Restoration of Swedish Woodstove

   How is this for instant gratification? We bought this Handöl wood stove in bad condition and I spent some time (quite a bit actually) cleaning, polishing, welding, resealing, and reassembling this little classic. It is made of a cast iron frame that holds together many pieces of soapstone and cast iron ports (ash clean out, stoking door, and exhaust port out the back of the stove).

Border Dispute

 We have dogs. Our dogs like to lay in cool soft spots. Our dogs like to hangout near us when we work. When we work in the garden this tends to be the flower beds and that is not good. What to do?
Quick cheap fencing made in China. Nope. We didn't even have to leave the house to solve this one!

  With all of the banches and trees that have been cut back we chose to weave planter borders. It keeps the dogs seperate from the flowers and saves us a trip to the store and looks better than we could hope for.