New Addition to the Family

After D inadvertently caused a scandal with his blog title earlier this month, I thought I'd continue the theme and tell you all about our new addition: a beautiful new vacuum. (No offense, blog readers, but you will not be the first to know should any *real* new additions join the family.)

We've tried for years to figure out the best way to clean our floors, which range from wood to tile to area rugs to wall-to-wall carpet and are spread out on three floors. We finally gave up on our Dyson upright, which just couldn't handle the hardwood or tile very well and relegated it to the basement's wall-to-wall carpeting (no more having to drag it up and down two flights of stairs) and bought this pretty fellow:

A Miele C1 Titan, retail price of a hefty $600. Fortunately someone we knew recently got theirs using airline miles and when I noticed that I had about 75,000 about to expire at the end of the year, I knew I should go that route too (get it, route?). With no trips planned, this felt basically like free money.

While I have nothing but hatred for airlines and for flying, using my United Miles for this was surprisingly easy. I was short a few miles, so they charged me $60. I kept expecting to see more fees or expensive shipping tacked on while going through the purchase, but nope - just a flat $60 to make up the 10,000 or so remaining miles. This is way cheaper than trying to buy or gift miles to purchase an actual flight.

How does it work? So far so good:

We haven't had to replace the bag yet (yes, this one has a bag - how old-fashioned) or vacuum anything particularly challenging. But it seems to work well transitioning between rug and wood, so we don't have to sweep as often, so that's a win. We still use a sweeper on our fancy hand-knotted rug to get the cat fur off, but we can set this one on low suction to get rid of crumbs without feeling like it's going to destroy the rug.

I guess we'll just have to see if it stands the test of time. But at $60, I'm not quite so concerned about whether this was the right decision.

Back That Branch Up

I committed a blog sin by forgetting to take a "before" picture, but trust me when I tell you that the big magnolia in the back yard was starting to crowd our garage roof.

D originally wanted to have the tree removed entirely but I enjoy its shade and fragrant flowers (though not the giant pods that seem to fall constantly and are large enough to cause a twisted ankle). In any case, we decided we would try to trim it ourself with an extendible tree pruner. With a freshly installed sharp blade, we went to work attacking the branches leaning on the roof. Fortunately none were so squashed up against the roof to make us fear the falling branch would grab a slate on its way down.

 You can sort of see the problem branches from here....a little. If you use your imagination:

 The sharp Fiskars blade made surprisingly quick and satisfying work. We removed 3 branches (D did 2 and I did 1) in about 10 minutes.

Here's the "after" picture from the angle we should have used first. You can see none of the branches  are touching anymore

It took longer to trim the branches, especially after we realized that our handsaw was incredibly dull. A 2 day delay to wait for a new 15'' handsaw from Amazon, and we were set:

We're saving these for firewood so D cut it into usable pieces, all stacked and ready for winter.

This was a very exciting project, given that we started out getting estimates to remove the whole tree for about $500 and spent a total of about $20 for new saw blades instead. I'm sure I'll continue to curse the tree out when I'm cleaning up the pods, but I'm glad we decided not to take it down. At least now I know how easy it is to take off a few low-hanging, annoying branches.

Little Brother

We never seriously considered getting a full-service security solution after being robbed. Way too expensive and hopefully not very necessary. But we did toss around the idea of self-installing something. The serious self-rolled security systems involve setting up a server to record video along with several expensive cameras. Just too much money and hassle. Should we ever make our house part of the internet of things, we may install cheap motion sensors on the main entry doors and ground level windows with some kind of hub (this or whatever Apple does?). But there's too much flux and uncertainty about which system will win out. So that project is on hold.

Our main concern is that packages get left on our stoop. Since our street is so highly trafficked, we are always worried about something getting lifted. So some kind of video camera or still capture system would work. A super popular one is the Dropcam. But this works by streaming all of the video through your home internet connection to Dropcam. So should Russian or Chinese hackers compromise Dropcam, they could watch your home camera from the comfort of their desks. But worse, Google bought Dropcam. Which means that eventually Google will decide to use the video streams to figure out how to sell things to you. So we wanted something we had some control over.

My brother is using this camera to monitor his front door and recommended it.

