D says that whenever people ask him if we’re finished the house yet, he says 95% finished. In his mind, that bare floor in the loft is what justifies that assessment.

Well, today that carpeting got done. It has taken this long partly because of green considerations, and partly, I confess, because we couldn’t agree on the type of carpeting. I was leaning toward our re-used fir flooring with wool area rugs up there. D wanted wall-to-wall because it is much quieter and cozier in that multi-use space open to the main floor. I insisted on wool because it doesn’t off-gas, naturally resists stains, and is from a renewable resource (sheep!) D just wanted plush wall-to-wall.

Finding wool carpeting we both liked that would cost less than about $9000 for 400 square feet was not easy.  There is very little wool plush on the market (plush is so yesterday, as is wall-to-wall) and very few lines with the brighter colours or patterns that I wanted. I looked in the States, online, in the higher end stores in Vancouver, and I just couldn’t find anything. Then, I discovered that the Vancouver End-of-the-Roll store carries wool. They’re the only E-o-t-R franchise that does. Everytime I had to come to Vancouver, I would stop in there to see if there was any rollend I liked that was big enough. Came close a couple of times, but the pieces were too small. There was no wool plush in a colour that worked.

As with most decisions one has to make while building green, we had to compromise. I finally found a wheat-coloured wool berber that both D and I could live with. We ordered the greenest underlay, 1/2″ thick, to make it “plushy.”

I was charmed by Alex's shoes

After a false start yesterday when Alex the carpet-layer arrived from Vancouver without  the underlay, he returned today to do the job. Started at 12:30, was done by 4:15. It’s a very physically-demanding job, but he seemed to hardly break a sweat.

And here are the “afters.”

I look forward to furnishing it, and maybe adding that bit of pattern and/or colour with area rugs. It’s a huge improvement over 2 years of plywood floor, but is it 5% worth? Can D say the house is finished now?

My sister blog, This Green Life, has a beginning. It’s about how we’re living in our new home and community. It will feature philosophy, tutorials, crafts, DIY, home decor, vegetarian recipes, and projects, all through a green lens.

There will still be posts about building on This Green House, from time-to-time.

Thanks for checking in.

Two days ago, this kind and generous man made me cry.

He offered to fix my blog. Since March 1, it  has been labelled an attack page, and a warning issued that opening my web site could infect your computer. I have been trying in vain to find a hacker that could fix this problem for me.

Kaan found and cleaned 2 viruses affecting 1314 files!  He used to do this kind of work for a living. We don’t know why This Green House was vulnerable, but will be changing passwords regularly from now on, and backing up the blog more regularly.

I will forever be in Kaan’s debt. Although he says,
“In return for this work, I politely request that you garb in any of your many costumes, attend one of the stone lions at the south end of the Lions Gate Bridge, and play 22 bars from any song with any instrument (“voice” not defined as an instrument for this purpose, although singing along with the instrument is allowed, particularly if you need to drown out the sound the instrument is making.)”

This is the same deal I offered him when I contributed to his Run to End Poverty fundraising.

I was worried that I lost 2.5 years of journalling our building project, and I was having severe withdrawal from blogging.

We have a few things to catch up on. Welcome back!

That basement bathroom is getting ever closer to completion. Soon, I will offer the big “reveal,” as they say on Home & Garden Television!

I have spent some time refinishing another of those beautiful fir doors from a university math building. Here’s what it looked like after most of the hardware was removed (a little less than beautiful):

Last time I refinished a door, I learned that it’s a waste of time and sandpaper to use a stripper (Safe Strip) on it. The old varnish just comes off in a gummy mess, and leaves plenty of gummy stuff to gum up the belts on the sander.

So, I just scraped the finish off with the scraper. I also learned that a sharp scraper works muuuuch better than a dull one, and that the blades are easy to sharpen with a hand file or the bench grinder.

I went over it with the big belt sander:

then the palm sander, and finally the foam-backed sanding pad:

Cleaned up all the sawdust with a vacuum, then a tacky cloth. Looking better:

Then, I coated with three coats of semi-gloss Varathane.

And this is what it looks like now (the “after”):

The commercial brass door hardware appeared to be painted, but I couldn’t seem to remove it until I used fine steel wool, so I think it must have been very long oxidized. Here’s the before and after polishing of the handles:

Our spa-like basement bathroom just seems to call for an unconventional clothes and towel hanger.

We went out for a good beach hike, and came home loaded to the gills with driftwood (and other treasures.) I specifically looked for flat-ish wave-worn boards for the base, and small-diameter sticks that have curls or knobs on them for the pegs.

Since the waves, wind and rain have been relentless of late, the driftwood was waterlogged, so it dried in the heated crawl space for a couple of weeks.

1. Sand the base board (I used both the electric hand-sander and the wonderful foam-backed sanding pad) until all the potential slivers are gone.

2. Select some similar-sized curved or knobbed pieces for the pegs, and measure them with calipers for their diameter.

3. Chose a drill bit of the smallest measured diameter of the pegs, and measure and drill holes 3/4″ deep into the base boards. (Because I intend to place the hanger diagonally, the holes were drilled with a slight angle, not at right angles to the face of the board.)

