Living Simply
I ran across this small branch of leaves which I believe belong to the green ash tree.
I know the leaves are definitely from an ash tree and compared it to the white ash tree. The leaves on the white ash tree have more “leaflets” on the branch. The black ash tree also has more “leaflets” on the branch.
So my Dear Watson — I would like to deduce that the leaves are from the Green Ash Leaf. Anyone please correct me if I’m wrong.
My husband and I went for a walk this evening around 7:00 p.m.
Up ahead, I noticed a woman who had stopped and had a large camera with her. She was taking a picture of a doe who was on the roadside eating. We stood still for awhile. The doe would lift its head up and look at us every now and again. After awhile it leapt away.
During this hour walk we saw several deer. I hadn’t realized that they come out before dusk to feed.
Note to self — always bring your camera on walks with you.
This year, Minnesota broke another record — the most humid summer. It has also been one of the top rainiest summers. I think we get more sunshine in the winter than in the summer — judging from one winter/summer here.
The rain is very different from Seattle rain. In Seattle, one has a drizzle with cloudy skies. In Minnesota, the rain comes down hard and one gets wet quite quickly.
We’ve had 3 trees affected by the constant rain and a small mudslide onto one of our parking strips.
Rain … I do like but I think it’s a little much this year.
Last year for my birthday, a friend gave me a really nice Sunjoy BBQ Tool set. We did not have an opportunity to use it until this past week.
The tool set comes with 17 pieces and is nice and compact in its container. I wonder if people stay organized enough to keep all the pieces together?
It worked really well for us.
[amazon_link id=”B000UOELJM” target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]
[/amazon_link]
Trying to eek out one more room to paint this week, I selected the upstairs bathroom which is small and shouldn’t take too much time.
I went to Home Depot to get my paint. I’ve been going to Hirschfield’s in Woodbury since the paint and colors I’ve been selecting have been by Benjamin Moore Paint. Since this bathroom will be remodeled in the next year or so, I decided I didn’t need to use high quality paint. Any paint would do. I was surprised to see a paint that was only $12 a gallon in latex and $15 in semi-gloss. I selected the semi-gloss since this would be for a bathroom and the salesperson told me it did not come in eggshell.
The paint, American Standard, says it’s the finest. I immediately thought “Where have you been all my life — cheap and the finest?” Who can ask for anything else?
When I got home and opened the paint can, small bubbles appeared on top. Oh no! I sensed problems were brewing. I’ve never opened a paint can and had these small bubbles before. But, since I had just arrived from the store and they had stirred the paint there, I decided it must be okay and there was no need to stir again.
Up on my ladder, I started painting the corner edges next to the ceiling with a small brush. The paint spread like water. Literally — the paint was so thin  that you could see through it. “Well,” I mused , “you are putting a lighter color over a darker one.” But again my gut told me something was wrong. I continued edging the entire room. “This room is going to take 3 coats of paint,” I said to myself out loud.
The instructions on the paint can do say to sand your walls lightly but that’s really only applicable if you’re painting over semi-gloss. Â All of the other paints I have used have never required or needed it. However, in fairness to the paint (a weird thought I know), I sanded a portion of the walls to see if it would make a difference when I used the paint roller.
Pouring the paint into the tray, I sensed another “oh no” moment. This paint is too thin I said to myself. Still, I put my roller in the tray and rolled the paint on the wall. I painted the whole wall — including the part that was sanded. The paint was too thin.
I don’t know why I kept second guessing myself. “Maybe,” I told myself “it’s because I haven’t used semi-gloss in a long time so I’m not used to it.” Finishing the room, I left for the day and allowed it to dry. But so little paint was used because it was so watery.
Peeking in the room throughout the day, I still had a bad feeling about the paint.
The next morning, the paint was dry on the wall so I started to apply a second coat of paint to the corners. Still water-like, it was no better than the first coat, i.e. you could see through the paint.
I had visions of having to paint the room 5 times with this paint. No — I had to take this paint back. It didn’t matter that the label said “No Returns – Custom Color.” Off to Home Depot I went.
