Chalkboard and Grill Tools

I picked up a chalkboard from IKEA as-is recently:

I assembled it upside down, and added a bunch of hooks, then mounted it on the wall by the back door:

A little chalk to add color:

And then I hung up the grill tools. The cast iron pan also goes with the grill:

When we left these tools on the grill, they mysteriously wound up all over the patio. Now they are safely out of reach of little hands.

New Saw!

Brianna got me a new cordless saw for my birthday! I've never had a cordless saw before.

Brianna stopped laughing and got very serious when I posed like this:

(I thought it was funny)

The saw matches my new drill, and uses the same batteries! Incidentally, the drill is still on the original battery charge it started with at Christmas. My old drill's battery died within a day, whether I used it or not:

Window Cleaning

The wall by the front door had developed an unpleasant brown streak from top to bottom, seeming to originate from the window above the door. Turns out the condensation on the inside of the window was picking up dirt from the window, then draining down along a specific path, leaving dirt streaks on the wall. So I got to clean the window today.

Some Windex and a few paper towels later, and the window is crystal clear again!

One More Picture Shelf in Nursery

I used my new drill to put up one last picture shelf in the nursery today.

Brianna and her mom bought the letters from Hobby Lobby and then colored them with tissue paper and a clear glue. I'm not 100% sold on the colors, but I can live with them.

Leaf Blower

Our new leaf blower arrived today:

It runs off the same battery as the weed whacker. Barely. Well, it should do a good job of cleaning up after I use an actual rake on most of the leaves (Hey, it was only $40!)

And we do have leaves. It seems like most of them fell while I was in Washington.

Brianna's New iPhone

Brianna's iPhone suffered some water damage back in November, and ever since then she's been soldiering through with my old, busted-microphone, three-year-old iPhone.

Today, her shiny new iPhone 6 arrived:

Now, Brianna will tell you that she doesn't care all that much about technology (and compared to me, there might be some truth there) but she's been on pins and needles waiting for this phone to show up. She unboxed it herself, then I stole it for half an hour to transfer her old phone's data over to the new one (and let me tell you, restoring a new iPhone from an old backup does not "just work", Apple). Since then she's been huddled over the phone, grinning, giggling and occasionally gasping.

I am very happy that Brianna has a new phone with a fantastic camera and lots of storage space for photos and videos. A little over two months from now, I expect the rate of picture taking to go up dramatically.

My First Ladder!

I haven't purchased a big tool in a while!

Brianna's Dad has been very gracious about letting me steal borrow his ladders (for over 6 months now!) But I knew eventually he would need them back.

I've been keeping my eye on daily deals websites, and earlier this week Woot.com had a couple of Little Giant ladders on sale. I was able to get a 22-foot Little Giant ladder for just $180, and the best part is: Shipping was only five dollars!

I think this ladder will serve my household needs quite well in the years to come. And it compacts down really small!

I should have no problem getting the rest of the house painted with this ladder.

The plan is to kick Brianna out of the house next weekend and finish painting, by the way.

More Firewood and Back Yard

I finished up the last couple of logs from yesterday. I finished filling up the wood shed, and stacked the remaining small, un-split logs next to the woodshed. So, I'm all done with all the big logs. There are still a number of branches with leaves on them in that back pile, though.

Brianna's been asking me to trim off the bottom layer of branches on this tree for a while now. According to her, the prickly branches give the local rabbits an "unfair advantage" over Eva during chases.

Since I already had the chainsaw out, so I made 3 or 4 quick cuts, and had it trimmed down.

I couldn't think of a better option, so I threw the branches back in the same area I've been cleaning out.

Does anyone know if conifer branches are safe for chickens? I think that tree is some kind of fir. Or at least, it smells like a christmas tree. Apparently it's a Blue Spruce.

First Power Outage

We had our first power outage today, during a thunderstorm. Lasted about 20 minutes. The emergency flashlights did their job.

Neato Robotic Vacuum

Brianna and I have had robotic vacuums for a while now. I started off with a Roomba back in Texas, but it eventually broke, and I killed it harder while trying to fix it (it's in my parts bin now). Brianna bought this Neato Robotic Vacuum back in Washington, and it has served us fairly well.

