It's August--Pickle Time

My first batch of Zucchini Bread and Butter Pickles is in the porch fridge soaking in salted ice water. Getting crisp.  I had enough zucchini from my very tardy garden to make a full recipe.  I had to go out to the grocery to get two red bell peppers and one jalapeño.  I had onions.  And I always have a gallon of vinegar and a 5# bag of sugar handy.

Back to the garden.  Harvest includes:  2 burpless cucumbers, enough zucchini (green and yellow) for the pickles, another two quarts of blueberries (total of 6 quarts so far), two very nice Sungold cherry tomatoes which I ate right in the garden, basil for a tomato (Farmer's market) and fresh mozzarella Caprese salad.   I have plenty of herbs and what people call "green leaves" but haven't picked any yet.

G weeded and watered and I planted a few more tomato plants.  I think I found the Early Girls.  And the Heinz special tomato they use in the ketchup.  And, possibly, the few Italian tomatoes that germinated from the five seeds in the package I purchased.  My Cherokee Purple plant has a nice tomato growing on it.  There is hope.

And my fertilization "program" seems to be having a result.  Dark green leaves.  I hardly follow the rules on fertilizing.  But the tomatoes all got pink stuff.  Miracle Grow Tomato Food.  And Epsom Salts.  Next up will be Fish Emulsion.  The peppers will be getting a pinch of sulfur along with their fish emulsion.  Riley likes to be involved in the "pouring" of the fish fertilizer--he is in charge of licking the bottle clean.  Dogs love stinky things.

My Hall Bathroom is never going to get done.  So slow.  I have a skim coat over the drywall. The vanity is in place but not the granite or the sink or the faucet.  No tile in the bathtub surround.  No faucets etc.  85% of the tile is in and grouted.  The part over by the radiator--no tile.  The pipe for the toilet water supply is coming out of the floor and not the wall--toilet wants it out of the wall.

While we wait for the plumber to get things moving-----still walking on dirty cardboard to get to the one bathroom and the bedrooms.  And the boxes of tile, grout etc and the toilet are still in the bedroom.  Oh, and paint, big tub of drywall compound, a construction vacuum.

And if we change radiators in bedroom (we ordered new ones) --we'll have to add more baseboards-- and find a solution to the "now the wallpaper (the other one--not the one on the walls) will show and how do you want to manage that?"  More baseboards = more painting.  It's getting to be a classic Money Pit thing over here.  And if we do any of these things--we won't be able to move into the master until all of that is done.

I have mentioned that the original owner pasted four different patterns of paper in each and every room in the house.  Home owner two had most of it removed but we find nasty little surprises of wallpaper--like behind the hall bath toilet and in the guest bedroom.  She "really" didn't want the stuff to come off the walls.  And in the master-- wall paper behind the radiators.  Original. We found it under the trim work on the windows also.  One construction guy said--she REALLY liked wallpaper.  Awful wallpaper.  Like a Victorian Candy Box.  Above the chair rail, below the chair rail, the chair rail, along the top of wall by ceiling.  Four different prints.  Each room a different set of four prints.  I got a first hand description from a teenager who babysat when the house was new.  She said it was all over the house and it was even in the two story high family room.  Wallpaper from floor to the very very tippy top of the room by the skylights.  Four and even five different patterns.  Each room.

Owner number two was some kind of trooper.  Removing all that wallpaper, painting everything, putting down hardwood floors, adding a third full bath, making a fourth bedroom.  She stayed only three years.  Imagine the flurry of workers that must have been here?  And she got it all finished.  Nothing left undone.

Perhaps that's the legacy of the house.  Renovation.  We were 26 years late getting our part started.