Just a girl with a hammer

  • Water heater safety

    Water heater safety

    I was recently watching Ask This Old House and they did a segment on water heater safety. Because water expands as it heats, your tank is essentially a pressured tank that can explode if there aren’t safety measures in place. One of the safety measures on all tanks is the Temperature and Pressure (T&P) valve. If the tank gets above 210 degrees the T&P valve will release steam from the pipe that runs down the side of your water heater to lower the pressure. If you see water around the pipe or witness steam coming from the pipe, it’s time to have your T&P valve replaced and your water heater serviced.

    Where it becomes dangerous is when people see that the pipe is leaking and put a cap on it. This turns your water heater into a bomb. In the This Old House segment (skip to the 10:00 mark) they show a house where someone had capped their T&P valve and it blew up, landing three blocks away and demolishing their house. Mythbusters later proved this by capping a water heater T&P valve and letting it overheat:

    So, PSA time: don’t ever cap the pipe you see on the side of your water heater. If you’re seeing water from the pipe, have your water heater serviced.

    Last week I noticed water around the water heater and surmised that it came from the T&P valve on my heater. I knew that I could replace the valve myself but I was worried about WHY our water heater was getting so hot, so I called American Plumbing Services. Because I’m about a mile and half from them, he offered to charge me by the quarter hour, instead of their usual base rate of 1 hour. My total cost was $51, which was totally worth it. I had a Thanksgiving dinner to plan! I highly recommend APS, if you’re in the Portland area. They were fantastic.

    They replaced the valve and said to call them if it starts releasing water again, because that could mean our thermostat is going bad and letting the water get too hot. This is another reason not to crank your water heater beyond 120 degrees.

    So go check your water heater, make sure the T&P valve isn’t capped, and then maybe flush your water heater of sediment while you’re there. It takes about two minutes and you’ll extend the life of your appliance.

  • Entryway, take two

    Entryway, take two

    A year ago, right before Thanksgiving, I decided to paint our entryway. The color didn’t turn out quite like it was supposed to but we lived with it. 
    So shiny! So blue!
    When I consulted with Anna to pick a paint color for the dining room she noticed that we have a lot of mid-range brown furniture and suggested French Press by Benjamin Moore for the entryway. 
    The color has really grown on me but initially both Greg and I missed having blue in here. How silly is that? I really like mixing brown and black but Greg isn’t a fan of the black doors with this color. 

    I’m really, really, really over gallery walls (I blame Pinterest) but I still like them in very small spaces. I’d love to cover every inch of our bathroom in artwork . . . too bad humidity is so bad for it. I crammed all the spare artwork I could find to juj it up in here.

    Greg was teasing that some day someone else will own this house and they’ll see all the layers of paint and think they were applied over a 60 year period when in reality it was over three. For now I think this is staying. I finally admitted that our baseboards are so layered in paint that I can’t freehand a straight line and used Frog Tape. Holy shit, that stuff actually works!
    I’m thinking a more colorful rug will make me fall in love with this entryway. Any opinions?
  • The Garden Island

    The Garden Island

    The weather sucks in Portland right now. Let’s visit somewhere warmer. To the Kauai vacations photos!
    Photo by Greg
    Photo by Greg

    We had a wonderful time in Kauai, despite a couple of hiccups. It rained off and on the whole time, which made us panic that we were going to have another experience like we did in Oahu. About halfway through our trip we got word that one of Greg’s team members, who was only 53, passed away. We had a pretty sad three days processing that and it was hard to feel okay enjoying a tropical vacation. But if there’s a better place to be sad than the ocean, I’m not sure where it is.

    It helps that we stayed in Koloa, where you can see sea turtles frequently. We got to swim five feet from them while we were snorkeling. Another time we were floating aimlessly on boogie boards and one popped up right next to me. They are gorgeous animals.

    Not a sea turtle (red-crested cardinal)

    We visited Hanalei town, which was a wonderful little town.

    Waimea Canyon was foggy but it was still beautiful.

