Not long ago me and the wife topped off the garden area with some bird houses. She likes having the birds around and hopefully with any luck we will get some birds.

So, I made three bird houses and mounted them on top of 4"x4" posts. Our garden area is basically hazelnut (off-white), so everything was pre-painted by us before doing this. The houses were easy to build. They just have a 1"x2" frame and then some old pickets (I picked up from a junk house in colorado springs), for the siding. I then topped them off with some copper I got from home depot. The copper does have a finish on it, so it won't patina for us but that's alright. Future houses will be raw copper I think.

My mom, Evelyn, lives in Colorado Springs and at the turn of the year, they had 75mph winds that caused all kinds of trouble for fence owners and anybody with a roof. I was unaware of what was happening because I live 2 hours north but she called me and said, "I need help". I asked what was going on and she said her fence blew over. She then told me about the winds and all the details.

She asked if we could fix it and I said sure we could. What we decided though was to see if the homeowner's insurance would fix it. As you've probably guessed they said no and a fence builder gave her an estimate that was for part of the fence (just the parts that blew over). I can't remember exactly his quote but I knew we could do it for cheaper than that and do the whole thing, not just parts.

I picked up an antique 1940's (according to the lady) bed frame. I saw it on-line advertised in an estate sale. What I liked is that it was cheap, I think I paid about $75 for it and great lines. The height was also an eye grabber for me. After seeing it in person I immediately thought about making it into a bench as I had never done a bed frame to bench conversion. The only issue with this is that the buyer may need a larger entryway, as this thing is pretty tall.

So, first things first, I'll strip this thing down and then sand it down. Since, I am probably painting it so I won't strip it all the way down to bare wood ...

Mother's Day was awesome this year for my wife, Angela. Last year we put in a garden and she has wanted a potting bench. I've put it off, not on purpose but because we had other things that we were doing and trying to get done. However, this year she was out of town for Mother's Day and I thought, I should build that thing.

I quickly did a scan of materials I had on hand and made a short list of some things to get from Home Depot. I went to Home Depot and picked up the items I needed.