A Rose by Any Other Color

This is one of the phoenix roses.  It has red blooms.

Below is a picture of the house when we looked at it, before the previous owner dug up all the roses.

Phoenix is to the left of the porch stairs.  Kind of hard to see, but it bloomed white back then.  All of the roses bloomed white or yellow or lavender back then.

BUT, after the owner dug them out and they grew back and we transplanted them in front of the fence, they all started blooming red.

I'm wondering if this is because the roses had been grafted and the root stock was for red roses.

Anyone more experienced than me have an answer?

A Very Unscientific Experiment

We're having sticker shock over the cost of the electrical for the basement.

First, the electrician's bid came in at almost TWICE what it cost to rewire the whole house and upgrade the panel two years ago.  That doesn't include fixtures.

Second, we want LED lights and the fixtures that give off the warm yellow light we like cost $300.  Our lighting plan calls for 25 of them.  Ouch!

Right now we are using a Philips EnduraLED bulb with a standard base.  It gives off the light we like and, at $25, the price is right.

To see if we liked the way it looked recessed, we took a six inch flower pot, covered it with aluminum foil to simulate the reflective surface of a recessed can and turned out all the lights in the living room.  It gave off a very nice light with a 6 foot radius where the light was strong enough to read by.

Now I just need to figure out some way to simulate a lens covering the bulb.  If we like how that looks, we've cut our fixture cost by over 80%!

I Married MacGyver

 We got a few recommendations for epoxy for our lock and J-B Weld topped everyone's list.

We took pictures of the inside of the lock before Rob took it apart.  The first attempt at gluing failed because there was nothing holding the two pieces together besides the epoxy.  Rob set an x-acto knife blade inside the lock and glued the two pieces to that.  Big improvement, but still not super secure.

After scavenging around in the basement he found another thin piece of metal that he wrapped around the outside of the mortise and cold welded in place.

Seems pretty sturdy, but the moment of truth will be when they put it in the door...

Stained!

The basement doors have been stained the same cherry as the windows and finished with the same clear coat.

Ultimately the doors will be trimmed with the same yellow as our windows, but our number one priority is getting the locks installed. 

The door manufacturer prepped the doors for an antique lock.  Somehow, a chip came off the mortise and the latch won't stay in place.  The first glue we tried wasn't strong enough, so we are on the hunt for a stronger epoxy.

Fingers crossed!