Nothing fancy. 640x480 resolution. IR sensors for night vision. Wireless network connection. But what I liked about it was 1. it's really cheap and 2. you can log directly into it and control it. We have it setup to transmit photos whenever it detects motion to an email account. D-Link isn't involved at all. The camera can't be accessed from outside our network. So it is (sort of?) secure. 

I originally put it in our bay window but the IR sensors don't work through the glass and I couldn't get a angle on our porch. I did a little bit of googling and it seems that a bunch of people are using them outside without too many problems. It's really cheap, so I think it's worth a try. 

Our walkway. The camera was originally next to the potted plant in the bay window. Now it is behind the gray pot center right.

Shielded pretty well from the elements from the bay widow overhang and the pot. It's also right on top of the outlet. 

The capture photo resolution is pretty lousy. But better than nothing. I think it'd only be useful for a actual theft for capturing the time and a general description of the thief. Unless the thief had really distinguishing tattoos. Since the emails get sent a minute or two after it gets triggered, I could conceivably catch a robbery in action.

Unfortunately a spider has decided that this location is great. Apparently a little spider walking right in front of the camera is enough to trigger the motion detector. Each morning I have a dozen or so captures of this little dude walking around.

Here he is during the day. 

I've removed his web several times, but he is quite clever. He immediately drops to the ground and scrambles away when I touch his web. A few hours later, a new web appears. I guess I have to keep knocking his web down to discourage him. 

Aside from spiders, the camera seems to work fine. The resolution is terrible, but there's a fairly steep price penalty to get a HD camera. We plan on getting at least another camera to cover the basement entrance. 

More blue chairs, more blue shopping

We've sort of dropped the chair thing as our house budget has had other plans (new AC...), but recently we stumbled into an unexpected choice: Room & Board. For anyone familiar with this store, you'll know that they make really fabulous wood furniture in the USA, but their price reflects their quality. We often oogle the furniture but alas, it is not meant to be for our price level.

So imagine my surprise when we wandering into a store to discover that the chairs there are in the same price range as the ones at Crate and Barrel and only slightly more than West Elm. And they come in dozens of colors!

We sat on one or two that we liked and then created a list from their online selection that would definitely prompt a revisit to test in person. Quinn, Braden, Abbott, and Cole all had the clean lines and not overly-stuffed look we are going for.

I was delighted to see that swatches were free and you could order up to some huge number like 20, so I picked all my favorite blues and waited.

They arrived and I was so excited to check which one matched best...

Only to discover that, yet again, my taste is apparently unique. They aren't bad, they are just blah. (I forgot to photograph them on the same pillow I did last time, but the blues are kinda the same.)

Oh well, I'll keep looking until we find the perfect match. West Elm just got some new colors in, plus I'm sure we'll find some other good candidates at other stores where we never expected to find them.

Strapping improvements (toddler proofing part 1)

When we installed our new shelves in the basement we took the precaution of attaching each one to the wall. We did not do that for the furniture in the brave new baby's room. Which is stupid because the wardrobes are large, heavy, and have drawers which may eventually prove to be tempting climbing steps. In our defense, she is still showing no interest in climbing. But who knows when that will change. So I spent an afternoon strapping her wardrobes to the wall.

I did order some Ikea straps through their just-announced recall program, but they hadn't arrived yet and we already had some generic wall straps.

The process was fairly straightforward. Find stud.

Attach one set of straps to the stud.

Attach other strap to furniture.

Do it in pairs.

Attach together.

Pull out as much slack as possible. One of the straps is just slightly visible on the tallest wardrobe, because the studs were in inconvenient positions, but otherwise the whole setup is invisible.

Randomness on a Saturday

I've been gathering up little tidbits that don't quite add up to a blog post, so I thought I'd dump them here more for my own ability to keep track of things, rather than for you, dear reader(s). And so, without further adieu or any ability to turn these into a single theme, here goes:

1. Mouser kitty caught a tiny little mouse this week. Usually they only seem to come in during the colder weather, so this tiny toddler-of-a-mouse was definitely in the wrong place at the wrong time.

