refurbished a hand plane

I didn't need another one - this is the exact same model as the one I use, that was my grandfather's... but I couldn't let it sit and rust away.  I hand carved (obviously) a replacement front handle and found a screw to replace the lost one.  Got all the rust off, and put the blade on my grinding wheel - ready to go!

New Woodshed

So, my junky old woodshed spot was looking pretty sad, and I decided this extra wet year that it isn't big enough to hold enough wood to get us through these longer wetter weeks, so this old thing had to go:

   

I went over to the neighbor's, who has a treasurer trove of materials that need to be pulled out of the woods.  I found these old HVAC ducts:

So I grabbed a bunch and flattened them out as recycled roofing tiles: 

Then organized some old-but-still-solid pallets:

and then put the roof on:

Rescued flat griddle

Happy with re-seasoning this old rusted griddle.  It's super heavy - like 50 lbs or so.  Great to fry a bunch of stuff over the fire, all at once. 

Bits of fix up

The third try at setting up a 'greenhouse' sort of cover for my work space, to keep things relatively dry and less sloppy.  I think the arched roof will succeed in not pooling up the water and crashing apart.

Finally got around to fixing up my 'ax hog log', the chopping block I use with hatchets and such.  It wasn't level, and struggled with the slope of the hillside. 

Kitchen Knife Handle project

Getting rid of the plastic in the house, one log at a time.

It's tricky to do this in the right order. Every step can fail - that is, the wood could crack, or the metal might fail, or something... so I'm always holding my breath until I get to the last bit. 

Seems good enough for our kitchen.

little plaster chips and holes

Turns out having a kid is hard on a house.   I'm trying to figure out how to best repair all sorts of little dings and holes and chips in my natural lime plaster and limewashed walls. 

And by repair, I mean make it look like they didn't happen. I have attempted repairs in the past, and have never really been satisfied.  

bathroom window and finger:

other bathroom window sill and finger:

bathroom windowsill horizontal:

spot by bathroom door that gets hit by a small stool used to bring teeth high enough to brush: 

Drying Persimmons

We've now made bug screen tubes for the persimmons, and I suddenly came up with the idea to put hooks on the rafters on the front of the house.  It's funny how ideas seem to come out of nowhere, and seem so obvious once you have them.

War of the Rodents

So, here's some of the weird damage some sort of rodent is doing in our garden.  These are tomatoes that have been eaten while still on the vine, leaving just the skin still attached. 

Weird, right?  Here you can see one that's not quite ripe yet, so it hasn't been a victim, like the one behind it: 

what else is weird is these aren't down by the ground, they're about 5 or 6 feet up.  

This motivates me to continue my assault on all things rodent. I'm happy to report that I got my 4th mole today, which is in addition to my twenty one (21!) gophers in 2016.   Here's a product endorsement: http://cinchtraps.com/

charged up about the new system

The solar trailer is no more!  Finally, the batteries, that we've had for 10 solid years, had had enough. So I got around to building a new way to hold all that extra power generation stuff.  A little box behind the house:

it was a nice little puzzle to work out how to get the inverter, charge controller, fuses and connections into a tight spot without causing other problems (like overheating):

Just 4 6 volts all in one series to make a 24 volt system that works with the old inverter.  Powering the chest freezer now!

Chimney holes

Deciding to just avoid all possible hot chimney pipe exposure to the walls, I've added a cement board outer wall:

There's still a gap, so I put cement board all the way around as well:

and then added a little extra aluminium at the top for heat buffering. Can't hurt, right?

Rescued umbrella

Home grown umbrella pole attached to canvas umbrella rescued from the trash.  Creates great shade!