Super Urchins!

This past weekend we finally got to the bottom of The List. Yep.

The bottom. Of The List.

The List that we set for ourselves of things to finish before the rental season started. As of now, nothing (well, nothing major) shall be added to any New List until the fall. When we are fortunate enough to find ourselves at the cottage this summer, it will be for bonfires and gelato runs and no-holds barred Farkle matches.

Getting to the bottom of The List was more problematic than we expected. There were setbacks.

But this weekend we prevailed, thanks to our Super Urchins.

Little Urchin (Lu) took on the job of adding pickets to an unsafe railing around our back deck / tent platform.

He worked hard in the hot sun. The result is a deck that is miles safer for little guests, and actually looks better too.

 

 

 

 

 

 Meanwhile, Big Urchin (Bu) got up on the roof. We passed him a blower to see if that would remove some of the gunk on the shingles. But like so many jobs in life, there was no easy way to do it. In the end, it took a broom and a lot of effort to get the roof looking good. 

I still can’t get over it!  It was a long, hard job on a very hot day. He did not quit. He did not cut corners. He even put on a shirt when advised to do so. Could this really be true? 

These are the tears of a woman who may have just had a glimpse of the light at the end of at least one tunnel. 

And it was good.

Wood Stacking, Debris Packing and Garden Whacking

Along with venerating good Queen Victoria last holiday weekend, we had company for two nights – barbecued, bonfired and drank pink wine – and also carried on with our list of things to accomplish before our first renters of the season arrive next month. Chief among these is yard clean up.

As a team, we wrestled most of the newly-felled firewood into a woodpile behind the (full) woodshed.

Then Cottager hauled a good portion of the debris down from the top of the property while I continued to groom the garden. 

old construction debris for the dump

All of these jobs are on schedule to be completed next weekend, when we will have the use of a truck (Thanks Gary!) to make a run to the dump and probably a few to the green waste depot. Meanwhile the garden is looking spectacular.

Cottage garden in spring splendour

 

I made sure to take some time to enjoy it, taking my morning coffee into the hammock in the shade of the red maple.

Fabulous New Retaining Wall!

When the tree fallers carted away all of that debris from our driveway recently, the center portion of the retaining wall in the driveway collapsed and was carted away as well. We quite literally pulled the remaining wall down with our hands, and then set to work making a new one.

Old retaining wall comes tumbling down

Cottager and I went over very early one Friday morning, but still arrived only about a half hour ahead of the delivery truck from the lumber yard.

Delivery truck, after grinding up the driveway

Besides a lot of hard digging, which I lent my expert supervision to, the tricky bit was getting the posts in just the right position. It turned out the old wall was rooted in concrete, so we had to put the new posts elsewhere. In the end, it took Cottager one whole day of hard work to get it all lined up for concreting. We got the concrete poured early next day, in about two hours, thanks to this handy little rolla-mixer from Lee Valley. Then we tidied up and left it to set up.

Great little system for mixing very small amounts of concrete

Hard part of the job is done.

Last weekend Cottager invited his ‘Fight Club’ buddies (they fight it out over Trivial Pursuit) out to the cottage for a bit of a retreat.

“Oh,” says he, ”And could you give me a hand with these giant, sixteen foot timbers, by the way?”

Fight Club crew gets the job done, alright!

In about two hours they had it all put together and backfilled, so they could get down to the serious business of board games and cold beer. Thanks for helping out guys! 

Now we just have to fix the driveway that the truck made a mess of it whilst delivering the timbers to repair the wall that fell down when we had the tree fallers over.  And so it goes.

Wall complete. Tick. What's next on the list?

Fun With Found Things

My pal AJ came over for a visit on Friday evening and we had a fun 24 hours.

On Saturday morning we tackled a strawberry planter that Little Urchin recently found amongst the treasures put out for Spring Clean-Up garbage collection in our neighbourhood.

Tidy potting

One lip had been broken off and threatened to disgorge dirt everywhere – probably why it had been tossed out. We patched it with a bit of landscape fabric with tape to hold it in place until the dirt fill could take over the job. Then we turned that part towards the fence. Radically, we decided on trailing annuals rather than strawberries. We were a bit short of plants, but I have my eye on some trailing snapdragons to complete the job. 

While we were at it, we prepared planters for sweet peas and a cherry tomato. We also planted some Money Plant seeds AJ bought at a local plant sale for 25 cents. Lunaria annua are usually grown for their translucent ’silver dollar’ like seed pods as a dried flower.  They bloom with lightly scented purple or white flowers which slowly transform into seed pods. It is also known as “Honesty”, Satin Flower and Moon Wort.

Old vinyl shower curtains are wonderful for projects like this. The one seen preserving our potting soil and keeping the deck clean in this photo is the same one my kids recently used to drag branches and other debris down from our back yard.

They are also a really superior painting tarp, since they lie tight to the wall, don’t tear easily or get squirreled up when you walk across them.

 

 

Tim-bah!

Four months after we contracted with the local Danger Faller to take down the leaning-cherry-tree-of-doom, a cedar, a hemlock and some assorted weed trees – he actually showed up and did the job!  I guess that’s ‘Coast time’ for you. 

Seven trees came down in total, and though it takes a bit of getting used to, it is definitely an improvement. Best of all, we now have several years worth of firewood. Cottager, urchins and their friends have been having fun with axes and wedges, and there is still no shortage to be split. The menfolk come in glowing, having connected with their inner Dick Proenneke. And the urchins have always been fans of dismantling things, so reducing large pieces of wood into smaller ones is a natural for them, too.

