Build Something New: Compost Bin

Spoiler Alert: My learn something new for year 32 was learning to garden (which I will post on shortly!), but ever since we got the garden project started I've really, really wanted to have a compost bin with the wiggly little worms inside.  This weekend, I finally got everything together to create a compost bin for the shed on my back porch.  Here's what happened.

Today when I got home from running errands, this box had landed at my front porch.  I had a love/hate thing going with this box because I was very excited about this project, but also, it was a box of worms.  Gross. Vomit.

I gingerly picked it and carried it around to the back porch.  The errands I was running included a trip to Target for a big Rubbermaid bin and then to Home Depot for some bricks to elevate the bin once it was finished.  Here are the initial supplies as I prepare to get started.

The first step is to poke airholes in the bin for circulation and so that the worms can breath.  I did about 20 on the top and then about 20 around the sides.

I just used a screwdriver and it was pretty easy to pop it through to get the holes.  I also popped 2 holes on the bottom of one of the narrow sides to serve as a drain for composting juice (eww).

The next step was to make some bedding for the little worms.  I went the cardboard route.  I just ripped up an old packing box.  At first I was cutting it, but that was killing my hand.  And ripping it gave each piece a little more texture which creates a fluffier (more circulation) bed.

Next I found some leaves from the back porch to add.  Not required, just an option since I needed to sweep the back porch anyway.

Then, I added one scoop of dirt.  You don't want a lot of dirt (according to blogs/videos online), but a little helps with the little wormy digestion.

Next up is scrap food.  Basically just a vegetarian diet with some paper product supplements.  I had some fruits and vegetables that were about to go bad or were scraps.  I did add a little citrus (part of a lime in the fridge), but you don't want to use too much citrus/onions.  Also, only a small amount of carbs.  So I didn't add the leftover rice from the fridge.  I'll wait until my worm colony is more established to add things like that.  I did have a toilet paper roll and some paper towels that I added.

I added a little more ripped up cardboard in between layers of food.  This was recommended on one demo although my friend's that I'm basing mine on didn't have that.

Next it's time to add the worms.  Apparently, it's recommended that you let the compost bin sit as is (all prepared) for 1-2 before adding the worms to create a better environment, but you don't have to and since my worms had already arrived, I needed to do something with them before they died.

  

So I'm dumped them in.

They came in a lot of dirt.  The demo I watched said to only use a little dirt, but I wasn't about to go picking out 1000 red wrigglers from this pile of dirt, so I'm just going to have a fair amount of dirt in my compost bin to start with.  They'll have great digestion.

I let them sit out in the sun for awhile so that they would move around.  They don't like light and dig away from it, so this got them moving and hopefully they started heading down to start chomping on my leftovers.

I added one more layer of "bedding" to the top. My friend had used paper shred for hers, but I still had half a box so I just used that.  I made the pieces bigger so they'd be easier to move when I need to add more fruits & veggies to the bin.  This part isn't for composting so much as it is just for cover and insulation.

Here's my bin all tucked away in the shed.  I need to add little bowls to the front to collect the juice that trickles out (gag), but other than that, it's ready to go!

Learn Something New: Knitting Project

Every year I try to learn a new skill (for all of two years in a row now).  Two years ago it was knitting. Last year is was gardening (posts still to come on that).  And this year is TBD (two options, just trying to narrow it down - one is more expensive and one is more absolutely terrifying).  In addition to learning a new skill, I also try to brush up on the previous ones.  One of my goals this year was to try some new knitting projects because I really could just endlessly knit scarves (why do something new where you actually have to pay attention to the knitting project instead of Castle?).  Anyway, a good friend commissioned a tea cosy from me and it seemed like the perfect opportunity for a new knitting project!!

First I researched all kinds of tea cosies to see how hard they were to make and what kinds I could reasonably do.  Ravelry.com was very helpful in this regard.  Next, I asked my friend to tell me what kind of tea cosy she wanted (Harry Potter themed).  And then we looked together at the pot and determined how we could combine what she wanted with what I could reasonably do.  

