Making Progress

Things are growing and filling in the flowerbeds at the farm. This is the back bed along garage. The mint is going crazy! The green swimming pool is for the dogs to cool off in 😊

Another view of the back bed - the edging I found buried under the dirt by the driveway!

Another view further back - of the driveway bed (on the right). Farm Road sign is from Canton. I'm thinking about changing the "1" into a "B" so it says "Farm Road B" for the B Farm, of course!

Lantanas in bloom

The studio has been wired and insulation installed

The floor needs to be redone where the workbench is going plus Bruce needs to build a big door to go between the studio and workbench area.

The fire pit has been redone (it was torn up for brick to use for the walkway to the studio)😀

rebuild in progress!

The bees are thriving:

And mowing happens at the "Spot" and reception areas to groom the grounds every.single.time.we're. there!

Reception tent going on the left side of the fence line

Things are progressing nicely and everything should look nice in October for the wedding. It's a happy time for us as we prepare and get things ready.

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In other news, we got a new refrigerator. This one is nice and big! The smaller one is out in the garage to be used to store drinks and just have extra space when needed. We had a moment of panic when we got up to the farm and found the small one was warm inside. Fortunately, it only needed defrosting but we ended up losing everything inside of it. I decided to see it as an opportunity to clean it out. ha.

I even had time for a quick makeover of the metal chairs I picked up in Canton. They will be great around the fire pit!

Sorry for the less than great picture. I was in a hurry to take it before we left to come back to the city. They are super comfy! My grandparents had similar ones on their back porch. So these bring back happy memories too!

Then here at the city house, we are finally replacing the carpet in the living and dining rooms with laminate flooring. I'm so thrilled! With the dogs keeping the carpet looking nice has been a challenge. It goes in this Friday. Whoop!

It's going to look great and should help with resale when that time comes. 

Lastly, I continue to enjoy being part of KariAnne's book launch group. Not only is she amazing, but the group is too. In case you're interested in her book, "So Close To Amazing", you can pre-order it here:
https://www.amazon.com/So-Close-Amazing-Learni…/…/1496422015 
"This is a book celebrating the incredible, awesome, special individual within each of us. It’s also a book for anyone who has ever mismatched her shoes or trimmed her own bangs when a professional might have been a better choice or added too much soap to the washer and watched it overflow.

(Not that KariAnne Wood has ever done any of these things.)"

I really think you'll enjoy it! I know I am. 

Until next time!

Quick Projects Around the Farm

We headed to the farm on Thursday to check on the bees and water plants.

I am happy to report the bees are doing well...it looks like new bees have hatched and all is going as it should.  And the plants are thriving and blooming (yay).

I ended up not having to water - a storm blew in Thursday evening and we got an inch of rain. Afterwards the weather was just gorgeous with perfect temperatures! And check out the sunset - isn't it so pretty with the sun gilding the edges of the clouds?

The next morning dawned sunny and cool The mowing got done,

 And I planted plants in the new front bed in front of the guest room. Looking forward to those growing and softening the edges of the rain drain.

I placed the little tractor in the flowerbed - when the plants grow up around it, it will look so adorable among them!

I also got a couple of smaller projects done.

One of them was redoing the small metal table we use out on the back patio. I'd painted it yellow a couple of years ago. Here's what it looked like shortly after I painted it:

But now the paint was starting to peel and I was rather tired of the bright yellow. It didn't go with anything I had.

This time I painted it red. Love the way it turned out! hm, I forgot to take a picture of it.

I put the tiered cart with dog art in place of the school desk on the back porch (it looks great there). Oops, I forgot to take a picture of it in it's new spot. Blogging fail again!

The next project I took plenty of pictures of - The telephone junction box stuck out like a sore thumb along the garage wall. (I guess the electric meter isn't all that pretty either but it doesn't have a pole going down into the flowerbed). What can I use to hide it?

Let's see...I have several old fence pickets; I have a new Ryobi circular saw; I have Bruce to show me how to use the little circular saw. Sounds like I have everything I need! So with Bruce's guidance, I cut supports and the pickets to size. Then Bruce used his new Kreg pocket jig to put the supports together and I nailed the pickets to them.

An old garden fork head screwed into the pickets hold my cute chalkboard sign I picked up in Canton.

Isn't it wonderful? I like how it hides the telephone box and gives the flowerbed a focal point.

(I still need to put the supports on so it will stand up straight. )

Plus, I got good practice using my circular saw!

Soon it was time to head back to the city. But that's ok. The kids were taking me out for Mother's Day Saturday night and we were honoring my mother-in-law on Sunday.

I'll see you soon, sweet B Farm!

Linking up here:
Vintage Charm Party
SaveSave

B is For Bee - Putting the B in the B Farm And Doing Lots of Work

There's so much happening at the B Farm right now...where do I begin?

How about the bees? Yep, we finally put the "bee" into the B farm (yes, B is from our last name) but Wednesday, we got our first hive of bees! They made the journey from pickup point to the farm buzzingly (ha).

The arrow is pointing to the tab that is holding the queen box

And yes, some rode outside the box the whole 3 hours to the farm. They hung on tight. Bruce said the delivery truck had bees buzzing all around it. They won't leave the queen so they stay with the box. They're really amazing creatures.

Beekeeper Bruce got the hive all set up

He dumped, huh, placed the bees in their new home. It was a fascinating process.

Can you believe they've already started making the wax cells? Hopefully Ms. Queen Bee is laying already. We have seen worker bees with pollen so they are settling in.

We spent the rest of the week working busy as bees....haha, ok enough with the bee jokes.

Last weekend, our friends helped me weed and plant the front flowerbed (thanks Patty for all the plants - they are doing great! and thank you Paul and Mira!)
And this week got mulch (thanks Simon for the mulch!) down in the flowerbeds. Can I say my friends are the best?

The back flowerbed is also mulched.

The oakleaf hydrangea is very happy. Look at all those blooms!

Hello pretty Lady Friend (iris variety)

I completely dug up the front bed in front of the bedroom window (goodbye snake hiding grass) and had Bruce pull out the tired bush on the corner.

 The cannas were passed along to a friend.

I need to bring more plants from the city house but for now the new butterfly bush is in place and should be gorgeous in that spot.

 Bricks and rocks should help with where the rain pours off the roof until we can get gutters installed.

drain on the left side - also one on the right side 

I got the studio door painted (thanks Bruce for putting the second coat on when I was too tired to move that evening) and Bruce started running the wiring for the outlets and lights. Yes!

Then on Saturday, with the help of B's brother, we got the pathway to the studio done!

Woot. Y'all! It changes the look of the backyard completely! I can now see my vision of the backyard coming to life. It might not happen overnight but it's there!

Sore and tired, we ended the day with a yummy dinner from Pint & Barrel.

Sunday morning, we headed to church for a wonderful Easter service. I think I could have stayed there all day singing and worshipping our Savior.

Back at the farm, I worked on lunch while the guys finished up the walkway from the patio to the steps up into the yard. It looks wonderful. A huge "thank you" to my brother-in-law Barry for helping us get that job done!

I hope you enjoyed seeing our progress at the farm. Come back Wednesday for a fun (and more relaxing) post on wedding stuff. Megan and I had a blast with it!

linking up at these parties:
Talk of the Town
Homemade and Handcrafted