Faux Wood Floor

I just completed the laundry room floor on the cheap.  We had linoleum, which I peeled off and then painted the concrete floor yellow, yes yellow.  It looked ugly so I removed all the paint and filled in the cracks.  I like the look of wood floor, but it's expensive, so I tried painting on a wood floor.  Here's the floor stripped and cracks filled in:

I used a semi gloss milk chocolate brown for the base coat:

I used a black sharpie and drew the lines for the wood planks. Next I combined 3 parts "Kona" colored stain/polyurethane and 1 part glaze.  I bushed it on the brown base paint, then lightly brushed in one direction to simulate the wood grain.  Pale webbed feet not required for this procedure (thanks dear for including my foot)

Here's the floor over half way done:

I finished the floor with an acrylic finish to protect the paint and glaze.  I put the wood plank I was trying to copy next to the floor.  I think it's a pretty close match.

 

We're thinking of doing this for the living room.  The wood floor guy quoted us $3,000 for that area, so we'll see how much we can beat the price.

Goin' Hiking

I went for a 5 mile hike today at Towsley Canyon Park in the Santa Monica Mountains.  This mountain range separates the Santa Clarita Valley from the San Fernando and Simi Valleys (or is it Vallies) hmmm.  Anyways, here are some pictures and a little history:

 Here's a tree growing out of the side of a rocky hill at the beginning.

This is the Golden State Freeway, specifically the Newhall Pass going south towards San Fernando. This was the view just shy of the top of the hike.

 A downed oak.  In the background are communication towers and Doppler radars on the ridge separating Santa Clarita from Simi Valley.

Here's a great example of tectonic upheaval.  Those two hills in the foreground are sedimentary rock that were once flat and were pushed up and broken in two.  Don't jump my stuff because I only had High School geology.

 The State flower, the Golden Poppy, blooming after much needed rain.

 

There's a lot of oil around here.  Actually, about a mile north of this photo is the historic town of Mentryville.  Back in the late 1800s Mentryville had the first production oil well in the country.  In the center of the photo is a naturally occurring pool of black gold.  Last I heard the EPA was suing God trying to get Him to stop doing this.

 

Not So Green Acres

 Some projects turn out fine, others are miserable failures.  Here's the latter:

I planted sunflower, brussel sprouts, broccoli, lettuce and onion.  They took off and grew too tall.  I either gave them too much water or not enough light.  Back to square one.  I'm planting a new batch and I'm putting them under artificial light.  We'll see how that turns out.

My Espalier Nectarine Tree

Espalier is a French word which refers to a growing technique for trees.  It comes from the Italian "spalliera" meaning to rest the shoulder against.  It's a good technique for growing fruit trees when space is limited.  When we went to George Washington's place at Mt. Vernon, he had a walled off garden area with several of these trees.  I started my nectarine tree two years ago.  Each year a new row is tied to the trestle.  As you can see I have two rows and I'm waiting for this spring to tie down the third row.

I know it's a bit ghetto, but it's my first.  One day it'll look like this:

Cityscape

Mamma said I haven't posted in awhile.  Yes, I've been lazy, but here's the first one of 2015.

Wifey and I went to New York a few years ago and she loved the place, especially all the lights and high rises.  So I brought New York to her, sort of.

We have a long cinder block wall that worked as a good back drop.  I took 1/8 inch rod, from a welding supply store, and bent it in the shape of buildings.  Then, with much patience, I hot glued a strand of LED cool white Christmas lights to the rods.  Lastly, I used anchors to attach the rods to the wall.

Hmmm, I lost my iPhone two weeks ago and all the pictures I took of the process.  Oh well.  Here's the  finished product (about 1/4 of what's going up).

Fig Update

It's been two months since I attempted to sprout the fig twigs. The two with roots in the last picture both died. I think because I planted them it soil that was too dense. I planted the others in a mixture of sand and peat moss to make it easier for the roots to expand. Here they are in their various stages. 

