LBP - Storming The Door

Unlike many people in the United States a storm door is not a necessity and their homes look super adorable with a nice door. Well here in Wisconsin, we don't get that luxury. Our harsh winters make storm doors almost, but not absolutely, a necessity. If you have an exterior door in awesome money saving condition with great weatherstripping, it isn't a necessity.

We have a decent standard steel door with a foam core for warmth. It does the job.

So why do Wisconsinites tend tend to have storm doors? Well storms door tend to create a tiny pocket of air in between the two doors and keeps some of the heat from escaping. 20-40% depending on how energy efficient your current door is. Also, ever gotten blasted by a -20 wind chill after being in a nice warm house? Sometimes its nice to get a semi-cooler blast at first at about 30 to 40 degrees. On the other hand, we have hot summers and having a variance for that much, you like to get a breeze in the house as well while keeping the bugs to a minimum.

I chose a Larson First Impressions Full-View Clear glass and screen storm door from Menards. What the website doesn't show is the fact in-store you get to chose your choice of three tempered glass inserts, color of the finish of the actual door and a handle style. We got the white finish with a two-line glass and aged bronze (oil-rubbed bronze) handle. I wanted to be able to still see our door (eventually we will paint) and any wreaths I might (and will) hang.

From these photos, you can tell we installed these in mid-March. Max and Mark tackled the installation which was actually pretty quick and painless.

After unscrewing the old storm door, they used the same fitting and installed the new door.

Mark did the screwing while Max held the door frame steady.

Let's be honest, you follow the directions and magical things happen.

Max put the finishing touches on the door frame and added the door handle.

After all that. Here we have our new door!

Here is the before with the old door circa summer of 2012. It's has a very country bumpkin look to it and it did absolutely nothing for warmth for us. 

Flash forward from March to July. Here is our after July 2013. Much cleaner lines and much less dated. Looks pretty snazzy with my herb wreath. 

And although we currently have the full screen in because it was summer, it was very nice when it was cold out not to get blasted by the cold every time I went outside. I say, win!

VG2012: Update

Today here in Milwaukee, we are expecting near record breaking heat at 95° and a crazy high heat index.  I went for my morning jog (doing the RunWithJess Half-Marathon Challenge this summer to lose that wedding weight) and felt like I was going to die. So hot! I will undoubtable be staying inside most of the day. Some of my little friends will have to bear the heat though, my vegetable garden.

Since I killed my starter shoots (again) I bought a few varieties of pepper and tomato plants from Steins in early stage and some closer to already producing so we would have a prolonged summer to eat. 

Some of my tomatoes are already ripening.

I did however plant lettuce and string beans straight into the ground and they are both doing wonderfully. We'll be able to eat the lettuce very soon.

I'm making something tonight with our poblano peppers, so pumped!

My late season tomato plants that I bought tiny are now huge and blooming. They should also be producing within the month. My onion plants which I transplanted from last summer (sort of forgot about them) are doing great as well and blooming. 

So far, raised bed garden is doing great! I'm so relieved and slightly proud I haven't killed anything in there yet. The only fail was when we were planting our jalapeno pepper plant, the upper part got snapped and killed part of the plant, good new though, its has new growth coming up around the sides.

How is your garden doing this summer? Post links to pics! Let us know what you are eating this summer.

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

I told you that the month of May was going to be a killer for us... well we just barely made it through. And all though I have not really been posting, its because we've either been completely gone getting someone married, walking for charity, hauling random sectional couches home or doing something pre-wedding related (including my new guest blogger gig on The Budget Savvy Bride), we were working on our yard. Not lying. We were busy little bees. And tired ones at that. Can a girl get a nap up in here?!

So what have we been doing you might ask? Well I would like to answer with what haven't we been doing? The yard is definitely all in different stages right now. Some of its completely amazing (the good), some of it is in progress (the bad) and some of its just a non-hot mess (the ugly). Let's do a walk through of it all starting with the best first.

The Good


We split all the hosta in the front yard until they were left with tiny plants. I'm not taking chances this summer that they will be cute. They are vicious and massive. I put the remains of them up on Craigslist for free. Within thirty minutes of the post going up, a couple came and took the entire lot. They even said themselves there were enough for three houses. Thanks for sharing with the other two houses friends... Greedy people. Oh well, they are out of my hair now.

I planted some more bushes bulbs to fill in the front area. They haven't come up yet (here's to hoping they still do). Also do you like the mismatched mulch? When we went back to Menards to get more cypress, they were out of the same dark brand we used before. So much for Salt Lake City, FL apparently...

