At Home in St. Paul

Spring Cleaning and More

2013-06-11T17:07:00.000-05:00

There's been a lot going on around the house recently, and I'm in the middle of two back to back weddings that I'm in, so it's been hectic.

Annie's dad has been helping by painting the window trim on the porch, and Annie and I have been working on spring cleaning. At least, that's what we call it, even if it's June. Summer starts in ten days, so we're still technically correct.

Anyway, I've taken a few photos of various things around the house, and so I'm just going to upload a bunch of them and leave little comments after each pic:

I installed the air conditioners a few weeks ago, but we've yet to use either of them.

Besides the hops, the onions are growing the most in the garden. I think this is an older picture, they are taller now.

Annie's dad also helped us change the window that was broken on the porch. In this photo, I got a little bit of Leo in the foreground before I pushed the window out.

This is actually two pictures blended together. The only light is from by the couch.

Here's our Hackberry tree before being put into the Earth.

I spent most of the cleaning day on the windows. Annie helped, but she also cleaned out both cars.

I got some tomato cages for the garden, along with pepper cages. They've got plenty of room to grow now!

I also swept helicopters off the roof and cleared really, really nasty stuff out of the gutters. At first it looked like it might make good compost, but then I smelled it, and I figured if I put it in the garden the onions would retch.

Here I am by the hops. They're already about 8' tall!

Here's the onions again.

I don't have a picture of the painted porch yet, because I took most of these yesterday and it was being finished today. However, I do have a few pics of when Maren and Own came to visit for the first time. Leo was confused but friendly with the odd curiosities, and I didn't see either of the babies sneezing, so maybe they're not allergic? Anyway, here are a few pictures:

Maren's first sight of the kitty. She was thinking, Man, that cat is fat!

Leo was being funny and showed his butt to the camera. He's such a stinker. Either that, or he heard someone five blocks away opening a can of cat food.

Maren and Leo. Also, Dave makes an appearance.

Maren doing her model pose.

Leo's still confused about the babies, but he's trying to act normal.

Leo stuck his paw into this picture. I think he was envious of all the attention.

This is the closest we got to getting a picture of Leo, Maren, and Owen. As for getting them to look at the camera, Leo, by far, was the most unruly.

Leo's brushing up next to Owen, and it looks like he was laughing. At the rate everybody's growing, I'm not sure Owen will ever be heavier than Leo.

Owen and Leo agreed to do silly faces for this last one. Leo's sticking his tongue out.

Well, that's all for now,

-me

One Year Anniversary and H20 Downstairs

2013-05-23T01:25:00.000-05:00

It's the 23rd of May, so this anniversary post is a little belated!

We got the house May 18th, 2012, but I still thought it'd be nice to put up a shot from a year ago, so here it is . . .

(Annie. May 18th 2012)

For some reason, I don't have one of the two of us on the first day of owning the house. I think my mom does though.

Of course, we didn't move in the first day we got the keys. Annie's dad did a lot painting and Annie and her mom did a lot of cleaning and I did some stuff like get food from Arby's and go to Menards. In fact, Leo was the first to spend the night in the new house. We set up a card table in the middle of the dinning room so no one would hit their head on the chandelier, and that was where Leo slept. I stopped after I got off work a few times to check on him and when I'd look in the window he would be on the card table staring back at me. A few days later we all moved in and the family was yet again together.

So there's a random memory from a year ago.

One thing we didn't have a year ago at this time (I think), ALL THIS RAIN!

(Annie used a broom to sweep the water into the drain, and then we put the fan on the floor and all the water evaporated)

It really wasn't that bad, especially since this is the first time we've gotten water in the basement. Well, that's not quite true—we had water in the basement from our tub leaking, but that's not what I'm talking about.

For a little bit, Annie was worried that the sump pump wasn't working. I could hear water draining into the hole where the pump is, but we couldn't hear the pump. But after the rain was done and we went out to look at the way the evening sunlight was hitting the water drops on all the plants, we saw water gushing out of the sump pump's outlet pipe.

(You can see the puddle of water. It came out of the pipe.)

