Good for Another Hundred Years

 I have finished caning the dining room chairs.  I ended up doing six total.  There was the first Ugly Chair that we had at the table.  Then I repaired the ruined one that had sat up in the attic. We picked up a few extras to round out our set of eight and ended up with nine matching chairs.  All but three of them had some degree of damage to the seats.

I enjoyed spending an afternoon in the woodshop.  I would put an audio book on my can speaker and arrange my tools and spend a couple of hours pulling cane.

I did three last spring and three this winter.  There is only room for six around the table, so now we have three extra chairs tucked here and there around the house.

The sixth chair is the one that I am most proud of.  I finally got neat little Xs around all four sides.  There may be a wayward strand here or there, but for the most part this is an example of a competent caning job.

I still have this oddball round, red chair to do for fun. Since I have been putting photos up on Facebook, I have had a few local friends mention that they have chairs that need to be repaired.  It might be fun to do one now and then.

More Outside Puttering

This morning was mild and pleasant.  The kind of day when you feel you should be outside doing something.  And we have wintery weather forecast to return next week, so if we wanted to play outside, this was the day to do it.

 

Besides raking up some sticks, the driveway was rolled to firm it up.  This changed the fresh gravel from feeling as if you were walking on sifting sands to rock hard pavement.

I noticed that some of the hyacinth bulbs I planted are coming up.  It is exciting to think that the days of colorful flowers will come again.

My pile of chopped leaves was thawed out enough to dress up the tulip bed.

There is no point putting leaves on anything in the fall because the winds will scatter them everywhere.  Hopefully the upcoming snow will flatten them.  I threw some compost on top to hold them down.  This will help insulate the soil from the upcoming freeze and thaw cycles.  It is good to get outside and do just a little something.

Dressing up the Driveway

 

This is an old photo from a previous post, but its that time of year again.  The driveways need a little attention to replace gravel that has drifted away or sunk into the mud.  We just sprinkle a little on top and smooth it out with a rake.  It keeps the garage floor clean and prevents pot holes from forming.

I also watered my transplanted apple tree.  The down side to beautiful weather is that you don't get the usual amount of moisture and transplanted or container plants can get too dry.   I should probably also water the perennials in the whiskey barrels.  That will be a little chore for tomorrow.

Winter Weeding

Every winter we get a few breaks when you can go out and spend some time in the garden.  Yesterday was absolutely perfect for picking up sticks and leaves.

It got up to 49F.

There are a few spots where the weeds were flourishing.  Even flowering.

There are few weeds in the raised beds but the ones that are there were getting pretty big.  I pulled them all.

The last of the lettuce was down for the count.

The tulips are eager to get going.

This morning was very cold and clear with freezing fog and hoar frost.

The silly blue birds were in the middle of their mating ritual and checking out the bird house.  I've even seen a few robins.  They'll have to face reality though.  The ground hogs are predicting an early spring but I think we have at least a month to go.