Uh, spring's coming?

I've been kind of awol. Ok, it was winter. From a garden perspective, nothing happened. And still, nothing much is happening. But there are signs of life. And my inbox is starting to get filled with garden spam, I'm waiting for a paycheck that might cover more than the bare life essentials so I can go spend money on planters and seeds and seedlings and fun stuff. Meanwhile, I sort of remember a last ditch effort to plant some bulbs before the first frost. I think I cut it pretty close. And I know I meant to log what I planted and then didn't. And sure enough, now some stuff is coming up, other stuff that I'm sure I planted isn't, and it's going to be a big surprise.

For example, in the "tomato planter". I remember planting bulbs. No idea what they are.

Also out front, the dogwood tree has some stuff coming up. Again. Don't remember at all what they were.

And then there's other miscellaneous stuff going on: the hydrangeas have buds forming, the bleeding heart is coming back, there seem to be other miscellaneous bulbs coming up (one can hope), and the flowering quince has Actual Leaves:

Overall, it's really time for an overhaul. If I can manage it, early spring projects include tilling the lawn (remember that? It's still "balding"). I can rent a tiller from Home Depot, then mix in the bucket of compost from the giveback, plant new seed, and then keep my fingers crossed. And I really really really really really want to replace the fence on the back wall. The green and white vinyl slats in the chain link. I hate it so much.

Welcome Cyrus!

Here he is!

merry xmas to us!

All that's missing is the bow on top of the damn car.

Honda Fit! Car of my dreams!

(and, just for Eliza, flower pics!)

Happy birthday to me!

They were so beautiful. This was a couple days after thanksgiving, so almost a full week after they arrived.

Glogg!

Menu:

Swedish meatballs
Bacon wrapped dates with goat cheese
Salmon/cucumber squares
Beef/carrot ‘sushi’
Anchovy lemon dip with fingerling potatoes and green beans
Polenta squares with mushroom ragout
Manchego quince paste napoleon
Peking chicken summer rolls
Cayenne apple cake
Pistachio dark chocolate tuiles
Cranberry orange pistachio cookies
Asian pear 'sandwich' with praline mascarpone filling
Plum pudding tartlets
Kumquat, olive and other candied fruit tarts

Tiling progress!

(Cheating. Adding pics after tub is in and plasterer Allan came by. And we still haven't cleaned up after the plastering ...).

But, here's more pics:

And these are the cabinets Steve will build. The sides are already panelled with zebrawood -- that's what the cabinet door and drawer fronts will be. And the vanity top will be a white silestone we think. And yes, there will be a sink, and faucet, and mirror.

Ok, here's what we're tiling

So here is Steve, after building tub surround, as we tested to make sure the bathtub will fit. It will! And that's our tub! This was the first time we got a sense of what the bathroom is going to be like. It's going to be nice. There will be a glass wall on the curb, between Steve and the shower. The wall to the right will not be tiled, it is where the sink and vanity will be, and a big kind of cabinet right when you walk into the bathroom.

And here is a view from Steve's position, sitting on the toilet. The wood soffit will be painted, not tiled. The column in the corner will now be the pretty glass tile, which will also be a 6 inch band going around the near-top of the room. The walls and top of the tub will be white. The floor, and sides of the tub, will be brown. We were putting up durock from 6pm until 10 pm Friday, 7am to 9pm Saturday (well, also doing other things like prying up the durock that we'd put on the floor since the tilers are going to mud in the floor tile), and Steve was working Sunday and I finished things off for three focussed hours on Sunday evening.

Here's the tile itself, and a closeup of the shower. That shower pan took 6 months to build. Six. It would take a professional half a day probably.

We were going to have the glass tile on the shower floor, but Tiler Charlie says that's not going to work, so now we're doing brown on the shower floor. Brown will also be the floor tile in general, and go up the sides of the tub. The top of the tub and walls are the white long tile, and then the glass tile will be an accent -- as mentioned, a band around the room and then a column.

It is already so much better than last week: Remember? Toilet in center of room. Temporary bathtub on left. Nasty rug only slightly better than nasty plywood subfloor, no sink. We really lived like that for, three years?