In case you were wondering...

In case you were wondering...

This blog exists to encourage all those who have ever wanted--and needed!--a tiny getaway close to home. A workshop, playhouse, garden shed, sanctuary, mini-greenhouse, studio, home office; whatever it is you need, it IS doable, with some sacrifice, imagination, and compromise.

It helps if you're handy, too.

Saturday, April 30, 2011

New firepit


I tried to find a link to our new firepit, bought last fall (J. says on sale, maybe at Lowe's), and haven't been able to do so.  It's lightweight, has a grill the fire rests on (not sure about that part, may replace with sand or clay litter), has a screen lid and came with an odd little poker/lifter.  Quite the deal!

It was WELL under $50, and the ones I'm finding are mostly a lot more than that.  A LOT.  But Home Depot has the most inexpensive ones, now...$29!!

Friday, April 29, 2011

First Fire


Like everyone else, we have lots of twigs and limbs dead or down over the  winter...finally, it wasn't raining, so we decided to get out the new (as of last fall!) fire pit for its inaugural run and burn some of it while we sat on the deck and read.  VERY pleasant...and Pepi seems to agree!  (The birds weren't wild about it, though...they were shy, except the cowbirds.)



Joseph got out the pruner to bring down the dead limb that's been hanging over the path for a year...it'll make great firewood!

Tuesday, April 26, 2011

Quiet Easter at the shed


It's been a busy, crazy time for us...J had surgery early this month, and I've had a rotten cold, so we've spent a LOT of time at the shed, recuperating, resting, reading...and of course, sketching.

There's been SO much rain here that on Easter Sunday, we were very grateful for a quiet day with a bit of sun...even the robin was napping on his perch!

The yellow patches on the white-throated sparrow were like drops of pure sunshine.


J. just got the new birdhouse up on the fence outside the shed door...hoping it attracts something!  It has a larger opening one one side and a smaller one here, for different kinds of birds--I wasn't sure which to pick, so we'll see.



We're adding more bird feeders and making this little spot into a real nature sanctuary...looking forward to being able to start the planting, when it stops raining and we can get together with our friend Keith, who owned a greenhouse and is advising us on what will grow best in this shady area, and be food for birds.

I can foresee sketching subject for a long time to come...

Thursday, April 21, 2011

A new link you'll like...

...if you're dreaming about your own shed or cabin or tiny house.  Check out Pennypincher Barn Company at http://pennypincherbarns.com/ --if I hadn't already designed my own I would have fallen in love with several of these!

Theyve got off the shelf models, plus plans for sheds, cabins, small houses, barns, garages, accessories--all kinds of goodies.  (I'm in love with the Baby Bear Cabin, below--that turret is TOO MUCH!)



This is one of the links in the Tiny House Blog...if you haven't bookmarked that one, DO it!  Great stuff...

Wednesday, April 6, 2011

The shed gets a prezzie!

Two of them, actually...

I love rocks. Always have, even as a kid, filling my pockets till I could barely walk, dragging them home from mountains and Ozarks to make mini-environments in my own back yard.. Round rocks particularly fascinate me, wondering where they've been, how they were formed, what's inside them. Some are geodes, some are formed by wind, like the tiny round sandstone pebble I brought home from Nevada a few years ago, literally scoured out of its cliff-face mother by eons of desert wind.


Recently I was asked for my mailing address by Pablo (the author Paul Lamble) of Roundrock Journal...one of my favorite blogs that covers the natural discoveries over his 83 acres of Ozark land--including a long line of round rocks appearing here and there, hence the blog name. 

It's always been a pleasure to read, full of astute observation and wisdom, and though I understand what he meant when he told me his rambles of explorations had morphed into searches for blog material instead of simply discovery, I miss it anyway.  (It's on hiatus till further notice, but worth going back and reading old entries, and I do! 

He told me he had a present for the shed, and I'll admit I had my hopes!

Well, to make a long story short, we returned from the West to find a HEAVY box waiting at the post office, and in it were the two beautiful round rocks you see here, nestled with Missouri limestone and a chunk of pink quartzite carried here by the glacier.  They've found a new home, near pebbles from the Rockies, the seashore, and more...

Thank you, Pablo, I couldn't be more delighted!

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