Like I said, we got a lot of rain. Our rain gauge was around 4-5 inches, but I haven't emptied that out all spring, so I have no idea what we actually got. I do know that our potted plants got too much, as you can see . . .

(The middle one's basil. I think.)

To end the post, I'll put up some pictures from the short walk we took after the sun came out, as well as a few random ones . . . Enjoy!

(Leo helping get rid of the water with his furry paws)

(The onions are winning as far as sprout height in the garden)

(Here are the hops and Annie. Most of the seeds haven't come up yet, but the snap peas and beans and onions have)

(Leo watching us dump water out of the container plants)

(All that rain makes for a jungle! I've since mowed.)

(Leo's creepy)

(A close up of some wet apple blossoms.)

(Some purple tulips near Highland Parkway.)

(One purple tulip near Highland Parkway.)

(I just thought this looked really green.)

(This one makes a good desktop background.)

-Daniel

The Garden and Some Other Stuff

2013-05-15T13:27:00.002-05:00

It's May 15th and it feels pretty nice out. We broke the record high yesterday, something like 97 degrees. I know most people who see this are already aware of that, but this way, when I look back on this post a year from now, I can say, "Wow, it was 97 on May 14th?" And I should also note a week ago I was in Wisconsin for the fishing opener in Hayward, and this is what that looked like:

(May 5th!)

We got the garden up and running finally, and it was a bit of work. I still had a sizable pile of crap (leaves, sticks, other various detritus) from last fall. I was hoping it would naturally compost itself leaving beautiful black soil, but it didn't. It just became a heavy, wet pile of crap.

(The garden after I moved the crap pile)

(Said crap pile, ready to be removed)

After clearing the space, I finished fencing in the garden, hoping to keep the critters at bay. (Of course, as I'm writing this, there's a squirrel in the garden, doing whatever the heck he wants. I wish I had a BB gun, do you think it'd be kosher to pop open the screen and shoot animals from inside the house?)

I got some dirt and manure and fertilizer and made some raised plots to plant some seeds. Now that I look at them, though, they look much more like graves.

(Garden ready to be sowed)

Our mini transplants weren't looking too healthy after the long winter, so we are mainly planting from seed. We also got some serrano peppers and roma tomatoes as transplants.

(It's a prison for plants)

Despite all this work, I could see the garden not really working out. But one thing I know I can count on . . . the hops!

(Hops don't care about crappy weather or soil. They're like the Yang Yang's of the plant world (Referring, of course, to star badminton player Yang Yang).)

(Room to grow)

Last year was the first year for the hops (I guess that's obvious, being it was our first year in the house), and they still grew to the top of the shepherd's hook I was using. This year I got a ten foot pole of conduit and used an S-hook to tie the twine to (don't worry, it looks really close to the power lines in this photo, but that's just an optical illusion—I still have a good five or six fee). I zip-tied the pole to the fence, so that's kinda trashy. But it's been working well so far.

Finally, here are a few night shots I took yesterday.

(View out the back door—notice the slight streak in the stars due to the Earth spinning)

(The front of the house. It was windy, if you're wondering why the tree looks weird.)

That's all for now, peace out,

-me

First Day of Yard Work

2013-04-28T23:01:00.005-05:00

It's finally spring at the house, and even Leo's excited. We moved his cat tree back into the porch and there he spends most of his time, watching birds and squirrels, thinking about the meaning of life and how he might get more food. The nights are still a little too chilly for him though, so he usually stays out there until the early hours of the morning then comes into bed with us to warm up.

Here are three photos of Leo enjoying the porch. One was taken at night with a thirty second exposure, during which he held ridiculously still (his lips were sticking out over the cat tree and they caught the light of the night light, if you're wondering why his lips are green).

(The creepy thing was it was too dark for me to see him, so it wasn't until I looked at the picture that I realized Leo was staring at me.)

