Back before we moved, I ordered myself a little housewarming gift.
You may recall that the sun porch has three doors. One that opens to the catio, one that opens to the house (which has the cat flap so the cats and come and go) and one that opens to the driveway.
Since the cats can be out on the porch at any time now, I wanted something that would remind people to keep their eyes open and not let a cat slip by them.
It arrived the other day, and I was not dissapointed.
I found the company that makes them through a Facebook ad. As soon as I saw it, I knew it was exactly what I needed. You get to pick from a variety of cat icons, and personalize it with their names. You can have up to six cats and also pick their eye colour.
I don’t know about you… but I think it’s just purrfect!
Almost as soon as I posted about the sun porch on the weekend, I found the bolts to my patio table. So I dedicated my Sunday morning to reassessing how I had things set up there.
One of the big issues was the loss of my wooden plant stand. It meant my house plants were taking up a lot of floor space on the porch. Floor space I now needed to fit my table in.
I’d been looking at plant stands online, but they aren’t cheap. One exactly like my old one is about $200. And we just don’t have a lot of money left to spend on things like that right now.
But Dave, my shining knight, came to the rescue.
When we first moved into the townhouse, a previous tenant had lined a wall in the basement with homemade benches. Dave had taken them apart and turned them into a storage unit for the basement. However, it was too big to get down the basement stairs here. (The basement here is not much – very small and low ceilings). The shelves had been sitting at the side of the house since moving day, while he tried to figure out what to do with them.
As you can see, they are the perfect size for the porch. I dragged them in, cleaned them up…
After they were thoroughly inspected by Burton, I had them filled with plants in no time!
Adjacent to them, I set up the chairs and table.
It’s a smaller bistro set, so it’s perfect for the space.
In the corner where the broken plant stand was, put this lovely bamboo rocking chair. An old neighbour gave it to me several years ago for my yard at the townhouse. There was no room for it there, so it spent all its time in my bedroom, buried under a pile of clothes. It’s nice to have a proper space for it now. Mom and I are discussing the best way to make a seat cushion for it.
And I mentioned that our fish tank was currently in storage on the porch. Since it won’t be going anywhere until we finish renos on the living room, I decide to make use of it for plant storage too!
Here’s a little panorama of it all together.
I have to say…. it’s really hard to focus on work inside the house when I have a space like this calling me!
Let’s take a break from from all my goings on to admire some more of Mom’s amazing quilting skills. A coworker asked her to make some mandala pillows for her daughters as they head off to university.
They aren’t done yet, but Mom sent me progress photos of them…
With everything else going on, I’ve barely had a moment to even consider my yard and garden. All the plants I dug up from the townhouse were still sitting in pots. That wasn’t a problem when I first brought them, we were getting a lot of rain and they were doing well. But the last few weeks have been mostly dry, and the temps have been rising again. And I’ll admit, I hadn’t been watering them as much as I should, given the lack of rain.
I had to start getting them in the ground or risk losing them all together, and waste all that work I did digging them up in the first place!
My enormous to-do list wasn’t the only thing holding me back… I’ve been having a hard time deciding how I want to lay things out. But I decided it was better to just get things in the ground and healthy again .I can always move things around next year.
First, I tackled the day lilies and the oriental lilies. They went along the fence – easy peasy. Because they are mostly done blooming (with the exception of the Frans Hals daylilies you see there), so I’m not sure which ones are where. I’ll find out when they bloom next year!
Inside the catio fence was looking a little too much like a prison yard, so planted a good chunk of the other plants around the interior, along the fence line. Once they perk up and fill in a little, this will make the catio look a lot nicer!
I had seven strawberry plants, and I plunked them right down in the middle of the catio. Eventually, I want to build a nice raised bed, and have DOZENS of strawberries plants, but for now, the catio fence will keep them safe from bunnies. And the cats won’t mind them in there.
In the corner by the porch steps, I planted my special little Toad Lilies. There’s not a lot of shade in this yard, but this spot doesn’t get much sun until late afternoon, so my little toadies should do just fine here.
