Quail Eggs

It's been a month since Dusty passed away. He's been buried next to the kiwi vines. I have hosed the cage with water to make it as clean as possible. I wasn't sure what to do with it. It's a well built cage, so I certainly didn't want it to go to the landfill. I finally decided to post it on Craigslist's free section today. I got the cage from Craigslist nine years ago but paid a small amount of money for it. I was surprised to see this cage is made in Italy!  I don't know exactly how old this cage is, but as we know, almost everything is made in China these days.

It's a very well made cage with two openings, one in the front and one on the side. The bottom panel isn't made of wire, so it's better for the pet's paws or feet. I posted it as "first come, first serve" but someone emailed me a number and requested for a call back. He wanted the cage for his quails and would bring me some fresh quail eggs. That's more than what I expected. It was smart of him to make sure that I still had the cage before driving all the way over from San Pablo. I was happy that someone wanted it for other animals instead of taking it for scrap metal.  I brought the cage back into the driveway and waited for the quail guy to come. I am happy that the cage will be put into good use for many more years to come.

Getting Ready for Warm Days

We had a pretty mild winter this year.  There was hardly any rain although it rained a little today.  It seems summer is arriving early. Our new home gets hot in the back, so I have started getting some patio items out. The cooling orange bed for the dogs. Crucus likes to jump onto it like it's a trampoline. I also put on a clothesline to dry towels and sheets.

A few weeks ago on my way to work, I saw someone put out a green patio chair to give away. I turned around and put it in my car.  After hosing it down, it's my patio chair now.

A few months ago, one of the neighbors on my block was getting rid off a couple patio umbrellas. Other than they are old and used, they are in perfect shape.  I took both of them since there isn't much shade in the yard until all the leaves grow back on the trees. I have been hoping to find a couple umbrella stands on cragislist.com with no avail. I finally had to buy a cheap one from Home Depot.

A few days ago, I found the umbrella with the stand lying on its side when I got home from work. I guess it was too windy. Now I put 2 of my spare kitchen counter tiles on top of the umbrella stand, and it's perfect. Those tiles are very heavy.

Pre Sand Village Days - Paving A Patio With Free Material

When I was pulling weeds yesterday, I thought about how I put together this brick patio all by myself without spending any money other than gas for transporting the free material. It was back in 2009 before I started my vegetable garden. I just wanted an area in the middle of the yard that I could put a patio set as a gathering spot.

I didn't want to spend too much money on the project, so I started looking into "free" section under "for sale" on craigslist.org. I was only interested in picking up free material within 5 miles radius from home. The posting I had been waiting for showed up one Saturday morning. A house up in Kensington was being remodeled, and they had taken down their old fireplace. The bricks from the fireplace were outside of the house free for the taking. I responded to the posting, got the address, and went up to get the bricks. I roughly estimated that I needed at least 400 bricks for the size of my patio.

The bricks were quite heavy, so I made at least 6 trips in two days to upload and unload the bricks. I also picked up some free sand from a house in Berkeley. Before I could lay the bricks down, I had to dig up the weeds. That digging was a back breaking job since the soil was extremely dry and hard. Finally, on April 29, 2009, I start putting the bricks together. I had never put anything together like this before, so I looked up some patterns and methods on the internet. That was all the knowledge I had. Everyday after work I was out there assembling my patio for the next two weeks. Some bricks had mortar attached to them, so I had to either try to knock the mortar off or dig the ground to fit the uneven bricks.

As I was finishing up the patio, I picked up a free patio table with 2 chairs in Albany. The table was small enough to fit into the back of my PT Cruiser. I put 3 coats of paint on the table. I also picked up a free patio umbrella from a nice elderly woman in El Cerrito Hills. The woman explained to me that the squirrels had chewed up the fabric at a few spots; other than that, it was a really nice umbrella. I didn't mind the holes. I could sew them up easily. That was a much easier job than paving the bricks!

So, this is how I got my patio. About a month after its completion, I hosted my first BBQ in the garden to celebrate my cousin's going off to college.

Little cousin was leaving for UC Riverside