Master Closets

Over the past month or so, Matthew and I have been working on the last two rooms in our house - the master closets!

 

I forgot to take a "before" shot of my closet, but here is what our room looked like once I cleared it out.

 

While re-organizing, I went through my Breyer model horse collection.  Good thing we put up lots of shelves in the closet to make room for all of them!

 

Here is a "before" shot of Matthew's closet.  Most of the shelves had already fallen down before we moved in.

 

It's hard to get a good photo, but here are the "after" shots.  I patched and repainted all of the walls, trim, and doors before Matthew put up twice as many shelves and clothes rods as before. It feels great to finally have everything organized and to finish the last rooms in the house!

 

Tack Room and Clothes Line

With the heat and rain of the past weeks we have not been working too hard around the house.  We did, however, start working on the tack room walls a little in the mornings.  First Matthew covered the outside of the tack room with drywall so that we could insulate the walls.

 

Then we measured out the sanded boards from the pallets to fit between the studs.

 

Not all of the pallet wood is usable but this is how far we got with three pallets. It may not be the quickest way to cover walls but it is inexpensive, helps reuse wood, and looks pretty nice (in a rustic way)!

 

We  also installed a small improvement around the house to help save some money and energy.  I bought a retractable clothesline and we put it up around the carport.

 

The line goes along the front and side of the truck and fits about one load of laundry.  The fact that it is in the shade should help keep the clothes from fading too much and the added cover might come in handy during a pop up rain shower!

Wassaw

Last weekend we took another boat trip on our friends' boat.  It has been extremely hot here but being in the water and on the beach was quite pleasant.  We anchored at Wassaw Island where we did some swimming and beach combing.

 

On the boat, Wassaw is behind us.

 

The science girls (Lauren, Coral, & I) went beach combing while the guys (Matthew & Matt) relaxed.  Here we found a really neat tide pool on a dead tree.  Wassaw had a "boneyard" beach that is littered with dead trees.

 

These little zebra periwinkles are all over the trees.

 

Along with lots of barnacles.

 

The old weathered wood makes for great photos.

 

Here's a cute little crab that we found along the way.

 

And we saw some white pelicans near another island on our way back to the dock.  These birds are not that common around us so it was nice to see.  I didn't bring my zoom lens, of course, so I didn't get good photos but it was neat anyways!

Game Night

Last weekend we had another game night to say goodbye to a good friend who is off to Arizona with the Army.  We started the night by teaching Le to shoot with us.  We shot into the stack of hay inside the barn since we haven't made a real target yet.

 

Le is a quick learner!

 

We also bought a ping pong net for our pool table and it works perfectly!  Now our house has quite the game set up with pool, ping pong, and foosball (in addition to all of the board and video games).

Margaret's Visit

I'm a little behind in posting but here are some photos from Margaret's visit two weekends ago.  We spent Friday night playing games and touring the property.  Anthony and Michael couldn't get enough of all the different toys and games at Uncle Matthew and Aunt Lindsay's!

 

Saturday morning we went to the train museum and then walked around Savannah.  The  kid's playroom was the favorite hang out spot at the museum.

 

Sunday we visited Oatland Island Wildlife Center and toured all of the outdoor animal exhibits.  The weather was a little rainy but that kept the temperatures down.  Here we are at the alligator exhibit searching the water for gators.

 

The mountain lion exhibit.  All of the animals at the center are (or once were) native to Georgia.

 

 

We also spent a little time in the salt marsh searching for crabs and snails.

 

The boys sitting on some eggs in a nest while eating their snacks.

 

After Oatland Island we had a picnic at Forsyth Park in Savannah and the kids played on the playground.

Horses, Garden, & a Haircut

We mostly spent the holiday weekend relaxing and hanging out with friends but we did work on a few projects at home.  We finished the minies fencing by adding a sight rail (top right in photo).  We also installed some mats around their hay bins to keep Spice and Peanut from digging holes while they stomp flies.

 

Next, Matthew and I started working on the walls for the tack room.  We are dismantling pallets and re-using the wood for the walls.

 

A quick sanding and the boards are ready to put up.  (More photos when we get another chance to work on it).

 

Here's an updated photo of the garden at its peak.

 

And finally, I cut my hair this week to donate to Wigs for Kids. This is my 4th donation and it has been about 2.5 years since the last one.

 

Good thing my hair grows quickly!

Around the house

In between guests we have been working on a few small projects around the house.  I painted up the plant shelves in the foyer just in time to start my fall broccoli crop.

 

The garden has been producing quite well with all of the recent rain and I made my first batch of completely home grown salsa!

 

Matthew and I worked in the rain and dark one night finishing up a small section of permanent fencing for the miniature horses.  The rest of the fence will have to wait until we are done grading the back two acres (we will still be using portable panels until then).

 

Although we did not plant or even grade the back of the property there is a lot of grass coming up so I put up some temporary electric fence in order to let the big horses enjoy it.  There is actually enough grass that the horses are eating less hay right now!

 

My flower beds are blooming nicely and I cut some flowers to put on the table while we had guests.

 

One of the last things on the barn to-do list was to paint the roll up door.  I started painting this morning while it was still cool out and managed to finish before the shade disappeared.

 

I got a lot of use out of Matthew's ladder Christmas present!

 

Finally, here is a glimpse of what I will be working on this week.  I have enough tomatoes right now to make some spaghetti sauce and hope to make one more batch of salsa once the rest of the peppers ripen.