I finally boxed up my Xmas decorations today. Yay!!!
It's not as bad as it may seem. You see, I had them in all sorts of odd boxes and I wanted to rearrange them into a few identically-sized ones. And by type. OK, I got a bit obsessive about it.
Like, what goes with a 20 pound enameled steel tree stand? I had door-sized ribbons, large bubble-lights, plastic 2' candy canes, a WHOLE lot of glass pine cones/icicles/snowflakes, bird nests with wooden eggs, etc, etc, etc.
And trying to use identical-sized boxes as I mentioned.
Well, I did it. And here's the cool thing. I took 2' along the wall of the cat's room (they are OK with that, I asked first) a few years ago and installed a pipe up near the ceiling. And hung shower curtains exactly that height on the pipe. I even store the vacuum cleaners and such behind there.
Looks great. The Xmas boxes are all packed in (stack perfectly). Done... They are packed so nicely, I might not even decorate next Xmas... ;) Its the thought that counts, right?
Showing posts with label Boxes. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Boxes. Show all posts
Friday, February 22, 2019
Saturday, August 8, 2015
Been Busy, Part 3
Getting rid of old pressure-treated lumber and boxes...
When I busted up the 25 year old garden beds last Fall, I collected them in a corner of the yard. And there they sat. Meanwhile, thinking I might move, I was collecting boxes that were of same shape.
This past week, I decided the old lumber had to go, and I wasn't going to move. It was time to bring stuff to the landfill and the recycling center...
I did the old lumber debris first. I was surprised at how much I had. 480 pounds of the stuff according to the landfill scale. 1/4 ton almost... It took some work. First, I had to haul all the 480# from the far backyard to the front yard. Then into the hauling trailer.
Then drive it all 10 miles to the landfill. Then drag it all out of trailer into the landfill disposal area (with dinosaur-sized bulldozers screaming around me barely 2 meters away). And it cost $16 just to get rid of it.
And THEN I had a basement nearly full of identical boxes in 2 sixes. One group of 4 dozen wine boxes and a group of 10 chewy.com boxes. I was going to store them all in my attic, but decided "why". So I packed those all into the back of the Highlander SUV.
They never would have fit by themselves into the car. So I got inventive. The chewy.com boxes could hold 3-4 wine boxes. But there were still wine boxes left over.
I am spatially creative. I looked at the leftover wineboxes and thought for like 2 minutes. It hit me that a little reshaping of the wineboxes might fit them into the existingly-packed ones.
I crushed the narrow sides like paper grocery bags fold, and darn if they didn't fit right down into the other boxes! Two boxes in the space of one and 2-3 pairs of boxes inside the larger ones
I filled up the back of the SUV and drove to the recycling center. Free riddance of reusable materials! There were even guys there so bored that hey emptied my car for me...
Getting rid of 480 lbs (1,056 kilos) of old lumber debris at a reasonable cost and 58 boxes for free is a good day!
When I busted up the 25 year old garden beds last Fall, I collected them in a corner of the yard. And there they sat. Meanwhile, thinking I might move, I was collecting boxes that were of same shape.
This past week, I decided the old lumber had to go, and I wasn't going to move. It was time to bring stuff to the landfill and the recycling center...
I did the old lumber debris first. I was surprised at how much I had. 480 pounds of the stuff according to the landfill scale. 1/4 ton almost... It took some work. First, I had to haul all the 480# from the far backyard to the front yard. Then into the hauling trailer.
Then drive it all 10 miles to the landfill. Then drag it all out of trailer into the landfill disposal area (with dinosaur-sized bulldozers screaming around me barely 2 meters away). And it cost $16 just to get rid of it.
And THEN I had a basement nearly full of identical boxes in 2 sixes. One group of 4 dozen wine boxes and a group of 10 chewy.com boxes. I was going to store them all in my attic, but decided "why". So I packed those all into the back of the Highlander SUV.
They never would have fit by themselves into the car. So I got inventive. The chewy.com boxes could hold 3-4 wine boxes. But there were still wine boxes left over.
I am spatially creative. I looked at the leftover wineboxes and thought for like 2 minutes. It hit me that a little reshaping of the wineboxes might fit them into the existingly-packed ones.
I crushed the narrow sides like paper grocery bags fold, and darn if they didn't fit right down into the other boxes! Two boxes in the space of one and 2-3 pairs of boxes inside the larger ones
I filled up the back of the SUV and drove to the recycling center. Free riddance of reusable materials! There were even guys there so bored that hey emptied my car for me...
