Jun 7, 2010 Posted by Tiffany

What we’re up to this week

I mentioned a while back that we were thinking about digging up a bunch of the pavers in our courtyard and putting in some new growing beds. Although I haven’t mentioned much more about, we have been thinking about how to realize this plan and finally found the perfect edging stones that will help us complete the task at Bauhaus (home improvement store). The stones are called “Rasterstein... read more

Mar 26, 2010 Posted by Tiffany

Come on spring!

It’s hard to imagine that spring would suddenly be here in full force after such a long, cold winter, but we have had some absolutely incredible weather the last couple weeks. Highs in the 60′s (15-18°F) and plenty of sunshine. So I decided to get outside and slowly start getting things ready for the growing season here. The almanacs and forecasts are still predicting some pretty cold nights... read more

Sep 25, 2008 Posted by Tiffany

A little inspiration from our neighbors

Last Saturday after Stefan’s parents headed home, we got the chance to go tour our neighbor’s beautiful timber frame (“fachwerk”) house. We have been trying and meaning to get over there for months, after finally speaking to the owner for the first time many months ago while out walking Ayla. He told us then to drop by whenever their front gate was open and they’d be happy to... read more

Jan 6, 2008 Posted by Tiffany

New Year’s Resolutions for 2008

We got an email last week from Houseblogs.net which suggested everyone write some New Year’s resolutions regarding their home projects. Last year, we didn’t even think about writing any – mostly because we were so concerned with just getting the last little things finished in the house so we could move in. When I think back to how far we’ve come in the last year (we’ll be... read more

Sep 26, 2007 Posted by Tiffany

We’re up to no good with chalk

We haven’t been posting much lately because we just haven’t been doing much around the house. Stefan had been pretty burnt out from work so we haven’t even been working on any little projects around the house. But we’re going to make up for it now. Stefan is starting 3 months of vacation (God willing) and we have very big plans in store for the house during that time. We’ve... read more

Sep 6, 2007 Posted by Tiffany

Our terrazzo entry hall

I actually started this post months ago, thinking one of the times we talked to our Italian tile guy, we’d remember to ask him if he knows someone who does terrazzo. But we didn’t and he didn’t notice the floor so this post just sat dormant… But, when “the local” came by recently, he saw the floor and told us that he used to do floors like that AND we could get the... read more

Aug 26, 2007 Posted by Tiffany

A little inspiration for our barn

Yesterday we went to a wedding and the reception was held at an old farm. They’ve turned the fields around the farm into a golf course and the farm itself is just huge. The call it the chicken farm although the only real traces left of the birds are on their menu which consists mainly of various chicken meals. The owners have done an incredible job of renovating the barn inside and it gave us some... read more

Aug 10, 2007 Posted by Tiffany

Outdoor fires are so hot right now

I saw this extremely cool tutorial on how to build your own outdoor fire pit and I’m wondering where we could set one of these up without needing to move it…which of course would be impossible the way this thing is constructed. But I suppose it could work if it was built in the garden somewhere…which isn’t a terrible idea in my opinion…but of course our first focus for that... read more

Jul 26, 2007 Posted by Tiffany

A new woodworking project coming up

If you read our houseblog, you probably saw that we were working on the chicken coop last weekend and made some progress is re-plastering the wall which was destroyed after years of exposure to chicken nitrates. This weekend we’ll be putting in a wooden tile floor and painting the walls…all just in time for our housewarming party. I saw in a newsletter from Lowe’s Creative Ideas website... read more

Jun 25, 2007 Posted by Tiffany

From horses to house guests

For the past week or so we have been thinking hard and putting some of our ideas for the horse stall transformation down on paper. Unfortunately we haven’t had much luck drawing everything out in Google SketchUp. As much potential as that program has, it really isn’t all that easy for a novice to use. So we may have to break down one of these days and buy a home design software. But for the... read more