Tree Maintenance

Last month, I don't remember if I mentioned it - I sure as heck didn't post any pictures, because I forgot to take any (d'oh!) - I pruned that big Mulberry tree in the backyard.  It had grown about five million water sprouts (small, weak branch-lets that grow from the main branches, and are pretty much useless - at best they make a tree look ragged, at worst they can actually cause structural damage, and are highly prone to disease and insect infestation).   The sprouts had grown so long that they were dragging the ground on all sides, and the tree looked like a giant, green, hairy lollipop.  NOT GOOD.

Today, as I had the day off from work, I did the same thing to the Mexican Orchid Tree:

Before: 

This is the MOT before pruning.  It's basically just a giant mound of plant.

It's eight feet wide.  I am not even kidding.

Witness also the roll of hardware fencing sitting next to it, that I never put away after re-doing the porch trellis.

In fact, the black thing standing up against the house on the right is the old trellis.  Way to put your toys away when you're done with them, me!  Ugh.










During:

Hi, Raven!  I had to take this picture twice. Daisy was pooping
behind the tree the first time and I didn't notice.  Ewwww.

Fact: it's 113º out today.  

This is the part where I get most of the heavy pruning done and go sit inside in the a/c for thirty minutes before I can finish, so I don't DIE.

Most of the main branches that had grown out sideways, or up and then bent down, have been removed at this point.












After:

you can kinda see the similar shape of the
Mulberry in this pic, too. 

All finished, yay!  *sweat*sweat*sweat*


All the mini-sprouts have been pruned out as well, and all the smaller branches that were growing sideways or down.  I've also cut out all the suckers that were popping up from the ground around the plant, and removed some of the thick stumpy branch-ends that were left over in the crown of the plant from branches I cut off last year.  (I forgot they were there - the bush covered them up!)

I raked the ground flat, got rid of the mound of dead leaves carpeting the ground under the tree, and swept the patio stones that were covered up by the tree - you can see here that they were never taken up and re-arranged when I did the circles pattern with the stones last year.  I'm AWESOME at being thorough, aren't I?  Yeesh.

This thing was HUGE, you guys.  There's a nearly-perfectly-circular area around the MOT where there's no grass at all, even between the stones on the patio.  You can't see it in the pic, but there's also a Garlic Chives plant under the left side that I thought had died long ago.  Nope!  It just got eaten by the tree.

Raven, in his search for a cool patch of ground to lay in, has dug two dog-shaped holes under this thing, too.  SIGH.  Next time I feel like braving the blistering central Texas heat, I'll dig out the compost bin and fill the holes, then cover the area with some more of these patio stones to keep him from doing it again and possibly damaging the tree.

I was bitten by a spider while I was pruning.  Yay!  I wonder if I'll get super-powers now.




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And now back to your regularly-scheduled...

A short time-out to say  OMG YOU GUYS I'M TOTALLY GOING ON A CRUISE IN JANUARY WITH MY BFF!!!   

• So.  Much. Shopping to do.  OMG.  
• read up on cruise vacations and find out (a) what is available to do and (b) what I'll need in order to do those things (off-ship excursions, nighttime activities, on the ship, etc.)
• get passport  ← in progress
• do I need to get vaccinations of any sort?   ←  nope 
• find out about current travel regulations regarding luggage, containers, etc.  I haven't been out of the country for about eleven years, and I've never been on a cruise before in my life
• I have a brand-new swimsuit that I adore, but I can't wear the same one for 5 days.  More swimsuits, stat!  
• finish paying off the tickets (by November);  save up $$ to spend while on the cruise (food, drink, off-ship activities, postcards to send back to friends, etc.) 
• schedule vacation time with work - done!  
• we're driving to the coast to catch the boat:  should we pay to park for a week, or rent a car there and back? 

╔═════════ ೋღ❤ღೋ ═════════╗

ೋ   ♫♪♫    ~ ~SQUEE!!!  ~ ~    ♫♪♫  ೋ 

╚═════════ ೋღ❤ღೋ ═════════╝

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Couch Slipcover: Epilogue

I recovered the couch in July/August 2010.  *checks watch*  It is now June of 2012 - almost exactly two years later - and the slipcover is in great shape, still comfy, nice and soft, and although there are a couple of spots where the cats have clawed at the fabric, it's not bad at all.  I'm still really pleased with how it's holding up.

Except for one thing.  It's fading

1. really fast
2. unevenly - as in, the whole couch looks like it was made with four different brown fabrics.   Which is what happens when you use curtain panels to upholster your furniture:  they didn't all come out of the same dye batch, so they're aging differently.  Which I knew, but...well, they were cheap.  I needed cheap. 

Options: 

• throw a gigantic soft throw of some kind over the whole thing.  If I can find one large enough to look right, that is not just a bedsheet.  Which I can't. 
• remove the entire cover, wash it, and attempt to dye it. 
• remove it, take it apart, and use the pieces as a pattern to make a new cover...yup, completely replace the cover after only 2 years.   

I'm tempted to be mad that the thing is getting weird after two years - but I kind of intended it to last for a couple-three years, just until I could figure out and make a nicer cover for it.  I used what I had, intending to replace it.  And it's getting to be time.  What to do, though? 

1.  I've always wanted a blue velvet couch
2. have you ever tried to scrape cat hair off velvet?

funky-comfy drop cover, or soft linen?
But, the whole reason I slipcovered the thing
was so I didn't have to drape blankets over it! 

pattern-y? 

slightly more monochrome pattern-y?

or, since it's mostly the cushion fabric that's faded,
not the main body of the couch, I could do a co-
ordinating fabric on the cushions only, for the time
being.  I've done it before, and it was neat.  But..

