Happy Canada Day!

Posted on July 1, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Today, I and my fellow Canadians are celebrating our country’s 149th birthday.

I’m also celebrating because I’m a new contributor to homify.ca. homify is a new online platform for housing and construction. The goal of the site is to connect architects, designers, builders–all of the professionals you need–with house and apartment owners.

My first homify.ca post is appropriately Canadian: ideas to incorporate a bit of Canadiana into your home decor.

(I totally want this eh! pillow for my house).

Source: Samphire Bay

To my fellow Canadians, happy Canada Day. To my American readers, happy almost Fourth of July. No matter what nationality you are, happy weekend, everyone!

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Garden at the end of June

Posted on June 29, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Much progress has been made on the garden. You might notice in the photo above that we have a gate! And it’s not just propped in place. It’s actually on hinges, and it swings and everything. It’s only been 10 months since I built the gate. Not at all unreasonable to wait that long to fully protect the garden, right?

Inside, things are slowly filling in. I’m trying to remind myself to be patient and things will grow… eventually.

Let me take you on a tour of around our garden as it’s growing right now.

Quadrant one is our most well-established. It is home to five rows of potatoes–three red, one Kennebec and one Russian Blue. Although I really could have done two Russian Blues given how many we had and how much space there is in this quadrant. There are also three zucchini plants. Then in the perimeter beds there are onions, beets, carrots and a selection of herbs.

I’m a bit disappointed in the onions. They are spindly, some of the ends are brown, and I’m not confident that they’re going to size up. But I keep watering them and sowing new rows for my attempt at succession planting. (The beets in the background are doing excellent, however).

Quadrant two is bordered by our perennial crops: raspberries, grapes and asparagus. The middle is empty however, and we don’t have plans to plant anything here. One of the things I’ve realized is that we can only handle so much with this large vegetable garden.

The asparagus isn’t that much farther along than the onions, but I’m beyond excited by it. I’m trying to grow asparagus from seeds, and I thought I wasn’t going to be successful. These seeds took so long to sprout. Almost three weeks. I thought it wasn’t going to happen. So these little tiny ferns are tremendous progress.

Quadrant 3 has a lot of growth, but not the kind I want. Welcome to weed central. Ugh. There are some watermelon seedlings in here, but I’m not sure they’ll last that much longer without some defense. The outside edge has our sunflowers which are growing incredibly.

Quadrant four is slightly better than weed central, but not by much. This is our first year planting this half of the garden, so it’s taking more effort to clear out the weeds on this side. In this quarter we have two rows of tomatoes (under the wood frames), one of peppers, one of beans and three more zucchini plants. The outer edge has some more herbs, more sunflowers and our hollyhocks.

You’ve caught glimpses of the centre axis already, but here’s the view that I’ve been working towards for the past two years. A long look between our two rows of raspberries, through the squash A-frame and out to the back fields.

On Monday I posted about vision. The vision for this vegetable garden has been a long time coming, but it’s oh so wonderful to see it come to life.

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Seeing it all come together… sometimes

Posted on June 27, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

When I finished the guest room makeover, I started thinking about vision. By that I mean having a vision for a space and seeing it come together.

I loooooove the guest room. And it was an easy makeover. For me, easy means two things:

I had it clear in my mind what I wanted the room to look like.
I was enthused to work on the room. The makeover didn’t stall out halfway.

If I contrast that with the master bedroom, it’s a bit of a different story. I still really like that room, but the makeover was a project that I didn’t really love. It dragged on and on and on. From picking a paint colour to building the headboard to sewing the curtains, I wasn’t sure what I wanted. I didn’t have a clear vision. And so the room felt like a chore.

I’m a very visual thinker. If I think back to my university days when I was studying, I could visualize a page in my notebook and remember what was written on that page. It’s definitely not a photographic memory, but it’s about seeing pictures in my mind.

My approach to home renovation is the same. Usually, I can see it in my mind–very clearly–what the room is going to look like in the end.

And when I do, that makes me excited about the project. It gives me energy to keep going and to make the picture in my mind a reality in my home.

Fortunately, I’ve been thinking about our forever home long enough and we’ve been living here long enough that I’ve been able to develop a pretty clear vision for most of the spaces–both inside and out–at the farm.

Now if there were just enough hours in the day (and money in the bank) to bring them all to life!

How do you approach home reno projects? Are you a visual person? What makes you excited about a makeover?

Peony victories and failures

Posted on June 24, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Our peonies were spectacular this year. After lots of transplanting and splitting in past seasons, each bush is getting more established, and we had a beautiful mix of fuscia, blush and white blooms.

I don’t usually do cut flowers, but after a bunch of the white peony blossoms proved too heavy for their stalks, I cut them and brought them inside.

I don’t do cut flowers because they quickly turn depressing on me. I’m not one to remember to refresh water or pamper my plants. So blooms wilt, stems droop and the flowers look more funereal than fabulous.

