Projects – Edgewise Wendy Writes

It seems there is a push these days for everyone to de-clutter their lives. “De clutter your home! You will feel better! It will free up your mind!” Maybe for some people this all out attack is useful, but not so much for me. Sure, I like my home to be clean and organized, but I have plans for that so-called clutter. I am sorting through the filing cabinets and burning outdated, paperwork in the woodstove. When it comes to getting rid of all the random bits of crafty things I have saved though, I draw the line.

I am not a hoarder. I am an artist, a craftswoman, a collector of weird things. I keep my spare rooms useable for guests while also using the spaces for writing and sewing and growing fodder for the chickens. I save some things other people might see as trash and I repurpose them into usable goods. I will not replace my perfectly functional formica kitchen counter tops with newly quarried granite slabs, just because it looks nice. My idea of living green means using what I have as long as it still serves a purpose. My closets hold remnants of past and future projects that I will eventually use or give away to someone else who needs it more. The difference between myself and a hoarder is that I am not waiting for some future that never comes, I utilize what I have all the time.

I do not want to live in a house devoid of my homey things and the memories they conjure up.

Yes, I saved dryer lint from my old job. I still save my dryer lint at home. I have always thought to make paper out of it but never had the time or inclination until now. My first project was thick seedling starting quilts. They turned out to be very absorbent but I need to refine my microgreens setup. I hope to try my hand at fancy writing paper to write poems on next. I want to try incorporating colorful bits of leaves or threads or even feathers in to it and make it thinner somehow. It is a project for another day.

I have a hank of tail hair from my old pony, Ranza, that I saved when he died. It has been stored away in the hat cupboard in the mudroom and whenever I come across it, I think of him fondly. Some day I will make something cool out of it, maybe by braiding or macramé. Who knows? There are crafters, like Tail Spin, or Spirit Horse Designs, or Horse Hair Art on the web who do this for people as tokens of their beloved companions. Someday, I will make a hatband to remember Ranza by.

I save lots of potentially useful things and almost always get around to using or even needing them someday. It is quite satisfying to search for a particular bolt or piece of metal, or a chunk of wood or slab of rubber, and find it, ready for reuse, right here when I need it. I prefer building with things that have a bit of history or memory behind them to spending money at the soulless Home Depot down the road.

My chicken house is constructed from bits of an old wooden-floored outdoor tennis court, from a favorite gardening client in Great Falls, Virginia. I think of her every day as I feed my chickens and horse. The heavy green wire and green painted 2 x 6 ‘s are continuing their life that began in the 1950’s. Extruded aluminum panels from discarded benchtops in a greenhouse where I once worked make fairly predator proof chicken yard fence. This was all destined for the dump.

Salvaged Cedar boards and coat hooks salvaged from during a friend’s house remodel, now hang my iron pots in the kitchen. I also made some to hang backpacks and clothing. I have furniture and odd bits saved from the house I grew up in. My favorite chair came from a neighbor who lived by the dam on the boy scout lake. I do not remember their name but I remember the pine tree we used as a launching pad to jump into that lake. I made the cushion for that chair and some dog beds from an old futon mattress that we no longer needed.

I have an 8 gallon sauerkraut crock I bought at Starks hardware in Harrisville West Virginia. I will use it to ferment cabbage again, but currently it doubles as a plant stand in the living room. For many years I used it as a stool at my old treadle sewing machine. I kept sewing supplies inside and used a potters wheel bat as a lid and seat. Why would I ever want to get rid of things like this? Plus, it did not cost me much back in 1975 when I bought it and would cost a fortune today.

My father used to call my decorating style early attic. I call it just what I need. I have a corner cupboard that my dad’s mother made, canning shelves and a cedar chest my ex made, a crocheted blanket my first husband made, a wood cook stove I got for cleaning out a root cellar. I have a whole set of little wooden boxes filled with assorted hardware pieces that came out of a neighbors’ workshop on Mimosa Lake from when I was a kid. All very useful stuff that I go through whenever I am searching for just the right thing.

I do not save everything forever. The grandfather clock that was handed down in my family could not stay with me because I had no safe place for it. It passed to my mothers late husbands daughter, who takes good care of it. The potters wheel I bought in Greenwich Village in 1973 will most likely be passed on to someone soon, since it takes up space in my studio that I need for other things. However, I may save the round slate flywheel from it since it makes such a fine porch table when laid across the iron legs I found out in the woods.