(This one's a little blurry because Leo tried to punch me, and I had to jump back)

(I edited this one, if you're wondering why it's crisper)

Enough about Leo and back to the title of the blog post. It was the first day of yard work today (I don't count shoveling as yard work) and I worked on turning the garden into a plot of land capable of sustaining life. I put up a fence around most of it to keep squirrels and rabbits away, and will finish the back half once we take the giant pile of crap in this next picture to a rubbish site.

(We're settlers!)

Of course, the moment I finished the fence, a robin landed in the middle of the garden just to piss me off. And so begins my war with nature.

It was a really nice day today, and as time went on, it felt like more and more flowers were popping out of the earth. Here's a shot of the little purple flowers.

(Don't know what these are called, but once the flowers go away we pluck them.)

The nicest thing about spring so far has been the reopening of our patio. Nicki came over and we celebrated the occasion with burgers on the grill along with grilled asparagus and grilled pineapple (that was first covered in brown sugar). Then I burned a bunch of crap. What a glorious day!

(Patio's open for business—just like Wisconsin.)

This post is getting kinda long, but I do want to add a photo of the hops. They've started doing their thang.

(Just twelve more feet to grow.)

That's all for now. Hopefully it doesn't snow now that I've put up a spring post.

-Daniel

The End of Winter?

2013-04-25T00:22:00.001-05:00

It's supposed to be in the 60's and 70's this weekend, and it's almost May, but I'm not going to jinx us all by saying we've seen the last of accumulating snowfall. I'm just going to throw up a few photos from the last couple weeks.

Here are two from April 18th, after 8" of snow:

(Notice the roof-rake marks on the left side of the house. It was that bad.)

(The sun came out, and it was really bright. I sneezed—a lot.)

Here are two pics from April 22, after another 5-7":

(View out the porch door. Notice the snow.)

(April 22nd, while it's still snowing.)

In that last photo you might notice a sculpture I made. It was about five feet high. I danced around it at 2:30 in the morning singing Christmas carols and waving a shovel. I'm hoping that will appease the snow gods, and that they will move to other pastures until next fall.

Here's a closer shot, if you want to take notes on the design:

(Snow sculpture title: Yeti's Lower-Left Canine)

Finally, and completely unrelated to the snow, Annie and I made a midnight trip to Cub the other day in order to find a bag of the highly elusive new Lays potato chips, Chicken and Waffle.

(Taking a sniff before diving in.)

They were maple-syrupy sweet with a savory finish. And there is a strange phenomenon, I discovered, when eating them; you need to eat more than a few to really get a good, round flavor of the chips—but if you eat more than that they start to get cloyingly disgusting.

So keep that in mind.

-Daniel

Mini Greenhouse Progress . . . Loaf of Bread . . . and Keyless Entry.

2013-04-05T01:08:00.001-05:00

Hello World!

(The tall sprouts in back are Kohlrabi)

That's what these seeds are thinking. After only a few short days most of the seeds we planted burst forth from the miry earth to breath in the fresh air. The problem is, the Kohlrabi had to go and get all excited, and now they hit the top of the greenhouse whilst everyone else still needs the cover. I tried taking the Kohlrabi tray out, but they wilted pretty quickly, so I put them back inside. They aren't really a transplant plant, so this was more of an experiment. We'll probably sow some of these seeds the old fashioned way—as in straight into the ground. But the bell peppers, basil, chives, swiss chard and tomatoes seem to be doing well, and with the snow gone from the backyard, I'm sure they will transition to the garden with few problems. Still waiting on the jalapeños though . . .

Moving on, the other day Annie's friend came over and I made a loaf of bread. I got the recipe from Chef John, and have used it many times before. It's a beer based bread, and the flavor changes quite a bit with the different style of beer you use. This time I used a belgian strong ale—it turned out well. I've used an IPA and stout before and each tasted great. I wouldn't suggest a light beer though.

(Beer Bread)

This photo doesn't have much to do with the house per say, but I don't feel like starting a food blog, so there you have it.

However, concerning the home, we added a keyless entry lock to the backdoor, which is uber convenient. Here's a pic.