    By the time we got to one of the best viewpoints, it was so foggy that you couldn’t see the canyon at all. It happens to be one the wettest spots on earth, receiving an average of almost 374 inches of rain per year.

    We visited blowholes. We were underwhelmed.

    We drank wine and contemplated on the beach.

    We visited Ke’e beach, which sits at the base of Bali Ha’i. The waves were huge that day, as we were getting a lot of rough surf from Typhoon Haiyan.

    We visited Opaeka’a Falls and it was pouring so hard that we snapped this photo and ran back to the car. There were flash flood warnings that day.

    We drank a lot of maitais.

    We admired the plumeria and chenille plant that surrounded our condo.

    I still think I like Maui a smidge more but Kauai gets two thumbs up. And I thought its sunsets were better than Maui’s.

    Stay warm, Portlanders! Maitais help.

  • A visit to the Limahuli Garden

    A visit to the Limahuli Garden

    Toward the end of our trip we headed to the north end of the island and took the highway as far as it goes, to one end of the Na Pali Coast. The Limahuli Valley was one of the first inhabited areas of the Hawaiian islands and it has been established as a National Tropical Botanical Garden (other gardens I’ve toured include McBryde and Kahanu).

    “Set in a narrow valley framed by soaring cliffs, Limahuli Garden and Preserve evokes the history of Kaua`i, and of the Hawaiian Islands. Born of volcanoes and isolated by thousands of miles of ocean from the rest of the world, those few species of plants, animals, and insects that arrived on these remote and barren shores had millions of years to evolve into unique forms found nowhere else on Earth.” [Source]

    The terraces at Limahuli Garden were built 700 years ago and incorporate canals that carefully divert water from a stream to water the crops of taro grown here.

    Taro
    Hawaiian kava (Piper methysticum)
    Song of India (Dracaena reflexa)
    Indian mulberry (Morinda citrifolia)
    Hibiscus rosa-sinensis

    This is my color! I love it!

    Dwarf poinciana (Caesalpinia pulcherrima)
    Croton (Codiaeum variegatum)
    Unlabeled, I think it’s a Pandanus
    Unlabeled

    Ornamental ti (Cordyline fructicosa)
    Swiss cheese plant (Monstera deliciosa)
    Cape plumbago (Plumbago auriculata)
    Sweet sop, custard apple (Annona squamosa)
    Laua’e (Microsorum grossum)

    Makou, a celery relative that is endemic to the Hawaiian islands (Peucedanum sandwicense)
    Soil not necessary
    Hau (Rauvolfia sandwicensis)
    Rasp fern (Sadleria cyatheoides)
    I’i (Dryopteris fusco-atra)
    Palapalai (Microlepia strigosa)
    Hawane, endemic to Kauai (Pritchardia limahuliensis)
    Akia (Wikstroemia uva-ursi)

    Strawberry guava (Psidium cattleianum), pretty but invasive

    Pandanus tectorius (I think)
    Breadfruit (Artocarpus altilis)
    Dwarf ‘iliau (Wilkesia hobdyi)

    The finest sign ever.
    Brighamia insignis (endemic)

    If you’re ever on Kauai I really recommend this garden. It’s beautiful and it’s stuffed with incredibly rare plants that you won’t see anywhere else in the world.

  • A visit to the McBryde Garden

    A visit to the McBryde Garden

    While we were in Kauai we got quite a bit of rain, so we didn’t get to hit as many gardens as we wanted. One that we were able to visit was the McBryde Garden, one of five National Tropical Botanical Gardens. 

    “The National Tropical Botanical Garden (NTBG) is a not-for-profit institution, dedicated to discovering, saving, and studying the world’s tropical plants and to sharing what is learned.” 

    The National Tropical Botanical Gardens have plants that are found nowhere else in the world. We previously visited the Kahanu Garden on Maui, one of the NTBGs.
    The McBryde Garden:

    “. . . has become a veritable botanical ark of tropical flora. It is home to the largest ex situ collection of native Hawaiian flora in existence, extensive plantings of palms, flowering trees, Rubiaceae, heliconias, orchids, and many other plants that have been wild-collected from the tropical regions of the world. NTBG’s Conservation Program is based at this site and the Garden contains a state-of-the-art horticulture and micropropagation facility.”

