The "Or Else" List

I suspect that anyone who has ever bought an older home has gotten one of these from their homeowners insurance company, a list consisting of everything that needs immediate attention to avoid the "or else." Ours contained no surprises. In fact, the same things were on our own to-do list. Even so, there is something fundamentally annoying about the idea of having someone standing over our shoulder, arms akimbo and foot tapping, demanding that we do things we are in the process of doing anyway.

Now, to their credit, I have to commend our company for not doing what my in-laws insurance company did, i.e. simply canceling the policy with no prior warning because of x, y, z. Ours at least asked us to send them a "what we plan to do and when we plan to do it," response within 20 days thank you very much.

Our "Or Else" list looks like this:

• Back steps lack a handrail
• Roof has curling/lifting shingles that need repair
• Trees are overhanging the home that need to be cut back in order to prevent loss
• Siding has peeling paint, needs repair

Fortunately we can write back that all these items are either in the works or imminent. And at least one thing was already taken care of, the handrail. Of that, here is a "before" photo:

This was one of the real estate photos. Pretty sorry hand rail, huh? It was a 2x4 nailed to two posts. Obviously our insurance company didn't recognize this as a valid handrail. Actually, we had to replace it pretty quickly because DH cut that one down order to get some of our furniture into the house when we moved in.

Here's the one he made and I painted. The "after:"

We've discussed ideas for this area. We already charcoal grill out here. So should we create a patio? Expand the porch with decking? We're not sure yet. So for the time being I'll probably just repaint the concrete, and get on with the rest of our "or else" list.

The "Or Else" List copyright July 2009 by Leigh at http://www.5acresandadream.com/

DIY Mulch

You may recall that I mentioned in this post, that the property was very overgrown when we got here. We've worked hard to clear some of it out, and the result has been an ever-growing pile of branches, sticks, vines, and leaves.

As the pile grew, so did the problem of what to do with it. We could:

A. Leave it for the birds, chipmunks, snakes, mice, rats, cock roaches, and insects to inhabit.
B. Take it to the landfill, where the county will grind it into mulch to give away for free on a first come first served basis.
C. Hire someone to come and chip it for us.
D. Rent one of these .....

..... and do the job ourselves......

The lighter weight shredded leaves blew farther, and are on the right side of the pile. The heavier wood chips fell closer to the chipper and so are on the left. This is handy because I would prefer to use the leaf mulch on the vegetable garden, and the wood chips for other things.

The wood chips are a mixture of old wood and green, so this presents some considerations for using it. Firstly, the green wood will produce heat as it decomposes, and may become too warm for plants it's mulching. Secondly, decomposition requires nitrogen, which means that fresh mulch can tie up the available nitrogen in the soil leaving none for the plants. Obviously aged mulch is best.

At $145 a day to rent the chipper, I'm not sure we got our money's worth in terms of the amount of mulch we ended up with. But we got the yard cleared of that unsightly pile, and I do have two nice piles of mulch, which I'm grateful for.

Since there is a lot more to clear, we will have to face the same problem again soon. The larger branches we can use as firewood, but all the twigs, leaves, and vines will be an ongoing problem. Maybe I should add a small, 2nd-hand shredder to my Wish List.

Copyright by Leigh 10 July 2009 at http://www.5acresandadream.com/

Grape Update

I have been keeping an eye on the grape vines I discovered when I cleared all that brush away. This is how they looked yesterday....

Of the original two small bunches I found, one was almost entirely pecked away. The other was as you see in the photo. I was surprised that they ripened so quickly.

Considering that I only had one bunch left, I was concerned about not losing the remaining grapes to birds or other critters. These look perfect but the big question was, are they ripe yet? I decided to take a chance and picked them.

Unfortunately they are still pretty tart, which means I need to learn how to tell when they are ready to harvest! I do have a second chance however, as afterward I discovered a few more small bunches.....

Hopefully I can get these before the birds do. :)

Copyright by Leigh 8 July 2009 at http://www.5acresandadream.com/