But with these peonies, I think I beat even my own record. One day–just one day–after bringing them in, a blossom shed every single one of its petals. I scooped the white flakes into the composter and carried on. Three more flowers disrobed the following day. At that point the whole bouquet–or the remains–went in the composter.

So lesson learned, I will focus on enjoying the peonies outside and refrain from any further florist failures.

And it’s Friday, so I will be spending a lot of time outside this weekend.

What do you have on tap for the weekend? Do you have any peonies either in your garden or in a vase at your house?

Wild raspberries in Illinois

Posted on June 22, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Sarah in Illinois is kicking off summer with a quintessential summer activity: a family berry-picking outing.

One of the perks of my husband being a farmer and spending long days driving around backroads and secluded fields is that he finds secret spots.

Like the best mushroom hunting spot. Or like one day this spring when he took us out into one of the fields that he was getting ready to plant and showed us an eagle’s nest. The nest was so very big. We waited for quite a while but never got to spot an eagle.

His latest secret spot came to us Friday.

When he got home he said, “Tomorrow we are going raspberry picking!” In years past when he would see that the raspberries or blackberries were nearing ripeness, we would wait too long and the birds got to them first. So this year Steve said we had to go and we had to go immediately.

Saturday after breakfast we rounded up ice cream buckets and baskets, picked up Steve’s mom and headed to the field.

I think we were still a little too early but we picked for at least two hours.

And believe it or not, after Julia posted about her run in with a turtle, we ran across one in the field.

We ended up bringing home enough raspberries to freeze 3 quarts.

We have given Steve instructions that as soon as he sees these blackberries begin to ripen to take us back! There were even more blackberries than raspberry vines!

What a great bounty of berries, Sarah! Strawberries have just started in our area, so we have a little while to go until the raspberries are ready. I can almost taste the sunwarmed berries when I look at your photos. Enjoy!

Summer to-do list

Posted on June 20, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Summer officially arrives this evening. While I have grand plans of sunshine and hammocks and hikes and gardens and lots of time outdoors, I also have a handful of projects that I’ve been saving up for my favourite season.

Build a closet in the basement

Our house has fabulous storage. However, none of it is a match for my husband. I’m not sure Matt’s office ever successfully contained all of his stuff. Over the winter I had a brainwave. Remove some of the cabinets that are tucked between the dryer and the freezer in the laundry room (they’re already filled with his stuff anyway) and replace them with a full height closet. I think I can just about triple his storage space. And it should be a pretty simple build with some basic framing, drywall, bi-fold doors and shelves.

Sand scrabble tiles

Source: insideways

One of my Home Goals for 2016 is adding some art to the basement. Going with our fun and games theme, I want to DIY some Scrabble tiles. I’ve had the wood cut for months. Months, I tell you. I just need to sand them and then paint the letters. Sanding sounds like a good way to enjoy some time outside in the sunshine, doesn’t it?

Strip paint off the guest room bed

The only thing missing from our beautiful guest room makeover is a proper bedframe. I have a great rustic metal frame in the barn, but the finish isn’t the greatest. I’m planning to strip it back to bare metal and see what it looks like. Paint stripping is an outdoor job IMO, so another good way to enjoy the outdoors.

Makeover office cabinet

Last week, you saw the china cabinet I’ve bought for my office and heard about my plans to rebuild the upper hutch. I’m so excited to have my office organized that I can’t wait to get started on this project. However, I have to put this lower down on the list, as other projects have been hanging around much longer. So this one’s a maybe summer project.

Puttering on some projects, keeping up with the gardens and relaxing on the farm. That’s my recipe for a good summer.

What’s your recipe? Do you have a summer to-do list? What are you looking forward to this season?

How to help a turtle cross the road

Posted on June 17, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Our farm is in a very marshy area. On the roads around the farm, I often encounter turtles on the move from one marsh to another–usually on the opposite side of the road.

Fortunately, most drivers seem to be pretty conscientious about doing what they can to protect turtles (I saw one car yesterday with an “I brake for turtles” bumper sticker). So it’s not unusual to see cars pulled over or stopped a safe distance from a crossing turtle.

Most times though people don’t seem to know what to do with the turtles. They’re obviously not the fastest creatures in the world, so it’s usually necessary to help the turtles on their way.

Here’s my technique to move a turtle along.

First the basics: safely pull over your car making sure to get as far out of traffic as possible. If you have to enter the road, look both ways and make sure you’re going to be safe.

Now the more complicated step: picking up the turtle.

Most of the turtles I encounter are large snapping turtles. I have a childhood paranoia from swimming at my grandparents’ cottage about being bitten by a snapping turtle–not that I’ve ever been bitten. It’s just a childhood hangup.

However, I’ve learned it’s very easy to pick up a turtle without endangering yourself or the turtle.