2. Our own mouse-of-a-toddler now has free rein on the main floor, because we took down the gate:

She seems to know she's not allowed to go down to the basement alone (made easier by her laziness at doing stairs, so she usually demands mommy or daddy carry her down), and she more or less responsibly colors on her own in the office. We'd been leaving it open for a few months now, and after she tripped over the threshold the other day, we decided its time was up. Leaving the sticky cups up for now in case of a potential child #2 (or even just a party with lots of children).

3. We've been treating our hawthorn tree all year for rust to avoid the orange spots of last year. We have been less than diligent but it's much better than last year, though still seems to have traces of rust on the leaves. I'm a little disappointed because we selected a hawthorn because we thought they were supposed to be pretty hardy, and spraying it with chemicals weekly is not ideal.

 It has grown a little bit, as has the toddler in whose honor it was planted.

4. Reconsidering my love of sycamores after seeing how much bark they shed in my neighbor's yard, though a friend who has several says that they easily mulch into the ground when mowing. Still not sure what (or even where) to plant after we take our oak down this fall.

As I said, very random. Some longer posts on the way, but it's been a pretty lazy summer housewise, so don't get your hopes up for too much.

I see you!

It's a minor change, but our relatively newly revamped basement has some new wall decor.

I can finally run on the treadmill and not be snuck up upon (that's not quite a grammatical English phrase, but you get the idea).

Target made these mercifully easy to hang by making the packaging include a template, to know where to put the screws.

Here's the longer view. We are still really enjoying our pantry redesign and the purple wall, though the room still needs serious work to not feel like a basement (or maybe we just have to live with it). It doesn't help that the little one never tires of unloading the lower shelves of the pantry and dragging groceries all around the room. Why yes, I would love to enjoy a can of chilis in adobo sauce on the futon, thank you. And a jar of herbs de provence while going for a run? Perfect! (Did I mention we stock some pretty random things?)

On the to-do list to make this place little more polished? Spray paint this wine rack white, which definitely will have to wait until at least fall, since I don't spend more than a few minutes outside doing manual labor during the hottest months of the year.

 Get a new grate for the fireplace:

We debated painting the inside white and putting something decorative inside, but the jury is still out on whether this fireplace is useable (home was sold with this fireplace "as is" - the inspector agreed that we shouldn't use it but our chimney guy said it was fine) and we don't want to make it definitely unusable without more information.

 And maybe, one day, do something about the eyesore on this side of the room.

But at least I don't have to look at it when I'm on the treadmill.

Oh, a cool random find at Target when we went looking for the mirrors:

Back when we were searching for a solution for a nightstand in the bedroom that was compatible for our under-bed drawers and our cat-tunnel headboard, these would have been nice to have. They're little shelves that clamp onto the very top of the bed frame.

Neat, right?

Goodbye tree

Right around the time we were paying a fortune for our new AC, we got news of another costly problem. You may remember that I asked recently for a tree identification. That's because the big beautiful white oak at the front of the house has to go.

In fact, two branches vanished already - the town decided that they were at risk of falling on the street (or some cars).

We got two opinions because we really wanted to be certain before we took it down - it is the only shade tree in our front yard and probably as old as the house (or older).

But alas, the diagnosis is confirmed - fatal root rot.

 And so, this giant tree has got to go.

Apparently its placement between the driveway and the sidewalk put the roots under a lot of stress. And when they replaced the curb a few years ago, it may have made the roots more vulnerable.

Our plan for now is to wait until fall so that we can take advantage of the shade at least for the rest of the summer. Plus one of the landscape people who helped diagnose the tree suggested waiting until firewood season, so that we can use or even sell the oak.

And so, here we are shopping for a new tree and getting estimates to take this one down. We can't put the new tree where the old tree is, both because of the root rot and because of the stressful location. So we have to look for where we would put it, too.

Another window

When we replaced our main floor windows last year, we had to choose between two companies. The first was the company we had used for the upstairs windows several years earlier - we liked the windows but were not impressed by their follow-on service. The second was a new company that ended up getting our business.

We are so thrilled we went with someone new. After the initial install, we've had to deal with them twice and they have been nothing but helpful.

