About zefiart

Blogger, DIY-er, poodle lover, graphic designer, dog groomer, recycler, artist, wonder woman in my spare time.

up a ladder without a paddle – kitchen update

Posted on March 4, 2014 by zefiart

This last weekend saw a first for me – I painted the fascia on the front of the house at an altitude that had me ducking low flying planes.

Ok, ok, I exaggerate. I started painting the fascia… However, it was high. I’ve always been the ladder girl when it comes to painting – I’d never use one of those extension sticks with a roller. No way. It gives me a crook neck. I use a ladder and put all the strain on my leg muscles.

They are the strongest muscles in the body for good reason. They have to lug me around all day!

So, when doing any painting I’m always the one who gets the job cutting in around the ceiling. And painting the ceiling by climbing up, rolling a bit, getting down, loading up the roller, moving over a tad, climbing up, rolling a bit, getting down… you get the picture.

Its my version of a step class.

Well, this last Sunday had me doing the extreme version of that sport. And cause the only place the ladder could rest was on the aforementioned fascia (the one I was painting), and since there were more steps involved, it was a lot more climbing and a lot less brushing.

I had planned* to have all the white bits on the front of the house railing done. I did all the posts, porch side and garden side, and the inside of the fascia… and then it got hot.

I may have mentioned that I don’t do well in the heat? No?

I’m stubborn. I said I’d do it, I’d planned to do it, so by golly gosh I was going to do it!

I lugged out the ladder (with some help from my brawny half), fought with it to get it level and steady, then gamely climbed up the 323 steps and started painting. I painted about a foot, climbed down, wrestled the ladder over a foot and repeated.

About halfway across the front of the house my calf muscles started to shake.

I would have pushed myself to finish, but the highest bits were yet to come, and … did I mention it was hot?

I was about to make the decision to quit for the day when the decision was made for me… I stepped back from the ladder and right into the bucket of paint.

I now have a few white patches of grass and one white boot.

My failure to finish aside, other things did get done.

The gasfitter came and installed the gas lines. Here’s a pretty photo of our gas connection. We opted to go with smaller gas bottles we own and can fill as needed rather than pay rent on larger ones. You may not notice, but the gasfitter fitted the lines on the unfinished part of the porch enclosure. Handyman was not pleased.

Speaking of Handyman, he did a great job on making a slab for the gas bottles to sit on. And Barney promptly immortalised himself in the fresh concrete.

This is what that area used to look like – the end of the porch was pretty (now enclosed), but the ground sloped down in that spot and there was a broken concrete path that lead into the wall, and gravel. A mess basically. Having the slab there gives us a level area not only for the gas bottles but for my collection of ~~junk~~ decorative garden art.

Meanwhile, back in the kitchen a big hole appeared in the floor. This is where the floor dipped by almost an inch towards the wall. Handyman lifted the boards and raised up the joists to level out the floor, then he and Wayne moved the plumbing to the other wall where the sink and dishwasher are to be located.

It made total sense to use that huge hole to move pipes than to squeeze through a tiny door at the far end of the house and have to crawl under the house, dodging spiders all the way to the kitchen. It was a door direct to the spot they needed to get to. It would’ve been silly not to take advantage of it.

Neither Wayne nor Handyman were too upset about not becoming better acquainted with the arachnids under the floor.

So, plumbing moved. Gas fitted. Electrics almost done (will they ever be finished? I’m not sure.) Pine lining started. Floor work started.

Started. There’s still one piece of masonite to be removed. All nails have been removed or punched in on the rest of the floor and I’ve started sanding with the belt sander.

That may seem extreme considering I can hire a floor sander, but here’s the thinking…

1. I can’t lift a floor sander by myself. Sure, I have Wayne to do the heavy lifting, but he won’t be here when I’m doing it. Or shall I say, when I plan on doing it…*

2. I rather like the ‘unprofessional’ finish. I like character and imperfections. I want the floor to look old – not brand new and slickly polished.

3. I have nothing better to do than crawl around on my hands and knees sanding the floor.

4. I’m insane.

So, the plan is to have the floor sanded and give it one coat (or two) before Sunday.

