Category: Projects

A simple fix.

My Harmony One.

We’ve owned a Harmony One programmable universal remote control for almost 4 years.  A few months ago it went on the fritz.  It would reboot itself randomly, making it impossible to use, because it would forget the state of the devices it was supposed to control between reboots.

So, it has been sitting in the closet gathering dust.   In the mean time, we’ve had to dig out and relearn how to use the multiple remote controls that it was intended to replace.

I was just about ready to buy a new one on Amazon today, when I thought to google for any known issues and recommended fixes.

Turns out that a common problem with the Harmony One is that the battery, after a year or two, can become a tad loose inside the remote, and if that happens, the battery’s contacts with the remote can be disrupted as it is moved around.   When that happens, the remote reboots itself.  The “fix” is to put a small piece of thick paper, like from an index card, under the battery to take up any slack.  Voila!

We are back in business!!   I ♥ my Harmony One  🙂

Home-made.

Black Seeded Simpson, all grown up.

This is the last of the lettuce that Monte planted about 6 weeks ago.  It’s all rinsed and spun and ready to eat.

In its place, lots of basil seed has been sown —  right next to the carrots, broccoli, and mystery squash.

Walk with me.

Not my walking shoes.

I had a long day of meetings today.  Tomorrow evening I fly back home – always the best part of a business trip.

I didn’t take my camera with me this morning, so by the time I got back to the hotel it was dark, I was tired, had little material to work with, and was searching for inspiration for a blog post.  During my daily catch-up on blogs I read a post on the wordpress blog itself from last week.  It was an announcement for the 2nd annual WorldWide WordPress 5K, on Sunday, April 29th.  The WWWP5K is a virtual 5K, originally conceived by the employees at Automattic, the company behind WordPress, to get their geographically-dispersed fellow employees to run or walk a 5K “together,” each in their own locations.  They invited the entire blogging community to join them and to blog about it.   Last year I did.   And I plan to again this year.

Thanks WordPress for a fun idea, and for providing me with the inspiration for a photo for today.  I didn’t bring my running shoes on this trip, so these will have to do.

Mark your calendars, and walk with me!

My cactus.

My prickly pear cactus out back.

When we bought this house, we went from a yard that was about 1/10 of an acre to one that was about 3/4 of an acre.  I enjoyed taking the first walks around the back to discover the trees, flowers and other features that came with the deal.  One of them was a tiny little cactus, which uncharacteristically started growing in the very shady wooded part of our back yard.  But, still it was my first cactus, and the only one on our property, so I wanted to keep an eye on it.   In that first year it was pretty small, and ended up being run over by the lawnmower a couple times (you can see a cut on the top of one of the pads in the middle of the plant).  So a couple years ago I marked it with stones.

Several years I’ve had to go out and dust it to deter an infestation of cactus-sucker-bugs. The droughts have been tough, too, but, hey, it’s a cactus.   This is the 6th year since I discovered it, and this spring it is covered with lots of new pads.  And it’s finally getting some height.  The spines on the new pads are soft and green… but will soon turn into those horrible little spikes that you never want to touch.

Baby cactus pad.

Maybe next year we’ll be treated to a flower.

If you build it, they will come.

Bewick wren egg in nest.

Exactly 4 months ago today I posted a picture of a birdhouse I had just made.   The sides are hinged and open to reveal clear plastic walls inside the birdhouse – a “peek-a-boo” birdhouse.

The birdhouse sat on the table next to the couch for a long time, because Keeto liked to perch on it while we were all sitting in the gameroom.  But I finally hung it up outside about 6 weeks ago.

Well, I couldn’t help myself, so I finally peeked inside and saw a nest and an egg!  My friend Doray said it could be a bewick wren, when I described the momma bird to her that has been keeping watch in the birdhouse and nearby.   I looked it up online and sure enough, i think it is a bewick wren.  Just one egg, though.   But, I’m so excited to see a birdie in residence.

I was also happy to see mom come back to the birdhouse afterwards.  I’ll leave them in peace now and resist the urge to take another look.

Mom returns.

A blank wall no more.

The result of my 2nd Painting With a Twist class.

Yesterday I joined a bunch of friends at Painting With a Twist – my 2nd time.  It’s a BYOB painting studio where everyone in the class follows along with the instructor and paints the same picture.   I have had my eye on this red landscape for a while.  I knew exactly where I wanted to put it… the blank wall in our (not so) recently remodeled master bathroom.

So, today I hung it up.  It’s smaller than what the space calls for.  But, I like it!

New growth.

Crepe Myrtle buds.

I have several large pots filled with dirt in various spots in the back yard.  They are leftovers from plants that have either died or been replanted, and I haven’t gotten around to planting something new in them yet.  Two years ago (or maybe 3?) I noticed a shoot growing in one of these pots.  Another volunteer.  I let it go for a while and realized it was a crepe myrtle.  The first year it grew a bit and leafed out.  The second year, it had a few more shoots and it even had a few flowers.  This year I want to start to shape it into a taller tree, rather than a bushy shrub.  So, a couple of weeks ago, I pruned it back to two bare, woody stalks about 3 feet high.

In the shot above, you can see some of the big buds that have popped out along the main branches.   Glad to see that I didn’t kill it.  🙂

Bye-bye Winter (and a few other items of miscellany).

pea-knuckle.

We met Doray & Tom at BB Rover’s tonight for dinner and to play a few rounds of pinochle.  The ladies won a tightly contested best-of-three match.

Today is the last day of winter.   Spring will officially be upon us at 12:14 AM local time tomorrow morning.

