Chainsaw Massacre

I brought out the big guns today for my battle with the dead spruce:

(Ugh... I really need to lose some weight!)

To avoid dulling the chainsaw, I dug around and under a number of roots before starting up the chainsaw. (Mom helped a bit... I had asked her over in case I had an accident with the chainsaw, but she helped move dirt too. She had hurt her back the other day, though, so she stuck to stuff that wouldn't aggravate her back.)

Then, with some assistance from mom (it seemed to take three hands plus a foot), I got the chainsaw started, then started again after I didn't keep enough pressure on the trigger to prevent it from stalling. Then I went at the roots. The result:


Sawing took longer than I thought it would. I think I wasn't applying enough pressure... I think I was expecting the saw to kind of drive itself in, like other power saws seem to do.

After cutting through the roots (I think I cut two small ones with the axe while I was digging, then five thick ones with the chainsaw), I attached the come-along again, and had a go at pulling the tree over:

Mom thinks she might have seen it budge minutely. I'm not sure it did.

Since it was going to take me a while to dig around more roots, mom decided I could do that on my own while she got in out of the rain. (It started spitting as soon as I went outside to get started, but didn't get heavy enough to stop until later.)

Before she left, mom used a shovel we found in the garage to put my piles of leaves and pinecones from sweeping the patio Thursday evening in the yard waste bins:

(She filled two bins. The pink one I put dead raspberry canes in, then shovelled a bit more of what I had swept up in the back lane.)

I didn't really feel like doing more digging today (especially since it had started drizzling a bit harder), so, after cutting out the dead raspberry canes, I moved dad's junk from an area I want to put my raised vegetable beds to a corner of the patio:

It's kind of a bummer to put that big ugly pile on the patio when I had just gotten it pretty good looking, but there wasn't really a better place for it. I put the biggest propane tank on the driveway side of the garage, but I didn't really want to put the other stuff there... I want to be able to park there, and it would mean carrying it farther. (It was a shorter distance for the big tank to the driveway, because I was dragging it across the ground and around the piles of dirt, rather than tossing it over top of the piles of dirt.)

Look! No junk:

(Some suckers I need to deal with, and not exactly level... but it's a start.)

My garlic and onions (green and walking) are doing well:

It looks like most of the perennials survived the winter too. (There's a couple I'm not sure about yet.)

Ow. I *hurt*. Oh well... at least I feel like I made progress today, even if it's not enough. It's nice that they're now recommending we wait until some time in June to plant live plants (it's okay to seed now, though)... but I only have access to the chainsaw until next weekend, after which it is returning to the lake. Plus I want to get my raised beds started with lettuce, peas, and other "likes it cool" seeds. Argh.

Unexpected

I noticed a white spot on my suet bird feeder. Had something gone moldy?

Nope... turns out a plum branch was caught in the feeder!

I wonder how that happened? (Branch freed now, and feeder moved over slightly so that hopefully this won't happen again.)

Mystery

When I looked out my kitchen window today, I discovered that Mr Hoot had tipped over. Given how round he is, I doubt it was the wind. Was it a squirrel? A cat? Or does Mr Hoot like to party a bit too much on a Saturday night? (At least he's quiet about it.)

Home Sweet Gnome

I wanted a gnome for my junkyard-turning-garden. The White Rabbit is adorable, and I love him, but he is not a gnome.

I saw a promising-looking fellow in last week's Rona flyer, but he was sold out at the one I visited, and the other garden statuary didn't fit what I was going for. (There was a nice gargoyle, but I think it was $40, and so I decided to wait for an end-of-season sale for that one, assuming I remember and there's one left.)

Today I popped into Home Depot for a thatching rake (which they didn't have), and checked out the garden centre while I was there. I found some great groundcover plants (three kinds of creeping thyme, a moss similar to the one I bought last year but a different colour, and a saxifrage), and a gnome!