My technique is to grab the turtle with both hands on the rear half of the shell. Get a firm grip. If the turtle’s on the small side, you might be able to grab it with one hand, but it’s safer to use two hands. The turtle might squirm a little bit or might be heavier than you expect.

Now lift. Her head will maybe turn around, but she won’t be able to reach you if you’re on the back half of her shell.

Make sure to hold the turtle away from you. It will likely be slimy and wet. And the last time I moved a turtle, I swear it tried to pee on me.

Now carry the turtle across the road and gently set it as far from the edge of the road as possible.

Wipe your hands (the grass will probably work if you don’t happen to have tissues in the car) and go on your way.

Have you ever helped a turtle cross the road? What’s your technique? What animals do you encounter around your home?

Garden in June

Posted on June 15, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Every night when I get home from work, I walk through the garden. It’s one of my favourite times of the day–outside at the farm, seeing what’s grown during the day, appreciating all of the hard work we’ve done so far.

The garden is finally taking shape as I’ve envisioned it would from the start–as in years.

Sprouts are growing, from hollyhocks to beets to onions and sunflowers.

Some of the plants have gone beyond sprouting and moved onto blossoming.

There are even signs of fruit on the raspberries and grapes–although I’m working myself up to picking the grapes, as the vines are supposed to focus on growing, not fruiting yet.

I’ve planted herbs all around the perimeter, lavender, thyme, sage, rosemary, basil.

The biggest progress since my final Dueling DIY update are the trellises for the squash, raspberries and tomatoes. I’ll go into more detail on each of these as we go through the season, but here are a few snapshots for now.

The tomatoes are planted under a simple 2×2 wood frame. I’ll add strings once the tomatoes grow a bit more.

Matt hammered 12 steel T-posts around the 2 rows of raspberries. I still need to string wire between each post to hold the raspberries upright, but the hard work was definitely the posts. So much hammering.

The biggest addition is our squash trellis. Fingers crossed this works to corral the squash. We have a big garden, but I learned last year that it was no match for squash.

We have a few more tasks to do before we can officially move into maintenance mode: hang the gate and spread the straw for our deep mulch experiment.

But for now, I’m enjoying my evening walks and seeing the growth so far.

What’s growing at your house?

China cabinet makeover plans

Posted on June 13, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

Last week you saw the china cabinet that I’m going to make over for my office. Today I’m back with my makeover plans–and a couple of spots where I need your input.

This cabinet is a win for a lot of reasons: drawers (surprisingly hard to find), the exact width I need to fit on the wall beside the window, solid wood, decent quality.

It has one big miss though. It’s not quite as tall as I want. The three shelves on the upper hutch are great. But they’re too short to hold even a magazine. So I’m planning to rebuild the top to give a little more breathing room between the shelves. I think I can reuse a lot of the hutch–everything except the side pieces, which isn’t a bad thing because I don’t love the half-moon cutouts anyway.

I’ll make the old and new wood blend with a coat of white paint, but I have a plan to let a bit of the wood show through. Hopefully I can sand out some of the scratches.

I’m not sure what I’m going to do with the pulls yet. They’re all wood and completely recessed into the doors and drawers. I can’t remove them without leaving big holes in the cabinet. I’m wondering if some gold paint would work. I have an idea it might look a bit campaign-esque like this dresser from Centsational Girl. What do you think?

The other area I’m questioning is the legs. Right now, there are two long legs on the bottom. Basically 2x4s screwed to the cabinet. (Please ignore the dust).

I feel like I’d like something a little more traditional. Here are some options I picked up from Home Depot. Which do you like best?

I’m not sure when I’m going to get to the cabinet makeover, but I’m excited by the possibilities.

What are your ideas for the makeover? Any ideas to deal with the handles? What about the leg options?

Thrifting with the in-laws

Posted on June 10, 2016 by Julia at Home on 129 Acres

A few months ago (yes, I’ve been holding out on you guys), Matt and I went out to dinner with his family. The restaurant just happened to be next to a Value Village, so there was a family thrifting excursion after dinner.

After a little while in the store, Matt and I exchanged a look. His said, “I didn’t find anything. You ready to go?”

Mine said, “Nope. Absolutely not. I found something I’m quite excited about. You have to come over here right now.”

After years of searching I had found the cabinet that I wanted for my office. My office is our last untouched room–in fact it’s still full of boxes that have been in there since moving day. The cabinet is my trigger to paint the walls, unpack the boxes and finish this space in the way I’ve been imagining for years. So I was not leaving the store without this cabinet–no matter that I was surrounded by my in-laws.

In fact, the in-laws were a bonus. My father-in-law was our chauffeur for the night and his truck was just what we needed to transport the cabinet. My sister-in-law stood guard over the cabinet while I went to the cashier to pay. And my mother-in-law found my father-in-law and told him to bring the truck.

Ahhh, family.

Want to see what had me so excited? (In a very poorly lit picture?)