    It’s huge and it’s beautiful. My only complaint was that signage wasn’t always perfect, so some plants weren’t labeled. Let’s hit it.

    Sugar cane (Saccharum officinarum)

    Ricinus communis is found all over Kauai. It escaped cultivation but has not yet been labeled a noxious weed.

    I love the canopy of this tree.

    Ruffle palm, Aiphanes minima

    These palms weren’t labeled but I think they are cabbage palms, Clinostigma savoryanum, and they had the most beautiful blue trunks.

    This was one of my favorite plants, sadly unlabeled.

    The enormous glossy leaves had the coolest striations in them.

    Pittosporum halophilum

    Hibiscus
    Geckos were everywhere
    St. Thomas Bean (Entada phaseoloides)
    This enormous vine was completely entwined in a monkeypod tree.

    The McBryde Garden has an extensive spice garden, which includes a collection of coffee trees.

    Coffea arabica

    Areca palm (Dypsis lutescens)

    I’ve tried finding an areca palm because it’s one of the best houseplants for cleaning indoor air.

    Chao muang trang palm (Licuala peltata var. sumawongii)

    I want one of these. I want to take naps and have picnics under it.

    Portlandia platantha, a gorgeous member of the coffee family

    Indian shot (Canna tuerckheimii)

    This was one of my very favorites, Ficus dammaropsis.

    The enormous leaves had the most wonderful texture.

    And those blooms! The purple veining! Oh my god.

    I hope these pictures don’t make the impending sn*w they are predicting for the Portland area any worse. I know I wish I was still in Kauai. Maybe with a maitai.

  • When tans go bad

    When tans go bad

    I returned from Kauai a little (not a lot) tanner and found that some of my plants were tanner as well.

    Even though temperatures were dipping into the thirties, my cannas were still blooming.

    Then the temperature dropped below freezing and my poor cannas and Echium candicans ‘Star of Madeira’ turned my front garden into a swath of brown.

    Luckily my Mahonia x media ‘Arthur Menzies’ has recently erupted in blooms.

    And my Geranium ‘Rozanne’ is completely unfazed by the temperatures.

    And my Clematis jackmanii just put out a new bloom! Thank you Laurrie, for suggesting this one.

    And my Fatsia japonica is doing its wonderful Sputniky thing.

    Thank goodness for these late season blooms. I’m itching to get back in the garden but this cold dry weather is making it hard (I feel like a mummy!). Better to enjoy the blooms from inside the house.

    Have a happy thanksgiving, all you turkeys!

  • Aloha!

    Aloha!

    Greg and I just returned from ten days on Kauai and we’re slowly adjusting to a cruel lack of sunshine, maitais, and the gentle smell of plumeria on the air. It’s cold and rainy in Portland. 
    I gave in at the airport and bought this tree fern (Cibotium splendens) and popped it in a weirdly wonderful pot I found at Digs.

    I think it looks like the Grinch without his hat on. I’ve set it up in the bathroom where it should get the humidity it likes. Anybody have any luck growing one of these?

    I’ll be back online with garden tours soon!

  • Fall color I’m digging

    Fall color I’m digging

    This spring I went on the hunt for Fothergilla gardenii ‘Jane Platt,’ which was rumored to have the nicest fall color of all the fothergillas. She did not disappoint.

    A few weeks ago some of the leaves starting changing, turning a screaming red at the tips.

    Now it looks like this.

    WHAT. Some of the green is deepening to a dusky purple that looks so nice with the hot carmine leaves.

    I love! I read somewhere on the internet that its color can vary from year to year, though I can’t find where anymore.

    This spring I kept looking for ‘Jane Platt‘ and finding only Fothergilla x intermedia ‘Blue Shadow,’ which has the most beautiful blue foliage. I am definitely making room for one of these next. Even if the fall show is half as good as Jane Platt I’ll be happy.

    Image source: Rick’s Custom Nursery

    I bought my Jane Platt from Gossler Farms Nursery, if you feel the need to add one to your garden.