Meet my new gnome, who needs a suitably Germanic name that I will hopefully manage to remember:


While in the garden statuary area, I couldn't resist Sourpuss and Mr Hoot:


Sourpuss (aka Grumpy aka Grouchy) is sitting in the mud under the plum tree where nothing (yet?) grows. Mr Hoot is near the same spruce as The White Rabbit. The gnome is currently in the same general area as The White Rabbit and Mr Hoot, but I suspect he'll be moving to the vegetable garden area when that area is ready.

Don't worry... I don't plan to clutter the yard with statuary. I will hopefully manage to keep it at a relatively tasteful level. I'm not currently looking for any more, although some "perfect" pieces might still wander home with me.

Two things I would still like to get for the garden are a niger-seed bird feeder, and one or two wall decorations for the fence on the south side of the yard. (One in the main garden/yard area, and, if I get a second wall decoration, then it would go in the vegetable/back area.) Plus all the plants and raised beds, of course, but those will take time.

Garden Update: Me vs the Dead Tree

Before I get to the tree, here's a photo of the adorable little ceramic bunny I bought for my garden:


And I'm glad I cleared the dead leaves from the day lilies before the art show... here they are now:

I still need to dig up the weed roots, but that'll come... eventually.

Okay, here's the tree:

You may (or may not) remember that I started digging it up last year, and managed to get a number of roots exposed before the snow flew. Well, the snow is now gone, the roots are still exposed, and the tree is still standing.

With the assumption that the dead tree with it's roots partially exposed will be less well anchored than the live tree that is thicker, I attached the come-along to both of them (once I found some chain), and started winching.

Not even a hint of budging. So I hacked at the roots some more, and removed more dirt.

Dang, that's a thick root. And spongey wood is hard to chop. I eventually did get through that root, and chopped through some others too.

Still didn't budge. This is going to take significantly more effort. (And I can already tell that I'm going to *feel* today's effort tomorrow.)

I winched that come-along so tight, I bent a link on the chain I borrowed from mom:

Whoops.

Cheeky little chickadee!

While I was winching & chopping, I moved the bird feeder over so that it wasn't in the way. When I was done for the day, I topped it up and hung it back up, but before I had removed the come-along and chains. As I was working at the chain (whose openable link was reluctant to unscrew), I heard the buzzing of wings as something flew to the feeder. I paused for a second, then looked up to see a chickadee, no more than a foot from my face. It flew off, but returned a moment later once I wasn't looking at it again. So I stepped back a pace, and took out my camera... and got the above shot.

I also sat and enjoyed the sunshine for an hour, and listened to the birds (and a ... leaf blower?). It was a nice day, but it feels like I didn't accomplish anything despite all of my effort.

Next weekend I'll work on the raised vegetable beds, so that I'll at least feel like I've accomplished something. :P

Art

Done:


Very close to done:

Mega-Update Post

I have been crazy-busy, but in a good way. Here's a brief summary:


1. Last weekend I had a Thursday evening to Sunday afternoon retreat with a spinners and weavers retreat. The weather was more winter than spring, but we had a *fantastic* time! One of my "so awesome, I don't know how I deserve her" friends (who wasn't even able to attend the retreat this year) surprised me with a *gorgeous* batt from Wild Wind Naturals. I petted it and showed it to everyone, but forgot to take a photo before I started spinning. I did remember to take a photo of the yarn (not posted), and the final result, finished while I was at the retreat:

That pom-pom is made from the extra locks tucked between the ribbon and the batt as decoration. At the retreat, we decided it was a "Canadian fascinator"...: "Canadian", because it's on a tuque, not a useless little hat! ;)

2. Monday at art I finished painting my "Bird in a Gilded Cage", but haven't added the last few (non-painted) finishing touches:

Then I worked some more on my starfish:

Wow... not too much more and I'll be finished this too!