So no, I will not stop collecting things that I can foresee using later in one of my many projects. I enjoy being creative and re-purposing old stuff way too much. I will not feel guilty for cluttering my life space. I will continue to dig into my closets, sorting and coming up with new ideas. I finally have more time to implement ideas that have been on the back burner for years. It would be such a shame to hold on to things and then get rid of them just before you finally retire and have more time to play.

-Edgewise Wendy

I have a lot of stories to tell. Some of them hang out on my homesteading blog, some on my travel and hiking blog. All the stories that do not fit into those two categories are going to end up here.

I also have a lot of opinions I would like to share. Sometimes I think I have it all figured out, then I realize that I never will. Still, I think that writing them down helps me , even if no one else reads them.

I usually have too many irons in the fire. It can be hard to stick to one thing. Now, I won’t have to. Readers who are more single minded can now stick to their one thing. I will continue to move here and there and back again, depending on what makes me happy that day. I never was any good at keeping to one track and I don’t see why anyone should have to. Life is too short to limit ourselves according to other peoples whims.

I went to the Speak Story fundraiser last night at the Community Club in Shepherdstown, and something Jim May, the guest story teller, said resonated with me. I cannot remember what words he used exactly , but the gist of it was, that although many writers feel compelled to force themselves to sit down and write, even when it is frustratingly unproductive for them, that he just could not make himself do it. When he gets stuck the best thing for him is to get up and do something else he enjoys. Go for a walk, or work in the garden, or watch the birds, something to totally take his mind off the writing task. Then he gets relaxed enough that the ideas can make their way in and inspiration fills him back up. I was the one in the audience who could not help but clap and say, YES!

I hate being put in boxes. All kinds of boxes. Even cardboard ones . There are stories in me about that. When I cannot settle down to write, there are plenty of other things I can do. I have many ongoing projects to choose from. Some of them make it to a list, others get done and then I put them on the list just so I can cross them off. Sometimes I have to stew on an idea for a good long while before come up with a workable solution. When I finally figure it out though, I get right on it.

For instance, I have been trying to come up with some way to make a raised bed for our strawberry patch. We hate crawling around at ground level to weed and pick them. Growing our own food makes us both happy though, so we persist. It is really nice to have all we need in the freezer.

Originally, I planted the strawberries under the young blueberry plants. That worked for awhile, but then as they grew matted together,it became really difficult to pick them without stepping on the plants.

Then I decided to try growing them in straw bales. That raised them up nicely but the straw rotted over the summer and the straw sunk back down so I had to rescue them. It was a good idea for annuals like tomatoes, but not for long lived plantings.

So next, I moved them to a couple of hilled up beds in the veggie garden. I mounded the soil up about a foot high and 2 feet wide, which made it a little easier to reach them. Then I made wire arches and used remay cloth to protect them them from the birds and frosts. This was working pretty well until some stray cherry tomato seedlings moved in after harvest practically smothered the poor strawberry plants. The plants that survived took a hit with the 0.5F degree temps we had a couple of weeks ago. With all the rain we had this fall (68 inches this year!) I did not get them mulched for winter and the poor things froze to death.

Every year I try an come up with a raised bed system that does not cost too much and I keep failing. Then yesterday I was looking out the kitchen window and saw the old metal, round bale-surround sitting out in the woods. I do not use round bales anymore since I am down to one horse and she cannot be exposed to any moldy hay. The outer edges of round bales can go bad from sitting out in the weather. Small square bales kept in the barn are safer and there is less waste.

I looked at the surround and thought, I could use that as a raised bed frame. We went out and rolled it into the yard and measured it. It is 8 feet across and can be filled 30 inches deep. Seems like a pretty good solution. We will need 14 cubic yards of good soil to fill it, which is my next project. We have it sitting on the back lawn in a spot with plenty of sun, where I will pass by it on the way to the barn twice a day. We cannot see it from the porch, which is good, since it is not the prettiest thing in the world. I might paint the outside green instead of the galvanized grey color.

Since it might be a little hard to reach the center, I am working on ideas for that now. Maybe fill the center with a sculpture like a homemade clay garden gnome? Maybe sink the old water conditioner cylinder in the middle and use it as a water reservoir? Make a fountain? A pole to hold a bird house? Maybe not that since birds love berries and it will need bird netting.

In the meantime I need to find a good source of weed free topsoil, get it delivered, and then get someone with a loader on their tractor to dump it in for me. I cannot get a big truck back there and mine would take about 28 trips. Or I could rent a bobcat. That would be fun. That opens up other possibilities for even more projects, like that path through the front woods or the underground greenhouse I want to build. Way too many ideas now.

See what I mean?

Category: Projects

Not Clutter, Good Stuff

Telling Stories