    I’m also deeply in love with my Spiraea japonica ‘Magic Carpet.’ In spring it is the most wonderful zinging chartreuse.

    It mellows a bit in summer.

    And then in the fall it turns every color imaginable.

    I hesitated to add this shrub to my garden because it’s used so widely in grocery store parking lots here. It’s really tough and can take a lot of abuse, though it tends to get sheared into unsightly blobs by landscapers. I will never understand the need by landscaping crews to shear everything into blobs. I know it’s fast and easy but it looks terrible.

    When I am dictator people will prune with hand pruners until they’ve been deemed worthy of using tools of mass uglification like hedge trimmers. Anyway. I’m glad I added it to my garden because the color is totally doing it for me.

    I just picked up another spirea for the front garden at Xera Plants recently: Spiraea betulifolia var. lucida. I waited until it lost almost all of its leaves to get my act together to take a picture, so this doesn’t really show off the kaleidoscope of colors this native boasts. It’s stunning.

    One of my Epimedium ‘Black Sea’ went rogue and turned completely red.

    . . . While the others look like this. If I could get them all to spread out, bulk up, and turn that blazing red color next to the Hakonechloa grass, I’d be the happiest of campers.

    You know what else would make me happy? If I could go back in time and not buy this Sedum cauticola ‘Lidakense’, AKA “Clown whore sedum.”

    (Shudder.)

  • Rules I have flouted, grasses I have loved

    Rules I have flouted, grasses I have loved

    If there are two things I should’ve learned by now, they would include:

    1. Short plants go in front and tall plants go in the back.
    2. Read the plant tags (and then count on them getting bigger).

    When I asked Scott to help me design my meadow he gave me these really great plant lists and three different planting schemes but I went sort of off-script and then I forgot about the two bullet points above. I planted little bluestem grasses (Schizachyrium scoparium ‘Blue Heaven’) right in the front of the meadow, thinking they’d stay two feet tall even though the tag clearly said they’d get four feet tall (and because this is Portland they’ll probably grow to six).

    So while the grasses were beautiful, they were obscuring the lovely fountaining of the Pennisetum ‘Redhead’ just behind them and generally looking inappropriate for front and center placement. And they were straight up hiding the Panicum ‘Shenandoah.’ They’re in there, I swear.

    So I relocated them to the back of the meadow. I’m hoping they’ll continue to bulk up and I’ll get a nice color block there. Even with their smaller stature I’m enjoying them in their new location.

    And now Pennisetum ‘Redhead’ can really strut her stuff.

    It’s hard to tell, but there’s a ribbon of Sedum ‘Matrona’ along the front of the bed. Hopefully that will bulk up next summer, too.

    I am a little concerned that the little bluestems won’t get enough sun next summer at the back of the bed. “Right plant, right place” has also been a hard one to learn. What other rules of thumb can I ignore next? Plant in groups of odd numbers, work the diagonals, never wake a sleep walker . . . what else?

    Of course, all I can see when I’m in the front garden is Muhlenbergia rigens. I am so head over heels for this grass right now.

    After its brief foray into bondage with the insulation installation, I decided to move it toward the front door. Greg didn’t like the way it reached out and tickled him when he’d walk up the driveway (it’s kinky, what can I say).

    Because I’m a dick I moved it right in front of the outside faucet (M. rigens up! your! nose! every time you turn on the hose!). This grass can tolerate a lot of manhandling (especially after the bondage) so it will still look nice even if I drag the hose over it again and again. Or step on it to get to the faucet.

    I’ve thought about getting bee hives but who knows what it would do with the hot wax?

  • It’s mushroom season!

    It’s mushroom season!

    Ask me how I know.

    Our wood chip pathway has gotten totally overrun with them.

    The six inches of rain we got in September has turned our backyard into a terrifying fungal lab experiment. If only they were edible! “Do you like your lasagna? We harvested the mushrooms from under the Sedum ‘Autumn Joy.’ The mushrooms in the salad came from the walkway.” Ick.