3. Thursday evening I was at a workshop (two evenings, one Saturday) on making bent-shaft canoe paddles. Here's some of the instructor's paddles he brought to show us:

We got as far as preparing the jig and gluing the strips of wood for the shaft:

Mine is in the foreground of this photo. It's made from walnut, ash, pine, and maple.

4. Today I did a bit of spring tidying of the garden, clearing a bunch of old growth on the perennials... four wheelbarrows full, if I remember correctly. I discovered another thing to add to my to-do list... install a window well for this window, whose sill has half rotted away:

I forgot "before" shots, but remembered "after" shots:


*Much* better, although it will need digging-up of weed taproots, dividing plants, moving them around, adding organic matter... but, it'll hold for a bit now. In the photo below, the pile on the left is mostly the stuff I removed from the garden, plus some partially-composted leaves from last fall's pile layered in to help the process:

(I also turned the pile of leaves from last fall, and shovelled some snow so that I could get the wheelbarrow here. After I took this photo, I tossed some snow on this pile... I figure the moisture will help the composting, and anything that gets absorbed by this pile won't be adding to the mud in my parking spot. :P

This cat really likes hunting for mice in dad's junk pile, but I don't think it likes me very much:

Spring?

This photo was taken Sunday:

As you can see, the table-glacier is melting... but more snow is falling. *sigh*

In preparation for the spring art show, I've finished the nostalgia-themed piece I'm donating to the raffle:

(proceeds go to Alzheimer's Society), and have made progress on a related piece that will be for sale in my section:

New Paintings Started

I have paintings that I haven't finished, but that didn't stop me from starting two new ones tonight:

...but I have an excuse. The upcoming art show has a theme of "nostalgia", and I asked folks on freecycle for records for this idea. It would be a shame for people to give me records to paint, and then not get them done in time for the art show, right?

The dog will be a dalmatian, and I got the inspiration from the fire hydrant on the label. The canary is inspired by one of the songs on its record: "Bird In A Gilded Cage". (The gilded cage bars are coming. I'm only going to paint them behind the bird, though.)

I still need to clean the chalk sketch marks off both. I want to let the paint dry really well first.

I feel a little bad at how pleased I am with myself... but it's also nice too, because I'm happy. It's nice to be happy!

Random collection of photos from the past week

Cool icicle! Uh... dang... that probably means that corner needs the gutter join caulked too. (I should probably just plan to do all of them when I take care of the worst spot.)

The snowbank I decided to not shovel through last weekend:

(Given that it took me three hours to do everything else, probably a good decision.)

The corner with the gutter problem I've known about the longest:

A section of rotten wood needs replacing, plus there's the fact that the drip leaves a dangerous icy patch on the sidewalk to the back yard. (I wonder why dad didn't fix this when the house was repainted a couple of years ago? That would have been the best time to have done it, and I'm pretty sure it was a problem then too. Another reason not to hire a student to paint the house... there's more to painting than just slapping on paint!)

More problematic gutter:

This connects to the part in front of the kitchen window that was dripping last summer that dad "fixed" (not sure what the fix was), but that part is also looking... wonky. I'm not sure if I should consider replacing this whole stretch, or if this icicle is inevitable, given that a big patch of the upper roof drains to this spot, and there's probably a good chance that the lower gutter, spending more time in the shade, probably fills with ice. Well, I'll get up there with a ladder this summer and have a look... maybe see if cleaning and caulking does enough to hold it for a bit longer.

Hee, I think I have a mini-table glacier:

Taking a short walk off a shorter table?

I needed to clear my head on Thursday (too much bashing my head against the same frustrating bug), so I took a walk around the neighbourhood near work. At least my house doesn't have this big of a problem:


Graffiti, but cute graffiti:




Now *this* is a big chunk of ice:

(And that is *not* my house, thankfully!)

This weekend I took a workshop on making Shaker boxes, and made these three awesome boxes:

While I was putting the finishing on them, I finally got around to putting the finish on my turned piece too. They'll all need another coat or two, but at least I got one on!