That’s the plan…

a quick shot of power tools

Posted on March 1, 2014 by zefiart

I mentioned that the other day I got distracted from pulling nails out of the kitchen floor by the fact that I could finally reach my power tools.

Hello circular saw! Hey there jigsaw! Nice to see you again grinder! I sure have missed you guys!

So, while I was there admiring them, patting them, etc, I remembered that I’d promised Wayne I’d put a lid on the box he stores chaff in for the horses. Its a raised garden bed box made of pallet wood that we got (in pieces) from the Men’s Shed in New Norfolk. That’s a community based place where men can go and bond over power tools, as well as learn new skills.

Anyway, Wayne had put this together, lining it better so it would hold the chaff, but he’d never put a lid on it. Up till recently we’d been using pieces of leftover flooring as a lid and moving them out of the way to reach in.

I’d been hit on the head by a falling ‘lid’ a few times…

It was time for a proper lid.

I’d gotten some pieces of laminate flooring from a friend and one piece was almost the right size. Using that and a piece of old timber I’d found, I created a proper lid. I attached the bit of timber to the end to give the lid something to hinge off, then trimmed the lid to the right size.

Since the flooring is that click together stuff, I had to reinforce it with bits of pine that came out of the kitchen. I glued and screwed those into the back to give the lid strength.

Then I used some gorgeous big old hinges I’d picked up from a tip shop. (I tell you, my tip shop finds always come in handy!).

The flooring and the timber slat were different thicknesses, so to make the hinges fit properly I had to pack it up a bit. For this I used some of the masonite we’ve been pulling off the kitchen floor.

Waste not, want not!

Lastly, I found an old handle among my collection of junk, and voila! A working lid. Not perfectly finished, but hay (pun intended!), the horses don’t mind.

No more head bashing cause now when you open it, the piece of timber on the end allows the lid to sit back against the wall with the right lean so it won’t slam back down.

look what i found

Posted on February 28, 2014 by zefiart

I got a great email the other day from Laure,l from The North End Loft, telling me she had featured my tin crown in her Friday Finds post. Thank you Laurel!

http://www.thenorthendloft.com/2014/02/friday-finds.html

It got me thinking. Lots of bloggers do ‘finds’ type of posts once a week and its a great way to share things with your friends and followers. Maybe I should do it…

Then again I’m a ‘fair weather’ blogger. Sometimes I post a lot, other times I disappear for weeks and my friends have been known to phone E.T. to intercede on my behalf in case if I’ve been abducted.

Its all very well to have time to do everything I try to cram into my day, then I have to find time to blog. And most of the time I’m just too tired at the end of the day to answer emails, let alone be creative and blog.

I think I will join the ‘finds’ club, but make it a random thing… you know, more like a surprise than a reliable weekly thing.

So, in the spirit of sharing interesting things I’ve seen, been inspired by or found… here is the best idea for displaying art. I found it while browsing The North End Loft. Laurel made up boards with pegs and clips up different art according to the room and the mood. Isn’t it brilliant?

I think I’m going to make some of these for myself. There is only so much wall space in this house and there is just so much I’d like to display. Changeable displays are a wonderful idea.

Here are some great finds from a garage sale up the road a week ago. I love this old fashioned bike light… it’ll make a great something one day. And those clamps. I have ideas for those already, but you’ll see how one has already come in handy in an upcoming post.

I also found these two old scales to add to my collection. (Anything over 3 is a collection and I now have 4 of the hanging type and 5 of the table type scales). This first is wonderfully chippy with that lovely old fashioned green on the back.

The other has a lovely patina of rust and green. They’re both hanging on the side of the house for the time being, replacing the plants I had in hanging baskets.

Most of the plants I had in pots have gone into the ground now. The garden is looking wonderful. Most of the plants I put in have grown and the place is starting to look like someone loves it. If I continue in this vein my garden will soon look like a little old lady lives here.