I still have to get my roses and irises in the ground, but they are faring a little better than other other plants, so they can wait a day or two more.
There’s just so much room to grow here. I can’t wait to start some seeds, and start dreaming about next spring!
After getting caught out with no knitting while having to wait around for tow trucks the other day, one of the first things I did when we got home was go dig out a skein of yarn and cast on.
While most of my time has, unsurprisingly, been eaten up by house stuff, I have tried to take an hour or so each night to chill and do a little stitching. As a result…
TThe yarn is deep stash… it was missing the ball band, and I can’t remember the brand. I do recall that it was a handpainted yarn, the colours was called Butterscotch, and it’s sport weight… but beyond that, everything else is blank. The pattern is Oyster Ridge. It’s very easy – a four row repeat, and only one of those rows has pattern. It is, however, one of those patterns that looks better stretched out on a foot.
Such pretty little shells! I have the second one started, but it’s being set aside as travel knitting for now. I have a deadline project I have to get started on!
I hope you all aren’t too bored with the house posts. As you can imagine, getting things together is pretty much all-consuming right now.
I mentioned before the that sun porch kind of ended up as a staging/storage area as we were moving in. Even though I’d tidied it up so that the cats could get out there, every time I turned around, Dave was filling the empty spaces with stuff. (We’re having the same problem in the kitchen!). I finally put my foot down and told him “NO MORE CRAP ON MY PORCH!!!!”
Then I went out and cleaned it up again. I wanted to get my table set up so I could sit out there with the cats. Of course, all the hardware to put my table back together has gone missing. When I took it apart, I put all the bolts in a ziploc, along with the allen key. I even labled the ziploc… but do you think I can find that ziploc? Nope. It’s around here somewhere, and will turn up eventually I’m sure.
For now, Burton and I are making do with a little plastic side table. Despite Burton’s face, he’s actually thrilled to have the chairs out again.
I still need to get a plant stand to replace the one that broke. and the porch is still storage for a few things (our big fish tank and accessories and some screens from the windows), but I now have a nice space where I sit and knit and hang out with the cats.
I’m happy to say both Burton and Relic have mastered the cat door and now go in an out as they please. Rupert is slower, but I brought him out the other night. He was skittish at first, but soon calmed down. By the time it was dark, he didn’t want to come in! (No pics because my camera was charging.)
During the downtime on work days, I’ve been slowly unpacking my office/library.
It’s the smallest room of the house ( little bit smaller than my old studio/office at the townhouse) and it’s the last room at the end of the upstairs hallway. It makes it ideal for a home workspace.
Like every other house in the room – eventually the wallpaper and carpet will be removed, and it will be freshened up. In the mean time, it’s a nice quiet little space where I can earn those dollars to help do all those renovations!
These aren’t great pictures, but I just had to share.
I moved all the garden pots to the outside of the catio so I could mow the lawn inside. This is Burton trying to pull the catnip through the fence for a little nibble!
Many of you will remember Dave’s big white ’67 Bonneville.
She’s one of the reasons we bought this particular house – it had a garage that could easily accommodate it’s width (8 feet) and length (19 feet), as well as his other classic car (a ’67 Charger).
While we lived at the townhouse, she was stored in the underground of Dave’s Mom’s condo. He’d being her out regularly during the summer (as above when we took her to his uncle’s wedding). At the end of last season, we decided that she couldn’t really go another year without a new top. It was still original, and was developing holes that were beyond patching (most convertible tops don’t see 54 years like our girl!)
In January, he put the wheels in motion to get it done in a shop an hour east of the townhouse. She was supposed to be done the month before the move. But due to COVID and supply issues it got delayed.
Two days before the move weekend, we got the call that we could bring her in the next week. We ended up rescheduling it to this past Tuesday, because things were just so chaotic for us.
Now we are 2 hours and 15 minutes from her storage location, which is an hour and a half from the shop that will replace the top, and that shop is now 3 hours from home.
So, we planned to get up at 4:30 am. Pick the car up by 7:30, drop the car off at the shop by 9, and be home around noon (and I would work late to make up for the hours missed in the morning.)
