The "Wall" project

Ever since we moved into this house, I was quite unhappy with this wall.  I think it is also because our neighbor's wall looked so much nicer and that made the red brick on ours look even worse.  So I finally decided to paint it all.  It took me some time to figure out what color.  And of course, I couldn't just go with one. I decided on 3 (within the same family of) colors!

So here you go - light blue, medium blue, and then a dark blue.  It took me a whole day to do just the first two colors.  I had inquired about some "handy helpers" but they were not very handy :-/

Thankfully it was not too hot and funny enough, a couple people that walked by said the wall looked nice - even when I wasn't even done with it yet.  And there was even a lady driving by that said she might hire me out.  Ha ha!

Not sure if it's too blue for the house??!

I had the boys draw a few butterflies on the wall.  Here is Graham's:

And Charlie decided to draw a whole "story"! These boys couldn't be more different:

And yup, I've decided to draw a few things too.  Here's the start to my cat silloutte:

I think it turned out pretty nicely:

And then I saw another silhouette of 2 cats on the internet and their tails hooked together to form a heart:

I actually couldn't stop thinking about this one when I was done.  I just wasn't happy with it! So the next day, I dug up one of these rags that I had bought a while ago.  I think the whole reason I had bought it was because of the cats and so,... time to fix my cats!

It's not exactly the same but I am much happier.  And when I was done, there were a couple of ladies walking on the other side of the street.  I think they actually stopped to look at my cats!  I hope they had some nice things to say about it :-P

And the Piece de Resistance (I couldn't figure out how to put the accents.  Hmm...):

I just had to do it, and of course in red color - so the heart was nice and noticeable :-)

In the meantime, I also had to deal with this crack at the side of the wall:

Bobby wouldn't let me pull the entire chunk of wall off to fix it.  Although I really think I should have!  Anyway, I tried to fix it the best I could with whatever concrete I had left and also some premade liquid one that I had previously opened.  Unfortunately, I also ended putting some concrete on some crickets that came jumping out of this big crack.  Oops!!!

Well, here it is...

With some extra concrete, I fixed up some other cracks along the house too:

I hope the foundation is not shifting too much to cause these cracks!

I finally decided to stick this screen up with concrete too.  I've had to fix this so many times because the boys keep hitting balls into the screen and knocking it off.  Maybe this might work???

All done!!!  Just have to draw a few more butterflies, maybe a white fence?... maybe some flowers and another cat peeking around the corner???   Who knows what I am feeling at that point.  Right now, Graham is taking up too much of my time with his school work! :-(

Bobby was quick to show me yesterday that the wall is cracking again!  Boo hoo...!!!

I was thinking that maybe I'll just paint some sort of vine along the crack.  Ha ha!  Well, at this point as long as the wall is not falling over, we're good!

Garden chairs project

With all the social distancing that's going on, I figured why not try and create a spot in the front yard where friends visiting can sit and chat!  I did finally find a couple of metal chairs for free on the neighborhood App. Free is always the right price!

Yeah, the chairs look pretty beat up.  Bobby asked me when we started a "junkyard".  Pha! Well, nothing a wire brush and a fresh coat of paint can't fix:

It's funny how I picked a green color that's almost the same color as The Masters golf tournament, which coincidentally is happening this same week when I was fixing up these chairs:

I think it turned out okay.  I couldn't get all the old paint off with the wire brush, so we'll just have to deal with the uneven surfaces on the seat:

While I wait for the paint to dry, I need to try and figure out where to put the chair and also how to level it.  We wouldn't want our guests to fall over!