4. Using the chop saw or a hand-saw, cut the pegs 3 – 5″ long.

5. If the pegs are too large, trim or sand them so that they fit snugly into the holes.

6. Spread carpenter’s glue around inside the holes. (Better to put glue into the holes than onto the pegs – that way placing the pegs won’t squeeze the glue out around the top edge of the hole.)

7. Push the pegs into the holes.

(If there is any movement after inserting the pegs, a small wood wedge can be pressed into the space before the glue dries, then broken off at the base board.) Leave the glue to dry overnight.

8. Do a touch-up sanding of both boards and pegs. Wipe sawdust off with a tack cloth.

9. Seal the hanger with 2 or 3 coats of water-based urethane.

10. Install with long screws onto the wall, at the studs, or use wall anchors. Since driftwood has its curves and undulations, you might want to insert tube slices as spacers on the back, if it’s not sitting flat against the wall.

11. Inset the screw heads and cover the screw holes with removable wood rounds, if desired.

The whole project took me about 3 hours, and cost nothing. (Not counting the  3 hours of beachcombing that we had to endure with the dog on a beautiful Sunshine Coast day!)

Linking to Funky Junk’s Folk Magazine Invitation

We’ve built a little shed to store all our garden stuff:

It’s close to where we’ll need it.

We built it entirely with scraps and stuff we had on hand. The only thing we had to buy was the latch.

We poured a concrete pad at the same time as the driveway was poured.

The structure is made from 2×4 and plywood that was pretty ragged and waterlogged.

Once it was covered by a sheet of copper-coloured steel that matches our roof, we let it air-dry for a couple of weeks before I painted it.

It’s kind of surprising how much the paint brightens and improves the look.

We built shelves up high in between the studs, to keep garden sprays and fertilizers (all organic, of course!) away from little explorers.

I decided on our dark grey paint for the bottom 12″, because the shovels and tools that are put away there will just make a white finish too dirty.

The door was built from the 1×6 tongue & groove pine soffiting material and painted in the dark grey to blend in with the house trim. When the weather improves, we’ll stain some more shingles and finish the shed exterior with those.

And, look! Presto change-o! Make that garden stuff disappear!

Way back here, I promised to update my fibre art studio post when the design walls were done. They are!

Here’s how we built them:

The bypassing barn door hardware is mounted to the 16-foot long 2×6 that we screwed onto the roof joists while finishing the t-strap ceiling.

The steel channel that holds the rollers is engineered to carry a maximum weight of 200 pounds per 8′x8′ door. In my last studio, we used regular closet door sliders to hold my work walls, and these were not nearly strong enough – they were always sagging out of the channels and I ended up sliding them along the floors.

We made a frame of 2x2s, with a channel dadoed on the table saw for the 1/2″ plywood to slot into.

This frame is screwed onto the edges of the plywood, after the plywood sheets are butted together and joined on the door back with narrow pieces of plywood.

Two hanging brackets are screwed onto the top of each door, near the ends.

The back door is lifted and hung onto the sliders by the sliding brackets, and the bolt tightened to secure the brackets to the sliders. Then the front door is hung the same way.

Construction glue is applied to the plywood, then two sheets of Donnacona board screwed on with washers.

Donnacona is cut to fit with a jigsaw

Donnacona is a soft board made from woodfibre scraps (and maybe cardboard?) It provides a backing that I can pin fabric and quilts to, like a bulletin board.

To pretty it up, I painted the 2×2 frame white.

I had 18 feet of 72″ white felt from my old studio, so I cut, seamed, stretched and stapled it tightly over the Donnacona. The felt acts like a soft surface I can just place my fabric on to audition it, without pinning everything.

I also retained 8 feet of grey felt from the old studio, which is useful when photographing my quilts. I can pin it up when I need that 18% grey background for the best exposure level and to encourage accurate colour.

So, now it’ll be so much more convenient to work in my studio, plus it’s much neater-looking, now that all the storage is concealed behind these wonderful big design walls.

I’m a happy quilter!

My father and brother have made this gift to me:

It’s a small oak table (29″x 29″x 29″) with family history. My father says that it was in the house in Victoria BC that my grandfather bought in 1928 from a former officer in the British army in India. The officer bought the table in India some years before.

When my grandfather sold that Victoria house and moved the household goods back to Alberta, the table came with them. My father saw the table on his brother’s ranch, in the chicken house, covered with bird excrement, mildew and cobwebs. Uncle David gave it to my parents, who repaired and re-finished antiques as a hobby. Mom and Dad  cleaned it all up, repainted the decorative pieces with as close a match as they could, and replaced the round shelf underneath. I first remember seeing it in my parents’ home in the early 1970s, when Dad asked for help to replace the goatskin on the top, which had been damaged by a moving crew. I found some soft goatskin, and used the ratty old top as a template.

