recycle/upcycle

Snow Days *

/ erin / 1 Comment

We’ve had a very nice string of snow days and cold weather here, which has been the perfect excuse to work away on the trailer! FINALLY! I am so excited to show the progress we have made, and it totaled 4 days of work! (More like 3 1/2)

First thing we had to do was finish up the drywall and muding process. If I never see drywall again I will be a happy camper!

 

While we waited for the mud to dry and Ben ran off on errands, I got to work with sanding the floors down once and for all.

There was this patch in the floor that was coming up and could cause some major splinters, so we tore it up and patched it with the original trim we ripped out of the trailer.

fb_img_1450145258016.jpg

Seemed to do the job just fine, and it was seriously the perfect fit! So far, we’ve gotten away with working with a lot of recycled materials and its been able to keep the costs low.

One thing we may have an issue with, and this has just come to mind recently, is that the drywall may have a hard time staying put if the trailer is going to be mobile often. Once we have more structures built into it, such as the kitchen etc, it may not be an issue. I guess time will tell and much like most I do in life, this too is just going to be trial and error . 🙂

Okay, so drywall and floors completed! Next thing I went to work on was priming and painting! Even tho my arms usually want to fall off by the time I am through, I kind of enjoy painting. Its relaxing. And no, this does NOT mean I will help paint your house for you 😉 okay I might.

 

All of these small details started to come into play, and they needed to be dealt with. SO. If you look back up to the first picture, you can see in the corner is a big silver piece of foam board. — We cut it to sizes, skinny long strips, and used it to insulate the gap where the wall and ceiling meet. That area will be covered by some ceiling trim and may also put up LED lighting there too… Time will tell.

I then went thru and spray painted the area black… The small spot at the top where the yellow foam is showing is kind of an eye sore, so I made it match the black metal for now, until we decide how that will be covered.

 

Next order of business was staining the floors! YAY! And cleaning up some more areas. Behind the pulley bar for the back door, is a lot of messy over spray, and it’ll be built in (one day) but we took the time to clean it up, and I also spray painted it black to make a cleaner look for now.

 

All of that took 3 days.

All was fine and dandy, until about 2 days ago I mentioned to Ben while trying to get to world 7 on Super Mario, that it would be nice if this bed had a frame, even if temporarily built on some 2×2’s, but it would be better than mattress on the ground.

Being the doer he is, he ran off to get the lumber needed and we spent the afternoon making the bed frame, sizing the storage that will go underneath, and even made cubby holes to access by lifting the mattress.

Oh, another cool feature is he made it to fit a queen bed, but also made it easily adjustable to fit a double, in case we decided to downsize on mattress size. (Its a tight squeeze with a queen)

img_20151220_175934908.jpg

Finished (?) product 🙂

I lifted the lace I have to show you how its lifted, it raised the mattress 14 inches off the ground and it makes a WORLD of a difference. The other half is still a cluster of stuff, but its looking better now that I can store under the bed! And it is all VERY organized and neat!  🙂

It is difficult to get used to the new temperatures at our new elevation 😉 but in all seriousness, it makes a world of a difference and we are struggling to find a new happy medium on the radiator!

img_20151222_181052608_hdr.jpg

Our little holiday shrine 🙂

Happy Holidays everyone! Seasons Greetings and a Happy New Year!

 

Peace and Love ❤

a little DIY

/ erin / 1 Comment

Okay, it’s cold, and the trailer work is a little slow as of late due to work and weather.

SO

I am going to share some of my DIY projects, past and present.

Probably the one that I am most proud of, and I hope to do more like it, is an old rocking chair that I was given by my father in law. Rustic old thing that more than likely would be passed over by people time and again.

I also have had in my possession, some light brown hide that’s ready for use. One day I may want to try and make a purse out of it (there is a LOT of it) but I KNEW as soon as I saw the rocking chair that the leather would be PERFECT for it. I’ve been in possession of the leather for awhile just waiting to put it to crafty use 🙂

wpid-20151122_132046.jpg

Here is how I started… I cleaned and stripped the chair completely so it was just the frame remaining.

I chose the spray paint color I wanted to use and had at it — The reason I choose spray paint is simply because it’s cheap, and if I wanted to re-do it one day it would be fairly easy.

I then just traced the seat bottom size on some brown paper, so I could cut the leather to fit properly. That leather was NOT easy to cut, a good pair of scissors would be advised. . .

I purchased some decorative nails from Walmart as well as upholstery nails. The tiny upholstery nails were sturdier and I liked the look it gave too, almost simple, so I placed those in between the decor nails.

wpid-20151122_132029.jpg

Here is the final product. I LOVED how it turned out and it was so easy. I ended up gifting it to a friend to was recently married and I knew it would fit her new home and her style.

I hope its enjoyed and loved! 🙂 The best part being if she doesn’t like it, it would still be very easy to re-do again!

 

. . . . .

/ erin / Leave a comment

My nose is very very sensitive to smells. Not in a bad way, I can just smell you, or that thing, or “insert scent here”, from a mile away. If it’s a dank enough smell it might send my gag reflexes going.. Courtesy of my mom’s side of the family 🙂

My favorite smell is the wind. I loved gym class growing up in the fall and spring time when we were able to go outside, because when we would come back in… You can smell the air, earth, and wind on your skin and hair. It’s a different smell than lined dried clothes, but that one is still ranked up there.

My second favorite smell is pine, actually, probably tied for first. But that smell, the pine and the needles covering the ground and the way it silences your footsteps. It reminds me of going to the Upper Peninsula Michigan when I was a kid to visit my grandparents camp on Lake Superior, and my other grandparents home. It’s been quite a long time since I’ve gone to the UP but it is absolutely BEAUTIFUL country up there, gorgeous! They call it Gods Country up there for a reason.  Anyways, I digress, I love the smell of pine.

SO!

All of this talk about smells is leading somewhere.  I went to the car wash the other day and they gave me a free air freshener, looks homemade somehow, and I picked the pine scent, but it looked like they also had an “air” smell. Next time. But my car smells so good I could live in it.

That was all.

NEXT order of business!

–SO. I HATE waste, and I really have been trying to minimize my carbon footprint, but in our current situation we don’t have a fresh water tank / running water set up in the trailer. (It will be coming just not yet). In the mean time we have been buying water either by the gallon or just recently in cases of water… and I KNOW I KNOW that is really bad for the environment, so this is why I’ve been looking up ways that I can recycle and re-use the bottles we will end up going thru!

My favorite ideas from one of the lists I found were…

  • Little greenhouses / Planters for plants
  • A vertical plant stand which you can use your grey water for it to grow plants like lettuce etc. Something that will be good for the kitchen etc.
  • Curtain/ Door sheer by painting the bottom of the bottles that are cut off
  • Making designs from the different colored bottle caps

http://www.boredpanda.com/plastic-bottle-recycling-ideas/

http://www.onegoodthingbyjillee.com/2015/06/31-creative-ways-to-reuse-plastic-bottles.html

45 Ideas of How To Recycle Plastic Bottles

(All of these links found in a simple google search)

Maybe I’ll think up a few new ideas to use the bottles for, but I don’t want to recycle that many away, it’s more of a challenge to be creative and see what I can come up with.

Altho sometimes I tend to get obsessive and that’s all my time will end up consisting of… hope that doesn’t happen this time 🙂