(New lock on backdoor)

I'll admit this now, since the lock is changed, but our old lock was broken and there were several mornings where I'd leave to go to work and discover the door had been left unlocked all night. Now we just press that button on top and the door locks itself. Like I said, uber convenient. Plus, it illuminates, which is nice since it's hard to see at night.

(Me installing the new lock. Multiple pitfalls led to a three hour procedure)

So the photo above is not my greatest picture, but it took me three hours to install the lock so don't expect a jolly smile. I'm not Santa. The problem with the installation was the old lock was pretty basic, and whoever installed it only drilled holes for what they needed rather than drill holes like you normally would for installing a lock. And I don't have those tools, so I had to improvise with a jig saw, file, and spade bit. I'm actually quite surprised it worked, there was a while when I thought we were going to have no lock on the door, and then we'd have to resort to the honor system.

Finally, and unrelated to the title, I thought I'd throw in two pics I took while playing around with my camera. They aren't good or interesting pictures, but the method behind taking them is. Somewhat. I've been trying to use the Bulb function on the new camera (which means the shutter stays open as long as you hold the shutter down—great for nigh sky photos) but I don't have a camera remote. So I would have to stand there and try to hold the button without shaking the camera. And if you want those pictures of the stars swirling in the sky you have to hold the button for several hours.

So I used a rubber band and a squished jelly bean to hold the button down. It was just an experiment, but here is a picture of our living room at night after a seven and a half minute exposure (with ISO 100).

(Like I said, not interesting)

The only light is from the streetlight a quarter of a block away and the brand name on the TV. Here's another one where I had the light on for just a second, then sat infront of the window for two minutes.

( A little more interesting, but not by much)

Anywho, when it warms up more outside and I can travel aways away from the city, I plan on trying this technique on the sky to see if I can get some cool night sky pictures.

-Daniel

Let the Garden Begin . . .

2013-03-27T00:54:00.004-05:00

On Sunday, March 24, in the year 2013, Annie and I bought some seeds.

Here they are . . .

(Some seeds from Menards)

We also bought that tray thing and some dirt, but the seeds are more interesting. We're planning on turning the southernmost section of our backyard into a garden, and we thought we'd give our plants a little head start. Apparently the last frost date for St. Paul is around May 15th, and these transplant plants are supposed to be started 7-8 weeks before that date. Still, I'm a little wary of planting the seeds considering our colder than average spring.

But we still did it anyway.

(The micro greenhouse doing it's thang.)

I think this would be a good picture for one of those motivational posters. Underneath it would be the line, "Confidence: starting a garden when it's still below freezing outside." Another option would be, "Water Bottles: they keep cats away from plants."

Here's a map of what we planted in our tiny greenhouse . . .

(Plant layout)

There are only so many plants you can start in containers. We want to try several other varieties in the backyard, but most simply get sown directly into the earth, so we'll have to wait for spring. It's supposed to be 50 and rainy on Saturday, so hopefully that helps get rid of some of the snow. We'll probably end up doing a lot of the herbs in containers on the patio and possibly in the flower box that's on our porch, so that should leave a good amount of space in the backyard for peppers and tomatoes and kohlrabi and kale and whatever else. Plus, we got the hops. Now all we need is a chicken coop and we'd be self sustained.

Anyway, it's just a start. Only time will tell how green our thumbs truly are.

Here are a few random photos just for the heck of it.

(I made a cake the other day. When I added the eggs to some oil and h20, I thought it looked cool, so I took a picture.)

(Here's the cake with a layer of caramel on top.)

(Here's the cake again, after the party . . .)

(Leo staying clear of the unfamiliar gardening equipment)

(This is the background on the mac right now)

-me

Time To Build An Ark . . .

2013-03-15T01:14:00.000-05:00

There was a puddle forming on our patio—I blinked and then it was a lake. Soon I fear it will be a sea and after that it's only a few gallons away from ocean status. Below is a photo of our water troubles.

(Here's a sea even Moses wouldn't be able to part)

This is the first spring in our new home, so we're still discovering how the backyard handles the melting snow. So far, it hasn't done that well. Since the temperature keeps going up and dropping, the snow keeps melting into water and then freezing into a skating rink. On the plus side, I just got my ice skates back from my parents (ba-da-bump!).