At first things went as planned.
We got to the underground on time. As it had been 2 months since he’d last driven her (because of the move) we’d brought booster cables just in case. He got in, and she wouldn’t start. But there wasn’t even a click… like there would normally be when you turned over a car with a dead battery. There was just nothing.
It was ominous… but we decided to try boosting it, just in case. Still nothing.
As we were standing there with booth hoods open, we heard a “pssssssssssssssssssssss” noise coming from my Dory. I turned to see a small stream of coolant pushing out of a crack from the overflow tank.
Greeeeeeeeat. I had a jug of coolant in the back, and as soon as the level got to the bottom of the crack, it stopped. It wasn’t an emergency (we could still get home with her) but it wasn’t an ideal time.
We pulled the battery from the Bonneville, closed up both vehicles and headed to the parts place (just a block from the condo). We tested the battery (it wasn’t toast, but it could do with replacing), got a new battery, and ordered a new overflow tank for Dory (it would be in within an hour or so).
We went back to the underground, put in the new battery… still nothing. I sat in Dory while Dave poked, and prodded and swore at the Bonneville for an hour.
Finally, he gave up. He was pretty sure it was the starter. But without his tools and a jack, he couldn’t do anything. And even if he’d had them, he’s not supposed to work on cars in the underground (His mom can get flack from the condo board).
We called CAA. But there were two problems:
The underground is low – exceptionally low, even for an underground. Clearance is just 6’2″. (Dory’s antenna smacks things as we go through)
The car is loooooooooong – exceptionally long for a car, even by 1967 standards (apparently only Cadillac made a longer car). It should be towed with a flat bed.
CAA had this solution. They’d send a small truck to get it out of the underground. There may be a few small bumps, but once out, they’d send a flat bed to take it to the shop.
Without other options, we sat to wait for the first truck. After 40 minutes, he arrived. Only one problem. His truck wouldn’t clear the underground. It was about an inch too tall.
So he backed it down the ramp as far as he could. With the help of the superintendent of the building, he and Dave pushed the car from it’s spot to the ramp so he could hook it up. As I said, this is not your average car… it weighs about 4,000 lbs. Yikes.
They got it hooked and up the ramp with just a small scrape the the exhaust.
Then we sat and waited for the flatbed. As we weren’t stuck on a road or highway, we weren’t considered a priority call. It was a long wait. And I had no knitting! It was however, a decent day (warm but not humid) so we sat on the curb and I crafted myself some new jewelry with the materials I could find around me.
After a little less than two hours, the flat bed finally arrived.
The old girl got towed to shop nearby. While Dave and the mechanics poked her some more, I went and got us all refreshment. (The guys at the shop set aside another vehicle to work on ours right away).
By the time I was back, they’d determined it did, indeed need a new starter. But… being the diva she was… it’s not a normal starter. Years ago, when we first started dating, we spent many hot days waiting in parking lots for the starter to cool down. When it was cool enough, Dave would whack it with a hammer, and we’d be on our way again. He eventually got tired of this, and put in some fancy performance starter. This is what we now needed to find. After a few phone calls, he found one at a performance shop in Toronto. In theory, only 20 minutes from the condo. But it’s Toronto – where 20 minutes away can really mean an hour. We had to chance it anyway.
We hit the road in Dory again. Amazingly, traffic wasn’t bad – in either direction. We had the starter in the hands of the mechanic in under an hour.
We popped over the Dave’s Grandma’s to take a break and wait. By 4 p.m., the car was ready. We picked her up and put her back in the underground (Top replacement has been re-scheduled… again!)
We picked up the part for my truck on the way out. She was too hot from all the running around to replace right away, so we took it easy going home. We stopped for dinner along the way and were home by 7:30.
You can bet we didn’t stay up much later (not with a day like that started at 4:30 am), and I was VERY happy to see my bed!
Hopefully, next week, the big white Diva will get her new top and FINALLY be brought home where she belongs!
Wandering Cat Studio 