In the garden, and RAIN!!!!
POSTED BY: SIGNYM
UPDATED: Thursday, December 25, 2025 04:27
VIEWED: 1005090
PAGE 971 of 1154
Hopefully it stays warm by you, Brenda.
Back to the 20's tomorrow and lows in the teens at night.
At least I don't see any single digits or negative nights in the 10 day forecast though.
Made the most of today though. It was nice having a break from the suck.
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Primed both sides of the top three shelves. Had just enough primer in the gallon to do it without having to open a new one. Sweet. One more gallon used up and out in the trash.
I'll let it dry overnight before putting any wood putty on there. Hopefully I'll have contact paper on them and get them up in the pantry this weekend. I want to give it 2 or so days for the paint to cure before putting the paper on. Might be able to finish them tomorrow otherwise.
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Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Hopefully it stays warm by you, Brenda.
Back to the 20's tomorrow and lows in the teens at night.
At least I don't see any single digits or negative nights in the 10 day forecast though.
Made the most of today though. It was nice having a break from the suck.
--------------------------------------------------
Vaccinated People: "You need to get muh vaccination shots that don't work because I got muh vaccination shots that don't work and I'm afraid of people that didn't get muh vaccination shots that don't work because muh vaccination shots that don't work don't work."
Suppose to be dry tomorrow then sunny Friday and the weekend. Hope so.
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Mah jong in the morning.
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Quote:GOOD LUCK!
Originally posted by Brenda:
Mah jong in the morning.
Nice to hear about your weather.
Maybe this means storms will track further south and well get some rain?
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
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I made the awesomest fancy dinner a few nights ago, also the last PITA dinner for a while.
Since hubby "hates chicken" I'm always looking for ways to disguise it, since it's better for us than beef or porl, so I always keep it in the menu rotation. So I tried an experiment, using a recipe for "twice cooked pork" (think tempura pork) with sweet and sour sauce from my Asian cookbook with chicken breast instead to see if it would work, and it did!
The sweet and sour sauce is not like the sauce you normally think of, since it has red and green peppers, onion, water chestnuts, ketchup, and peas, so it's a vegetable-rich topping. But since daughter "hates tomato" and "hates red pepper" I followed the sweet and sour cause recipe, but instead of using ketchup and diced red pepper I blenderized yomato sauce and red pepper so that it wasn't visible as chunks.
Hubby was suspicious of the meat. "what is this?" I made him guess, and he guessed pork. Good disguise! He was surprised it was chicken.
Daughter -of course- avoided the onion and green pepper, but she thought the red stuff made a tasty dipping sauce, and was vastly surprised to learn that it had TWO ingredients that she thought she hated - tomato and red pepper- expanding, at least for that dish- her palette of available healthy colored vegetables.
I rarely deep fry anything, this is an exception. And to make the dinner even more vegetable-rich, I made a version of chow mein that included julienned carrot, leftover bean sprouts, leftover snow peas, leftover pre-prepared calorie-free shitataki noodles, ginger, tamari, garlic, bamboo shoots and sesame oil.
So while meal was a PITA I did manage to disguise some "hated" ingredients into a tasty dish and make a healthful, low-carb meal.
But for the next few days its going to be plain home-cooking, like pulled pork and cole slaw and lots of salads, since the weather's been so hot (80-90F)
When the weather cools down on Monday or Tuesday it's back to soups like ham-veggie and beef-veggie and chicken dumpling, my three standards.
I'm always thinking of my family's health when I'm menu-planning and try to include a lean source of protein, a green(ish) vegetable (zucchini, spinach, celery okra, parsley, green beans etc) a non-green vegetable or fruit (carrots, sweet potato, beets, watermelon, cantaloupe, red pepper, tomato etc) and a low-calorie tummy-filler (cabbage, shiratkai noodles, cauliflower etc)
*****
Got good news on my cardiac function, which is checked every 3 months bc one of the monoclonal antibodies can give ppl heart failure, and my ejection fraction is still right up there at 70pct.
*****
I set up the humidifiers in the bedrooms last night since this hot unseasonable weather is thanks to a strong, dry Santa Ana. I'm glad I did, it makes for much more comfortable sleeping for everyone.
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
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Glad you got some good health news. Reading your post is making me hungry. I'm not a terrible cook, but I have an extremely limited menu with the bulk buys and I really miss eating like a king when I lived at my Grandma's in my mid-20s. You've got a lucky family for sure.
Got the wood putty on the 3 top shelves. I'm not going crazy and removing every single imperfection on them. It was plywood, afterall, and I knew that without having a $10,000 drum sander I wasn't going to have a perfect surface. And really, if I wanted it to be perfect I should just buy prefabbed IKEA crap.
There was some damage from the saw blade on the edges though, and I definately wanted to fill in the knots.
The primer didn't fill in much on the edges. Rather than fill in all the edges, I just dry-fit the pieces again after primer and decided which edge would be the front and filled just that edge in since once installed nobody would ever see the other three.
I didn't want to set these things up in the basement since it's so cold down there, but that means that I can't put a fan on them to hasten the drying time since they're staged on paint cans on top of cardboard in my livingroom and I'm sure as hell not putting on a fan while it's this cold in my house.
I should be able to sand it by the end of the day regardless. If I'm feeling up to it, I might at least get one coat of paint on it before midnight, but that might have to wait until tomorrow.
I'm going to finish some paperwork I mostly completed yesterday, do a little cleaning up and get my rebate completed so I can get that sent out. They owe me over $200 now, so I'm not going to wait on that.
