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Empire State Building

Front Door Refinishing

Our front door exterior looked sun beaten and washed out in most places. It has a solid wood core and mahogany veneers.  The veneers were starting to bow out and warp.  It was also splitting up the back on the interior, and the wood was starting to break out of the core of the door on the bottom.  So, we called in some help from Radiance Refinishing.

The door was taken down, all of the hardware removed, sanded and stripped down, repaired, conditioned, and oiled.  The threshold was refinished with a hard lacquer.  We are doing the final steps of applying 2-3 additional coats of oil over the next several days and reinstalling the knocker.

We forgot to take a before picture, but here it is after one oil coat.  It is just starting to take on a sheen again, and will be nice and shiny after all the oil is applied.  

The cost was extremely reasonable in comparison to a replacement, which would run ~$3,000 for a custom door of similar materials.

St Patrick's Cathedral

St. Patrick's Cathedral was under renovation both inside and out.

Times Square

We stayed at Hotel Mela, which was a block away from Times Square.  Emily and Andy joined us for the trip.

Green Grass of Home

We're back from a long holiday weekend in New York City.  We are happy to be home, especially Chris who has been away for a week and a half.  

And, we came home to extremely green grass thanks to lots of spring rain this past week!

Pictures from the trip are on the way...

Rain Delay & Tornado Warning

Team outing at the Rockies today, hampered by weather

Second day in a row for a tornado watch here.

Social Media Star

Zoey had her yearly vaccinations and heart worm test this morning, and she made Facebook.

Mopey McGruff

I think Zoey is depressed.  

She has been moping around and spending a lot of time in her crate, which is not usual.  She is just generally not herself.

The only rationale I can think of is: Chris is out of town this week and I think she misses her best buddy.  This is endearing, and at the same time makes me feel like chopped liver.

Oh, Zoey.

Planted

All of the plants are in place and it took forever!  

I made my own planting guide using the exact measurements of the garden and ended up with three extra plants. Fine by me, I couldn't plant another thing.

This picture isn't the greatest, apologizing in advance.  The plants are all so small right now, it was hard to capture them all.  And you have to imagine the tulips are gone, too.

Looking forward to watching everything fill in and start to bloom.  It is going to look so nice!

Iris!

A new addition to the garden!  Love the color.

House: Year 3

We passed the 3 year mark at our house at the end of March.  We keep chipping away at our to-do list, but the pace is slowing.  

We completed two major projects this year:

• New windows (planned).  
• New roof (unplanned & replaced due to a leak in the master bedroom closet).

Here are the other projects we completed.

• Permanent wall installed in the garage & trimmed and sided the outside wall.
• Planted a Nectarine tree in the backyard.
• Installed Invisible Fence.
• Put up a gazebo on the back patio.
• Installed a small fence between neighbors garage & shed.
• New garage door opener.
• Expanded front flower beds with new edgers.
• Removed Ivy & old patio fence and erected a new fence & gate.
• Installed new entry way light.
• Started installing a retaining wall in the front yard.
• We declared the backyard transformation complete.
• New knobs and pulls on the hallway built ins.
• Updated kitchen light with elbow grease & spray paint.

Here are the recaps from year one and two.

In the past we included an updated to-do list, but we are working on a detailed punch list room by room that we will post once compiled.

Happy Mother's Day!

We are both far away from our moms today.  Sending our love.

Erica was hoping to post pretty garden pictures, but the garden looks like this - An attempt at protecting our plants from the sleet now, and snow later.

A Painted Prairie

Just as we were starting to think about what to plant in our newly expanded front flower bed, we stumbled upon Garden in a Box.  It is a "plant by number" kit with xeric (low water) plants and plans for planting that is going to transform this into a Painted Prairie.  

We ordered weeks ago and picked up our plants today.  And because we live in Denver, we received $25 off our purchase which made this a really good deal.

We have to hold off on planting because of the looming winter weather.   Yuck.

In the meantime, here are all of the flowers and the Plant by Number.  We will keep you posted on the planting, there are 29 plants in all, and the finished product once in bloom.  

Pasty Republic

We have a new little restaurant in our neighborhood, Pasty Republic  and they serve nothing but pasty's.  Erica was pretty excited about it - it reminded her of skiing in the U.P. growing up and stopping at the pasty shops there .

Chris had The Miner which is the traditional pasty Erica remembers with steak, rutabagas, potatoes, onion, etc.  Erica had The Rock, which is a cheeseburger pasty with ground beef, cheese, onion, mustard, and ketchup.  They were both good.  We split a nutella orange pasty for dessert.  

We hope this place does well, it is quick take out food which we don't have a lot of nearby.  And it's fun!

Chris & ChickChick

ChickChick is the family chicken who blew in during a storm.  She is a friendly ole gal who rides around on the back of the great grand kids tricycles.

Traumatic Flight

Zoey was not a happy camper on the flight last night. Crying, whimpering, barking and general carrying on for the entire flight.

She was not like this the last time she flew, 10 months ago.

We've created a needy monster! A really cute needy monster.