(You need a canoe to get to the garage)

This has been an above average year for winter precipitation, so hopefully it's not as bad next winter. Also, after the first big snowfall, we didn't fully shovel the patio, so maybe it would help if the snowbank we have is a little further back in the yard. Although I'm thinking the patio is the low point, so either way if we get a lot of snow, we're probably screwed.

(You can see Lake Itasca up near the garage. It feed's the Mississippi and our patio)

I added the picture above to highlight our flow problem. All the snow and water and ice in the backyard meander down our walking path toward our patio. The one positive thing is the water seems to be pooling on the corner of the patio away from the house, so thus far we haven't noticed any water in the basement. My brother in law looked at the photo's and had some suggestions that might help reduce the H20 problem, but those will have to wait until spring.

(Just threw this photo in to be artsy)

I added the above photo for two reasons. One, it shows how I used the recycling bins to jump to the ice and walk to the garage, but mainly I added this photo because I was messing around with photoshop and wanted to add it to the blog. The way I made it was by pasting the same image over a photoshop document twice. I turned the top layer to black and white, then simply erased the puddle, revealing the color copy below. It adds a cool look.

Anyway, I don't hate the snow as much as most people, but I am excited for it to melt. When the snow leaves it means garden season is almost upon us. Can you say Bok Choy!?

-Daniel

More Shelves Than We Know What To Do With

2013-02-11T12:58:00.000-06:00

Again, Annie and I want to give a big thanks to her dad for helping make the basement look less creepy and more livable. He recently finished painting the last section of basement floor. Yesterday (Sunday, Feb. 10th) he added some much needed shelving. And, although Leo hasn't completely tested each shelf, they look to be quite solid.

This photo shows the finished floor as well as one set of shelves, which are connected to the previous shelving.

The shelves are anchored to the ceiling joists, which I think was a pretty good idea on Annie's dads part. Unless, that is, we get a massive tornado—then the shelves might get sucked out of the basement.

Here is a 'Leo view' photo that shows both sets of shelves.

So we've pretty much doubled our storage space, which is good, because we should be able to keep everything except rugs off the ground, and who knows when this basement will flood next.

Now we just need to drive around looking for piles of junk on curb sides with signs that say 'Free' so we can fill up all these shelves. Until then, we have this stuff to put away.

Of course, what's really important is the question, "What does Leo think?" When I asked him, he said the shelves looked nice, but he thought the materials and effort could have been put to a better use making one of these . . .

Maybe next time Leo.

-Daniel

Basement Update

2013-01-19T12:57:00.002-06:00

Annie and I would like to give a large thanks to Dave, Annie's dad, who just spent a large amount of time working on our basement. The cement floor is close to a hundred years old. It was multi-colored and pockmarked from time and probably from flooding. A new coat of paint really went a long way in making it look great.

First, a before shot . . .

There's a lot of junk laying around in this one, but you can see quite well the state of the floor. It wasn't very good.

And now, here is an after shot . . .

Ahhh. Much better. Most of the small craters are still there, it's just really hard to see them with a fresh coat of paint.

Here's another angle . . .

(Notice the large pile of crap still in the back corner)

In addition to painting the basement floor, Dave also painted the walls above the stairwell. They were simply unpainted wood before and there is no light, so it was extremely dark walking down the stairs. Now, however, it's nice and white, and much brighter when taking the journey to the basement. Here is a photo, although I don't have a before shot . . .

That's all for now!

-Daniel

Welcome, 2013!

2013-01-14T19:13:00.000-06:00

It's been a while since I've updated anything on the blog. A long while, really. I think it was around the start of fall or end of summer since the last post. Naturally a lot has happened between then and now, and I've probably forgotten a good deal—which is a bummer, because one of the reasons we created this blog was so that we would remember some of the details we might forget. Oh well, live and learn.