I think I'll pull the contact paper off the old pantry shelves after all. I've decided that eventually I want to throw out all of those dressers I have in my garage for storage and replace them with shelving units. I've gotten pretty good at making them with scrap wood and pallets and I could make one or two more smaller units with that wood rather than throwing it out. Since they'll be garage shelves, I won't have to worry about sanding down lead paint and I can just throw a coat or two of whatever paint I've got lying around that I want to get rid of when I build them in the spring/summer.
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I do love readung about your progress, SIX! It makes me happy to know that you're forging ahead.
I have a ???, tho: What is that gray color on the walls? It's perfect - not too dark, but dark enough to show up nicely against white trim, and not at all harsh and cold-looking. It's so classy! And you're right: it goes perfectly with the flooring. Nice pick!
*****
Aside from cooking, I've been keeping up with housecleaning and the odd random small project. Since it's been so hot the only thing I've been doing outdoors lately is watering, but my windowsill herbs sprouted. Also, have a largish indoor plant, taller than me, but the pot was in a 1.5 X 2.5 flatish tray (originally from a large birdcage). Turns out that the pot had legs that kept the soil from soaking up the water, and since its in an unheated room the water wasn't evaporating and got a good head of white mold on it. Didn't want that throwing off spores all the time, so I found a tub originally used to drain motor oil, cleaned that up, scooped out enough of the water from the tray so I could handle the tray without spilling, xfered the plant pot into the tub (a much better fit, and taller, allowing water to contact the soil so I can "water from below"), and cleaned out the tray. I will use that to hold my garden seedlings, since THIS year I want to plant cucumbers that can withstand hot summers, and grow more tomatoes specifically for sauce bc I want to can some for the winter.
For the residual white mold, I read that cinnamon does a good job killing it, so I sprinkled some into the tub and it seems to have done the trick.
My next project is burnishing the bedframe and putting a light layer of mahongany stain on the plywood aprons to match the birch ply to the beech frame (which has a more rosy tone) so hubby can FINALLY finish it. I've already tried the staining on scrap lumber so I know it will work well.
But, many more doctor's appointments this week, so first watering (so the plants don't croak), kitchen cleanup and the every three-week housecleaning.
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Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
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Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:
I do love readung about your progress, SIX! It makes me happy to know that you're forging ahead.
I have a ???, tho: What is that gray color on the walls? It's perfect - not too dark, but dark enough to show up nicely against white trim, and not at all harsh and cold-looking. It's so classy! And you're right: it goes perfectly with the flooring. Nice pick!
Thanks.
I'll get the colors for you that I've used. Which grey were you talking about though? In the Pantry? I've gone with several different colors now. The pantry and closet were both painted with one of the colors I had bought back in November 2019 but decided against using in the Kitchen and Living Room. I believe it was meant for the kitchen, since it was an eggshell, and the matte color was for the living room. I'm pretty sure that there is just a hint of green in it that probably isn't evident from the photos.
The accent color for both the kitchen and living room, which is by far the darkest of all the colors is called Antique Pewter. That's the only one I know off hand. The other 3 walls in the living room are a 2nd color, the other 3 walls in the kitchen are a 3rd color and now the closet and pantry make for a 4th color. Aside from the Antique Pewter, they're all fairly similar with just some subtle differences in shade for a different feel from room to room.
But again, I'll say that I wouldn't recommend this line of paint unless you're patient and don't mind painting a room 3 times. The price was right, and I believe it will actually hold up to washing really well, but it's a lot of extra work. I can get you the names of the colors, but I'd recommend if you want to use them that you find the closest matching color in a higher quality of paint.
Quote:
Aside from cooking, I've been keeping up with housecleaning and the odd random small project. Since it's been so hot the only thing I've been doing outdoors lately is watering, but my windowsill herbs sprouted. Also, have a largish indoor plant, taller than me, but the pot was in a 1.5 X 2.5 flatish tray (originally from a large birdcage). Turns out that the pot had legs that kept the soil from soaking up the water, and since its in an unheated room the water wasn't evaporating and got a good head of white mold on it. Didn't want that throwing off spores all the time, so I found a tub originally used to drain motor oil, cleaned that up, scooped out enough of the water from the tray so I could handle the tray without spilling, xfered the plant pot into the tub (a much better fit, and taller, allowing water to contact the soil so I can "water from below"), and cleaned out the tray. I will use that to hold my garden seedlings, since THIS year I want to plant cucumbers that can withstand hot summers, and grow more tomatoes specifically for sauce bc I want to can some for the winter.
For the residual white mold, I read that cinnamon does a good job killing it, so I sprinkled some into the tub and it seems to have done the trick.
My next project is burnishing the bedframe and putting a light layer of mahongany stain on the plywood aprons to match the birch ply to the beech frame (which has a more rosy tone) so hubby can FINALLY finish it. I've already tried the staining on scrap lumber so I know it will work well.
But, many more doctor's appointments this week, so first watering (so the plants don't croak), kitchen cleanup and the every three-week housecleaning./b]
Glad to see you're keeping busy too. You've got to show pictures of the bedframe when you get a chance.
You were dealing with mold today too, huh? Gross.
I think mine was worse though.
I got the contact paper off of the other 9 shelves I decided to keep from the pantry. There's no way I'm ever going to use them for anything until after I get a chance to power wash them in the lawn in the spring though.
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Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:Quote:GOOD LUCK!
Originally posted by Brenda:
Mah jong in the morning.
Nice to hear about your weather.
Maybe this means storms will track further south and well get some rain?
-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake
I did have a bit of luck today. I won 3rd. Finished with 3,670 points. Got a couple of decent hands with over 1,000 points in them.
Well, right at this moment which is 2:30pm the weather is a little iffy. It was misting when I went out this morning for mah jong and coming back. So have to see.
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