Easter Weekend

Yesterday was Good Friday. So in true DIY spirit, I spent the 'day off' - ok - the morning really - cutting the hedge.

We have a tall, probably 2, maybe 2 and a bit metre high hedge running down the entire length of one side of our property, and a shorter, I would say 1.3m high hedge running the length from the front of the property to the end of the house on the other side.  We have fantastic neighbours who keep their sides, and the tops nicely trimmed. We on the other hand, are useless at trimming our sides and the result is usually plain to see!

You see, I generally leave it to DIY-impaired husband to do - I don't see it as DIY. I see it as general upkeep, which is his department, like weeding etc. But having gotten sick of it not being done over the Christmas break when he was off for four weeks, and wanting to move my shed this weekend, I decided there was only one thing for it. Doing it myself.

One of my grizzling 'helpers' helping clear up the aftermarth

It was the first time I'd cut the hedges at this house. It wasn't a very long or arduous job though, took an hour or so, with a break for putting Red to bed with a milky in between. The clean up still remains however. I made the mistake of enlisting the two big kids to help. One prefered to hunt for crickets in the aftermath of the hedge trimming, the other kept telling me he needed a rest every two seconds. I eventually threw my hands in the air and told them to go inside and have some lunch because I was sick to death of hearing them grizzle! *Note to self: Purchase leaf rake - our neighbour from our last house still has ours!

More of a 'before' pic looking down towards the front of the section.

Today (Saturday) on the DIY front, I got my Mum to come over. We emptied out the shed and got the DIY-impaired husband to give us a hand with some muscle, he stood inside it, lifted at the beam inside and we guided it onto the platform from opposite corners.

The shed resting on it's new foundation with DIY-impaired husband inside, 

doing what exactly, I'm not sure!

I screwed it securely to the pallet platform/floor - wahey! We wriggled and jiggled it around a bit until some of the side panels that had come away were back where they were supposed to be in the channels at the top and bottom, and then with Mum inside the shed and me outside, she held the small piece of wood I gave her, against the metal as a chock, while I screwed it together from the outside. I went around and fixed anything else back into place that had come adrift.

The flashing in place!

Then it was time to fix the flashings on the roof. I love that my new Gorilla ladder is so versatile, I felt quite safe up it with the legs at different heights! I did one side to the middle, then had to clear away some of the hedge cuttings, and use the loppers on some of the hedge to cut of bits that were protruding  so I could get the ladder in the other side. I then fixed the flashing back on at that side to the middle! When I had put the shed together initially, I didn't fix the flashing on properly because a) I was much larger than I am today and was scared I was going to break something (like the shed or the ladder!) and b) my ladder was already rickety and I was aware that my father had fallen off of it once and it was a bit wonky.

Ramsay the ginger hard at work 'helping' by sleeping in the grass catcher!

Around that time, I sent the DIY-impaired husband off on a carpet collection run. I had managed to get a free square of carpet from Freecycle, this was to be used on the floor, not to make it pretty, but to make it more functional - I didn't want things falling through the floor! Once he arrived home, Red had decided it was time for a sleep, so I headed inside and left Mum and the two big kids to put the carpet down in the shed, and as it turns out, they also loaded everything else back in too!

The shed with it's back back on, manky carpet down, and most things moved back in.

After Mum left, when I had gotten Red to sleep, I did a bit of a tidy up in there, but it still isn't quite the way I want it. I will need to build the window seat for my room first, so I can empty out the cupboard I want to put in there.

Door attached - viola! We have a fully functioning shed again!

While cutting the hedge yesterday, I also rediscovered the old workbench top that was in the shed we demolished almost as soon as we moved in. It is a bit long for the shed, but I will probably build a frame for it and cut the ends off so it can become a useful workbench again.

Now that the sun has come out, plans for the afternoon include cutting the rest of the grass and enjoying the sun with the kids.

Happy Easter everyone!

Houdini, fenced.

I have spent today out at a meeting this morning followed by lunch with my mother and finally waiting at my mothers house for someone to collect some shop fittings that I had stored in the garage.

When I got home I was told about what happened in Red's day today. She had been with Daddy to her swimming lesson, had half an hours sleep (she was woken by someone banging on the door) than after some lunch they had gone to play outside. Daddy had left her outside to come in and make himself a cup of tea, when he spied a little girl with pigtails, who looked remarkably like our Red, walking up the ramp at our elderly neighbours house. Upon speedy closer inspection, it was indeed her and he exited via the gate at the street end of our property, raced next door and retrieved her!

Our elderly neighbour, while lovely, is not keen on our idea to replace the hedge with a fence (even at our expense), so that isn't a viable option right now.

In the spirit keeping Red safe, I decided I needed to solve the problem RIGHT NOW.

I had an old MDF door sitting in the back porch that I ripped out while I was pregnant with Red (along with a built in cavity for the fridge the previous owners left). I also had some scrap metal from the frame of the net of our old trampoline which the wind took for a ride two Christmases ago (which, incidentally, I had planned to take in to exchange for cash this week)

With these two things in hand, and a rubber mallet, I turned this:

In to this!

It isn't terribly attractive, but it was the best I could muster at short notice.
She thinks it is very exciting! Menace!