Then, I consulted an experienced knitter about designing my own pattern for this (new thing!) and then I learned how to add and drop stitches to create a rounded effect to expand and contract along the edge of the tea pot (new thing!) and THEN I learned how to stripe my yarn (so many new things!).  I had to do all kinds of measurements and then create a test patch and then wash it so that it would felt (shrink up and get really tight) and then convert that into how many stitches I would need in each row.  This involved math which I try to avoid outside of work (because in case I haven't mentioned it, my job involves so much math that nobody told me about beforehand so I use up my math quota at work and have none left for real life) but I was getting paid for this so I guess it safely falls under the "work" label.  

I knitted and knitted (all of the above took like two months to get together - maybe because I couldn't watch Castle while I was doing it - so blogging isn't the only thing I'm slack at) and then found some Harry Potter-esque buttons and voila - this is the result!!

I think Hermione and the members of SPEW would be proud. :)

Shopping Experiment Update

Earlier this month I posted that I was daring myself not to buy any new clothes for the entirety of 2012.  See post here. New clothes means brand new from stores; second-hand shopping is still quite acceptable.  I'm just going to give a brief update on what I've learned in the first month.

1. I don't really miss it all that much.  Of course, it's only been a month, and the month right after Christmas and during my birthday (not that I received many clothing items then), but maybe I've been pleasantly distracted from wanting new clothes because I did receive other new things (toaster oven! new bedding!)

2. I think it's worked out pretty good financially.  I definitely didn't realize how much was disappearing in little ways here and there from month to month last year.  Things didn't seem quite so tight at the end of the month this time, right before payday (yes, I only get paid once/month, I've actually only ever had jobs that pay once a month as an adult, I'd have no idea what to do with that whole bi-monthly business, yes, this is quite the tangent).  It'll be interesting to see if that repeats from month to month.

3. Last weekend a friend called up wanting to go shopping on Saturday evening.  I can't buy anything, but sure (actually, shoes & accessories are still possible buying items).  One of the things I realized while thoroughly perusing the racks (all that extra time with nothing to try on) was that I don't actually spend very much time thinking through clothes purchases at all.  I was in a store that I used to frequently buy things in and the longer I was there, the more I thought that the clothes were kind of cheaply made.  I had the time to notice since I wasn't so distracted by price and fit.  Also, I could pay more attention to style, what people are actually wearing (or being told that they're supposed to wear).  I'm hoping this year will make me a more thoughtful shopper when I do return to the world of clothes-buying.

4. Finally, I realized that the things I saw which did catch my eye would like much, much cuter in a smaller size (this involves other goals related to health and exercise that I haven't published for the world to see.  yet.) Having the freedom not to buy clothes actually reinforced the other goals that I'm working towards in my life.  It might just be working!  Can self-control be contagiously spilling to other facets for life?

That's the update on the Double Dog Dare of 2012.  In February, I've already set up a weekend of thrift-storing with a friend, so I'm looking forward to what I'll discover with that - discoveries both about myself and for my closet.  

Learn Something New: Glass Fusing

Eventually, I'll get around to blogging about the my official "learn something new" for this year, but in the meantime, I'm going to share about a "mini" one that came along.  One side effect of intentionally trying to learn something new every year has been a great willingness to make a fool of myself put myself out there when other new opportunities come along.  Take a painting class?  Sure.  Try something potentially hazardous sounding like glass fusing?  Why not?  So here's the glass fusing story -

A friend at work (of Bumble Bee cake ball fame) organized a group of us to go glass fusing.  It was at one of those paint some pottery places.  You can make all kinds of really cool things with glass fusing - bowls, plates, jewelry, decorative wall stuff.  As Christmas was coming up, I opted for a Christmas tree ornament. This was a pretty basic way to go as it didn't involve very much measuring or breaking glass ourselves.  They give you a triangle shape and you decorate it.

Ok, so I can't figure out how to rotate this picture, but we started with a base, a green (sparkle!) triangle, and then I added fettucini glass to make my strings of lights.  And I added a special piece of fancy glass to the top for a sparkly star.  Initially, you just work on placing everything where you want it to go and then later on your glue it down before it goes in the kiln.