Anyways it looks a 100 times better and when you drive up to the house, it actually looks like people who care live there.

I brought our little 1950s Mr. & Mrs. back out and gave them some shade loving plants to hold. I still need to wire them with a stick for wind prevention but they are looking mighty fine. I finally got smart with the shade flowers since last year's bunch were just bought because they were pretty and never really grew.

A new addition to the front door, I bought this green planter off of Overstock.com. It's made of a hard resin plastic with a really cool glaze over it. You can't tell the difference it isn't ceramic. I had purchased a LivingSocial deal earlier this year for $10 get $20 of merchandise. So using that and qualifying for free shipping with the purchase. I paid a total of $18.99.

Since this summer I'm all about the easy and simple lawn projects with all our wedding planning, this seemed like a no brainer. I found these pre-made container blends at Menards (also saw similar ones at Lowe's too, if you shop there as well...) on sale for $6.99.

To kill two birds with one stone, or many stones for that matter, I some of the rest of those stones we dug up from the lawn regrading and put the rest of them (the others went into the raised bed planters)  in the bottom of the planter.

The other side the front of the house also got space hosta and some light mulch... get it, light mulch... haha ok I'll stop.

The Bad


Ok, its not bad, but definitely in progress.

Here I'm trying to make our little faux fence more of a little feature. I planted a few of my many hosta, some of the Craigslist traded plants and I added a hanging basket. It looks like a hot mess right now. Dirty piles all over. Still sod that needs to come up. Hot.

At least the basket looks nice.

I did unearth that giant rock in our front yard. The green hosta had to go. The white ones came in though to fill in. I'm pretty sure they'll come back stronger. The brownness will go away very soon with some rain. A little mulch will help them out quite a bit. Eventually (probably next summer), I'll add some more plants to help our solo artists out. Rock on little fellas.

The prickly bush on the corner, which we found out is a rose bush now that it bloomed, also got a little attention. I added some of plant trade ferns to this shade lovers paradise. I mulched, only the fern side of the bush... Don't make fun of me. I do plan to put some flowers on the other side to feature the corner a little bit.

The flowers I planted on side of the house are coming up nicely. I can't wait to see them bloom later this summer.

The last of my half finished projects, is another bush. More hosta and I added some grasses around this bad boy. Some mulching needs to be done.

The Ugly


This used to be a tons of day lilies, but after giving them all away Craigslist style its a gapping lifeless area. Well not totally, there are some weeds next to the back steps.

Horray weeds.

On the other side of the back steps, this area last year was my tomato plant and green pepper planted area. They didn't take super well so I'm putting them this year in the raised bed. I'm going to try sinking my herbs like I saw on Pinterest.

This weekend's project... Finally planting said vegetables.

Last year's garden, has different plans this year. The more we have been living in this house, the more we have had a chance to see how we like it and its functionality. We have decided this area should be bricked in and part of our future patio space.  It is awkward, out of the way and things do not grow well here other than weeds.

I'm leery about using lots of chemicals on things but this was one of those things that had to be done. We used UltraStop Lawn Weed Killer. Supposed to kill everything but grass. So far its working well. I think we need another application though. It mixes with water and sprays easily with our garden hose.

With the addition of our new sectional sofa, we liberated the lawn furniture finally outside for its intended purpose. That means we can finally entertain, sort of. We have had our close friends over for a cookout already. Luckily, they don't judge. Thanks guys!

I transported some of the day lilies early in the spring to this super dead area, remember all the junk we were storing here? They definitely have taken off. I'm already starting to hate them again. UGH!

As we work our way around the last side of the house, you can definitely see we need two things, a lot more mulch and a weed whacker. Our irises and peonies that were replanted in March are doing fine, you just can't find them.

The Silver Lining


The peonies Max didn't mow over finally bloomed! They are my favorite flower so I was overjoyed to see what color they came were. Hot pink!

Here is an update of our lawn, the grass is slowly filling in. There are a few patches and we finally got to mow over the area. Max applied the weed killer to the entire lawn but this area to try and fight our mini jungle. We are waiting until the grass takes better until we apply it to this area.

What do you think a little better than before?

I think its quite an improvement! Not 100% but I at least feel that I'm not a hobo now driving up with our completely messed up lawn.

This was a month long progress so I apologize for how long this post was. What under done projects do you have going?