Crazy Weather Week, Low Cost/ No Tools DIY Wood Risers! Adding & Re-Habbing House Plants

 

Time to fill the pond! 

Crazy Weather Week-

It has been a crazy weather week! We had some family over for Easter breakfast, very fun! Our Grandsons River (right) and Oliver (left) were really excited when Dave filled the pond. He also turned on the pump! River kept asking "where's the water?" Funny what kids love to watch, a hose filling a pond. Weather was great! We've had some real temperature swings here that have been pretty insane. Last Saturday it was almost 85 Degrees, talk about summer weather. Then the temperature plummeted almost 35 degrees in a day and a half. Then back to the low 60s for the highs, Thursday was only 52 and very windy. April can be like that, definitely not quite summer. This next week is supposed to moderate a little bit of wind, with a high today of 60 and a low of 25! It's one of those weeks where you don't quite know what to wear, flannel shirts or tee shirts. I work from home but I still sort of dress for work, sort of. A lot of days I wear track pants and flannel blouse when it's cold, when it's a little warmer I wear leggings and a cotton blouse. There were two days this week where I had to change my shirt because I was too cold! Anyway here's a few things I have been up, I hope you enjoy it!

Low Cost/ No Tools, DIY Wood Risers!

I had been browsing Etsy at one point and noticed they were selling these little wood risers like these-

Raw wood

Raw wood

They were $15.00 to $ 25.00! Knowing what I do about wood and crafts I decided to look for something similar to make my own! Great thing about this is no tools required!!!  I found Joann's Fabrics woodworking section. They had round wooden plaques/discs and round knobs for feet. I knew that I had some left over chalk paint at home and it kind of got me thinking. The plaque was about $5 / $6 and a small bag of the wooden knobs for eight feet was about $4.00. So here's what I did-

First I lightly sanded the plaque, with routed edges, then flipped it over to space the feet. Since it was smaller I only used three-

I marked the spots for the feet, then I painted the disc with gray chalk paint and let dry. Next I glued the feet on the bottom, using wood glue. That stuffs really bonds! I let dry, then gave them a coat of clear poly. 

I had five knobs left over from the bag so I added four to a log slice I already had. Got it at Michael's several years ago, about $10.00, about 9" wide. I spaced them, then glued and let dry-

Love it! 

So the whole thing was less than $10.00 for both risers! Love them. Nice thing about this projects is all the different things you could do customized them- paint, stain, add textures like rope, buttons, etc. Components here-

                                                                     

                                                      

                                                      

                                                     

                                                     

                                                     

Adding and Re-HabbingHouse Plants-

I had been wanting to add a plant to my home office and rescue one that was already in there. They help clean the air and are nice to look at! One is a nice, new fern I found at a big box store. I had an Ikea pot on hand, added gravel, then planted. It loves the light! Next I bought a pot and another plant, sits behind me-

Next I had a very old, funky hanging plastic pot and the plant was pretty sick. I dumped the pot (falling apart), got a new pot, added fresh potting soil and it seems to be coming back! 

On my little Easter table

Next I had a sick Ivy, I took it out of the large pot and it's now under the grow light in the bedroom, sorry no pic. The huge Trader Joe's Amaryllis Garden Ivy I kept from 2 winters ago got moved into that pot-

Last I put this last winter T Joe's Ivy into an Ikea pot I had on hand in our bathroom, where the plant above was. I basically swapped them to more appropriate pots sizes- 

At Costco I got a Lavender topiary to go outside, but the weathers been too crazy, so it's inside on the dining table-

I also got a 3-pack of plants from Costco, 2 went to my girls at Easter, I kept this one! 

This lucky bamboo I've had for years. The plastic pot was yucky with hard water build-up so I got a ceramic one for less than $10.00 at Lowe's-

I also bought an Olive bush at Trader Joe's, will set outside when it warms up-

Anya was supervising my photo shoot-