Getting rid of 480 lbs (1,056 kilos) of old lumber debris at a reasonable cost and 58 boxes for free is a good day!
Sunday, February 8, 2015
An Interesting Week
I don't do well in the shortest darkest days of the year, but with the lengthening days, I have gotten more active. It's nice to start accomplishing things again.
1. I got The Salvation Army out here to pick up stuff I never used or no longer needed. Mainly, I had a dining room table and chairs that I bought at their local showcase store 8 years ago. It had some dings and scrapes, and I intended to completely refinish it as a Winter project. Realizing I would never get around to doing that, I wanted to give it back. I was also cleaning out closets and accumulated 8 boxes of miscellaneous household goods in good condition, a telescope (I have a newer better one now), an unopened flat screen wall mount (I decided to use a TV table instead), a nearly unused upright vacuum cleaner (I have wood floors now), etc.
It was all picked up last Wensday (I have decided to change the spelling; "Wednesday" is just medieval). The new open space in my basement workshop is appreciated.
2. I decided my cooking habits were in a rut. 20 years ago, I used to make pizzas from scratch. I relearned how. The first was bad. The 2nd and 3rd were very good. A pizza stone helps. So does a bread machine with a pizza dough setting. And leaving the dough sit overnight in a covered bowl helps. I made my own sauce from crushed canned tomatoes too. I do that for my spaghetti sauce anyway, just let it get a bit thicker. Sliced commercial pepperoni, hot italian sausage, green bell peppers, mushrooms, and onions.
And I made chicken cordon blue, my own breaded chicken nuggets, ground hamburger from top sirloin (I have a manual grinder), pancakes from scratch, and egg rolls.
My efforts to make decent hamburger buns continue to fail, though.
3. Rearranged and vacuumed the entire basement wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling. The guys who filled the walls with insulation last September left such a mess (even though they did a lot of cleaning). But I moved EVERYTHING and vacuumed. I vacuumed some spots that may have never been vacuumed in 28 years. When's the last time you pulled out the washer and dryer and cleaned behind there? LOL!
4. Reorganized all the stuff from the attic that I had to move down into the cats' room and stored them for returning to the attic when I replace the flooring up there. The cats are thrilled to have more space for toys, exploring, and scratchers.
5. Took almost everything out of the computer room, threw away lots of old stuff, and returned little. And there is more to get rid of. Why should I keep the boxes and disks from the apps from Windows 98?
6. Emptied out 3 closets and most of the stuff went to a new pile of stuff to go to charity. It is amazing how much unneeded "stuff" ends up on closet floors. "Out of sight, out of mind". For example, 30 years ago, I became the manager of an office softball team. I had bases, gloves and balls in a box. I'm keeping the ball and gloves, but the bases can go. One thing charities can't say is that I have boring stuff to give.
7. I had boxes of newspaper articles clipped out for "information". Computer articles, gardening articles, cooking articles. That stuff is all on the internet now. So those are going into the recycling bin.
8. One box was half full on fanfold perforated-edge computer paper! That goes back to the days of dot-matrix printers. But I'm not recycling THAT. I now have a lifetime supply of note-taking paper! Some old stuff is worth keeping.
9. The weather today was GREAT. It reached 67F! I went outside to do some gardening work. Mostly, I needed to dig level spots for the 6th of 6 framed garden beds. Unfortunately, the ground was still frozen 2' down, so I did some work, but not as much as I hoped. Still I did some work and the next warm day I can get another 2' deep. That will be enough to build that 6th bed before Spring arrives.
10. Haircut time! Ever 2 months. And I love the feel of heated shaving cream around my ears and neck when the barber does that razor cut!
11. Visited the bank. Got 6x higher interest rates on my savings with some creative transfers. 3% interest is better than .5%
I may have had a more productive week sometime, but I can't recall when exactly. LOL!
1. I got The Salvation Army out here to pick up stuff I never used or no longer needed. Mainly, I had a dining room table and chairs that I bought at their local showcase store 8 years ago. It had some dings and scrapes, and I intended to completely refinish it as a Winter project. Realizing I would never get around to doing that, I wanted to give it back. I was also cleaning out closets and accumulated 8 boxes of miscellaneous household goods in good condition, a telescope (I have a newer better one now), an unopened flat screen wall mount (I decided to use a TV table instead), a nearly unused upright vacuum cleaner (I have wood floors now), etc.
