More Pictures from the Desert Dome

Yesterday I posted on a bit on the desert dome at the Mitchell Park Conservatory (The Domes) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I took a fair number of pictures so will be sharing some of those with you over the next couple of days. Cacti can be grown successfully indoors in northern climates in a sunny window. It is amazing to see the variety of cacti available, some more suitable to growing indoors

Moving On To the Desert Dome

Living in Ontario, Canada I don't have a lot of experience with cacti other than the few I grow on my windowsill. My little cacti seedlings are coming along nicely and while they are about double in size they sure take a long time to grow! I can fully appreciate how long it takes for a cactus to get to any appreciable size. Mine are now 3 years old and aren't even big enough to transplant.

Bedroom Makeover: Nightstand Edition

So it is now time to make over our bedroom.  It’s still in the drab white that was painted with the house built.  In an effort to maximize our dollars we decided to give our current bedroom suit a make over.  There are several things wrong with it all of which I will fix over time but the first thing that hits you is it’s just plain ugly.  We still haven’t totally figured out why we bought it 10 years ago.  I guess we were young it was in our budget and we needed furniture for the house we had just moved into.  That being said how do you take a 10 year old not so good looking night stand and bring it into the new decade.  Let’s explore this in a little pictorial.

The ugly nightstand

I guess really it’s not all that bad but it is far from our current taste in furniture and design.  I have some ideas on how I would like to fix this guy.  The first thing that needs to happen is that I need to remove all that molding next to the drawers.  I just think it really disrupts the look of the nightstand.  So what to do…..   Find one chisel well two actually and one hammer and presto you get the following result.

The Ugly Nightstand Molding Removed

Now how did I do this?  It is not that hard really.  The molding was nailed and glued in place and my goal was to have as little tear out as possible so take one of our chisels and place it on the back edge of the molding and start tapping it breaking the glue joint and prying the molding away.  Take your time and do a little bit at a time.  You are most likely going to get some tear out, not to worry we will address that in a minute.  Eventually you will be able to pry the moldings off of the project and you get to take a cool picture like this one.

Demolition Tools

As  you can see the moldings don’t always come off in one piece no problem I had not planned on using them for anything anyway.  Now we can address any tear out that may have occurred.  There are at least  two ways of dealing with it.  One if you are planning to paint you can fill any of the tear out with wood putty if they are really bad, do this before you start any sanding, let the pudding try and sand it flush with the rest of the wood.  Now if you are going to stain the project then the putty isn’t probably a good idea as the stain at least in my experience will be soaked up more and look different than the rest of the wood.  If you are in this situation or if the tear out is not all that bad then you can do what I did.  I sanded the faces down until most of the tear out was gone and anything that was real deep I smoothed out with the sand paper and made them appear and part of the character of the project. 

A Sanding we will go…..

Here is the result of a few couple of hours of sanding.  I wasn’t worried about totally removing all of the finish that was on the nightstand previously.  I mainly wanted to get it scratched up real good so that the latex paint I am using would have something to grab a hold of and stick to.  If you can get it to bare wood all the better but I didn’t find it totally necessary on this project refinish.

 
And now through the power of the internet we have a mostly refinished nightstand.
  This is the first of 2 coats of Satin Black latex paint.  I wasn’t worried about overspray so I didn’t mask off the interior of the nightstand.  Now that the main part of the night stand is taken care of lets focus quickly on the drawers.  Remove the hardware sand as you did with the main section and paint.

You can paint the sides if you want to, I decided it wasn’t needed as the drawers are closed 99% of the time.
Now that you have everything painted you can either put the hardware back on and be done or you can distress things just a little.  I spent a little time sanding off the paint in some key areas.  It is pretty hard to tell from the picture but there are several distressed areas.  I took the sand paper and sanded until I got bare wood and then took a little stain and stained over the area let it dry for just a little while and wiped the excess away.  Once I was done I had the following refinished nightstand.

So I hope you have fun taking on your own refinishing project.  If you have any questions please feel free to email.

Here is a before and after side by side:


Have a great day!  --Grover

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LATEST SPRING COLLECTION..... PLANTS 2010

January 31st in Illinois; sunny, freezing, snow on the ground........

However, just returning from the 'Mid-Am' horticultural show for the industry, excitement builds with the new introductions available in Spring 2010.

Here are some of my favorites;

LILAC 'BLOOMERANG'

• Repeat, YES, repeat bloom on and off  all spring until frost....plus they are fragrant
• Zone 4-7,  4' high,  full sun

HYDRANGEA 'INCREDIBALL'

• Improved 'Annabelle' meaning strong beefy stems that WILL NOT FLOP!
• Massive flower heads in full sun  to part shade
• Zone 5+, 4-5' tall

HYDRANGEA 'INVINCIBELLE'

• This is major, a PINK MACROPHYLLA HYDRANGEA!
• From the Annabelle family, not only pink but near continious blooming.
• Zone 3-9,   3-4' high (good in containers) 

 

SUN PATIENS registered

• As the name suggests, impatiens for the sun, or shade arrives in many colors
• Thick showy petals and dark leaves
• Drought tolerant

WEIGELA 'RAINBOW SENSATION'

• Fragrant spring flowers are a magnet to Hummingbirds  

• Compact and very hardy  

• I love the foliage color of variegated chartreuse, green and pink which will stand out all season

 HOSTA  ' BLUE IVORY'

• Maintains a true blue splash all season
• Thick leaves are slug proof
• Low water needs!