One memorable event from fall was when our garage door broke. It was the first major pitfall of home ownership. I should have taken a picture, but I was bummed, and I didn't want to feel like a gawker at a disaster site. But I can paint a pretty clear mental image . . . you ready? Okay. Image a normal garage door. Now imagine an accordion. Now imagine both those things at once. You've just seen our broken garage door. Luckily the repair man was able to add a brace to the existing door and we didn't have to replace the old one. That would've cost a few Benjamin's, as they say in hip places that call hundred dollar bills Benjamin's.

The next memory of note, which I also do not have a picture of, was raking. I knew the tree in our backyard was a monster, but there was no way anyone could prepare for the amount of leaves that were spewed about our yard. I bought thirty leaf bags from Menards. After those had all been filled (using a mulcher, so the leaves were in very tiny pieces) I just raked the rest of the leaves into the back corner of the yard. We intend to use that section as a garden next year, so I figure the leaves will just act as fertilizer. That's what happens, right?

Well, I bet you're bored. Too much talking . . . where are all the pictures in this book? Here's one!

This is the first Christmas tree in the new house, as well as the first living Christmas tree Annie and I have ever had. It did a stupendous job performing it's holiday cheer functions. Not one ornament fell off, it didn't shed too many needles, and it didn't let Leo climb it's prickly boughs.

This next photo is a night shot of the house using a long exposure with a new camera. If you click it, it will get bigger, and you just might be able to see the moonlight sparkling on the snow covered roof. How special.

After we packed up the Christmas stuff, Annie and I pulled out a puzzle I got for Christmas. I actually got it several years ago, but with the new table we actually have a space that can properly handle a 1500 piece puzzle.

Today, Annie's dad and brother came over to help with a major project—painting the basement floor. It was during this that I thought to take some pictures, and use them to update the blog. The first step was to try to level out some of the gouges in the concrete, so here are some before and after shots so you can see the difference some self-leveling cement makes.

(Before)

(After)

We had to move all the crap we have in the basement into the back corner in order to free up ground space. It makes for quite a cluttered mess. Leo loves it, so many places to explore. We had to shut the basement door though—we didn't want any Leo tracks in the wet cement. Here's the basement crap pile.

Leo hates closed doors. He likes to let us know that this is his house, and he should have full access to every room. When you close a door, he voices his objections.

I've seen that face before. If you get within four inches he'll reach out that little orange paw of his and pull you under the door. He's quite strong, for a cat. Don't let the cuteness fool you.

Well, that's all for now, a large update. Hopefully it won't be as long until the next post.

-Daniel

The First Mouse near the House

2012-07-10T01:58:00.004-05:00

I don't have any picture to go along with this post like I do with most other posts, but I thought it would be wise to at least chronicle a momentous event. Today, while grilling pizza on the grill (as if you grill it any other place), I noticed a black furry rodent scurrying around the back of our house. It came through the small patch of the Lilly of the Valley flowers, ran around the corner toward the porch, then disappeared through a small hole in the concrete steps that I previously hadn't noticed. I was speechless and was staring at the rodent. I quickly looked up at Annie and tried to wipe the startled look off my face before she could notice anything amiss, but it was too late. She noticed. I haven't seen a mouse with her before, and I can say I am proud she didn't scream, but she did seem disgusted. In fact, she kept saying, "That's disgusting," with heavy emphasis on the "gust." I hope the little critter wasn't too offended. We later saw him scamper back the the Lilly of the Valley from whence he came.

After reading this, you're probably thinking, "Grilled pizza, how does that work?" I was just as skeptical, but it works—and it tastes amazing. I start with a dough ball that I buy from Lunds for 1.49. After forming the right shape by tossing the dough in the air like a pizza professional, I heavily oil the grill then drape the dough on the hot grates. After a few minutes, I flip the dough and add the sauce, cheese, and toppings. Within a total of 5-8 minutes, the pizza is done, and it tastes super-duper (as some nerdy home school kids I know would say). I know I said there wouldn't be any pictures in this post, but what the heck, here you go...

This was a nice margherita-esque pizza. Marinara sauce with sliced mozzarella, olives, and basil from the garden. The possibilities are endless.

-Daniel

Updated Home Video

2012-06-28T13:43:00.000-05:00

Here is a video of the Updated Home.

