Reprieve!

Today our little dinky donkey Eeyore recieved a reprieve. At 2pm the vet was to arrive and ...well....take care of business so to speak. Donkeys are animals who don't like to be alone and you should always have them in with other animals, preferably another donkey. We have our little Phoebe but she is only 11 months old and can't be bred until she is at least 2 1/2 to 3 years old so that means they can't go in the same pasture for a LONG time. They call to each other...it's so sad. One day we came home from the city to find Eeyore standing in the lane next to Phoebe's fence....oh oh...time to make a decision on what to do with Eeyore. So the decision was made to have him 'fixed'...and today was 'C' day. As it turned out the vet got lost and didn't have enough time to make his appointment.....lucky Eeyore!!! So...he has the rest of the week to enjoy life as he's known it. He'll probably be a little upset with us for a while but once the waiting period is over I think he'll get over it pretty quick because he'll be going over to Phoebe's pasture. I think we'll have two very happy donkeys running around that day!

Sweat Equity

When we moved to the farm last June we slept for 3 months in our camper as we renovated the living room, dining room, and all 3 bedrooms. The kitchen and laundry room/back porch and bathroom were going to have to wait until later. The walls in the living room were splattered with thick plaster stuff ...so thick you could easily have cut yourself on them! We had to sand them down but we left a texture which I love. Every surface was painted....then came the real dirty work...re-finishing the floors. They were in such terrible shape that there wasn't much finish left on the dining room floor and the living room had tile on plywood so it had to be torn up and then all the holes filled before we could move ahead. The sanding took the longest but it was worth the hard work. We used a product called Waterlox with no stain and we discovered that the floors are pecan! They turned out beautiful and we didn't take all the imperfections out so that they kept their character.

I kick myself for not taking pictures of the tile floor but these pictures above show the shape the floors were in and the sanding that was done on the walls. Romeo and Miss Betty Hen took advantage of the front door being open to see what we were up to. For 3 months that cooler was my seat at the computer and the computer was on the scafolding.

Sanding (cough cough)

The darker color is what the floors looked like before sanding.

Living room floor after 3 coats of Waterlox. I did one more after this.

This wood has such a beautiful grain to it

Finally moved in! The floors loose about 25% of their shine in a few months which is what I wanted.

That wall behind the love seat is the same wall you see when the rooster is peaking into the office.

I love the flowered love seat ..it reminds me of my mum who was from Surrey England.

It may not be perfect but the old farm house is now my idea of a cozy country cottage. Soon we'll tackle the rest of the rooms but that will have to wait as we now have to start on the dirty work outside. I'm not looking forward to it! 

Our Old 1902 Victorian

This is the home we moved from last June. It was a beautiful home on 2.5 acres on the edge of a charming little farming town. It had a 3 car garage and a 30X80 heated shop for my husband. The people we bought it from had faithfully maintained the old home for over 30 years. It needed some updating as it had old wallpaper everywhere which I had planned to tear off and then paint. I never did get around to doing that as we only lived there for 9 months before the pull of the country became too strong and we sold it. I sold the home myself ..it took about 30 days. We ended up buying an old run down farm but I have NEVER regretted it. So today I thought I'd show you a few pictures of our old Victorian. This place had potential so if you love old homes like this one...go ahead and dream about what you would have done with it if it was yours. I'd love to hear some of your ideas!

The turret with it's original weathervane that has the initial of the first family that lived here.

Front porch

This is the pergola off the kitchen out back. We put picket fences up later and stained them a dark walnut...I wanted white but the water there has iron and it would have stained them so I went with the dark stain. It was very English looking. There was wisteria and trumpet vine growing over the top.

 

This is the front parlor. The pocket doors had quarter sawn oak on the parlor side and on the dining room side was a wood no one seemed to know. The fireplace was tiger oak.

The wood fretwork was beautiful to the left.

Part of the dining room. The turret wall isn't shown in this picture and you can see the second set of pocket doors going into the family room/kitchen area

This is the guest room. This room and one other bedroom and the hall and stairs were the only rooms with wall to wall carpeting. The rest was quarter sawn oak and were beautiful.

I later found a beautiful white wicker headboard but don't have a picture of it on my computer.

One of the old cypress trees out front.

Not sure when this picture was taken but in the back you can see part of the old barn with cupola that was in the back. The people we bought this house from tore it down and built a huge workshop. To this day they regret it. Me too! I hope you enjoyed the pictures. Have a wonderful day.

'Back in the Saddle Again'

Well that's a figure of speach but my butt feels like I've been in the saddle. Nearly 2 years ago we lived in the city and I went to the YMCA regulary at least 3 times a week. I worked on the machines...took Yoga classes twice a week and even took belly dancing classes. Yes...you read right. It was a blast. We had so much fun in that class and some of the ladies were in their 60's. They could shimmy pretty darn good too! This morning I drove the approx. 20 miles ONE WAY to the Y and met my sister in law there for the first time since we moved. We walked the track for about 30 minutes and then headed to Yoga. OH BROTHER. I didn't do too bad for the first while but by the time we were into our 100th (just kidding) 'downward dog' my wrists were giving out and during 'dolphin' I thought my thighs were going to vibrate my teeth I was shaking so bad! Anyway...my sister and I survived our class and headed straight to Panera's Bakery for scones and coffee...ahhhh. I love Yoga...and if you don't think it can make you sweat...try it! Now it's time to get back into the routine and check for eggs and see how the new barn kitties are doing and get some housework done. I hope you all have a WONDERFUL day and take good care of yourselves!

PS  No...these are not pictures of me...I wish!  Makes my back ache just looking at some of those poses.