Unhinged

I fixed the hinges on both the shed doors as well as the garage side gate this past weekend.

The shed was easy, but it won't last.  I simply pried up the doors and tightened all the hinge screws.  Both of the doors swing freely, but they're just too small for a door that weight.  Perhaps it will last a season, who knows.

The fence gate by the garage was another matter.  The lag bolts holding on the hinge to the 6x6 post were short and fairly well rusted.  Just replacing them tightened everything up and made the gate swing without hitting the path and aligned the latch up again so it works correctly now.  I got some galvanized lag bolts, about 4" long and put them in with the impact wrench.  Not that it was much tighter than by hand, but it saved my hand from putting them in with a ratchet!  Anyway, the gate swings nice and latches securely now.

I noticed a TON of mosquitoes in the front yard.  It's like a swarm out there.  I need to get either some Cyanara or Cykick and spray out there ASAP.  It's bad.  I was hoping to wait until all the shrubs stopped blooming so I didn't kill any bees, but I may not be able to wait that long. 

The rose shrub in the back yard, which looked dead to me, is in full bloom!  It's got hundreds of buds coming too.  I know it needs to be pruned back, but I don't know how to do that.  I've never worked with roses before, but they look great. 

I am done with all the brush burning too.  There's a lot of left over junk out there to be burned, but I cut up some stuff and left it in a nice pile.  If we have recreational fires in the pit the next few weeks, I will burn it.  I'm pretty sure fires will be unpopular once it gets a bit hotter.  I know the wife unit is disappointed we're not using the fire pit we bought, but we have no place to burn it.  We can't burn inside the patio, and we can't put it on the lawn, so really, there's not much we can do with it.  The dug pit in the yard is nice, except there is no real place to sit.  The benches have rotted in the weather.  I wish the benches weren't used as such though because they are two shelves of the built-ins from the living room!  We really could have used those shelves, but they were moldy benches when we moved in.  It's a shame.

The lawn is greening up, and it will have to be mowed this weekend for the first time.  Luckily, we don't have as much sidewalk to edge any more.  While I find tending to the trees and burning brush somewhat relaxing, I detest lawn work.  Luckily, I have a son.  There's a few weeds here and there, but for the most part, the lawn looks really good.  I will hit the weeds with some weed control soon.