Firewood, Lots of Firewood

The Monday after our tree came down, one of Mario's workers came over to sort out the work.  Whatever Mario paid, he wasn't paid enough.  He tidied up the yard, carefully filling up our woodshed and then placing the rest of the wood along the back stonewall.  Notice how he piled up the kindling and then place to sticks in the ground as place holders -- while we went to work and sat in front of computers.  I think we'll be good for firewood for the year.  I will, however, have to split some wood.  Good exercise. 

The Tomato Confit

We've come to the conclusion that sticking things in the oven and cooking them at low temperature is almost always a good idea.  It was a good idea with the short ribs we cooked in coffee and wine and it's a good idea with tomatoes, especially our garden tomatoes combined with our garden basil.  Here's the tomato confit we made -- flavors intesified by hours in the oven.  

Tomato Harvest

We're thinking about making this recipe, from this Friday's Wall Street Journal:

Tomato Confit
Yield: 4-6 servings
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 1 to 11/2 hours

1 or 2 sprigs each of 2 to 4 varieties of fresh herbs, such as mint, basil, lemon verbena and thyme
4 large, ripe tomatoes (such as beefsteaks or Brandywines), cores removed or 8 to 10 Roma or plum tomatoes, cored
1 head garlic, cloves peeled and smashed
1 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon sea salt or kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon hot-pepper flakes

Set the herbs in an oven-proof baking dish large enough to hold the tomatoes (this will need to be twice the size of the whole tomatoes). Cut tomatoes in half equatorially and lay them cut-side down on the herb bed. Wedge the garlic cloves into the spaces left betw

No More Dead Tree

The tree came down pretty easily.  I went for a long run and by the time I came back it was almost all down.  They started from the top and cut their way down.  I thought for sure our fence would get damaged but these guys were good.  They're supposed to come back Monday morning to cut the wood for us.  With gas prices these days, we'll burn all the wood we can. 

Man Cave, Now Less Cavish

The ceiling went up in the man cave.  It actually does make it feel more like a normal room, less like a cave.  Now, we need to tape it, spackle it, prime it and a paint it.  Then the floor needs to be installed.  There's some serious spackling needed to be done along the edges -- the stone foundation doesn't necessarily make for straight edge. 

The ceilings need to be painted a dark color.  Some people use a dark, ruby red.  Some go black or dark brown.  I definitely don't want red.  I'm thinking about Benjamin Moore's "Dragon Breath" (see above). I was all set to get it but the sample I picked up at the paint store was very, very dark and didn't look to have any brown tones at all.  Now we have to test. 

One More Wall

Dave and Ron (Joe's friends) came down to finish up the basement.  They finished the other wall in the basement. 

Timber!

This dead tree is scheduled to come down today.  One of Mario's guys was supposed to arrive at 8 AM.  No sign of him as of 8:45 Am.  Mario told me that the tree guy was heavily invested in the market and may have had some margin calls.  He explained that it was a good thing the market was up Thursday and Friday -- if not, our tree guy would have been too depressed to do the job.  Mario then went on to complain about margin calls.  What kind of landscapers are we dealing with? 

IF We Were to Ever Expand the House

This is very rough drawing of what it could possibly look like...

More Proof that Rose-Tone Works

These are the roses outside our dining room window.  We were watching a gardening show on HGTV and the host said roses need lots of air, room to breath.  Uh oh.  We planted these right up against the wall.  They seem to be doing okay -- with the help of Rose-Tone.  I also cut back the ivy significantly. The host also said to mulch around the roses, which we've done.  We need to properly stake these roses.  There's also room for one more yellow rose bush, which we'll buy next season. 

TALL Flowers

All the flowers we planted grew much taller than we ever imagined they would.  We have no idea what these orange flowers are -- but they grew taller than the bushes next to them.   Amazing that we grew these from seed. 

Tapin' & Spacklin' the Garage & Basement

Joe graciously agreed to come down to tape and spackle the garage and basement.  We had drywall put up but had never gotten around to the finishing work.  (We were going to hire this job out.)  They'll need to be a another round of spackling done but we'll be able to paint very soon.  Then we'll just have to figure shelving, etc. The garage will be painted Benjamin Moore Sag Harbor Gray (HC-95) with eggshell finish, which I bought yesterday.  See (not very good) sample above.  We plan to use the extra paint we have from the kitchen pantry in the basement. 

Tomatoes Galore

The tomatoes have finally turned red.  With cucumbers, cilantro and now tomatoes from the garden, we've been able to make some great gazpacho soup.  Only store-bought vegetable we have to use is the garlic.  There's about 25 tomatoes sunning themselves on our back room window sill.  Our lesson learned this year is that we really need to buy some serious stakes.  We had a few pitifully inadequate stakes that held up during the first few weeks. 

Man Cave Wiring

A few weeks ago, Joe came down and finished the wiring for the man cave.  It actually took two visits.  I temporarily mounted the projector and screen and hooked up the stereo speakers to test things out.  (See photo of The Lord of the Ring playing.) Very cool. Olga says we need a dehumidifier.  She's probably right. With wiring done, the drywall for the ceiling is set to go up next week.  We should see good progress over the next few weeks. 

Gargage Door Window Treatments

The garage door windows were covered by an old stinky and stained fabric.  We finally got around to replacing the fabric with some inexpensive, custom-sized rolling blinds from JC Penney.  Big difference. 

Rose-tone Rocks

Mario, our contractor guy, strongly suggested we use Rose-Tone.  Of course, we had no clue about Rose-tone.  We spread it around every 3 weeks or so.  Instant blooming.  Our roses are still going strong late into the season. 

Sunflowers

Besides swiss chard we didn't order, Burpee also sent us a free packet of sunflowers.  We weren't sure where to plant them.  In front of the chimney looked like a good place.  I think we should have planted them early, but they've done well soaking in the morning sun.  

What to Do with Swiss Chard

Burpee had sent us "rhubarb" swiss chard instead of just plain rhubarb.  We had no idea what to do with swiss chard.  Apparently, chard often finds itself in quiche.  Olga made a yummy quiche (sorry, no pictures).  She also made raviolis.   The "pasta" she used was actually store-bought what wrappers.  

Fried Green Tomatoes

We knew we were going to have loads of tomatoes to eat so we began picking early.  Olga made some delicious fried green tomatoes (after researching that "green" tomatoes were in fact just unripe tomatoes). 

Pile 'O Cucumbers

We're now making a more concerted effort to give away cucumbers.  They're much appreciated by people who receive them, and until recently, we haven't been able to use them as fast at they're growing.