Mini Bathroom Remodel

We completed a semi-remodel of the kid's bathroom after they complained of shards of grout jabbing them in the feet from the old floor.  I had to rip up the old flooring, replace some of the subfloor and, while I was at it, ripped out the original sink/vanity and metal medicine cabinet.

I built the new sink/vanity from an abandoned piece of lumber and pallet I found on the side of the road.  The flooring is faux wood ceramic tile.  I built a wood shelf  into the wall to cover up the hole created after removing the medicine cabinet.

                       

The glow is from the angel's approval of the finished job.

We're Back

Henry's been under the weather so he hasn't been able to post for awhile, but he's back now.

                                 

My Baby Fig Trees

One month ago I cut 8 twigs off our fig tree in an attempt to have them sprout roots.  After a month in moist peat moss I discovered two of the twigs did sprout roots.  The other 6 are getting there, but probably have another week or two to go.  I'm going to plant these two in containers and see how they do.

Halloween 2014

So here we are at our yearly pirate ship for Halloween.  We spent two days setting up for the event.  We had a few props set up around the ship.  Here's one of the pirate treasure.  As you can see no skallywag has been able to make off with the booty.

Here's the drunk pirate lady drinking her grog.  We made her using a pond pump with tubing running up her arm.  We put clear tubing running from the mouth to her belly so you could see the grog flowing.  I took 3 yellow highlighters and squeezed all the juice out of them and mixed it with water.  That made the water fluorescent and much brighter than plain old water.

Here we have the captain steering the ship.  He's an original and has been with us since the second year (this being our tenth anniversary).  In addition, we have other pirates, one standing swinging his sword and one hanging off the plank trying to steal some jewels.  The hungry crocodile waiting for a tasty snack.

Here's another pirate in the cargo net sitting on boxes of TNT (yes we are aware TNT hadn't been invented during the time of real pirates) and holding a sword and grenade.

Another drunk pirate passed out neglecting his duty of manning the cannon.

A sign warning pirates, with a pirate hanging by a noose.  This pirate had some cool clothes, but while I was trying to distress his clothes with a butane torch, the clothes caught fire and burned his pants and most of his shirt off, also melting his rib cage.  Next time I'll take his clothes off first before I distress them.

Here's the completed scene.  We are waiting for it to get dark and have the trick-or-treaters show up.

The ship is 32 ft long, with a 25 ft tall mast.  The little dinghy in the foreground is "the bearded clam".  You can't see it in the picture, but my daughter drew a little clam with a pearl in its mouth....with a beard.

Lastly, here's a picture at night.  The cul-de-sac had people hanging around all night long.  Our neighbor told us we made it on the internet as one of the top ten places to trick or treat in Los Angeles. (Redtri.com), as well as google earth, pinned with a pumpkin.  We estimated we had 800-1000 kids come through this year.  

Halloween Henry

Poor Henry, he hates this time of year. Always getting dolled up for Halloween. 

Arrrrgh!

Cuban Night

We went to a friend's house the other day for a book signing.  John Verlinden was cooking a few dishes from his new cookbook.  His partner's mother is Cuban and sat down with him and gave him all her recipes and shared a few stories about life in Cuba before Castro.  Over a ten year period he compiled the recipes and stories and has now published a cookbook, To Cook is to Love.  The book has lots of recipes, stories and pictures of Cuba.  Here he is with a dish of arroz con pollo and a dish of black beans.  He also made some appetizers of small empanadas and garlic shrimp, which were tasty.

The Pirate Ship, She Comes!

Next week we go into high gear getting our pirate ship up and running.   We captured this guy to let the neighbors know the winds have shifted and Davey Jones is headed our way. 

Liposomal Encapsulated Vitamin C

I have been very interested in Orthomolecular treatment of diseases since about 2003.  Back then, I went to the doctor and he said I had high cholesterol and advised to go on cholesterol drugs.  I said to myself "no way" and began researching this stuff.  I read some of Linus Pauling's studies (he was a Vitamin C guru).  I regularly go to doctoryourself.com which is a site by Andrew Saul, who is the "MegaVitamin Man" and has alot of research about mega vitamin therapy.

