Lucky Kitty

Finally... a new couch.

The old couches.

Initially, I loved these green couches... love the color, love the shape.

They weren't exactly what we were shopping for the day we bought them - we were in the market for a bit of a sectional type situation - which this particular series of couches offered at the time... but alas, they stopped making them right before we ended up at our favorite Swedish modular furniture store to purchase them.

Not one to go shopping for couches and return empty handed, we made a quick decision to just buy two loveseats and call it a day...

Since the day we brought them home and put them together, they just didn't seem to fit in the room... kinda big and bulky... and I've never been a fan of the hole between the two in the corner... it's huge!

The final nail in their couch coffin, however, just recently occured since I found myself to be in the Family Way... these couches are not comfortable. You can't stretch out and take a nap on them. If you sit on them too long... they put your behind to sleep. I made those brown pillows so that they would have back cushions...

So, that was it... back to our favorite Swedish modular furniture store... this time to actually sit upon the couch before purchasing it...

Voila!

Sweet, sweet comfort! No more lost space in the corner! Me, the Hubs, and all the cat beasts can all stretch out and take a nap at the same time! Rejoice!

Had to get a new rug too - old rug didn't match and had seen better days...

Decided on using some Flor tiles as a rug this time - sturdy, kid-friendly, cute colors... if you dirty one of them, you only have to replace the one... that's nice...

Now, to find a more suitable coffee table...

Front Porch Goodness!

Even though my backyard is now known as "The Big Ugly"... the front porch is finally looking more like it does in my head...

Mosaic is all finished up, fresh coat of nice chocolate brown paint and some heavy duty poly sealer on top - so the mail delivery person won't mess it up... again...

Turned out pretty good! I'm so tired of trying to fix this porch up - it's taken 3 or 4 tries to get it close to being right... and the grout still doesn't match up... but I'm letting that go...

Our sad sad flower bed - I've been calling it "The Death Bed" lately - got a little bit of a makeover as well. I had so many ideas for the Death Bed... from those cool metal rectangular shaped planters full of elephant ears to some zero-scaping - I think the husband just wanted to put grass there at one point - this thing has been a beast since we bought the house.

It's had two different types of shrubs, various flowers, mulch, it had some big pieces of wood that were being used as a border, but when we pulled 'em up, they were all rotten on the underneath... yuck!

Pretty much, for the last few years, it's been a dirt box with our yard chickens hanging out in it... but not anymore!

Behold!

Pots... plants... garden border made from recycled materials... finally... some sort of plan came together! We planted lots of succulents because Austin is so amazingly hot and sunny most of the time, so, hopefully, we haven't just sentenced a big pile of plants to a slow and horrible demise...

Here's some more pics...

...and a long shot of the porch and the death bed... oops... guess I can't call it the death bed anymore... how's about... the... super cute happy time plant bed!

The Big Ugly...

A few weeks ago... in the middle of the night... our big giant half dead tree in the backyard just couldn't take it anymore...

It dropped a very major part of itself right in the middle of the backyard... missing the house, the fence, the neighbor's fence... just simply fell right where it wouldn't hurt anything... which was very nice of it to do.

So, I called the tree guy. Turns out this tree was a Hackberry tree... and that's a bad thing... the tree guy said they are 'weed trees' growing 5 to 7 feet per year with soft bark and shallow roots means big troubles for the house, the fence, the deck...

He said that not only did the big half dead tree need to go, but 9 or 10 of it's little friends needed to be removed as well... yikes!

It goes against everything in my nature to just remove trees... doesn't seem right...

Here's what our trees looked like before the tree people came out...

This is the side of the house where the neighbors used to burn old pieces of fence in a wheelbarrow... classy...


...and this is the side of the house where the neighbor somehow magically managed to park not one but two cars in his backyard... even classier... yeah, our neighbors rule!

The carnage...

Here's what's left of the big tree...


Here's the view from the car side of the house...

No, I don't know how he got those cars back there... it's a mystery... it's too bad I didn't get a wider shot because I've left out the giant pile of misc. car parts and pieces of tire that are closest to the fence we share... good times...

Here's the view from the wheelbarrow fire side of the house...

Awesome! Now I can see right into your yard!

Check this one out - I thought the tree people had left a bit of tree on the fence, which they did, but only because it had grown into the fence...


Needless to say, when I got home on Friday afternoon to find the death and destruction and complete lack of privacy that was waiting for me... I freaked...

I needed a plan and I needed one quick... what to do? Be as super classy as my neighbors and get one of those bamboo fence rolls, that's what to do!

Off to the Home Depot where I purchased two rolls of the lovely bamboo and some zip ties to make sure it was up securely...

Have I mentioned that it's been over 100 degrees for weeks and weeks now... so, yeah, that was fun...

Here's what I had to say about the entire situation...


...and here's why...

I've been comparing it to the surface of the moon... The sawdust mixed with old dusty dirt and what used to be grass makes for a lovely combo!

Sunday afternoon, we headed back to the Home Depot and got some shrubery... Red Tips to be exact - they get really big really fast...

Ok, so, they're not very big right now... but at least we managed to put a little lipstick on our pig...