It's been a while since we've posted anything on the blog. After about a month of being in the new home it is starting to look like a place where people live. We still need to hang most things on the walls, but overall the house looks great.

Annie's dad has spent many hours painting the walls and in some cases the ceilings in order to make the home feel warmer. The rust colored accent wall goes great with the brown in the dining and living room, and the odd shade of green that we probably wouldn't have normally picked works surprisingly well with the tile backsplash in the kitchen. Also, the newly painted white porch is much brighter and fresher looking then the worn, non painted wood that was in there before.

In addition to paint, we have also added furniture to fill in the house. Luckily we moved from a decent sized apartment into not to large of a house, so we didn't need to buy too much furniture. Mainly we wanted a large dining room table (So that we would have ample board game space) and a queen sized bed (The full was feeling small, especially when Leo was sleeping with us).

We also did a lot of work on the exterior of the house. Over memorial day weekend I got on the roof and removed four garbage bags worth of dead leaves and other detritus. The garden got a little freshening up with a new layer of mulch, and I planted my hops along with some vegetables.

You can see all of these updates in the video, so I won't post any pictures of them. Enjoy!

-Daniel

First Success. First Failure.

2012-05-21T00:42:00.000-05:00

Technically, I suppose the first success for the house would be the major cleaning Annie and her mom completed. However, I am going to stick with small house projects. Our first success was...a new toilet seat cover! Here is a pic of the old toilet seat.

(Old toilet seat cover...Yuck!)

As you can see, the old toilet seat cover was wood. I don't know why they make toilet seat covers out of wood, it reminds me of an outhouse. Plus who knows how many people have pooped on that thing. Might as well get a new cover, right? We weren't sure if we got the right size, and I have never changed a toilet seat cover before, but after a little bit of laying on the bathroom floor, our toilet looked like it was originally supposed to look...beautiful.

(Amazing toilet seat)

Now onto the first failure. It wasn't a big deal, we will just have to make a return trip to WalMart. I will probably not go to the WalMart on University Ave like we did to get this item. That place is one of the worst places on Earth. Although if you have enough patience it can be fairly entertaining. For example, on our last trip we got to see a really fat guy walking while holding his cell phone above his head as it rang over and over again. Shortly after that we saw some people almost kill each other over line position at the checkout, and to top it all off we got to see a guy get arrested for stealing a white vest. Still, I'd drive to the nearest WalMart in Iowa if it meant avoiding that WalMart.
Where was I? Oh yeah. Our first failure was a poorly fitting dish drying rack. Bummer.

(That's not going to fit)

If that is our biggest failure, I am going to count ourselves blessed.

We did get a new table today too, but that doesn't come for several weeks. We measured it and I am pretty sure we can play a game of PowerGrid on it while also playing a game of Small World. So yeah, it's a pretty nice table.

-Daniel

We Got the Keys!

2012-05-21T00:31:00.001-05:00

I know this entry is a little late but it has been a bit hectic the past few days and we only expect that to become a trend over the next couple weeks. On May 18th, 2012 we started our day by driving to a title company in Eagan and signing several documents. After a half hour or so and some polite small talk we had the keys to our first house. Well, technically we got a envelope filled with a ton of keys that we had no idea went to what door, but you get the point. After driving straight to the new place, we took this video. It is a tour and our first time being in the house as owners. Enjoy!

Click Here for Video-It's on YouTube.

Well, I hope you enjoyed that. It was a busy day closing on our new house. I worked until 3:30am the previous night and so was fairly tired at closing. It is somewhat of a blur at this point. Annie's mom came over soon after getting the keys and we started cleaning the house. Here are some photo's of the action.

(Annie working on the Sink)

(Mysterious stranger dusting (Annie's mom said she didn't want to be on the blog.))

I cleaned a little but was primarily driving to and fro picking up supplies and Arby's salads for lunch (We wanted to eat healthy because we went to the Nook for dinner). I did, however, plant my two hop plants in the backyard. Did I mention it was stinking hot outside? I got really sweaty. First I had to drive the hop plants over from the apartment. Here is a pic of that sweet ride.

