Didn't think it could get any better...

But then it did.

This makes me feel so filled with nostalgia it's a little ridiculous... and totally fantastic. (Especially for a new version of the song.)

One Week in Bellingham - Home Makeover Edition

May 15 - May 23

What do you do when you have a week to do nothing?

Build a bathhouse, but of course.

This was my first building project using all (or 99.99% all) recycled and scrap materials.

Totally gratifying.

Totally worth the very little money it actually took.

And totally turning me into a raisin, slowly but surely, day by day.

Yesterday I drank my coffee and shaved at the same time.

Amazing.

Here's the transformation in action:

What we started with... (a deck that I built two years ago and a tub from craigslist that had sat for two years, unused and exposed, on top of it)...

The only new material we used were these four pillars for framing (learned from experience the difficulty in framing with bowed wood)...

The hardest part, or at least the part that inspired the most swearing, was the used metal roofing... (thanks so much Kris!)...

All used windows (and a door sawed in half) from the ReStore. (Why doesn't the world have more ReStores?) All walls built out of wood from fallen, milled trees here on the property from about a year ago...

All downhill peddling from there...

Except for installing this son of a bitch...

If I had youtubed a video of me wrestling with this pipe, the grunting, heaving, sometimes screaming redicularity of it all would have gone viral, I'm sure of it. (Note to self: Trying to connect stove pipe by yourself through a wall is NEARLY impossible and may leave you stranded and almost crying... don't try it again.) But as my very first stove pipe installation, I think it turned out pretty alright.

All scrap granite pieces from a much larger house project made shelving and benches. A milled, fallen madrone also used...

So this is pretty much my new address...

Now you know where to find me...

I'll have the bubbles ready.

xo

What a Very Green Spring We're Having

If we (as in WA) had "team" colors, we'd be grey, green, and white.

Up until a week or so ago, we had only had 7 sunny days in 2011.

But it happened this week! Meaning... the sun came out and made my yard go from this...

to this...

Thank baby jesus... who did not send the rapture as planned this week.

One Week in Garza Blanca

May 1 - May 5

I recently spent one week at Garza Blanca, which is in Mexico. It would be misleading to say "I spent a week in Mexico," because I didn't really.

I never left the resort. Not once.

And this is why...

xo