More Easter Crafts and a Lot of Yard Projects...

Posted by Admin on April 12, 2023

Welcome to Debbie-Dabble Blog!!

I am so happy you decided to stop by!!

I am now back to posting TWICE a week !!!

I will be posting on MONDAY and FRIDAY!

As always, click on each picture if you would like to enlarge it....

Today, I have a few more Easter Crafts to share and a whole lot of garden projects that we did this week since the weather was nice...

In my last post, I shared my friend Anne Marie's Home decorated for Easter with mostly all vintage and antique Easter decorations!!

Click HERE if you missed that post!!

I want to Thank to Richella, over at Imparting Grace, for choosing my post, Easter Tree, a Few Carrots and More Crafting in the Kitchen,as one of her features from last week's Grace at Home Party!

Thanks so much, Richella!!

And also Thanks to Barb, over at French Ethereal, for featuring my POSTS, Easter Tree, a Few Carrots and More Crafting in the Kitchen AND Easter/Spring Beverage Bar in the Kitchen from last week's Share Your Style Linky Party!!!

THANKS so much Barb for featuring 2 of my posts, calling it an Easter Double Header!!!

Please stop by and link up to these wonderful parties....

Let's talk Food first....

My next door neighbor Mehrukh sent over some Lasagna for us the other day...

Muslims only use halal meat and poultry so I can not send anything containing those over to them...

They are now celebrating 30 days of Muslim Ramadan...

I am always amazed by the Fasting they do during this time....

"During the entire month of Ramadan, Muslims are obligated to fast every day ( 30 days) from dawn to sunset. Fasting requires the abstinence from sex, food, drinking ( not even water), and smoking. "

"By abstaining from eating and drinking all day, Muslims who are able to fast come to understand and empathize with the less fortunate and feels it brings them closer to God"

Doing acts of charity is also important during Ramadon....

They sent lasagna to several other neighbors....It was delicious!!

My neighbor Ed brought over some Kielbasi the other day....

This is Komensky Kielbasi which is quite famous here in our area...

It has won awards for being the BEST in the area...

This will be the first time that we will be trying it.....

I am ready for Easter and have everything for our traditional Easter Dinner....

A 6 pound turkey breast....

A 3 pound boneless ham....

Everything I need to make my Dad's Sausage Stuffing...

And more keilbasi!!

I send my sons home with kielbasi.....

Mashed potatoes, turkey gravy and corn will also be served...

I will be making something new and baking some chocolate chip cookies too!!

I will be sending cookies over to some neighbors...

And in my next post, on MONDAY, I will share something new that I made for Easter Dinner in my Easter Recap post!

Some good news is for the first time in MANY years,we are actually getting money back on our Taxes!!!

I honestly cannot remember the last time that happened as we have had to pay for many years...

And that will go right out to pay other taxes that are due now so it is such an unexpected Blessing!!!

We have had some nice weather lately and the first sign of Spring is out!!!

The Forsythias's.....

In my yard....

And in my neighbor's yard....

Joe picked up this shovel in Price Chopper with an adjustable handle on Clearance for $4....

Originally $20...

It is the perfect width to shovel our steps up to our townhouse....

2 more Easter Crafts that I want to share.....

You may remember these bunny heads that I bought at Dollar Tree....

I used an empty Parmesan Cheese container and made this....

I used pink chenille trim to cover the bright pink on the ears....

I covered the cheese container with white felt, trimmed it in blue chenille and added eggs and ribbon flowers to it....

And ave him a bow made from pink ribbon....

I painted these wood bunny paws that I bought at Dollar Tree.....

I used 2 of them to make this plaque....

I used a wooden round that I covered with white material, trimmed it with pink gimp and ribbon flowers....

I topped it off with a snowball as the Bunny tail....

And I hung it here....

I can't believe that Easter is in a few days...

I still have a few more crafts that I want to make but I am tabling them for the Summer as that seems to be the time when I have a lot more spare time to do so!

Joe bought a new toy for himself.....

Against my wishes....

I wanted to pay a professional to cut part of the lilac tree down in the back yard as a large branch of it was pushing up against the fence and the fence was starting too pitch forward into the yard...

But Joe insisted that it would be cheaper if he bought a chain saw and cut it down himself....

I was afraid that someone would get hurt....

In true Joe fashion, he just plopped the ladder amidst all the garden things, moving nothing out of the way...

And to make matters worse, he just threw on sandals with his socks instead of wearing a good sturdy shoes... to climb a ladder no less!!!

Socks with sandals are an accident waiting to happen, especially in Senior Citizens...

No, he did not want me to hold the ladder even though it was perilously perched on the back slope....

He wanted me to CATCH THE BRANCHES AFTER HE CUT THEM OFF THE TREE.....

I opted not to get a concussion when hit on the head by a falling branch and stayed on the patio!!

Glad my arbor did not break when a huge limb fell on top of it!!!!

He managed to cut most of the higher branches off without killing himself or cutting off his hand...

So far, so good.....

The next day, Joe used his new toy to cut the stumps left from the trees that he cut down in our neighbor's yard last year....

Again, so far so good....

Day 3 involved him now cutting the big branch off the tree at the base so they were no longer up against the fence...

You can see the offending branch....

We even had to cut a notch in the lattice to accommodate it....

Of course, he wanted me to confirm that he was cutting the right ones off the Tree...

