelf on our sun porch for our plants...actually, he told me he had already bought the shelf.

I wasn't too keen on the idea of screwing something into our walls, as I told him, wouldn't it make more sense to get a cheap, short bookcase-type of furniture or a plant stand so we could move it around at will?

Andrew would not be swayed from his vision, and like all good husbands, sensed that it would be futile to change my mind over the phone and calmly ended the conversation.  Like all good attorneys, I think he had already had his persuasive argument planned out in his head for when we both got home at night.

This was the situation we were dealing with - due to Phu's green thumb and generosity in sharing plant clippings as well as a few potted vegetables we've been nurturing over the summer, our sun porch is overrun with plants.

Don't get me wrong, it's nice to sit out on the porch and be surrounded by the plants and the view of the park next door. It's just not so nice to have the only surface suitable for holding drinks covered with flower pots.

Andrew described his vision of where he would install a shelf and how he would do it and I gave him the all clear to move forward (admittedly, in a somewhat exasperated tone of voice).  The end result was beyond my expectations.

The shelf stretches perfectly from one end of the porch to the other, and is aligned to fit snugly under the existing window frame.

End result: a charming display for our plants, more sunlight for all of them and a tidy looking table that's ready for a plate and a drink.

As a side note, while I call them "our plants", they are truly Andrew's labor of love. He putters around each night watering them (if you look closely in this picture, you can see the teeny little green pepper growing on the plant Andrew's watering):

Clearly, they're flourishing under his care, as these two tomato plants demonstrate.  I just wish the plants would flourish enough to start producing some edible additions to our kitchen!



Just Call Us Gym Rats...

This may look like an ordinary basement to the uneducated eye, but for Andrew and me, it's our home gym.  We actually call it the {insert our last name} gym (original name, I know) but just because it's named doesn't mean that it's open for public use (take your sweat elsewhere, Phu!) 
Total number of machines in our gym? A whopping two, including our trusty treadmill (Andrew's main Christmas gift last year) and the Bowflex (Andrew's main gift this year):

Sad to say, the treadmill was neglected during the last couple months leading to the wedding and was even used as storage for shower gifts that we couldn't fit upstairs into our kitchen storage! However, it being a new year, and feeling inspired by New Year's resolutions, we're making the effort to be healthy. That means a regular exercise regimen - complete with an old-fashioned, pen and paper tracking calendar - as well as eating healthier. Sad to say, that means no "baking without a cause" as I promised Andrew. However, there are always events coming up that will require something sweet (two on my work calendar for this month, in fact) so this does not mean the end of baking posts! It just means I'll have to reserve my time and efforts for some really good recipes.

PS - I have to give a shout out for my Kindle, I didn't think it was possible to love it even more but it's wonderful for reading while you're on the treadmill.

Straight Out Of A Catalog

The past couple of days - who am I kidding, the whole past week - has been consumed by preparing for a housewarming BBQ where we would introduce our friends to the house for the first time. While family and a few select friends were able to see the house from the beginning (in really rough shape), we decided we were ready to show off the house to the world and were using it as motivation to finally unpack some of the last boxes that were lingering around.

So while my camera was fully charged and ready to take pictures, I completely forgot to take any in the craziness of the day while fulfilling my hostess duties.  However, I did manage to snap this photo in the calm before guests descended. Andrew had been consumed with getting our three season porch ready for the party, which included moving boxes out of it (since we had been using it for storage space), building our patio furniture and locating lights for it. I'll take credit for finding new pillows to replace the dreary pillows that came with the set. The end result was something that looked picture perfect, like something out of a Pottery Barn catalog:

It's the perfect place to sit and enjoy the summer weather, catch breezes from outside and the overhead fan while enjoying a cold beverage.

Andrew's parents were the first to enjoy the room the night before our BBQ for a quick drink and then I had a group of friends spend most of the day in it on Saturday. As one of them put it, "I could spend all day in here - in fact, I think I just did!"

I know this is a bit of a no-brainer statement but it was incredibly exciting to show off the house to everyone and hear how much people liked it. Four months after buying the house, Andrew and I still have no regrets about our decision and we take a lot of pride in finding new things (at bargain prices) to turn the house into our home.

