How do you have an in-law live with you and keep your sanity?
mom2emall
15 years ago
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stargazzer
15 years agolast modified: 9 years agomom2emall
15 years agolast modified: 9 years agoRelated Discussions
How do you keep your animals safe?
Comments (16)What would I do? What have I done? All of it. Not only have I walked onto the neighbors dogs on a rampage trying to get at my llamas (thank god for strong fences) they then turned on me and I had to make a weapon out of anything I could grab. I have found tom cats killing my cat's kittens inside my house after they tore off the screen in the window to get in. I have beaten raccoons in the head with an extra large flashlight with all of my 200+ lbs while they were trying desperately to get into a bird cage where I had a breeding pair of cockatiels - only to have them hiss and walk away, and I mean I hit them hard over and over. You won't win. The only thing to do is build a super strong fortress around your place and only let your animals out when you can defend them. At one time I had many large coops for show poultry as well as the llamas and some sheep. I could only afford to build super strong pens for some of them. It took a lot of management, I had to spend a lot of time shuttling animals from secure pens to pasture. It was a big pain - but after building the fortress I never lost another animal, I never had to poison or trap anything, I never had to shoot anything, I never had to confront another neighbor over what their dogs were doing on my property. My animals adapted to the routine and it made living in the country much more peaceful and not a war zone. At the time I didn't have a dog and I was amazed at my neighbors behavior. We would have neighborhood meetings to discuss problems and I would loudly announce that the best thing about the fourth of July was that hot dog weiners and antifreeze were both on sale and that I wasn't going to waste my bullets teaching their dogs manners. I never poisoned anything but you would think these people would realize the problems they were causing. Nothing worked. I eventually moved away and now years later I have once again moved out in the country. Everybody that visits asks when I am going to get livestock again - they miss the llamas and the sheep and the chickens. I don't plan on getting anything until I build a fortress around the whole place, strong enough to keep my stuff in and their stuff out. You need strong fences if you want to run guardian dogs - sometimes they mistake a jogger or someone walking the road as a threat and they slip through the fence to bite the intruder. You'll have another problem if your dog kills someone on a public street....See MoreDo you have room to keep your finds?
Comments (22)Welcome to all my relatives. I live in a small 4 room house. DH has one bedroom for his office, stuff,& twin bed on boxes. Mine has my huge computer desk, and no floor space to put anything of any size. My cat sleeps by my electric radiator heater. I have long plastic storage boxes under my bed, a small four drawer unit in my closet, & am hiding a new gardening book that I paid #30 for & that was 1/2 price, an extra shelf hung on the closet door piled high and underhung w/ clothes. Storage container under my "puter desk. A bench at the foot of my bed piled high w/ papers & books, also on my bed that rotates from my desk chair to bed day/night. And the list goes on. My living room is called a ware house by one son, but it is oxygen blessed w/ way of the many house plants and I want more. My kitchen has 2 aero gardens hung on the wall, plants on all windosw sills, DH put 2 extra shelves on 2 windows. I use plastic shelving units because the kitche is bereft of adequate cabinets. DH built shelving down the basement stairs for pantry & it is maxed out w/ food. Oh yes, the bathroom is a postage stamp size room for one person unless one is in the tub. The steps are over populated w/ stuff also. The bottom of the steps received a shelf unit yesterday that is not full yet. The window has 2 plastic crates w/ a box on top for storeage, w/ 2 6" pots of onion sets on top w/ 8 noses up to get the afternoon sun. 2 rose bushes live there and the garlic pot went outside 2 days ago. I finally brought up the last 5 amaryllis buulbs from the basemnt yesterday, cleaned out the pots, cut off the roots and repotted them w/ fresh dirt that lives outside the back door on the walk w/ 2 other bags of potting amendments. My basement is a vertiable warehouse of food, dishes, laundry machines, storage storage, junk, empty boxes, exercise equipment that we threaten to use some day. My DH keeps paint cans, et all in one corner........ His garage is worse, no car has been in the 2 car building since we moved here 3 years ago. Sunday he hauled out an oil tank to make room for shelf units so he could unload tools etc. from his car plus the stuff he brought home from his mothers, she is moving into assisted living... He put up a canopy for his car, and it only fits 2/4 way under it now because of the stuff he hauled home, & I stacked there. Being a handy mand he has all kinds of advantages to adopt other peoples cast offs that might be usefull someday. Not to mention what is lined up against and behind the garage, including the suburban he got 25 plus years ago, along w/ the other 2 suburbans that live in the front of the garage along w/ my buick and the 23 foot trailor we hauled to Oregon and back 17 yeass ago, overloaded and had to stop to put stuff in a storage unit that we retrieved coming back a year later, & only 1/2 of it came back... and it is full too.....another trailor lives on daughters property, full of goodies, like a small pot belly stove I want to use for a plant stand someday, and my 30 year old Mother Earth magazines. Hoarding is an addiction according to an article in Readers Digest last month. If/when I move to my won home I will have a gigantic "curb sale" Not to mention all the 70 plus pots of flowering plants in the yard. When I get my own home they go w/ & some that will get dug up too. 3 violet leaves I propagated produced 13 babies & I put the original leaves back in water. YUP I belong to this family... Vangy love to play in the dirt & in the kitchen w/ food....See Morewhat do you keep in your linen closet...& how do you organize it?
Comments (31)You could actually do a couple different things. You could have one rod and use hangers. You would have to fold them a bit to fit on the hanger and not drag on the floor, but that's usually how they come from the cleaners. For heavy cloths, use two hangers together for added strength. You could also hang multiple rods at slightly different heights and depths. If you have a walk in closet this works great, but will still work with a reach in. Hang the highest rod the farthest back, then one a bit lower and closer and even a third lower and closer than the second. Then you can hang the cloths right on the rod instead of on a hanger. I like the rod because of it's larger diameter it doesn't leave creases in the cloths. You can also overlap them on these rods. For optimum use of space, you'd need to use multiple rods and overlap. Is that totally confusing?!...See MoreHow do you keep the peace when you and SO have different opinions
Comments (51)This is an entertaining thread. I've read all the way through, and realize that dh and I are extremely fortunate in that our tastes coincide on so many levels, and he's very agreeable after I spend hours researching agonizing over selections. What I have learned though, after we built a home 10 years ago, is that it all needs to be done at the outset. Because after the initial construction is finished he is extremely resistant to more construction mess. I had FREE labor offering to help me finish my sewing studio - no go. And the backsplash that we were going to finish after we moved in and lived with a kitchen for awhile - never happened. We sold the house 7 years later, and it was still ABB. So this house, my studio has been an integral part of the plan, AND I just found my perfect backsplash. I can't join the ABB club, or I will forever be without a backsplash. It's all just knowing your own particular dynamic. I'm agonizing right now over which sink to put into the kitchen. I've asked his opinion - he said "get whatever you want" We've gone over our plans with a fine tooth comb in the last week, and I found a few places where we could change selections or leave off, and he pretty much added everything back in....See Morecearbhaill (zone 6b Eastern Kentucky)
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