On my way back to the safety of the patio, I got tangled up in the cord and hit the pavers on the patio like a ton of bricks ....

I landed on my right hip...

Thank Goodness it was not my right knee where I had my knee replacement...

I did have a few bruises and scarps...

And I had a dandy black and blue mark on my hip which was sore for about a week as it was a soft tissue injury....

This is why I wanted a professional to do this because every time we do some sort of work in the yard, together, I am the one who gets hurt....

Well, at least it is Done....

MUCH better!!

Joe had to haul all the branches through the house and out to our dumpsters....

See that nice piece of wood.....

I had Joe cut me a few slices of that branch as these are quite popular now in home decor...

Source unknown

I have to sand mine down and maybe put some polyurethane on them....

Joey even got in on the action, using the chain saw....

Wearing a leather coat!!

LOL!

Thought I would never see the day as Joey's tool of choice is a computer!!!

However, in cutting those big branches off the tree, we lost half of the tree which provided some degree of shade from a Sun that is blaring down in the back yard from Sunrise til around 4pm when it finally swings around to the front of the house...

You can fry an egg out there on those pavers in the Summer....

So of course, like a snowball rolling down a hill getting bigger and bigger, this all led to another project!!

Last year when I enlarged the paver area of our patio, using pavers that a neighbor did not want, the area on the left side looked like this....

To accommodate one of my umbrellas so it would not hit our awning when you opened it ...

Now why in Heaven's name did I not extend it over further as I did have both an extra small and large paver, is beyond me!!!

So I did it this year....

MUCH better....

This will now allow me more space as I will position my Fairy Garden tub elsewhere...

See the tub over on the left side....

Okay, this is the final extension of our patio....

Because if I keep going, I will have no yard left!!

One other part I also needed to fix was this.....

See that piece of scalloped brick border jutting out???

Well, it was not an issue last Summer when I had the furniture on the patio....

BUT....

In the Winter, when I would take the grand pups out to do their business, I can not tell you how many times I almost fell over that stupid piece of border....

SO.....

Again, that snowball is rolling and getting bigger...

I ripped that sucker out of there and replaced it with 2 bricks that fit in it's place perfectly....

MUCH better!!!

Again, the Snowball is getting bigger and bigger as it rolls down that hill!!

Since I "borrowed" the large brick paver from this area to extend the patio....

I had to do something different here...

I had 2 big gray pavers on top of each other to create a "step"....

So this is what I did....

BUT those gray pavers now stuck out like a sore thumb though!!

So I used something I mistakenly discovered a few years ago when painting the wood steps that my Dad installed in the back by the fence to get out of the gate....

Rustoleum makes a spray paint primer that is a rust color!!!!

When I used it to prime the steps, I realized it was the same color as the brick pavers so I just primed the steps with it and left it that way...

And it has held up all these years later....

I used to use the primer to freshen up the brick pavers over the years so I decided to put a good coat of it on those gray pavers.....

What a difference!!!

I bet you did not even see the "scenes" on those pavers before???

One has a Mill with a Water Wheel in the woods on it....

And the other has Deer in a field....

MUCH better!!!

I still have to rake up and mulch the yard before I get out all my garden decor and set up the Patio for the Summer...

Maybe next week after the Holiday.....

We did however take advantage of Lowe's sale on Mulch.....

5 bags for $10!

Joe mulched the slope in front of our house after cleaning and raking up the mulch that was there....

While I took everything out of the front flower bed, raked it up and then mulched it!!!

Along with the flower bed under the Living Room window....

I also spray painted the accordion extension for the gutter system and straightened out the border......

MUCH better!!

Amazing what a fresh coat of mulch does....

The following day, we mulched the slope belonging to the house next to our townhouse , as the owner, Trish, gifted us an extremely generous gift card for Christmas in appreciation of helping her get this house ready to rent out by doing landscaping in the front and back....

I did the top flower beds....

Hostas will soon be popping up in this one

And Joe did the slope where more hostas will be popping up soon...

Mine and next door's slopes...

Soon the phlox on my slope will start to bloom....

Since Ed is a great neighbor who is always bringing food down to us, we also freshened up his flower beds and slopes...

Here I am working on the top areas...

I am wearing a pair of old scrub pants of mine which are now too big on me but perfect for work and a tee shirt that I could not fit into for several years...

I only wear tee shirts for doing work...

And Joe did Ed's Slope....

Because we put on a heavy coat of mulch last year when we first landscaped these 2 properties, we only used a mere 6 bags of mulch between the 2 properties!!!

In total, with our front yard, we only used 10 bags of mulch for only $20!!

And what a difference that fresh coat of mulch made!!

MUCH better!!!

I will leave you on this Good Friday, or as one of our former priests always used to say " On a Friday that they call Good"......

With pictures of a sunset from our front porch and the sky at dusk after some rain.....

HAPPY EASTER!!!

I hope you get to spent it with those that you love!!!

And I hope you will stop by to visit again on MONDAY!

Next week, I return to posting twice a week on MONDAYS and FRIDAYS!!

Stay safe, healthy and most of all, HAPPY!!

Thanks to those who took the time out of their busy day to spend a little bit of time with me!!

If you do not have a blog, PLEASE give me some way to reply to your comment, maybe by including your email in your comment. If I can not find a way to reach you, I will reply on the post where you commented so please check back......