Green Acres Is The Place To Be

Andrew and I are becoming quite the domestic homemakers. Needless to say, we've been spending the past couple of weeks at Lowes (on top of the countless trips that Andrew had already been making). But this was the first time we headed into the Garden section. Here's a shot of one our shopping carts below. That's right ONE of our shopping carts. We ended up needing two to haul all the plants that we had picked out.

Arriving home, while Andrew was puttering in the yard, I had all our new plants lined up on the ledge ready to go:

The little section we had selected for the plants was occupied by a large bushy thing with purple flowers. It had a certain charm (despite all the bees crawling all over it) but we decided it had to go:

We believe that big plant was sage based on the shape and smell of the leaves (plus a marker we found buried in the dirt), so I picked a few leaves and froze them before we uprooted the bush.

In its place, lots of young seedlings waiting to grow us tons of yummy things to eat (that's how I like to picture it).  I got a little carried away in the aisles of Lowe's and ended up picking strawberry and blackberry plants, and what I believed to be a fig bush. When we got home and actually read up on figs, we realized it was actually a tree that can grow up to ten feet tall and wide. Whoops!

Andrew did a great job of uprooting the unruly sage plant and tilling the dirt with our handy dandy garden claw:

With a lot of digging and potting soil, I transferred all the plants to their new home. There isn't much open space in our backyard that isn't devoted to Andrew's grass growing project or paved, but I like the fact that I can see how far my plants have progressed during the day when I come home from work each day.  Joining the plants I mentioned above, I also added a few varieties of tomatoes, one red pepper plant, one yellow pepper plant and one cucumber plant. I also sprinkled some wildflower and carrot seeds that we had received free with Andrew's grapevine purchase in some open patches:

That's our new garden upfront, with Andrew's grapevines around the corner to the right, and our deck overlooking it all:

A week later, it's amazing to see the plants' progress already. They look healthier, taller and have multiple new leaves. As I keep telling everyone, I will be thrilled even if only one of these plants bears something edible this summer.

Weeds vs. Plants

Can you tell which is which?

We really couldn't, even after consulting the landscape design blueprint the previous owners had left behind:

But using the map as a guideline, we methodically took out any type of plant we guessed was a weed. We started off doing the weeding by hand, but really got going once Amy discovered the garden claw in our garage (a relative had given it to me years ago and I had forgotten we owned it):

Of course, Andrew wanted to get in on the garden claw action:

Success! We were amazed at how big some of the root systems were for the weeds:

Afterwards, we admired a neat and trim perimeter.

I think doing yard work really made me feel like a homeowner. Andrew's been handling all the yard work for the past couple of months (even putting down grass seed a few weeks ago that is sprouting nicely) but this was the first time I got out a few hours to get work done. I probably accomplished around 5% of the work, but feel inspired now to plant flowers and vegetables in some of our newly cleared spaces.

Progress Comes In Small Steps

Behold the fruit of Andrew's labor - specifically an hour removing and take apart a boxspring:

This may not look like much but what you don't know is the picture was taken upstairs. Yup, the boxspring made it up to our second floor after forcing it around a bend in the stairs and some careful maneuvering around protruding nails. That's right, we're one step closer to setting up our beds, all without having to cut our boxsprings. Of course, this is all dependant on Andrew's skill with his newly acquired staple gun! And we still have one more boxspring left in our dining room.

UPDATE: Woohoo! Andrew managed to successfully put the boxspring back together after using a drill and screws. The first morning we slept on our a newly elevated bed, I promptly forgot how high up we were and stumbled off of it when my alarm went off in the morning.  A clear sign that we spent way to much time sleep on a matress on a floor.

Just Forget You Know Us...

We're almost two weeks into the new house, and we're slowly settling into a routine. I wake up an obscenely early hour, shower, dress and drive into work to arrive at 7 am so I can leave at 4 pm (if I'm lucky) and beat the worst of the commute home. What time I leave each day makes a difference in whether I'm facing a 30 minute or a 60 minute plus commute. The house still feels a little like it belongs to someone else and I'm just a guest in it, but Andrew and I are doing our best to make it our own a little more each day.

By this, I mean Andrew and I have been trying to unpack a little each night. It's been tough to find the time since a rough start with the great flood of 2010 - heck, I barely have the energy to throw together a sandwich for dinner. Plus, we're hampered by the fact that we don't have enough furniture to unpack stuff into, but haven't had the free time during the week or the weekends to devote a lot of time into looking at furniture (although we do spend a lot of time each night browsing furniture online!)

