Greenhouses

Posted on April 21, 2025 by Marisa

My mom used to say, “The old people were always happy till the Sears catalog arrived.” For anyone who never received the Sears catalog it was like YouTube and Amazon had a baby, and it was made from paper. When TV came out, we had commercials that explained to everyone why their lives were incomplete and then told them exactly what product, toy, fashion apparel would bring joy. TV shows, movies, and magazines told us and showed us the amazing lives that everyone else was living. Those things were nothing compared to the Sears catalog which existed long before film confirmation that we should be unhappy and most of those magazines might never be seen, oh but that catalog in all its free glory was the bringer of despair. What does this have to do with greenhouses and raised beds?

Continue reading →

Posted in Gardening, Homestead, Reviews | Leave a comment

The Buck Stops Here

Posted on April 11, 2025 by Marisa

A Trader Bucks opened here in Logansport, Indiana.  We were so excited because we had decided to get a booth and become a vendor.  The idea had been that this year we would finally get some inventory built up and start doing the craft shows.  However, with husky in tow this was going to become more complicated.  Having a stationary booth in a building was the answer.  We would not need to sit there all day, no loading up, driving, setting up, packing up, driving home and repeat that for as many days as a show went on.  The reality has been, complicated, and not worth the time or money we put in.

Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

Basement Bedroom Ceiling Tile Redo

Posted on March 25, 2025 by Marisa
Moen one handle 1225 replacement cartridge

Moen one handle 1225 replacement cartridge

This is how it started. This small fairly inexpensive little part. It seemed so innocent, so well intentioned, so needed, right before it all went horribly, horribly wrong in a spectacular manner.

Continue reading →

Posted in Finishing, Homestead, Reviews, Uncategorized | Leave a comment

Automate Print Head Cleaning To Prevent Clogs

Posted on March 20, 2025 by Marisa

Have you ever gone to print something and the printer either won’t print or prints streaks or has missing print?  Ink can dry and cause the print head to no longer be able to move ink through it.  Some kinds of ink, such as sublimation or DTF, are more prone to clogging than others.  If any inkjet printer sits for too long without printing through all the print heads, problems can arise.   Sending a print job at least once a week that will use all the heads can help to prevent problems.  You can do this manually or you can schedule it to happen but not all printers allow for scheduling via their software and not all printers can be accessed via the internet.  You can create your own internal setup that will send a scheduled print job to each printer on your network or physically connected to your device.

Continue reading →

Posted in Printing | Leave a comment

Chom Chom Roller Pet Hair Remover review

Posted on March 18, 2025 by Marisa

This review is not sponsored, we are not getting paid, they don’t even know we did it. It has nothing to do with woodworking, gardening, art, sewing, and I had promised myself I was going to cut back on review posts. Yet here we are. I felt compelled to write this because for years I have searched for something that would be simple and effective in my battle between woman and beast. I wish I could find the video that inspired me to buy this because I would link it here. Laura did a quick little video of her cleaning an outdoor chair that her cat, Russel, likes to sit on. You can find her and her cat here at Garden Answer. I was in awe as she quickly removed a thick layer of cat hair from the outdoor cushion. I trusted what she was saying more than I trust a lot of reviews, it was sincere, it was honest and I almost fell running to my computer to buy one.

Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews | Leave a comment

SVG creation using GIMP & Inkscape

Posted on February 10, 2025 by Marisa

Bill purchased some clear acrylic light kits to do laser engraving on.  Often the biggest hold up, for us, is the “need to do make something really spectacular and special” syndrome.  Because these kits are cool the search was on for the perfect thing to engrave on one, Bill’s idea was to engrave the USS Saipan LGA 2 logo on one.  Then the search became how to vector it to create the SVG.  He did find a site that said that at one time they might have had one but it is no longer available and it takes a month to get a response from the creator, he didn’t want to wait a month.  Especially when you know you should be able to do this yourself.

Continue reading →

Posted in Editing, Laser Engraving and Cutting | Leave a comment

Laser Engraved Pens

Posted on January 6, 2025 by Bill
Laser Engraved Pen

Laser Engraved Pen

I got an order for a dozen laser engraved pens, meant to be Christmas gifts.  OK, not a problem.  I have played with engraving pen blanks by just setting them on the laser bed and engraving them as if they were flat.  For something with a larger diameter, this isn’t really a problem. Continue reading →

Posted in Laser Engraving and Cutting, Wood Turning, Woodworking | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

Change Your Water Heater Anode

Posted on December 31, 2024 by Bill

This is also a review of the DeWalt DCF900 Brushless 3-Speed Impact Wrench.

Shop Heat Water Heater

Shop Heat Water Heater

We put in in-floor radiant heat in the shop when we built it.  This works pretty well, but a couple of years ago, I noticed that the heating elements were corroding away rather rapidly.  I realized that with our hard water, the anode likely needed to be changed.  I tried to replace it last year, but could not get it to budge.  I tried an air impact wrench, a normal Ridgid impact driver, a breaker bar, I even tried a 6 foot pipe on the breaker bar.  All that did was spin the water heater.  Not good.  I tried propping it in place while using the breaker, but still could not get it to budge.

Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews, Shop Tips, Tools and Machinery | Leave a comment

DEWALT 20V MAX Cordless Battery Powered Pruner

Posted on November 22, 2024 by Marisa

The problem and the solution

large oak tree after tree service cut two large branches off

Continue reading →

Posted in Reviews, Tools and Machinery | Leave a comment

Into Each Life a Little Rain Must Fall

Posted on August 12, 2024 by Marisa

When it’s too little you have to step up your watering game.  We have been adding automatic watering solutions into our gardens and it’s been wonderful.  A problem that we have is getting water to areas that have no access to water.  I’ve been filling up empty cat litter containers and hauling them around and it’s worked.  Until we planted around 80 mums in areas without access to water last fall.  This fall we will probably plant more mums and we have about 1k spring bulbs on order.

Continue reading →

Posted in Gardening, Homestead, Reviews | Leave a comment