Unfortunately, it started to choke on Brianna's long hair - the hair strands actually worked themselves all the way to the brush motor and jammed it tight. Removing the motor for cleaning involves removing 28 screws and being careful not to disturb any other electronics. Eventually the motor jammed completely, and I had to replace it with one from eBay. I thought that would have fixed it, but now the left bump sensor is stuck.

Sigh. Guess I'll take it apart again and try to fix it sometime this week.

Weed Trimmer

Part of the deal when we bought this house, with the big backyard that Brianna loved, was that Brianna would do most of the yard work. And honestly, Brianna has kept that bargain better than I ever expected.

She's been using a lawn mower that we're borrowing from her brother, but we didn't have a trimmer that could do the edging.

This trimmer popped up as a refurbished model on eBay for $65. Worx doesn't have the best reputation for heavy-duty equipment, but our use-case is pretty light - just a pass around the perimeter of the yard. I'm curious how well this battery-powered trimmer holds up long term, but for $65 it seemed worth the risk. It's hanging up in the shed now.

Garage Saling

Brianna took me garage saling in a very nice neighborhood on Saturday, and we got a couple of great deals. I don't have pictures of everything but here's a taste:

We picked up a filing cabinet for just two dollars, to supplement our single-width, overflowing filing cabinet we have had since we got married:

And I picked up a Sears wet/dry vac for my workshop for twelve dollars - I will finally be able to get the sawdust out of the nooks and crannies down there!

Step Stool

Should have bought one of these when we moved in. Makes putting on masking tape way easier.

(yeah, this one's for you Jarred).

Unpacking My New Work Shop

After assembling my new workbench, I kept going with setting up my new working space.

Having one central place to keep tools is going to be really nice. In setting up the space, I've already used it a bit: I had to cut down the pegboard by about 4 inches to fit the wall, and I cut a few other pieces of wood as well, all using my saws-all. I might have to get a shop-vac in the near future. The light above the workbench is actually coming from my second strip of LED lights, this time a brighter 5050 SMD strip. The continuous strip of light means it is almost impossible to get shadows on the workbench, which is fantastic.

Here is a shot of the wall opposite from the workbench:

The white cabinet in the corner is actual an IKEA wardrobe from the as-is section - retails for $100, and I paid $10. I'll have to grab some shelves for it later this week. The bookshelf on the right has some white tubs Brianna bought for previous kitchens. Now that she actually has cabinet space in her kitchen, I've stolen them and will unpack my crates of parts and bits (two of them are visible in the photo: on the left and inside the white cabinet) into these small white tubs. I'll actually be able to find something without dumping out an entire crate!

I'm pretty excited to have a dedicated working space!

Birthday Present from the In-Laws

I got some money from Brianna's parents for my birthday recently (...there was a slight time delay). I was originally planning to get some sort of tool to help with the house, and was thinking along the lines of a miter saw. Ultimately, I decided to go with something more foundational: a workbench. I picked it up from Harbor Freight on the way home from work today.

It's in a flat pack box in the basement right now. Sigh. Another piece of furniture to assemble. :-)

I am looking forward to having a good surface to work on again. And this one should be pretty solid and stationary for a few years.

Emergency Flashlight

We've had a couple of instances since moving in where we needed a flashlight, and even though I know we have several I couldn't find them. 

I purchased this Energizer Rechargable Flashlight. It plugs directly into an outlet and stays there until it's needed. If the power goes out, it turns on - making it easy to find when all the other lights no longer work.

Unfortunately, it's really not all that bright. So, I like this idea, and will probably get something else like this for each floor.

Pet Door Installed

Finally had a nice enough day to install the pet door. It was my first time using my new Saws-all!

It took a good half hour of training, but Eva eventually crawled through it, and is comfortable with letting herself back into the house.

The whole point of this smart, RFID reading door is to prevent Bob the Cat from getting out of the house. As the door is currently configured, however, any pet can get out, and only animals with an approved RFID tag can get back in. I'll have to dig into the manual to figure that one out. For the time being, I've locked all exiting privileges, and allowed Eva's tag entry to the house.

Ratcheting Screwdriver

I should have gotten one of these years ago.

Haven't had much time to use it, but the ratcheting seems to work fine, and they did an awesome job of storing a bunch of bits in the handle.

Brian's new toy.

We stopped by the hardware store today to pick up more door handles. Found last year's model Skil reciprocating saw on clearance. Now I have a new toy tool! First job will be installing a doggie door.