New Look

G has been wanting a fire pit for awhile. This weekend he decided we would "pull the trigger" and get one. We looked at some blocks to make our own, but it seemed a little...big. G had seen this one at Lowe's and took me to check it out.

 

I liked the look of this one, but it seemed a little expensive for what it was. So what did we do? You guys are going to love this. We purchased the exact same blocks separately (about $79), and another fire pit ($89)- this one to be exact.

 

 And made our own creation!

Perfect for roasting (mini) marshmallows.

I really love how it turned out. The best part? It was $30 cheaper than the kit and I think it looks more finished. What do you guys think?

Outdoor Project

A few weekends ago, G got it in his head that he needed to redo one of our ponds- make it bigger and better. So, he did. I can't wait to show you what it looks like once the flowers start blooming. But for now, here it is.

G is cutting the liner.

Next, I watched a ferocious pup fight.

We had to go pick out some rocks.

We had a big helper.

He's very strong.

I liked this sparkly one, but G said it was too jagged.

Another helper?

I don't know what happened to the camera at this point, but the next photos I have are all finished.

Here is our other pond.

Pup Houses

Gary made Lexi a house. Milo took over, so he had to make Milo a house. Then, Lexi and Milo snuggled in Lexi's house and they finally switched houses. Silly dogs!

That's Milo in there, with a bone...


You can see both houses here, but I wish I had one of the sides, which are pretty cool. All the wood is recycled.


And here's Lex...after her house was built. Figures.

Little Gardener 4.2.11

Gary and Vin have started the spring planting.

New Playset!

Gary and I have wanted to build Vincent a playset for the past several years. What has stopped us? Well, for one, they're expensive. And two, we live within walking distance of not one, but two awesome city parks. But this year we decided to finally go ahead and do it. Well, here is the almost finished product.

The slide is 10 feet long.

The playset features tree branch spindles, left over from our tree trimming, as well as a cute telescope.

The playset is where our rock box used to be, trucks can still be played with underneath. Also, there is a little wooden tree stump table and seats.

Safety grab bars also are made from carefully selected leftover wood pieces. You can see one to Vincent's left, as well as two at the top of the ladder.

Also, since Vincent can't really carry stuff while he's climbing up the ladder, there is a pretty sweet pulley set up for him.

We have a baby swing for when babies visit.

A little merry-go-round and a jeep, although I think Vin might be getting big for the octopus thing...

Oh, and did I mention there were binoculars?

And finally, G plans to add a little climbing wall. Here are some of the pieces we have chosen for it.

Don't worry, there's still plenty of wood left...

Gary still wants to add a pirate flag, caps on the rails, possibly a roof or umbrella, and "clean it up" by erasing some of the pencil lines and sanding anything rough. But Vincent loves it. Now we just need to get some friends to come over!

A New Look...

One thing that I love about my beau is that he is very handy. He can do pretty much anything, and if he can't he has a friend that can. He can fix cars, houses, cook, clean, paint, garden, landscape, and even decorate... like I said, just about everything.

The other day we decided to invest some of our tax refund money into fixing up the house. We have been wanting to paint the exterior of the house for awhile, so we went ahead and got some house paint and new outside lights. G's dad came up to visit on Friday and my mom took the baby to the botanical garden, which gave the boys several hours to paint while I was at school.

When I got home they had quite a bit done, however, I wasn't sure if I liked it. It's clear that we'll need a second coat, and it's hard for me to imagine it how it will look and not how it does look. Since Friday, a lot more has been painted and even some of the second coat has been applied.

The color of our house right now is dark blue. The reason we hadn't painted the house sooner is because we couldn't decide on a color. First, G wanted to point it black, then white--neither of which I liked. We settled on a blue color called Morning Glory. It's a very pale blue. At first, it looked almost white, but after the second coat it is more bluish. I think I like it now. We started on the back of the house. I can't wait to see it finished.

Since we have started painting it has effectively rained several days, which has kept us from progressing too much. :( It will get done, though.

We just finished another outdoor project, which I am really happy about. We have had this wooden outdoor patio set for over a year now. We bought it from The Shop Around the Corner, resale. When we got it we planned on weatherproofing it, but never got around to it. G finally sanded down the chairs and the table, and weatherproofed it. It looks really nice, and prompted me to get some new chair cushions (which we didn't have before) and a new umbrella.

We got the cushions and umbrella from Garden Ridge. They have really nice products for really inexpensive. We discovered this store several years ago, and if you can get past the sometimes disorganized part, it really saves money. I told G that we couldn't put the cushions or the new umbrella out until the house was painted, and it would be our reward for finishing up the job. We'll see how that goes.

I'll have to figure out how to post pictures on here, so you can see before/after pics. I didn't take a pic of the table/chairs, but you can see how nice they look without knowing what they looked like before.