From the bench
Season notes
Six short notes on putting our pieces up, keeping them alive through a season and getting them back into a box in one piece.
The order December goes up in
Chair covers before the table is laid, pillow covers before the sofa fills up, lit pieces last because they are the ones tied to a socket.
Christmas decorRead the note
Boxing up autumn without crushing it
Velvet, felt and preserved stems all fail in different ways. Pack them by what they are made of rather than by what shelf they came off.
Fall and ThanksgivingRead the note
Which pieces need a socket
Fifteen of the eighty-eight run on current, and they are not all lights. Here is what the cord changes about where a piece can go.
Anything with a cordRead the note
What we let stand outside
Sixteen pieces are built for open sky, thirty will do either, and forty-two belong under a dry ceiling. The line between them is material, not category.
Out in the openRead the note
Holding weight on a wall
Hooks, brackets and clips fail at the wall far more often than at the metal. What you are screwing into decides what will hold.
Fix and fastenRead the note
Ground cover for a small yard
Barrier fabric, nursery pots and a rolled mat each solve a different problem. Getting them the wrong way round is how a bed ends up worse than it started.
Yard and gardenRead the noteWalk the shelves
Seven rows hold the whole of what we make. Step across to any of them, or answer three questions and let the picker thin them out for you.