Hm.

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Overdue [Living Room] After Pics

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wide-open seating plan + ghetto-ass minicouch under the window 

this is what it looked like before.  Functional and huge, but the
seating area needed to be back on this end of the room. 

there's my $9 thrift store rug!   it makes me happy.  

look, a chair!  :D  I wish. 

Unflattering Pictures

On a whim, I looked up my house on Google Maps - the last time I checked, they still had pictures from 2006.  They've updated them since:

This appears to be from 2009.  I can tell by the visible bean trellis arbor in the backyard, and the line of stones still wrapping around an old garden bed that doesn't exist anymore.

The yard was in *terrible* shape.  In 2009 I had recently been divorced, and had the place to myself for the first time.  I worked two jobs for most of that year:  40 hours a week at the state university, and another 35+ a week at a fast food joint near my house.  I did NOT have time to garden, or even weed the yard, or water it; which resulted in several arguments with the HOA that year over the state of my landscaping, unfortunately.

This photo is also a pretty good way of showing you, gentle reader, how pitifully small and weird my property actually is.  Long and narrow, just like the house;  with a teeny-tiny front yard, and a backyard that's little more than a playpen - 25x37 feet.

Yeah.  Yikes.

The house faces due north, so when I say my backyard is in full sun, I mean it:  it's fully exposed from sunup to sundown.

Or at least it was. The Mulberry tree is finally mature enough, the last two years, to shade about half the yard, thank goodness.

A little helpful labeling, to relate to all these pics I post of my various rooms inside.  This is really, REALLY not to scale, but it's just a quick MS Paint thing, hehe.  But it shows the approximate placement of all the rooms, and the comparative size - and yes, I really do have a long, football-field-shaped living room, LOL.













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It's June! June, June June

Name that tune.

May In Review

• the roof is NOT leaking!   :D
• sick for two weeks:  no projects for me    :( 
• re-arranged the art wall in the bedroom
• painted the bedroom ceiling
• sewed & hung new curtains in the bedroom
• sewed & hung new curtains in the dining room, too
• painted the dining room/kitchen ceiling
• re-arranged the living room furniture for probably the ten thousandth time

A Bird-Safe Backyard

2011

As much as I've loved the Wall O' Vines on the back porch, it's become a danger to neighborhood wildlife.  Every Spring at least two families of birds move into the trellis and raise a batch of little birdlets:  usually house finches, sometimes Mockingbirds, this year a mama Dove and a single baby.

The problem is that I have three dogs, once of whom fancies himself quite the Bird Dog, and has taught one of his sisters his craft.  Last year Raven caught a young Mockingbird during flight training; this year - I believe, I'm not actually sure - Daisy got the baby dove.  They're good dogs, but they're still predators, and the trellis is no longer a safe place for birds to roost.

So today, down it came.  Last Wednesday I clipped the Sweet Autumn Clematis off at the ground, and let the top growth wither for a few days so that it would be easier to remove from the trellis.

2010

This morning I got to work:  I chopped up the dead vines, yanked them down, and stuffed the whole bundle into the compost bin.

The trellis itself was actually two sections of an old metal standing screen that I had removed from its frame and mounted between two wooden rails at the top and bottom, all of which I painted black.

I un-bolted the screen panels from the wooden rails, then removed the top rail from the house, and re-mounted it about three feet lower than it had been.  I scrubbed the trim on the house and the porch post clean - under the vines, they get covered with all manner of mildew, bird poop, and bird dander.  I primed the wooden rails and painted them to match the trim on the house.


The last step was to stretch a section of wire fencing between the wooden rails, to form a new trellis for the Clematis to grow up onto.  I lashed it in place with hemp twine - not the most long-lasting method, but I was out of baling wire AND heavy duty staples;  I also think that if I end up really loving this new, shorter trellis, that I may end up putting wooden posts in between the rails, for a proper porch railing type of thing.

June 2, 2012

It doesn't look spectacular at the moment, no.  But once it's covered with vines, and with little white star-shaped flowers in the Fall, it'll be quite lovely, I think, and still provide privacy from the neighbors for us humans, without endangering birdies.  Bonus:  this also lets WAY more light into the living room.

And this picture also serves as a "before picture for the back porch, as well as an "after" for the trellis project.  Further plans for the back porch include:

• hanging baskets
• fixing up and repairing an old wind chime, and hanging it back up
• sprucing up the wicker chairs, and making cushions for them
• plants in the empty pots that are scattered around the porch
• new lighting
• and, eventually, the pergola/arbor I keep talking about building over the patio. 

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Another Ceiling Done!

Have I mentioned how much I hate typing the word "ceiling"?  I'm a smart woman.  I'm an educated woman.  I type over 100 words per minute.  And yet "ceiling" is one of a handful of words I just can't type correctly on the first try (or the second, third, fourth) to save my life.  The name Kevin is another one.  I always type "Keving" first for some reason.  I do the same thing with "bacon"...bacong?            σ_O
Anyway.

TADA!! 

the CEILING is done!  Yay, I love it!  

It's a little thing, but I really love the way the chandelier
lights make a big starfishy shadow thing on the CEILING.
Also: the new round light bulbs I was talking about.

one of which has already burned out, and it made these
weird swirly patterns on the inside of the glass.  Neat.  

So, to recap, here's the way-before:  

Which got new curtains and a tablecloth, but still had blue CEILINGS: 

And now, well...see above.  Ta.


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