Looks like this works!  As usual, Charlie is always happy to be the guinea pig in my projects :-)

Looks pretty good and actually, the chairs are quite comfortable:

Ta da!!! I think it's just under 6 feet of separation though.  Perhaps that's okay in this case :-D 

So far, no official social distancing yet on these chairs.  Hopefully they won't get too rusty when the time comes as they are being showered with sprinkler water every other day at this moment.  I'm hoping to maybe put a hummingbird feeder in this spot.  That would be pretty neat be able to see and hear them at such a close distance.  Just looked up some of the hummingbird stakes and feeders online.  The specific one that I like is more than what I'd like to pay.  Seriously?!  It's just a metal stake in the ground, and don't even get me started on the actual feeder!  

Random photos

A few random photos from the last couple weeks of November.  To start, here is almost always a familiar position for ALL 3 boys on the couch after dinner:

The last time I had the boys load up the dishwasher, the kitchen sink clogged up!  I'm not sure if it was some sort of sabotage, but those boys better not think they can get away from loading the dishwasher again.

In the meantime, it has gotten cooler at night!  

We've gotten down to the 50s at night now.  So we now have extra blankies on the bed and our portable fake fireplace/heater is also back out from the garage in the living room.  Even so, I've decided to pull out my fingerless gloves :-)

Funny enough, we haven't really turned on those new minisplit AC units for heat.  I did do it once for Graham's bedroom and I was totally impressed at how quickly (and quietly) the heat warmed up his room!

Here's the hair update - 3 months later after the buzzed hair cut.  It seems that I'm the only one struggling with bed head compared to Graham and Charlie.  Why is that??!

Charlie drew this stick man.  I call it "Dust art".  Yes... this house is so dusty!!! Somehow I just can't get to it very frequently :-/

We finally went to the dentist this past month and thankfully all good!  I thought for sure Charlie had a cavity but he was spared this time. Phew! But on the way home, we spotted a Railway Museum not far away.  How cute!

One day, if we remember - we'll have to come back and check it out:

By the way, we found the mouse!  Yup, thankfully dead along the side of the house.  I'm glad a cat didn't decide to eat it because I had obviously poisoned it:

I started crocheting again for a little bit, which means the boys are doing it too.  Graham supposedly is crocheting a blanket to donate. I love his thoughtfulness but he seems to be taking a really long time! Charlie is still struggling to hold the yarn, perhaps he will be better in a few more months with more practice:

I think I forgot to post this one the last time when Charlie made his screen-printing.  This kid is such a ham!

I'm glad I spotted the spider before anyone tried to ring the doorbell.  Wouldn't want to be responsible for any heart attacks!!!

The trail of shoes (soles) are finally complete!  

We will probably have a few more pairs of shoes to spare once the boys grow out of them.  Wonder if I should put more of them along the path?  Well, that's if I get to it.  There are some other projects I really need to get done first!

More bodyboarding and Dolphins!

This was about 3 weeks ago.  I'm lagging behind even more now with the postings!  Somehow there's just been a lot going on? Or perhaps it's just colder and I don't feel like doing anything other than sleeping in and watching TV.  Ha ha!

I was finally able to buy a used/smaller wetsuit for Charlie last month.  So I was also finally able to convince them to wear their wetsuits!

I should seek out a modeling agency.  Ha ha!

And off they go! The water is so cold.  Brrrr....

There were so many birds flying over the ocean today.  And then we also started to notice all the dolphins.  How cool!

Graham and Charlie are just oblivious to them now.  Ha ha, just another day in paradise :-P

Here's a video of the dolphins swimming to and fro near them.  Did you spot them?

I believe it was Veteran's Day today and thankfully the beach was nice and quiet:

I didn't have to worry too much about being too close to someone.  Covid has definitely changed our behavior about being near people!

Charlie found a Silver Dollar! Unfortunately it broke but nothing super-glue can't take care of :-)

Ahhh... the luxury of having a sailboat:

Too bad we don't know anyone that owns one!

Graham is so funny - he dug up a little "seat" for himself, right where the tides had left a drop-off.  This kid knows how to take relaxing to the next level:

One more photo of a dolphin near the boys!

Well, if you haven't noticed yet... I love dolphins :-)