First, in December, we were left with a slice in our screen as a result of the burglary. Our insurance would have paid to have it fixed, but the company didn't charge us (this stuff is all supposed to be laid out in contracts, but it never is as easy as it seems, so we're never really sure what we have to pay for and what we don't). Not only that - they came out the week we called and fixed it on the spot. No missed pick-ups and delays and haggling over the whole process like when we needed our torn screen replaced with company 1. We even told them not to rush because, well, it was December, so it wasn't like we were anxious to open our windows. But they booked an appointment immediately, after confirming that the frame itself didn't get dented and need replacing. Yay for company 2.

Fast forward to about a month ago, when I noticed this in the picture window:

Of course, if anything were to break, it would be the biggest and most expensive window in the house. And one that doesn't open and pop out, for an easy replacement. Fortunately, it was only on the outer pain of glass and didn't go all the way through.

I called the company who put me in touch directly with the (local) window manufacturer they work with. When I called to set up a time for someone to come take a look, they answered "how about tomorrow" and even said I didn't have to be there, since it was accessible from our front walkway.

Then the day after that, they called to say they would replace the window and that -the best part -it was free! They would make a new one right away! I was surprised they were even going to go through all the effort of replacing the window with such a small chunk taken out and told them that if they didn't think it needed replacing, we were fine with ignoring it. No problem to replace it, they said. Could they come out the following week and install it (someone obviously would need to be home for that one) - they even worked with my ear schedule and gave me a 2-hour arrival window that wasn't horrible.

One hitch in the plan - after I left work early on the day of the install, they called to tell me that the tech had accidentally broken the window while it was in his truck and he was working on an earlier job. Oops. I guess it happens. At least they were really nice about it and gave me an even later window the following week, so I wouldn't have to miss as much work.

Today they came out and, in one hour of what appeared to be a fairly intensive two-man job...

I have a new window (and a few pesky flies darting around the house to keep the cats amused). Painless. I guess it pays to think about the follow-on customer service, as well as the product and initial work. If I still had an Angie's List account, I would definitely give them a stellar review.

Plant identification

This post has two stories in it, and the first of them is really part two of a story I haven't told yet. But you'll just have to hear that one backwards.

I'm trying to identify a tree that we might want to plant in our yard (I'll explain the "why" we are looking for a new tree in a future post). As is usually the case, my source of inspiration is my own neighborhood.

This tree, not far from us, seems the epitome of what I'm looking for. Huge (well, obviously that takes a lot of time), paler green leaves that seem to let in lovely diffuse light, and interesting pale and dappled bark. The leaves are too high up for me to get a really good look and picture.

I'm pretty sure, however, that this tree in another part of town is the same tree (but smaller). So some close up pictures might help with the identification process:

I'm pretty sure this is a maple (the leaf makes me think of the Canadian flag) - can anyone confirm that? If that's the case, then I'll start doing research to see if maples are hearty enough for a black thumb like me.

Plant identification, second story. Yesterday afternoon I decided to do some weeding while forced to hang out outside with a toddler who seems immune to these hot, muggy days. I tried weeding around the holly bushes that were freed last fall when we had the back corner of our back yard cleared out.

And this is what I stumbled on. More than stumbled - repeatedly tore from the ground. Until a small thought dawned on me, a mostly forgotten rhyme..."leaves of three...".

Quick image search - yup, classic poison ivy.*** Fortunately I was wearing gloves. And I thought, at least, that I had kept the toddler  from touching any of it. After some truly OCD washing with Tecnu and some rubbing alcohol, I hoped I was safe (I'm updating this post 15 hours after contact, so I *think* it's safe).

I'm not quite sure what to do next, because it's not just in the mulched area under some bushes but in our grass. And instructions on how to eradicate it basically sound like practicing a scorched earth policy over years. D says he knows someone who just sprays the individual shoots with Roundup. I'm usually anti-herbicide, but I think I'll make an exception in this case. I see Roundup even makes one specifically for poison ivy.

Have you had any poison ivy run-ins lately? Any luck removing it? Or done any plant identification of your own? I'd love to hear about them.


***Edit: thanks to my lovely readers, I've since learned this is a blackberry bush and not poison ivy (and upon further reading, can verify that's true - this had tiny little thorns on it and poison ivy does not). However, we also assaulted it with heavy duty poison ivy killer so it probably has no chance of survival either way.