– You know. The older the you get the more into gardening you are… the best cottage gardens usually belong to little old ladies who’ve been gardening for 30 years.

its all happening – kitchen update

Posted on February 27, 2014 by zefiart

Yesterday was one heck of a busy day. And every busy day begins with a busy day before cause I had to remove everything that wasn’t nailed down from the kitchen.

That means I had to empty all cupboards and find a spot for the necessities (toaster, jug, coffee) and rudimentary food prep and cleaning. We now have a temporary kitchen area in the office and are washing up in the bathroom sink.

Handyman got here early in the morning and we removed the rest of the kitchen cabinets, then he started removing the flooring – vinyl and masonite.

I helped. I got down on the floor and started removing nails. Fun job.

The kitchen is a real mess. We have holes in the walls, electrical cords taped to the wall (my idea to keep them off the ground where the dogs can touch them, even though they’re capped off). Speaking of caps, Handyman forgot to bring the caps for the taps so he had to put the tap back on so we could have water in the house without also having a swimming pool in the kitchen. Bet you’ve never seen a mixer tap used like this before!

We found that the bump on the floor is because there’s a rectangle of boards that was put in later or something. The joist along the wall in that area is about 1/2 inch lower than the rest, creating a wierd dip. The previous owners found it easier to trim the baseboards than to do the floor properly.

So my plan of sanding the floor this weekend goes out the window. I don’t think it’ll be smart to hire a sander for the weekend hoping that Handyman gets the floor issue sorted out on Saturday… Who knows what we’ll find when the floor comes up…

What did I say about this job growing with everything we start and can’t finish?

The electrician arrived to do a bit more wiring work. I somehow found the only electrician in Tasmania who believes in drip feeding his work. Seriously, he keeps calling to say he needs to come around and do something, does a small amount of work, then comes again a few days later to do a bit more.

Maybe he just likes my company!

Well, he’s a nice guy, neat, does a good job. And he likes country music. Anyone who likes Dwight Yoakam is a friend of mine. As long as it all comes together at the end I’ll be happy. He can’t finish the job till Aurora comes to move the electricity meter. Then he has to connect the stove and he’s done.

I had advertised the kitchen online and a guy came with a truck and a friend to pick it up. Thank goodness cause the porch was chockablock and I hadn’t been able to access my workshop area for weeks.

With all those cabinets gone, I was finally able to get to my power tools and I’m afraid that proved to be a temptation too hard to resist. I never finished pulling nails in the kitchen… I got distracted.

I’ll share my creations later. Meanwhile Wayne has been warned to stay out of the kitchen and I’m feeling better even though I have to make toast in my office and have aching hands.

Being creative makes my day.

the whole picture

Posted on February 24, 2014 by zefiart

I was reading a book the other day and a line popped out at me.

“Maybe things always look better when you can’t see the whole picture.”

The main character was referring to seeing herself and her friend cut up into thin slices in their reflections in some office building windows, how in small slices they looked thinner, their clothes looked nicer, the colours seemed more vibrant.

She’s right. Things do always look better when you can’t see the whole picture.

You can take it literally, like the slices of reflections and in the cropping of photos, or you can take it figuratively and see how it can refer to everything in life…

Have you ever admired someone else’s relationship from the outside, then gotten to know the people better and realised that it wasn’t so special after all? You could only see ‘slices’ of their life, maybe just the bits they wanted you to see, maybe just the bits you chose to see. Then when you see the full picture you see the ugly as well as the pretty.

Since I’m not a psychologist, this post isn’t about relationships but about cropping and how images can have so much more impact depending on how they’re cropped.

As you know I’m a graphic designer (or was in my previous life in Melbourne) so I know a bit about layout, balance and the aesthetics of pages whether on paper or the monitor. To me, cropping is a big deal.

Firstly, sometimes images need to be cropped to hide the crap I don’t want you to see!

Secondly, I have to crop to make things look prettier than they are in real life. You don’t want to see the weedy grass or the old boots lying on the porch. Trust me. You don’t.

So by cropping I not only make my house – and my life – look better, but I also spare you the reality of my life.

Now. Tell me. Aren’t you glad I know how to use the crop tool?