It was all picked up last Wensday (I have decided to change the spelling; "Wednesday" is just medieval). The new open space in my basement workshop is appreciated.
2. I decided my cooking habits were in a rut. 20 years ago, I used to make pizzas from scratch. I relearned how. The first was bad. The 2nd and 3rd were very good. A pizza stone helps. So does a bread machine with a pizza dough setting. And leaving the dough sit overnight in a covered bowl helps. I made my own sauce from crushed canned tomatoes too. I do that for my spaghetti sauce anyway, just let it get a bit thicker. Sliced commercial pepperoni, hot italian sausage, green bell peppers, mushrooms, and onions.
And I made chicken cordon blue, my own breaded chicken nuggets, ground hamburger from top sirloin (I have a manual grinder), pancakes from scratch, and egg rolls.
My efforts to make decent hamburger buns continue to fail, though.
3. Rearranged and vacuumed the entire basement wall-to-wall and floor-to-ceiling. The guys who filled the walls with insulation last September left such a mess (even though they did a lot of cleaning). But I moved EVERYTHING and vacuumed. I vacuumed some spots that may have never been vacuumed in 28 years. When's the last time you pulled out the washer and dryer and cleaned behind there? LOL!
4. Reorganized all the stuff from the attic that I had to move down into the cats' room and stored them for returning to the attic when I replace the flooring up there. The cats are thrilled to have more space for toys, exploring, and scratchers.
5. Took almost everything out of the computer room, threw away lots of old stuff, and returned little. And there is more to get rid of. Why should I keep the boxes and disks from the apps from Windows 98?
6. Emptied out 3 closets and most of the stuff went to a new pile of stuff to go to charity. It is amazing how much unneeded "stuff" ends up on closet floors. "Out of sight, out of mind". For example, 30 years ago, I became the manager of an office softball team. I had bases, gloves and balls in a box. I'm keeping the ball and gloves, but the bases can go. One thing charities can't say is that I have boring stuff to give.
7. I had boxes of newspaper articles clipped out for "information". Computer articles, gardening articles, cooking articles. That stuff is all on the internet now. So those are going into the recycling bin.
8. One box was half full on fanfold perforated-edge computer paper! That goes back to the days of dot-matrix printers. But I'm not recycling THAT. I now have a lifetime supply of note-taking paper! Some old stuff is worth keeping.
9. The weather today was GREAT. It reached 67F! I went outside to do some gardening work. Mostly, I needed to dig level spots for the 6th of 6 framed garden beds. Unfortunately, the ground was still frozen 2' down, so I did some work, but not as much as I hoped. Still I did some work and the next warm day I can get another 2' deep. That will be enough to build that 6th bed before Spring arrives.
10. Haircut time! Ever 2 months. And I love the feel of heated shaving cream around my ears and neck when the barber does that razor cut!
11. Visited the bank. Got 6x higher interest rates on my savings with some creative transfers. 3% interest is better than .5%
I may have had a more productive week sometime, but I can't recall when exactly. LOL!
Sunday, August 17, 2014
Attic Work
I'm been negotiating with an insulation company for several weeks. It's not that I'm trying to drag things out or trying to get them down a dollar at a time, but each quote they send has either some errors or descriptions of work that need some further explanation.
Well, for example, I have part of the center of the attic covered with plywood flooring. The complany is focussed on the insulation gains, so they proposed to remove the flooring. They just want to fill the entire attic 2' deep in blown-in insulation. And they wanted $100s of dollars just to remove the plywood. So I replied that I would remove the plywood myself and that if I decided to replace it after they were gone, that was none of their concern.
There were also some questions about access to the basement framed paneling. The cavities between the cinderblock wall foundation and the paneling covering the 2"x4" framing need blown-in insulation. They wanted to do that for about $1,900 "along the entire perimeter of the basement". The paneling is only along 1/3 of the basement. That sort of thing...
And part of their cost was moving the many many boxes I've saved. The boxes are just in the way of their work (and I understand that). There was about $500 involved in that work.
Well, I've saved boxes all my life. It's practical. As I used to move from apartment to apartment when I was younger, it was really useful to save the packing boxes for all the various stereo and minor appliances. What better packing for stereo equipment is there than the original boxes and styrofoam shapes? And good sturdy boxes are always useful for packing "stuff"! I mean, I always expected to move "someday".
But I've decided that I'm not going to move anytime soon, and when that day does come, I can afford to just buy matching moving boxes. So I didn't need the ones I had (except for a few recent product boxes I'll keep). So I started tossing attic boxes down the stairway.
