Her Side Funnies

*At the urging of several friends, I have designed plans for this food storage rack.  If you would like to purchase these plans for $6.00, click the Buy Now icon below.  The advantage of this is that you will not have to guess about how much lumber, or how each piece is cut, and you will have a much easier time putting it together than I did.

I would like to thank the special lady who allowed me to view the food rack that her father built for her.  I adjusted it slightly and built a food rack of my own from looking at her rack and am posting the idea here to help others as she graciously helped us.

My husband, Ken, calls it the Mormon can museum – a tribute to Mormon food storage.  Though neither of us are Mormon, we  have a lot of friends who are Mormon and many adhere to the philosophy of storing a year’s worth of food.  I loved the idea of having some extra foods stocked away, especially since we have suffered lay-offs more than once, but I was never able to manage the foods without a lot of waste since the expired foods would get lost in my cupboards and expire before I could use them.

Complaining to a friend, he urged me to come look at a rack I could build with scraps of lumber.  I did build my own version of it, and I cheer anytime I can incorporate using canned food in my dinner menus.  I enjoy watching the cans roll down the rack filling the hole where I had just removed a can. (more…)

For those interested in the prior Grass Carp entry, click here.  For a complete index of Dani’s comical posts, click here.  *Before and after shots of the pond are shown at the end of this post.

The grass carp have been in the pond now since late August and I, the ever-optimistic one, assumed they would have already cleaned the pond by now and be ready to tackle the laundry, or vacuum my living room, or at least be sweeping the front stoop.  This, to my disappointment, is not the case. (Proof of abundant laundry shown at left.)

In looking out at the pond, I continued to see globs of crusty nasty glop floating atop the pond.  Asking husband Ken about this, he explained to me that while grass carp will clean the pond, they eat the yummy stuff first.  Crusty nasty glop floating on top of the pond, he assured me, is not that yummy.

I concede that point.

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This post follows “Slipforming, part 9 – Some cool rock inspirations.”  For a complete list of links to all slipforming posts on this blog, click here.

One of the greatest things about building your own home is that you can incorporate inspirations from a host of places.  For me, I found a lot of inspiration in old books on Germany.  The architecture there is ah-maaaa-zing!  But just as amazing was looking at my surroundings with a new awareness of how much beauty is local and still standing.  For me, I get ideas from everywhere – of what TO do and what NOT to do.  I cannot use every idea in my project, but sometimes seeing something – breaking it down to elements – and then re-evaluating how you can include something similar in your own plan makes the impossible seem suddenly possible.

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This post follows “Slipforming, part 8 – Successes and failures.”  For a complete list of links to all slipforming posts on this blog, click here.

For whatever reason, perhaps the sheer effort involved, the popularity of building with rock was a rather limited affair.  Finding buildings that are still standing is challenging.  Luckily, there are a few that were built in the early 1900s near my home.  I am going to add some photos of them as I found them inspiring as I built mine and thought you might find them inspiring as well.

This is the Community Methodist Church built in 1929 in Hotchkiss, Colorado.  It is three stories tall and judging by the work involved, the masons must have started it in 1500 (just kidding).  The main part of the building shown here is square – again, easier for forming and cheaper on insurance.  But the architectural details are fascinating.  For instance, notice that the corner blocks are lined up with the window sill blocks.  Interesting. (more…)

This post follows “Brandy swamp juice at day 29.”  To see that post, click here.

On July 29, 2009, I forged ahead with an experiment, of sorts.  I had never tried to make brandy, but had a lot of fruit falling off the tree and decided to go online and get a recipe.  The recipe I found involved filling a glass gallon jar with fruit, adding three cups of sugar and approximately 26 ounces of cheap vodka.  The instructions said to turn the jar of brandy daily, from right side up to upside down for three months.  And so I have.

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