(The hops and I going for a cruise-they went out the sunroof!)

I am not sure if they are going to make it, it was pretty hot that day and the rootball came apart pretty badly when I planted them, but we'll see what happens. Hops are suppose to be hearty. See what you think...

(The hops are the things around the dowel.)

Well, that's all for now, I am sure there will be more to come soon!

-Daniel

Let the Packing Begin

2012-05-07T00:36:00.001-05:00

The 6th of May, 2012. A day that will live in infamy. Just twenty-four hours after the fun and revelry of Cinco de Mayo, Annie and I started packing. We still have a comfortable amount of time to get this task accomplished and yet we have already packed a decent amount of items. We started in the bedroom.

(Annie getting packing started in the bedroom)

The cats were very curious and explored the new real-estate previously occupied by several books. Leo approved of the vantage point, although he did not approve of Jasper being in the slot beneath him.

(Leo and Jasper on the bookshelf)

Another shot of the cats. It's really hard to get them both to look at the camera at the same time. I accomplished this by making very loud meowing noises, and even then it took several pictures to get this money shot. I'm sure the elderly woman, Pat, who lives upstairs is also excited for us to move.

(Leo and Jasper on the bookshelf II)

After clearing most of the books and random items from the bedroom we had some fajitas. Then we decided to start packing the front closet, but then I was on the computer and saw Dairy Queen has a new Confetti Cake Blizzard, and so we went and got two small blizzards. After spending an hour or so of being really full and lethargic, we started packing the front closet. I knew we had a lot of games, but I was still startled by how much room they occupied. I guess that's what happens when you work at a game store.

(The board games patiently waiting to be packed)

Well, that's all for now. Annie is still putting the finishing touches on packing the front closet but we've made good progress. It will be nice having plenty of time to move and only having to move all this crap only 1.2 miles away (I have measured it with our cars odometer).

-Daniel

Leo Getting Ready for the Move

2012-04-24T21:52:00.000-05:00

Just thought we'd post a quick blog entry showing how Leo, our beloved feline friend, is preparing for the move. As you can see in this video, Leo is inspecting all of our boxes to ensure they are of proper construction.

Enjoy!

-Daniel and Annie

Menards Trip 7 of 12,349

2012-04-09T21:12:00.002-05:00

Despite our lack of actually moving into the new house, I have somehow managed to make 7 or so trips to Menards already. Usually I do this during my free time when not at work and I am not looking for anything in particular. I simply start at one end of the store, then meander aisle by aisle looking at all of the beautiful projects as I daydream about how they could be used to amplify the beauty of our already beautiful home. Today (I'll call this trip seven even though it is just an estimate) was the result of different conditions.

Annie and I were in Hudson getting our new car repaired (again) and found ourselves stranded in a town that was not designed with the walker in mind. Naturally the best option (even if Hudson had a bustling transit system) was to walk to the nearest Menards and wander the glistening aisles. While we looked at just about everything in the store (we had to burn 3 hours) I only ended up taking a picture in the lighting department. We are planning on changing the light fixture in the bathroom a little after we move in, and there were definitely plenty of options.

(Any gazing toward the heavens. No wait, that's just a neon sign)

Below I took a picture of a likely candidate. It was about 60 bucks which is less then we were originally thinking about, so that would be a plus. Ironically the picture has poor lighting despite being in a department where you wouldn't expect that to be a problem. The sun is simply too powerful.

(Possible light fixture for bathroom)

Until next time!
-Daniel

And so the Blog Begins...

2012-04-05T15:46:00.000-05:00

Early in the spring of 2012, my wife Annie and I decided to embark upon a search for our first home. After mentally preparing ourselves for a long and arduous adventure, we (with the help of our friendly Realtors) scoured St. Paul for the house that fit us best. To our great surprise we purchased a home within a week of beginning our search.

This blog is open for anyone to peruse, however the primary reason for it's existence is to serve Annie and me as an easily accessible record of our first home.

Enjoy!

-Daniel