Mind you, I normally crop a lot when taking photos. I actually had a hard time finding photos I really needed to crop crap out of. Most of the time my photos come out like this one, not needing cropping to make them more interesting.

I’m just a smarty pants!

not my usual type of post

Posted on February 24, 2014 by zefiart

This is definitely not the type of thing I normally post about. I’ll get back to that later today.

This post is about something that has upset me deeply and which I cannot get off my mind since I watched 60 Minutes last night. They had a segment about the dolphin slaugher in Taiji in Japan.

I hadn’t planned on watching it, I didn’t want to watch it. I even tried to change channels. But then I told myself that closing my eyes and ignoring something would not make it go away, and would not help make the world a better place.

I’m an animal lover. I’m not a vegetarian though I should be. I just hate cruelty in any form. I believe that humans are omnivores, we eat meat, but that we should treat the animals we eat with compassion. They give our lives so we can eat, they deserve to be killed in a human and respectful manner. I hate killing for sport or fun or just for the sake of it.

The program last night has given me nightmares – although watching re-runs in the back of my mind all day isn’t a nightmare technically.

The Japanese herd these poor dolphins into a small cove during dolphin hunting season and then slaughter them. They say its tradition – but are power boats and the huge numbers dolphins they kill the same tradition thats been going on for centuries? Why would a tradition continue once the meat is toxic and unsafe to eat? They’re no longer killing dolphins to feed the people. What really got to me is that they select the ‘pretty’ ones to sell to marine parks around the world for mega bucks and kill the rest.

And how do they kill them now? They ram a steel rod into the dolphin, give it a bit of a poke and jiggle around inside, then plug the hole by pounding in a wooden plug so the blood won’t flow and colour the water with their shame. The dolphins die slowly from internal bleeding. There was footage of them doing this and you could see the dolphins seizing as they died slowly.

I’ll never be able to un-see that.

If its all so great and cultural, why are the fisherman hiding it? Why do they need to do it at night behind tarps, and why do they need to stop the blood from turning the water red?

I feel absolutely sickened.

Luc Besson, director of The Big Blue (one of my all time favourite films) and now my hero, has made a documentary/film about Taiji called The Cove. I haven’t seen it and I’m not sure I’ll be able to. Its bad enough having watched a sliver of an excerpt…

I couldn’t find the 60 Minutes story online but here’s CNN coverage.
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/01/20/world/asia/japan-dolphin-hunt/

This seems the sameto me as the dolphin slaughter in Denmark where dolphins are slaughtered yearly in a tradition where boys become men by butchering defenseless, trapped dolphins.
http://www.snopes.com/photos/hunting/dolphinhunt.asp

Only difference seems to be the Japanese are making millions from selling captured dolphins while the Danish are just using it as a right of passage.

Society no longer needs this type of “tradition” to eat, so why does it continue? Surely man has progressed beyond such barbaric ways and some cultural traditions are better in history books and not expanded on with the advantages of new technology.

I mean, we no longer traipse down to the coloseum and nibble on peanuts while watching Christians being fed to lions and that was a pretty strong tradition for a while…

guitars cadillacs hillbilly music

Posted on February 18, 2014 by zefiart

It didn’t rain on Sunday.

I’m glad I didn’t listen to the voice of laziness and watch tv all afternoon. After cleaning up the mess in the kitchen I got out a paint brush and tackled the porch rails.

I only did the front of the slats and the posts as far as I could reach without getting out a ladder. I figured squatting, bending and ducking behind lavender bushes was enough of a workout for one day.

Squint and imagine the rails painted the same pale grey as the house with white posts and top rail.

It’ll look good.

Of course there would’ve been more contrast if the colour I chose for the house was a bit darker like I thought it was…

Still…

Now all I have to do is undercoat the top of the posts, the inside of the rails, the fascia and do two topcoats on it all, and I’ll be done.

Sometime in 2017.

It was fun though, cause when I paint I listen to music and sing out loud. It helps me keep up the pace. I have proof the dogs love me unconditionally. They lay around my feet as I painted.