I have experimented with high doses of Vit C, niacin and other stuff and I'm a true believer.  Anyways, I watched some videos on YouTube of Dr Thomas Levy and his research and found out about Liposomal Encapsulated Vitamin C.  He treats all sorts of illnesses with this and other antioxidants.  He has treated Dengue Fever, cancer, toxic poisonings, MS, hepatitis, among others.  I'm not talking about the 65mg of the recommended daily allowance by the FDA.  I'm talking about mega doses - 10,000 to 200,000mg (10 to 200grams) of Vitamin C, mostly given intravenously.  Liposomal is even more effective in getting into your cell walls and a 6gram dose of this stuff is equivalent to 60grams of intravenous.  So being the DIYer, I made a batch.  Here's the recipe...I don't know if its readable, but I got it from 8aloha.com under liposomal vitamin C.

 

Here are the ingredients:  Distilled water, non-GMO lecithin and Vitamin C crystals.  They can be purchased at any vitamin store or online.  The ultra sonic jewelry cleaner machine I purchased at Harbor Freight. 

 

 

 

I tested my product and it was Heisenberg grade stuff (you'll see what I mean as you read the recipe).

 

 

 

I made a batch and took 6 ounces, which should be about 6 grams of Vitamin C.  This is alot better than the way I've taken it in the past because the encapsulation doesn't upset the stomach like regular crystal Vitamin C.

 

I know it sounds lame, but I really get into this stuff.  I found out a fun fact during alot of reading.  Did you know that if someone claims to have a natural cure for Ebola, the FDA has threatened to arrest them?  Interesting.  Ouch, that's the government pushing down on our heads with their thumb.

 

 

Our Fig Tree

It's getting close to the end of the fig harvesting season.  We collected about 200 figs this year with the squirrels and opossums getting their paws on another hundred.  There's a cool history to this tree.  In the 1970s my grandfather cut a twig from a fig tree and gave it to my father.  He grew it into a fig tree at the house where I grew up.  Before my dad died he cut several twigs that I found after his death.  I took one and planted it.  Here's a picture.

Anyways, today I cut several twigs and placed them in a zip lock bag with moist peat moss.  Hopefully they'll sprout roots in a couple weeks.  Keep you posted.

Where's My Brownie?!?!

Dear, have you seen my special brownie?!

HENRY!!!!!!!

Shiver Me Timbers

Garrrr Peter!  Our first pirates are up and ready for a fight.  The pirate labor force is pretty scarce  so we had to settle for cardboard cut outs backlit by a flood light.  Baby got back huh?

Flourless Cookies

I was reading a website by a doctor who treated her autistic daughter with a natural foods diet void of gluten and glutamate.  It is unbelievable how she reversed her daughter's autism as long as she's on the diet.  She has videos on her site unblindmymind.org showing the transformation.  She has some recipes, one of which are nut butter cookies.  I made a batch and I think they turned out pretty good.

Here's the recipe:

2 cups nut butter (I used 1 cup almond and 1 cup macadamia butters)

2/3 cup raw honey

2 eggs

Dark chocolate chips (not part of her recipe)

Mix ingredients and bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes.

BBQ Championship

Wife and I went to the California BBQ Championship at Dana Point.  It was a beautiful day on the coast, but pretty hot.  We even got to see the hulk at the entrance....at least I think that's him.

                                              

We went to the event to see what's needed to compete.  Our friends in Denver have started competing and wanted to get some pointers.  Since we are part of his west coast crew we obliged.  We saw lots of different BBQ rigs.

   

We tried lots of different different food.  Pulled pork, tri tp, burnt tips, mac n cheese, buffalo turds (jalapeño poppers), but these bacon wrapped donut holes were definitely the best....we went back twice.

                                             

We're still learning about this blog thing.  We kept on eating things before taking a picture.  We got half way through the candied bacon when I realized we didn't take a picture.  We did take a picture of half of it though.

        

Hmmmm

                                           Honey!! Have you seen my ukulele?!?!