Here in the United States, yesterday was Labor Day. Most of us have no idea why Labor Day is a holiday, but we really like that it’s a three-day weekend. For those who are curious, check out the history of Labor Day HERE.
For my part, I spent a lot of time outside with family and friends, and no time doing writerly things. We had a lot of fun and got a lot done. Check it out!
On Monday, my cousin and I took our kids for a ride on my favorite bike trail.




We also babecued and invited over lots of family and friends. We had a full house with about a thousand kids running around with water guns. I didn’t, however, think about taking pictures. You’ll just have to take my word for it when I say we had a lot of fun.
On Sunday, we re-purposed an old bed frame and built a fence out of it. We’re going to plant a grape vine at the end and let it travel along the rails. How cool is that?

Also on Sunday, a friend stopped by with her new baby. Wyatt was in heaven. That boy LOVES babies!

Saturday, Lily and I finished the base of the fort. I ran out of studs, so the project stalled for a few days. Thankfully, Tara brought home some more studs for us on Monday, so we’ll resume our work today!

On Friday (which isn’t technically the weekend, but I’m going to count it anyway), we finished the short fence that will keep the chickens contained in a smaller section of our yard. They are not sure if they like it or not.


While we worked on the fence, the kids prepped for the impending zombie apocalypse.

That’s it for our big weekend. What did y’all do? Anyone read anything good? Write anything (good or otherwise)? Or were you all outside like us?
Our grape vine is climbing up, over, and between the fence planks. I love the repurposed bed frame idea so much better.
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That bed frame is actually half of a bunk bed. I’m extending our retaining wall and I’ll do the same thing on the new part with the other half of the frame. I am super happy with how it turned out!
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LOVE. Your projects just make my whole day feel awesome.
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They make my whole day awesome, too! R.G. promised to come back to Portland for gravy. You should come with her and we can paint a fence together or something. 🙂
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Oh, you people with energy AND chickens. You make me envious.
It doesn’t technically count as the big weekend, but you asked if anyone had read a good book and I recently read “Appalachian Justice” by Melinda Clayton. This despite my abhorrence of characters who speak with an accent or the local dialect (because I can’t get them out of my head) – and interestingly, this author was careful not to over-do that. The story-telling gift is really.evident, keeping this reader engaged through multiple points of view (& not always identifying the owner of the POV by name, but allowing the reader to keep those insights in mind). The events happen over a lifetime and the reader has to pay attention as the story unfolds. I highly recommend this book – and in fact I bought hard copy editions of the next two books in the Cedar Hollow Series. Hope you find the novel as moving and informative and ultimately joyous as I did.
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I’m totally looking it up! Thanks for the recommendation!
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What a wonderful weekend! Must feel good to get so much accomplished! We recently put up a split rail fence across the front and have grapes on it. So pretty. LOVE your bed frame grape trellis!! 🙂
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I had originally planned to do a split rail fence, but I’m really glad I remembered the bed frame! I love re-purposing things. It makes me feel like the planet loves me just a little bit for keeping it out of landfill. I also have an old patio umbrella frame. The fabric part is long gone, but the metal is still good. I’m going to plant some sort of climbing plant and train it to loop around the umbrella part! I think it’ll look awesome. Still trying to decide on the right plant. I like clematis, but Tara like wisteria.
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