That cherry is not so scary now!

 

The urchins and their creative urchin friends build WALL-E

 

Happiness is a full woodshed. Now, where to put the rest?

Spring Clean Up

Previous owners of Keats View cottage (and possibly some other wily locals) have dumped a considerable amount of yard and construction debris up near the top of the property over the years.  I was vaguely aware of this fact when we offered on it but too distracted by other concerns to think to include yard clean up in our purchase conditions. So now, we get to do it. 

And with both fire season and the summer rental season creeping up on us, it needs to be done now. As extra motivation, we have a tree faller coming to remove some trees for us, and he agreed to chip up anything we left in our driveway.  I’m not quite sure he knows what he has gotten himself into.

This weekend we concentrated on the piles of branches and other organic waste. Luckily, it is too early for bees nests, because if I was a bee I would want to live here!  We got about half of the job done.  The kids were a huge help, ’skidding’ piles of dry branches down the slope on an old vinyl shower curtain. They were rewarded with dinner out at their local favourite – the Waterfront cafe - plus homemade cinnabons. Its all about food with them. 

Cottager and I hope to borrow a pick-up truck or trailer in the next few weeks to get the rest of the branches and other organic waste up to the green waste depot and to take the construction debris – nicely studded with nails and screws – to the dump. Tetanus shots up to date? Check!

A bigger job than we expected (what isn't?)

10 foot high pile awaits the chipper

New Office Unveiled

Still not entirely complete – please politely fail to notice fill patches on door frame and need for new carpet and mouldings outside door – but our new office is operational, and the ‘happening’ place in our home. The floor coverings are on the priority wish list, and, in the fullness of time, some new furnishings and accent decor would also be desirable. In the meantime, our old stuff will do just fine. Without further ado…ta da!

The space before:  

 

And After:

 

Frank-the-cat loves his new perch, complete with heating pad!

 

Glass block detail adds interest (and light to new hallway)

 

Vaulted ceiling created high-altitude 'deep' storage opportunity

Hope For Spring

It’s snowing again! What a winter we’ve had.

I am warming my hands over these photos of new life in the cottage garden.

Hope they make you feel hopeful, too.

First push for spring bulbs

 

New hydrangea leaves, fat rhodo buds and heather in bloom.

Coconut Glazed Oatmeal Cake – The Food of Love for 2009

Last year, just in time for Valentines Day, I posted my much-admired and oft-requested recipe for Chocolate Fudgies. If you are looking for another home-baked love offering for this year, I suggest this cake; the ultimate, recession-proof comfort food. This sweet and very moist treat requires no fancy ingredients and delivers a wonderful old-fashioned taste complete with a broiled-on sticky coconut topping. Its a great reminder that sometimes the best things are also the simplest – like love and gooey toppings.

CAKE

1 cup quick cooking rolled oats

1  1/3 cups boiling water

1/2 cup butter or margerine

1 cup brown sugar

1 cup white sugar

2 eggs, beaten

1  1/3 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp salt

 METHOD

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

In a small bowl, combine oats and boiling water and allow to cool 15 minutes while you assemble the other ingredients.

In a larger bowl, cream together the softened butter and sugars, then add the beaten eggs, and beat til fluffy.

Sift (yeah, I never do either!) the dry ingredients and add them  alternately with the soaked oatmeal to the creamed mixture until well blended. Turn into a buttered 8×8 pan and bake at 350 degrees for 40-45 minutes.  Check for doneness with a toothpick, then press gently in centre of cake to make sure it is quite firm before removing from oven - otherwise the weight of the topping may collapse the centre of the cake slightly.

While the cake is baking, mix the topping:

TOPPING

6 T melted butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sweet shredded coconut

1/2 coarsely chopped pecans or walnuts

1/4 cup light cream

1/2 tsp vanilla

Mix all ingredients together. While cake is hot, carefully spread the topping evenly.

Set oven to Broil and position rack 4 inches from the burner. Broil cake while you are bent nearly double WATCHING IT ALL THE TIME!

Topping will melt, bubble and turn golden brown in 3-5 minutes.  Cool and enjoy.  My work here is done and I am off to the cottage!

Coconut-glazed oatmeal cake

Creating a Home Office From the Walls On Up

Here is a preview of our new home office space.  This is not at the cottage, but at our town home near Vancouver.

We have a large irregularly-shaped loft area, measuring roughly 18 x 10,  at the top of our stairs that has been a bit of a swing-space for storing-whatever-was-in-the-way-of-whatever-we-happened-to-be-working-on.  When the kids were small we had a couch here for reading. Then it became a computer and craft and toy area, but being at one of the main intersections in the house, it didn’t offer a lot of peace and privacy. 

Our kids are growing up fast but the space they seem to take up in the house has become entirely out of proportion to their sizes. Our hotel-style bedroom make-over gave us a nice new retreat, but we still needed a private work space.  Cottager had to talk me into walling up a part of our loft space  because I had concerns about the loss of light that would result.  But we managed to largely overcome that problem by choosing a french door and installing some glass block.  We are probably still two weekends away from having all of the finishing done, but here are a few photos of the early stages of the job: Framing and drywalling. Starting with a view of one side of the original loft space.

 

The framed office…

And with the drywall up…

This weekend Cottager is installing laminate flooring leftover from our downstairs reno and I am painting moldings and the french door. Tune in near the end of the month for the big reveal!