Simmer

Right now it's muggy and I'm wearing shorts, but a few days ago it really felt like fall.  Close the windows, wear a jacket, fall. I made soup.

 













Basically, white beans and andouille sausage, onions, carrots, lots of sage.

I started by browning the sausage.

While it browned, I cut some veggies.

That's three carrots, a handful of fresh sage, maybe two onions and 4-5 cloves or garlic.

Chop your carrots like so.  About the same size as the onions.

Set the sausage aside.

And add a little bacon fat - a scant spoonful.

To the pot.

Turn the heat back on and brown onions, adding carrots, garlic, and sage once they wilt.  Keep browning.  Medium heat.

Add the beans, cover with water, let it cook on low for a few hours.

When the beans are soft - add salt, good salt, and probably more of it than you'd think, and grind some pepper in, and slice or break up the sausage and stir it back in.  Let all the flavors settle for another 10 minutes or so.

And eat soup.

Measure Once

I should have taken a photo of the rug running up our entry steps when we moved in.  The cheapest polyester "Oriental" pattern in a faded green, dirty as all get out too.  It had to go.

The green paint on the wood steps underneath was a bit rough so instead of re-painting I laid new runner.



















I've had a bit of a fondness for this charcoal to black industrial looking stuff - we had an entry mat of the same material in out last house - and I thought it would look good with the green.  $2.80 something a foot at the Depot.

You know the carpenter's saying, "Measure Twice, Cut Once"?  The point being that it's a lot easier to spend time getting measurements right than to fix it when you've got material cut to the wrong length - especially if it's cut too short?  Yeah.  I thought I was better than that.  Typical stairs are 7" rise, 11" run.  This is 3 stairs.  I was at Home Depot.  So, I figured math would guide me.  3x(7"+11") = 4'6", but I only wanted to wrap the last bit of the bottom step, and figured 4' would cut it, esp. since you typically get a few extra inches when buying by the foot.



















Well.  You can guess how well that worked out.  I kinda forgot about the way the runner would need to snake back under the tread.  Came up just a few inches short. 

 So - now I've got to go back to the store and buy a 5' piece of the same material.  And this project now costs nearly twice what it should have.  Yep.

Still, I learned a little screwing up the first time, next round I'll make sure it runs more evenly down the steps (this installation veers a bit to the left, see the top photo) and make sure I have enough.



















And, the basic process stands, and it was simple enough.  Pull up the old stuff, pull out remaining staples with some needle-nose pliers, give it all a good soap-and-water scrub, and then with the surface prepped, I laid out some double sided carpet tape.



















This stuff - Rhino Grip - because when you think of who you'd want to hold something down, isn't a Rhinoceros the first thing to come to mind.

And with that in place, I started tacking it down at the top, peeling back the paper on the tape, and using a staple gun at critical points - across the top, under the bullnose on the runner.  I scored each crease with the pair of pliers I still had laying around from pulling staples.  You could probably find a better tool for the job, but it worked. 
 

Until I got to the bottom.  Now I have to pull it all up and start over.  Don't repeat my mistakes at home.

Shiny new.

Not a house project, but a project still:  Biked into town from our new house for the first time tonight.  Jessie and I replaced the old circa 1990 Mountain Bikes we had been riding with really delightful new ones this summer and have been enjoying them a lot.  Tonight after getting home I mananged to grab a few minutes to install the beautiful Japanese brass bell I bought from the wonderful people at Velo Orange.  The design is something brilliant I haven't seen before, the bell is mounted to a specially shaped headset spacer so no extra hardware is added to visualy or physically clutter the handlebars.  It sounds great and looks even better, I think - it made me happy enough that I had to take a picture.

Existing Conditions

From the street

and the back

Sunny kitchen with tile counter and tall hand-made cabinets

Dining Room looking to Living Room

Living Room looking back

Enclosed Porch

Tracking Progress

We have a new home.  Or a new house at least.  If it's not a home yet, it will be - and that's what this is about: tracking progress.  Documenting.