Bead and fringe:

Table decoration. The half-circle inlay is attached with tiny brass nails:

Hand-hewn foot detail:

The base construction:

There’s a small space in the living room that I think of as the family history corner. That’s where the table belongs.

On a trip to San Francisco, I found two comfortable captain’s chairs at a Goodwill store ($20 each). Here’s the label on the seat bottom:

I thought these chairs would be perfect with the table, but when I placed them there, they seemed too large for the small table and for the corner. What do you think?

Two other little chairs that we had on hand seem to be better-proportioned:

(My sister, who has a collectibles booth and blog, says these words are useful descriptors for these chairs: Elm, English, Edwardian, Rattlesnake turnings.)

I’m thrilled to have this storied piece in our home, to remind me of family history every day. I am grateful to my brother for giving it up and to my father for passing it on to me.

Linking to:

Miss Mustard Seed Furniture Friday

The Brambleberry Cottage Time Travel Thursday

From My Front Porch to Yours Treasure Hunt Thursday

Funky Junk Interiors Saturday Night Special

So excited! My seeds for the dye garden have arrived!

My latest area of experimentation in my fibre art is using natural dyes on cotton fabric. I haven’t done much with natural dyes since university, where we dyed (and spun and wove) wool, using many of the same botanical dyes and a few mordants that are no longer considered safe (chrome and tin, for example.)

The back rock wall should collect all the heat I could want for the dye garden. It runs on a north-south axis, facing east, so will get sun almost all day. Some of the plants don't love sun, so I will plan the location of the tall plants to provide shade.

Late last summer we did the big landscaping thing, which created some terraces. I designated a bright, protected level to be my future dye garden, planted fall rye to embellish the soil, and planted a glorious sumac (in a pot to restrict its growth.)

The first plant, a Sumac, in the dye garden

In October, I took a wonderful course at Maiwa, on printing with natural dyes, from Michel Garcia. Michel is the founder of Couleur Garance (study group) and the Botanical Garden of Dye Plants, set in the Chateau de Lauris in France. Although Maiwa carries a wonderful variety of natural dyestuffs and extracts, I would love to grow some of my own. It turns out that finding a source of seeds for such dye plants as indigo, madder, and woad is not easy, although many common garden plants make fast dyes as well. (“Fast” meaning lasting or permanent.)

Some internet research did find the following sources of common dye plants:

Richters in Ontario for Tansy (a common roadside weed), Woad (blue), Coreopsis (flower), and Osage-Orange.

West Coast Seeds in BC for many common plants such as Coreopsis and Marigold.

And, the jackpot: Horizon Herbs in Oregon for their dye plant collection, which includes Madder (the best orange-red you can get from plants), Indigo (blue), Dyer’s Camomile, Elecampane, Our Lady’s Bedstraw, African Marigold and Stinging Nettles (another common roadside weed.)

Black walnut is another great dye plant, but it won’t be planted in my little bed. I’ll look for another part of the yard to install that one.

Wish me wisdom (works better than luck in this endeavor).

The basement bathroom has no window to the outside, so we framed two openings at the top of the wall to install some of those used glass blocks I bought off Craigslist about three years ago. (I installed glass block sidelites by the front door and learned a few things.) I read in a popular home decor magazine that glass block is no longer trendy, but I don’t care. I love the light effects day and night, inside and out, and the slightly green/turquoise tint.

1. We lined the opening with painted wood. A plastic floor guide was screwed into the bottom of the frame.

2. The blocks have been stored outdoors, so needed scrubbing to clean off the old paint or mortar and leaves, etc.

3. Special glass block mortar mix

4. When mixing this fine, corrosive powder, wear a mask and use gloves. This is the main lesson I learned from last time – don’t use bare fingers, because your hands will suffer all sorts of injury/pain.

5. Add acrylic (Weldbond glue) to the water to increase strength and adhesion.

6. Add liquid to powder (about 1:5). Mix thoroughly.

7. Our mortar mix had absorbed some humidity over time, so the hard lumps had to be removed and discarded.

8. The right consistency is dry-looking, and falls off the trowel in one big lump.

9. Gloves, tools, equipment are cleaned in a bucket. Mortar mix in your sink will harden and plug the drain eventually. Bucket dumped outside when done.

10. Apply the mortar in a generous layer on the bottom and sides of the opening, Then, “butter” the glass block itself before placing it into position.

11. The mortar wants to slide off the block, so I use the trowel and my fingers to push it firmly into the spaces. This is messy work, with lots of mortar falling to the floor and getting on every nearby surface.

12. Once the block and mortar is in place, check level and plumb. Make adjustments where necessary. I used some plastic spacers as “convincers.”

13. I used blue masking tape as an edge guide on the inside. It kept the painted wood clean, too.

14. Brick ties nailed onto sides to strengthen the row.

15. After a couple of hours, clean excess mortar and smooth joints with a well-squeezed mason’s sponge. Rinse sponge often, and buff with a soft dry cloth.

The end result

(Thanks to Tess for assistance with photos.)

And, an add-on: I have trimmed the openings with wood and paint. It looks much better, don’tcha think?

Outside trim

Wood trim inside