Sandbox (No Cats Allowed)

We think the little boy might enjoy some time in a sandbox so we built one for him. After doing a little research we found that Dunn Lumber was having a sale on cedar 5 1/4 x 4's (true dimensions are 1" x 3 1/2").

Here are a couple of sketch concepts of what the sand box might look like.

We used screws to assemble the sandbox and nailed some weed barrier fabric on the bottom.

After clearing a space, we placed the sandbox and leveled it.

Now for the hard part (450 pounds of play sand). We wheeled the sand from the truck to the box location and filled up the box. Nine bags in total.

The last thing to do was to put a lid on it so the neighborhood cats don't find it. Luckily, we had a remnant of plywood that was 48"x48" (the perfect size).

Sewer Work Starts Tomorrow!

This last weekend was dedicated to getting ready for the sewer contractor. We rerouted the kitchen drain, dug a trench to expose the washer drain line, and limbed up the cedars.

The side sewer stub will be installed tomorrow. The pipe from the stub to our house will be installed on Wednesday. We are SO excited! We have to admit that having work done by a contractor is a really nice luxury.

Leaf Blower

My father will disown me when he reads this post. I am now an owner of a leaf blower. He hates leaf blowers because of the noise they make. I bought mine used and it's electric. It's not as loud as the gas powered models, but it's still pretty loud.

The reason I bought it was because our roof had a leak. The roof company employee said it was because of pine needle build up on the shallow slope of the roof. He recommended that I use a leaf blower to clean off the roof once or twice a year. He also recommended that I use moss killer on the roof to keep moss from growing.

It takes longer than using a broom, but you can tell that it's not so hard on the shingles. It's good practice to keep one's roof free of debris as it helps keep the down spouts unclogged.

Later that week the roof company owner had the employee come back out a make some adjustments where the leak occurred. He didn't think the leak was solely due to pine needle build up. Okay by me.