There were lots of pieces of glass that were already broken that I looked through initially for my lights and decorations. And then, if I didn't find what I was looking for, I could break the noodles or rods of colored glass to the shapes that I wanted.

Next, I used tweezers to place the little ornaments where I wanted them to go on the tree.

Here's my tree!!  The colors here are very distinctly yellow for the lights (I straightened up that bottom one) and orange, but after being fired they kind of ended up the same color.  That was a little disappointing.

But all in all, I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.  You can see where I added a little trunk at the bottom. And the star at the top actually has a little gap in it so that you can put a wire hook through it.

I took a quick picture of it on the tree, although I haven't left it up there permanently yet.  The cats still haven't been convinced that the tree and ornaments aren't a giant play toy for them.  I think my $22 hand-made ornament will be safer on an ornament stand for the time being.  It is a bit of a pricey activity, but I opted for the larger tree, sparkle glass, and a fancy piece of glass for my star (that's a $2 star!), so my choices led to several up-charges.  You can make smaller ones for $8-12 or so.

Here's most of our group at our Creative Clayhouse.  You can see Kris (in orange) has a square piece, that will end up being "draped" over a mold and as it's fired it will melt into the shape of a plate with slightly raised edges.  Pretty cool!!

And Cheryl made an awesome snow flake where she did a lot of the glass cutting/breaking herself.  It turned out great!!!

Learn Something New: A Philosophy for My 30s

My 20s probably could have been titled "Do Something Kinda Crazy That Maybe You Didn't Think Through All the Way".  This involved lots of interesting decisions with vehicles (riding on top of them, hitchhiking with truckers, accepting rides in vans from strangers in foreign countries), religions (that whole accidental cult thing), clothing (on top of that waterfall in Thailand, that prison in Venezuela), and education (2 MAs.  Really?).

As I reached the end of my twenties, I began to realize that
1. I was unlikely to keep making these decisions that resulted in totally cool stories (some of the above will be forthcoming in future posts) because many were, ah, kind of dumb
2. There was lots of stuff that I still really wanted to learn how to do

So, I decided that my philosophy for my 30s would be "Learn a New Thing Each Year."  Each year of my 30s I choose one thing that I've kind of always wanted to learn how to do and I make a conscious effort to learn it.

The year I turned 30 it was move back home to America and get a full time desk job and learn how to be a normal grown up person.  That wasn't so exciting, but kind of necessary.

Year 31 was learn to knit.  All through my 20s I'd be hanging out with cool friends who would knit during movies. How cool was that?!?!  You could watch a movie and do something productive at the same time (and be hipster cool before hipster cool was even a thing)!  Knitting worked way better for this than my previous main hobby: reading.

When a knitting friend was visiting, I coerced her into a trip to Michaels and a quick beginner lesson in knitting.  My first scarf looked horrid.  But I totally love it!  It gets skinnier and then thicker and has some holes in it where I dropped stitches.  And I totally did the major knitting no-no and (gasp!) tied my yarn together when I ran out.  Also, I had no idea how to actually end the whole knitting process and get it off the needles.  Thank goodness for youtube videos.

My scarf definitely looks like a 3rd grader made it, but I love it because that's exactly what it's supposed to look like.  The very first time you try something, it's not supposed to be perfect, and I think that's something I lost track of as an adult.  I only liked to do things that I knew I would perform reasonably well at.  My first knitting experience was so awkward - how on earth do you hold your fingers like this?  And the yarn goes where?  But over a year (and a knitting group at church later), those finger movements come automatically.  It was weird and awkward getting started, but I've come to realize that you've just gotta embrace the awkwardness.  It all felt strange and uncomfortable at the beginning and I totally sucked at it, but the pay-off - totally worth it.

Here's my very first scarf!!  With a close-up of that bedraggled uneven looking part. :)

Stay tuned for an upcoming post on this year's "Learn Something New" Project.   What's something new that you're learning??