This is why our dining room (the main repository of boxes, ahead of the basement) looks like this - since we don't have a dining table, there's plenty of storage space for the time being. In case you're wondering, those are our boxsprings to the right, which don't fit up our new stairs. Yup, that means we've been sleeping on a mattress on the floor.

And, Andrew and I are in NYC this weekend for an event that can't be missed, so this pile isn't going to budge.  Which is why you shouldn't take it the wrong way when I ask that you forget that Andrew and I exist for the next couple of weeks. No social engagements = more time unpacking and buying furniture. We'll give you a call when we're ready to come up for air.

Send the Ark Away!

The flood waters are finally retreating (the bucket has been serving as our perimeter marker) although the water is still deep enough in the public park next to our house that I saw kids using inner tubes to float on it today.

In case you're wondering, no, the park doesn't even usually have a pond so that's all rain water! And, our basement is finally dry. Hallelujah for a streak of sunny, warm weather!

Hello Beautiful!

From reading my last post, obviously, our first weekend in the house has been a little rough. But nothing compares to walking through the house and loving every nook and cranny because we own it (even the waterlogged sections!)

This includes the appliances - I can't tell you how much joy I've received from putting our groceries away in a roomy fridge or running a cycle of dishes in a dishwasher that actually works!

The one thing that I've been bummed about is the fact that I have yet to unearth my mixing bowl and baking ingredients to whip up a baked treat in my gorgeous new oven:

Needless to say, it's a marked improvement over the oven I was using for the past eight years:

Good bye hot spots, uneven baking, burnt tops and undercooked interiors - hello cheesecakes, pies, souffles and other delicate items!

Rain, Rain, Just Go Away!

OK, I've got a lot of catch-up blogging to do. Last week was actually pretty interesting and I remember to take pictures for most of it.

But the thing that consumed most of our time was moving. Moving in a nor'easter rain storm. Not too much fun. It's Sunday, and we're tired, facing tons of boxes and dirty floors.  Then we look out the window to see that our new backyard has now turned into a pond:

This causes a sleepless night for both of us, as Andrew compulsively wakes up every couple of hours to check to make sure that the basement isn't getting any water. Miraculously, it's not getting anything except a little dampness under one window.

Monday morning brings a new trickle in a different corner but we're amazed at the fact that the massive amount of water outside still hasn't found a way into our basement. The water has definitely moved into the car port and the empty garage, but thankfully, the house and basement are located on an upward swope from the rest of the backyard. 

As a precautionary measure, Andrew takes the day off from work to keep an eye on the basement while I test out my first (longer) commute into work (which takes forever considering that every road surrounding my builiding is closed due to flooding!). Andrew keeps me posted throughout the morning, and out of the blue, sends me a somewhat panicked email in the early afternoon. I leave work immediately and this is what the backyard looks like now (note how flooded the park is next to our backyard):

Our neighbor's yard looks even more flooded, but luckily, their house is set way up from the water:

And the flood in our basement. Andrew and I are bailing water with a work shop vacuum and improvised buckets for a couple of hours, and then are assisted by Andrew's dad Tom (who also left work early), his workshop vac and a pump. They spend the next couple of hours bailing even more water and finally got it down to a level where the automatic pump is removing pretty much the same amount of water that's coming in:

Best use for a champagne cork goes to Andrew for his idea to plug a hole in the basement with it - this means my uncle Rich gets thanked twice - once for getting us the champagne Andrew and I toasted each other with last night as homeowners and once for unknowingly helping us with our basement woes!

The weather forecast is calling for the rain to end by midnight (it's about time) and for sunny days and warm weather for the rest week. I guess this is what being a homeowner means - dealing with the unexpected things that crop up. I just would've appreciated at least one week to unpack things before dealing with a flooded basement!

Every Day Should End Like This...

I'm not saying that everything was smooth sailing in buying our first house but the sellers did leave us a nice surprise in the fridge:

Official gift: A bottle of champagne and a box of chocolates with a note wishing us happiness in the house. 

Unofficial gift - a lone can of Bud Light that was sitting on the bottom shelf - we're thinking that they forgot  about it somehow!