But the geese complained.

The music brought back memories… I listened to cds I hadn’t listened to for a while. Like BR549. Little Ramona… That song was dedicated to me by a country band I would go see. I was the punk girl who went hillbilly nuts.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lK4Nmp6nJxQ

And Dwight, I love that nasally voice.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4foq4HcQdpg

A favourite dancing tune by Warren Smith…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JrHHO_FWABc

And of course, the Straight 8s, the best band in the world. Well, Australia anyway. I used to go watch, and dance, to these guys at least once a week. If they were playing in Melbourne, I was there or I was in traction somewhere.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dV8jmIfPpkg

Did I ever mention I was a rockabilly gal? Did I ever mention I also line danced and did the two step? Or that before that I was a punk and a goth? Like little Ramona, I went from army boots and studded belts to ponytails and circle skirts to cowboy hats and boots.

Now I wear a cowboy hat in the garden and work boots to ride.

My how times have changed.

its sinking in

Posted on February 16, 2014 by zefiart

Ok.

Deep breath.

I think I’ve narrowed it down.

I realised that whichever way I go, I need a sink with the space to put in two taps. See, we have rainwater tanks. And those tanks only work when the pump is working. ie if there’s a blackout we have no water in the house.

Or we wouldn’t have water in the house if we didn’t also have a gravity feed from the bore water tank.

Sure, the water isn’t the nicest to drink, but you can use it to wash up (to save rainwater) and cook with. For that reason we have 2 taps in the kitchen and in the bathroom. The mixer tap for ‘real’ water, and a regular cold water tap for the bore water.

So, after all that stuffing around yesterday and the tossing and turning last night, the conclusion I’ve come to is that NONE of those sinks I’d narrowed down to my list of 3 will do. None of them have enough space around the rim for 2 taps.

I now have a new list of 3, two of them are economical in price and come in shiny stainless steel, one is more expensive (but cheaper than the Franke) and comes in brushed stainless steel.

Needless to say I’m leaning towards the most expensive, brushed stainless one. Its called Posh. That’s so me… (not). Its got a bigger, deeper large bowl and a 1/2 bowl and overall size is 1050mm.

Next on the list are the Squareline sinks. Those are pretty much a tie in as much as bowl sizes, one has a 3/4 2nd bowl, the other has a 1/2 second bowl. Those are 980mm wide and 1080mm wide. If they done have the Posh in stock I’ll chose one of the others. They’re sold at the hardware store and they have plenty in stock. Or so they told me.

I choose to believe them.

So, I’ve made a decision. On Monday when the girl from the plumbing store calls to let me know if they can get the Franke in for me in time I’ll tell her I want the Posh instead, find out if they have one in store and go pick it up after work.

If they don’t I’ll just go buy one of the others.

Get the darn thing done and over with.

Now, on other news, I sit here while Handyman and significant other pull out the pantry in the kitchen. They already pulled out the corner unit so the electrician can put the wire in for the dishwasher. I’ve spend most of the day till now moving stuff from the pantry and rearranging things in the kitchen.

This is the bit I dislike about renovating.

The good news is that we have floorboards under the lino and under the masonite!!!!!!!!!!!!

When we rip out the rest of the kitchen cupboards we’ll lift up the flooring so the new cupboards can go on the floorboards!

That discovery really made my day!

Now I’m pondering whether to risk painting a bit on the porch rails. Will it rain? They said chance of early afternoon showers… Yesterday it poured and thundered. But the sun is playing hide and seek… The potato vine is saying ‘please paint so I can grow upwards’ but the sun is saying ‘go on, I dare you to paint’… decisions…

sink-ing…………

Posted on February 15, 2014 by zefiart

Today I spent the entire day looking at sinks. our kitchen guy said the cabinets would be ready in 3 weeks. A week ago. So I went shopping for a sink.

I started out unsure about what I wanted. By the end of the day I was unsure of who I was.

See, I thought I had the sink sorted.

