On Friday evening before Dave arrived home from work I cleared all the small stuff out of the office so we could install the laminate in there and I made dinner. We had grilled orange roughy fillets drizzled with a spicy tomato sauce, quinoa and scallion pilaf, and sautéed swiss chard. I picked the scallions and the chard from the crops planted outside my lab building on campus earlier. Yum, dinner was so good and we were so hungry that we didn't take the time to admire our food let alone take a picture. But trust me, it was yummy and pretty.
Knowing that we had plans with friends on Saturday afternoon (and therefore limited time to work on the office flooring) we went to Home Depot after dinner to pick up a load of baseboard and door casing. We noticed that all the 6-panel slab doors were on sale for only $19! That's at least 30% off the larger and more expensive doors. Unfortunately we didn't have room in the trailer for doors and the trim so we didn't get any. Because the trailer we've borrowed (permanently?) from my dad is only a 10-footer and the propacks of trim are between 10 and 12 feet long, we always end up buying some 16 or 12 foot 2x4s to support the trim as it hangs out the back of the trailer. We always end up crawling way up onto the stacks of lumber in HD to find boards that aren't knotty or bent. When we finally got home Dave helped me move the large furniture (desk and bookcase) out of the office and into the living room (aka the staging area for all our flooring projects). Then I pulled up the carpet, saving most of it into a roll to keep, and tossing the rest into the garbage can. Dave helped me bust up all the tiles and chisel out the termite poison holes (only 21 in this room). Whew, by this time we were pooped and it was nearly midnight. It was a very long day for both of us since he'd worked his tail off at work to be able to get home by 6pm and I'd had a physical chemistry exam that morning.
Saturday morning the termite poison holes were filled and we spent most of the day painting crown moulding and doors, installing the crown moulding, and stocking up on our vitamin D out in the sunshine. The dogs wore themselves out playing together in the yard all day while we worked. A few weeks back we bought new doors for the dining room to replace the icky ones that the electrician had accidentally drilled holes into--those were (finally) painted and installed.
Saturday afternoon we rode our bikes over to our friends' (John and Jessica) apartment for drinks and dinner. They have a new boy puppy who is a black, white, and brown border collie/terrier mix...just like our Ruby! His name is...wait for it...Rudi! As in Rutabega. Haha. They said that they just fell in love with Ruby and subconsciously chose a dog (and a name) just like her for themselves. We're very flattered. John and Jessica will be getting married down in Georgia in a few weeks so Dave and I will keep little Rudi at our house. Dinner at their place was super fun, with lots of talk about dogs, weddings, school (she just finished her masters last year and is now a professor at Touro University and he is in my program at Davis), gardening, and building our dream houses someday on our parents' land.
Sunday morning was a lazy one for us; according to day light savings, our clock said that we'd slept in but we sure were tired. Being out in the sun all day seems to wear me out! Once we got moving we were on a roll: Dave drove out the north Sacramento to meet with a recruiter who will help him find a new job that allows for more work-life balance and/or is in Davis so he can ride his bike to work like I do. I stayed home to paint the remaining crown moulding (enough for the office, hallway, AND master bedroom--that's a LOT of moulding to paint!) and to make my soil blocks. Dave was able to get the crown moulding up in the guest room and in the master bedroom. Because I decided that the decorative trim we'd gotten for the guest room was too small, Dave used installed it right underneath the crown moulding in the master bedroom. It looks very nice and adds that little something extra to make our room look fancy. I really like it. (We're going to use that the picture-hanger trim I mentioned last week in the guest room after all.)
A soil blocker is this little contraption that forms cubes of soil mix for sewing seeds indoors or in a greenhouse. The idea is that when the outsides of the blocks dry the hold together without the need for a container. It is a cheap way to start a lot of seeds in a small amount of space. The soil mix consists of peat moss, soil, compost, sand, and lime (to neutralize the acidity of the peat moss). Because the mixture contains 40 parts of the very hydrophobic peat my dad suggested that I moisten it with boiling water to speed up the soaking-up process. It took 2 of my huge spaghetti pots of boiling water to moisten the entire wheel barrow of the soil mix. Trying to carry boiling water all the way out to the yard with two curious dogs underfoot is NOT recommended. Making the soil blocks was a little tricky at first because the tops were getting stuck up inside the form when I pushed them out. I finally got the hang of it. My dad loaned me the sugar-cube sized one for starting seeds and the 2x2" one into which I will put the successfully germinated sugar-cube sized ones. Dave said it looked like I was making mud pies because I kept smelling the soil mix (I absolutely LOVE the smell of wet soil) and I used Dollar Store cookie sheets to hold them.
Around 3pm we got cleaned up, loaded the dogs into the car, and headed over to Toad Hallow dog park to meet up with John, Jessica, and Rudi (plus their two friends, Jared and Bronwyn, from church and their dog, Dodger). None of them had been to a dog park before and they wanted us to show them how it all works. We had so much fun! Little Rudi just wanted to wrestle with Dodger, their friends' dog, and he totally doesn't understand the point of playing fetch. Our dogs chased the ball a little too much after a full day of running around the yard; they were panting so much that they could hardly drink any water. It was a little scary because I was afraid that they'd over done it and would have heat stroke or something.Ruby and Potatoes:
Rudi trying to figure out the big deal with the ball:
Our whole gang at the park:
After the dog park Dave and I got hamburgers from In-N-Out (and more water for the dogs) before heading down the highway for Home Depot...again. I swear, the only thing we spend money on these days is groceries, mortgage, and stuff at Home Depot for the house. We rarely go out to eat, hardly go to or rent movies, and never go clothes shopping. Anyway, we bought 6 of those 6-panel doors plus a kit for making the knob holes and hinge depressions. I checked the nursery area for blue plumbago for my dad; they didn't have any but I did find both pink and white bower vines. Haha! I will definitely have to plant some of those in our BBQ yard, just for name sake. =o)I took some pictures of the garden but will post a garden update later. I really should get to school now to start my next compost incubation. Have a great week!
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