Arriving at the customer service return desk, I explained the problem to the woman at the counter. She simply said “It’s a cheap paint.” To which I replied “Why would Home Depot sell a cheap paint? Why sell something that doesn’t work?” She again responded “It’s a cheap paint.” I told the woman I was returning it. She pointed to the “No Returns” label on the paint can. I told her I didn’t care if they didn’t refund my money but that I was not going to get stuck throwing away their junk. She asked if I wanted a manager and I said I didn’t need one as I wasn’t requesting a refund. However, I again told her that I was shocked that Home Depot would carry such a substandard product. Her response? Lots of people buy it.
She then went on to say “You need to use primer before using this paint — even if the walls are white.” I was aghast. I explained that if you use 2 coats of paint you really don’t need to use primer in most cases.
I left the paint can on the counter, bought a paint tray and left. Heading over to Hirschfield’s Paint Store, I gave them my color swatch and they gave me a gallon of good quality paint. I asked the lady (although I knew the answer) “Do I have to sand the walls as I recently painted the room with semi-gloss?” She said no. My gut was right. Having painted off and on for over 15 years, I knew what needed to be done.
Lesson learned? You get what you pay for. Cheap is cheap so bring your expectations way down. But it’s better to get quality from the start. It will save a lot of time and energy.
The new paint looks beautiful on the walls.
[amazon_link id=”1554073766″ target=”_blank” container=”” container_class=”” ]
[/amazon_link]
Sitting in our family room watching TV, I got up and noticed something on one of our windows.
A baby frog. Well, at least I think it’s a baby frog. It could be a toad. I don’t know much about them. He is so small and … cute.
Fortunately for me though — he’s outside. I can enjoy him from a distance.
My Apple MacBook Pro is laid aside every evening on its side on our family room carpet floor.
In the morning, I open my computer and log in. Since moving to Minnesota, and particularly to our new house, I have had an interesting phenomena occur.
Ants spew forth from the keyboard of my computer. Okay, okay — spewing forth is probably not the correct phrase. One to three ants may come out when I open the computer.
At first I thought it was because the computer was warm as I left it plugged in overnight. But, I tested that theory by leaving the computer unplugged overnight. Still — the occasional ant comes out.
What’s even more interesting is that mine is the only computer in our house that has the problem.
Last night, I unplugged the computer, put it on a high shelf and opened it this morning to see if I had any new visitors. Nope. But, one time does not a success make. So tonight I will leave the computer plugged in and place it high on a shelf again. The only problem with that is that the ants could potentially walk up to the shelf via the adapter cord.
I then surmised that I might have a queen ant in my computer and she laid eggs and the ants come out occasionally. Â Far fetched though. The queen ant doesn’t work that way — although, stranger things in life have happened.
We’ll see … we’ll see …
It’s late July in Minnesota. I haven’t had much time to plant a garden as most of the time I’m working indoors painting, hanging pictures and other miscellaneous work.
Today though was a beautiful day. The weather was perfect and I was determined to work on two strips of dirt in front of our house. I had already prepped the area and planted a couple of bleeding hearts.
But the past week, it rained. And rained. And rained. The ground is saturated with water and the dirt was compact again. I took out my hoe and started digging. I like my gardens to look sculpted instead of wild so I place things carefully in “order.”
Adding new dirt, I mixed it with the old dirt. It was a little hard to make holes for the plants as I kept running into small-to-medium sized rocks. At first I thought that there may be plastic underneath as some gardeners put plastic, then rock, then dirt in order to reduce the number of weeds they get. But, I never ran into the plastic so I don’t know why I keep running into rocks.
This part of our property is very shady so we are limited in what we can plant. Although, I did notice later in the afternoon that we get filtered sun — very little filtered sun but it’s better than nothing.
We went to a nursery called Bachman’s in Maplewood, MN. There was not much selection there for a shady garden. But, we did come away with a few plants. The ones we bought were:
[/amazon_link]Despite the downpours of rain, heat indexes of 115 — in Minnesota — our basil plants are living. I don’t understand it. They are not in a very sunny location as we don’t have much sun on our property.
Basil plants are like people — in spite of the hardships they may suffer, they continue to live.
I wonder what other plants might be thrivers in our environment?
AT&T has a great commercial that exemplifies how I feel about all creeping things. (Click below to view it on Youtube.)
Minnesota may one day cure me of the “creeping things” paranoia. Last evening, before going to bed, we turned on the light to the outside deck. On the outside of the screen were many different types of insects looking at me — none of which I had ever seen before.
I wonder if there is “creeping things” insurance — in case I should die of a heart attack before the cure.