Firstly, I wanted a double bowl sink. But I’ve managed for 3 years with a single bowl and it hasn’t killed me. Then I decided I won’t need 2 bowls. I’ll have a dishwasher.

I planned to go with a laundry tub – single bowl, big, deep. No drainboard, but my sink in Fentonbury didn’t have a drainboard and I managed for 8 years with no permanent scars. I still have the plastic white drainboard I bought for there. We could use that till I find something prettier.

Then our kitchen guy recommended a Franke sink, single bowl, with a bowl almost as big and deep as a laundry tub, with the added bonus of drainboard as well. Yay.

Today I found out that they need to order that sink from Melbourne. They say 7-10 days delivery.

So, do I go ahead and order it and risk the sink not arriving in time for the kitchen installation?

Wayne doesn’t want to risk it…

I spent the day looking for alternatives. Prices vary wildly from under $100 to over $1000.

I’m not insane. I’m not willing to pay more than the cost of the Franke sink ($396) if I’m to pick an alternative. The idea would be to find something cheaper and save money, right?

This is where things started to go downhill.

Single sink? One and 3/4 sink? Drainboard or no drainboard? Bigger, deeper sink or shallower and smaller overall?

WAH!

I’m surprised I’m not still lying in the middle of the hardware kitchen aisle in a fetal position sucking my thumb….

I did what any normal (slightly OCD*) person would do.

I made up a comparison table.

Hey. It worked for me when I was buying my first new car. It should work when I find myself unable to make a decision for something that costs 1/100,000,000th of that.

By making a table, doing hands on research, pushing Google to its limits and driving a good friend to drink, I managed to narrow it down to a choice of 3 single bowl sinks. The Franke and 2 others which are smaller overall but still with good sized bowls and nice designs.

Too rounded?

Better?

Then I realised the bench top won’t be ready for installation in two weeks. If the kitchen is actually being installed in two weeks. We are talking about tradesmen here… We could put the old sink in the temporary bench top till the new bench top is finished and the sink arrives… I can still get the Franke.

Easy.

It should be easy. Right?

*Tell me… is it normal to count everything? Is it possible to be ‘slightly OCD’ or have OCD tendencies? I count everything. I count snips when I trim pom poms. I count mugs as I rinse them. I count brushstrokes when I brush my teeth.

Basically, I count when my mind isn’t busy doing anything else.

Is that normal? Should I have my head examined?

close encounters of the lion kind

Posted on February 14, 2014 by zefiart

I did something amazing.

I visited Zoodoo with a friend to play with the lion cubs!

It wasn’t cheap, but it was worth it. I justified it to myself by saying its not every day you get to roll around on the grass, hug, kiss and play with two gorgeous 6 month old white lion cubs. Its a once in a lifetime thing!

I mean, here we are, at the start of a very expensive exercise (renovating the kitchen – don’t ask) and I’m spending money on lion cub encounters.

Everyone needs a lion cub kiss at least once in their life.

The park had two 6 month old cubs, Zuri and Araali, and a litter of 3 week old cubs. We had a choice: wait 4 weeks to go play with the baby cubs, or go play with the older ones. I thought big bear hugs with big cubs would be better – more ‘lionlike’.

The cubs were so different. Araali was the quieter, more aloof of the two. Zuri was more playful and a bit devilish. And Araali had mismatched eyes. This is Araali as a baby.

This is Zuri and Araali as a babies.

This is what they look like now.

Just a bit bigger.

This is their dad – Bakari. A gorgeous, huge, white lion.

And their mom, Kiara. Obviously also white.

So much for ‘once in a lifetime’… I want to go again. Soon. I want to work there… I think I’m addicted to lion cubs…

Of course there were other animals and I patted as many of them as I could. Obviously, not this guy…

Or these guys.

Though I’d have loved to pat this baby.

I love these guys!

Apparently they’re trying to get government approval to have encounters with meercats, where you can book to go in and feed them and let them climb all over you. How great would that be! But apparently the Tasmanian government thinks that its safe enough to have an encounter with lion cubs up to 9 months old when they’re bigger than 2 newfoundlands, but its not safe to get in a pen with meercats.