 

FIVE FAVORITE TRENDS

Succulents
   Low maintenance, gorgeous colors,  major texture

GREEN ROOFS

  And Chicago leads the trend. We have the most green roofs in the world for the third consecutive year running.

 

 

 Permeable surfaces; any surface that is not concrete or asphalt and allows for water penetration.

 Lose the Chemicals. Each of these "trends" will receive their own post in the future and this is a BIG topic. Here are two quick points

1. I used to tease my Father-in-law...."Mr. Chemically Crazed".....that he could get Parkinson's Disease. His entire life was devoted to which chemical would solve every problem, in massive doses.He did and lost the battle.
2. My own garden has it's issues; weeds, bugs.........but i have allowed an eco-system to evolve and a multitude of birds and beneficial insects have naturally kept the destructive bugs at bay.

 PS: bunnies NEVER bother my gardens, naturally. Can anyone guess my secret?   

 

 

Living walls....indoors and out

I could not say we are perpetually charming  ;-)  and try we do........but as a full landscape design/build firm, our aim is to always
"make your soul blossom"

NEXT POST.            I am so excited to extend a huge give-away, $600.00 value!

Who is eligible? Do I have to live in Chicago?  No, everyone, living anywhere is eligible
Any hints?  Yes, it is a service we already offer.... Your home and a makeover

                                                       Stay tuned...................

                                                                xxo   Debra

The Train Show at The Domes

The Train Show at The DomesJanuary 23, 2010Yesterday I posted about our visit to the Mitchell Park Conservatory (The Domes) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Train Show was the featured exhibit in the show dome. This exhibit is their most popular and it is easy to see why it delights children and adults alike. I took several short videos of the trains in action. The Train Show included a free copy

Mitchell Park Conservatory (The Domes)

The DomesJanuary 23, 2010We love visiting conservatories during the winter months. It is a lovely way to enjoy a bit of warmth and greenery. We had an opportunity to visit the Mitchell Park Conservatory (The Domes) located at 524 S. Layton Blvd. in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The conservatory consists of three large domes with three themes. The first is the floral show dome which changes based on

Beginner Woodworker Tools

Today I want to talk about some of the basic tools of woodworking, some of these tools you will have some you will want and some are necessary for successful projects. 

 

Lets focus on small and medium sized projects:

If you are working on smaller projects you may not need a table saw or other “advanced” tools to complete the project.  Take for example the Coffee Table featured here:
I completed this table using only a Compound Miter Saw, a biscuit jointer, a Kreg Pocket Hole Jig, Clamps and a Random Orbital Sander sometimes referred to as a ROS.  In this scenario the the biscuit jointer is not necessary however it does make life a lot easier.  The one thing to note on this table is you want to get very straight boards.  If you get boards that are bowed or cupped meaning that there is a bend in the board and it looks like it arcs or has the beginnings of a U shape you will not get a clean joints.  There are ways to fix those issues in the wood but those required additional skills and tools which I will not get into at this time.  To build this table with the tools mentioned earlier you would use the Miter saw to cut your 2x4’s to length.  The biscuit jointer will allow you easily join the boards together, the pocket hole jig will allow you to attach the top to the base with ease and the sander is there, well to sand and prepare the wood for the stain or paint that you will be using. 

Purchasing tools:

As far as purchasing your tools you have many options you can get most of these tools at the big box stores or a Woodcraft and online.  If you are budget minded and you can order from Harbor Freight, I don’t believe you can get the pocket hole jig there but that is available at Lowes or Woodcraft.  Harbor Freight sells tools for a fair price and typically they are good quality.  You do have to be careful with what you get from them.  My biscuit jointer is one of theirs and I have had great luck with it.  My father has one of their miter saws and he loves it.  One other option if you are looking to possibly get brand names is Craigslist.  I have had real good luck with buying from Craigslist.  I purchased a Jointer and a Planer from craigslist and got both of them for less a either one of them would be now, both are brand names however both are probably 15 years old or better.  Each of those tools work great.  If you do decide to buy from Craigslist make sure you do some research on the tools ask for the model numbers if available before committing to the purchase always go look at the tools and ask to see them work.  One thing I forgot to mention is that I used was a band saw to create the taper on the legs.  You could also use a jigsaw to create the same taper and save some money on the tool. 

Well to wrap it up.  If you are beginning to woodwork I would suggest the following tools to get you started, a Jigsaw, Miter saw, Biscuit Jointer, some kind of Sander.  I briefly mentioned clamps.  These can get expensive, for a cheap alternative for the time being you could purchase some ratchet straps and use those to pull the wood together.  If you don’t already have them for around the house work I also suggest a power drill either cordless or corded.  That should get you building and allow you to tackle several projects.

 

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