I have a couple of unrelated other shots I wanted to post…  one is of a deer that has taken to laying outside the guest bedroom window.  He’s got an injured foreleg, and has been back here a couple of times.   This shot is from the bedroom window.  He’s only inches away.  Forgive the crummy shot through the solar screen on the window.  You get the idea.

Oh deer!

And this is a shot of a bunch of Texas Mountain Laurel seeds that I harvested from a bush growing in the greenbelt when we were there on Saturday afternoon.  I looked online to learn how to prepare the seeds for germination.  These seeds are from last season, they are hard and red and have shrunk a bit.  Conventional wisdom says to knick them and then soak them till they swell a bit, and then plant them about an inch deep.  The little dimples on the seeds in the picture below are where I cut through the shell of the seed.  The seeds soaked for about 8 hours, so they are plumped up a bit from when I knicked them.   I’ve got these guys in pots in the back room now so that I can tend them.  I hope they take!  We want to plant a bunch of mountain laurels along the back fence line.  I’ll let you know how they turn out…  FYI these are supposed to be poisonous, so if you try this at home… don’t eat them  🙂

Texas Mountain Laurel seeds.

There is rain in the forecast…it’s been slow getting here.  But as I type this post, there’s a big red line just moving into our area.   I’ll have to sign off now to watch the weather channel (my favorite).

Good night!

Happy 2nd Blogoversary to me!

Two years ago today sheila365 came to be.  As I did last year, today I’m posting a collage out of the photos from the last year’s posts.  In year 2, I didn’t actually post every day, but most days.  I’m still enjoying it.  And I’m looking forward to capturing and posting more moments in the year ahead

If the years really must fly by so quickly, I’m very happy to be able to look back through these images to enjoy some of the moments that flew by — all over again.

Year 2 in pictures

Fringe benefits.

New cutting board.

Being married to a talented woodworker has its benefits.  Monte just finished this beautiful (huge) maple cutting board and brought it into the house today.  Niiiiice.

Cornhole!

Ringer.

Fran, the kids and my mom leave today.  Before heading to the airport we got in a few more games of cornhole.  What’s cornhole, you ask?  A bean-bag (or corn kernel bag, rather) toss game.  Players take turns throwing the bags at the board.  If a bag lands on top, you get 1 point.  If it goes in the hole, you get 3 points.  It is a staple of most mid-western family gatherings and picnics.  Monte recently made a pair of boards.

Francine is quite good at the game, even though she’s never played it before.  She’s giving Monte a run for his money…

In the shot above, Monte’s toss is dropping into the hole (it’s all in the wrist!).

Planting a cache.

Shutterbug.

Geo-caching is a real-world outdoor treasure hunting game, where you look for hidden containers, or “geo-caches,” using GPS-enabled devices.  People can post the coordinates for caches they have hidden, for others to find.  And geo-cachers can share their stories of their finds online.

We enjoy geo-caching in the nearby parks and woodlands.  And we especially enjoy taking other people, especially kids, geo-caching with us when they visit.

On my last birthday, Monte bought me an ammo-case, which is the perfect thing to use for a geo-cache because it is durable and has a rubber gasket around the top, which makes it relatively weatherproof.

Today we took Fran, Rebecca and Aaron geo-caching in the greenbelt near our house, and I brought my own geo-cache to hide.  Inside my geocache is a disposable camera, so when people find and open the cache, they can take a picture of themselves, and leave the camera inside for the next people.  The shot above shows the cache, as we left it.

We found 4 out of 6 caches that we were looking for… not bad.  The kids, big and small, had fun.

After we got home I posted the coordinates of my new cache to geocaching.com.   Now I can monitor it online for log entries from people that have found it.

Check out geocaching.com for caches near you to look for and find.  Happy hunting!

Releasing my inner artiste.

A Sheila original (sort of).

Tonight Sue & I went to an art studio called Painting with a Twist.  They hold a painting class every night where everyone in the studio paints the same picture.   Oh, and you can bring your own wine and snacks to help get the creative juices flowing (that’s the twist part).  You can choose which session you want to attend by checking out their calendar and signing up ahead of time.  They have studios in many cities, check out their main website if you’re interested.  Tonight’s piece is called Moonlit Cherry Blossoms.

I know friends that have tried it, but this was my first time.  It was FUN!  The pic above is one I took of my painting after I got it home.  I look forward to trying this again.

Look out people, ARTIST COMIN’ THROUGH!!  😀

Peek-a-boo Birdhouse.

Ready to hang.

A few weeks ago, I saw a birdhouse in a catalog which had sides that were hinged like doors, which when open revealed plexiglass walls inside.  The idea being that you could open the birdhouse to peek inside if any birds decide to nest and take up residence.

The design seemed simple enough, so I sketched something on paper and whipped one up out of cedar.   I think I’m more pleased about making it than I will be to find any birds inside.  But, stay tuned…

Thanks to monte for help on some of the work that required table saw cuts.   I’m certified to use all the tools in the shop, except for that one.  🙂

The shot above is of the newly finished birdhouse.  The wall on the left is opened up and you can see through to the inside through the plastic wall.

By the way, we have been blessed with some intermittent rain showers over the last week, so as you can see in the background, things are starting to green up a bit.  I was pleased to see the bluebonnets starting to leaf out, as they should in the autumn.   I guess months of searing, endless, scorching heat does the trick on cracking their tough seeds for germination.   I hope this is a good sign for lots of bluebonnets in the spring — though we’ll need LOTS more rain between now and then.