It was enlightening! I had a box for the Commodore 128 I brought with me here 28 years ago. I cracked up seeing it. That computer is SO long-gone! Seriously, for those of you who have never heard of it, it was 128K memory. But you COULD actually do things on it. I wrote letters, learned spreadsheets, and played some rather interesting games on it. The best part was that the programs for the Commodore games were so simple, you could buy codebreaker programs to copy them for friends (and if you learned Fortran and Basic, you could even improve them. But I digress...
So I had all these boxes down the stairs (and more remaining in the attic. I spent an hour pulling the styrofoam and bubble wrap out of the boxes. The cardboard boxes are recyclable, the styrofoam (generically, polystyrene) is not. So my game for the day was to fit the small boxes into the middle-sized boxes, and those into the larger boxes. Then fitting them into the Highlander SUV. Packing is a fun game.
I needed 2 trips to the recycling center Friday to get rid of most of the boxes, and one trip bringing all the styrofoam to the associated landfill. And I really tried to find a place to recycle the styrofoam. The nearest place was 100 miles away. Apparently, styrofoam is dirt-cheap to make, buly to transport, and to energy-expensive to bother to melt down for reuse locally unless you live next to a styrofoam-producer. Sad but true.
Unfortunately, I had to make the styrofoam disposal trip twice. The landfill closes at 5PM. I left on a 15 minute drive there at 4 PM Friday. But there was an accident right at the intersection leading to the landfill. I sat in traffic for 45 minutes and only got to the landfill 5 minutes too late.
I made a second trip Saturday and got rid of all of it. (and some odd old items, and a few boxes full of styrofoam "peanuts").
But it was worth it. Only 6 boxes left in the attic (all old Christmas decorations I insist on saving). I'll just bring them downstairs temporarily for the insulation work.
At least it was some productive work!
Well, for example, I have part of the center of the attic covered with plywood flooring. The complany is focussed on the insulation gains, so they proposed to remove the flooring. They just want to fill the entire attic 2' deep in blown-in insulation. And they wanted $100s of dollars just to remove the plywood. So I replied that I would remove the plywood myself and that if I decided to replace it after they were gone, that was none of their concern.
There were also some questions about access to the basement framed paneling. The cavities between the cinderblock wall foundation and the paneling covering the 2"x4" framing need blown-in insulation. They wanted to do that for about $1,900 "along the entire perimeter of the basement". The paneling is only along 1/3 of the basement. That sort of thing...
And part of their cost was moving the many many boxes I've saved. The boxes are just in the way of their work (and I understand that). There was about $500 involved in that work.
Well, I've saved boxes all my life. It's practical. As I used to move from apartment to apartment when I was younger, it was really useful to save the packing boxes for all the various stereo and minor appliances. What better packing for stereo equipment is there than the original boxes and styrofoam shapes? And good sturdy boxes are always useful for packing "stuff"! I mean, I always expected to move "someday".
But I've decided that I'm not going to move anytime soon, and when that day does come, I can afford to just buy matching moving boxes. So I didn't need the ones I had (except for a few recent product boxes I'll keep). So I started tossing attic boxes down the stairway.
So I had all these boxes down the stairs (and more remaining in the attic. I spent an hour pulling the styrofoam and bubble wrap out of the boxes. The cardboard boxes are recyclable, the styrofoam (generically, polystyrene) is not. So my game for the day was to fit the small boxes into the middle-sized boxes, and those into the larger boxes. Then fitting them into the Highlander SUV. Packing is a fun game.
I needed 2 trips to the recycling center Friday to get rid of most of the boxes, and one trip bringing all the styrofoam to the associated landfill. And I really tried to find a place to recycle the styrofoam. The nearest place was 100 miles away. Apparently, styrofoam is dirt-cheap to make, buly to transport, and to energy-expensive to bother to melt down for reuse locally unless you live next to a styrofoam-producer. Sad but true.
Unfortunately, I had to make the styrofoam disposal trip twice. The landfill closes at 5PM. I left on a 15 minute drive there at 4 PM Friday. But there was an accident right at the intersection leading to the landfill. I sat in traffic for 45 minutes and only got to the landfill 5 minutes too late.
I made a second trip Saturday and got rid of all of it. (and some odd old items, and a few boxes full of styrofoam "peanuts").
But it was worth it. Only 6 boxes left in the attic (all old Christmas decorations I insist on saving). I'll just bring them downstairs temporarily for the insulation work.
At least it was some productive work!
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