Rivet Gun 101

 I picked up some cute one-gallon cans at Warrenton last week so that I could convert them into some sweet birdhouses. In the past, I connected the tin using screws. Today, my husband was home so I grabbed a quick lesson on the use of a rivet gun. OMG! They are so, so simple to use. I had absolutely no idea.

 This is what I accomplished after only 1 lesson!

 Our rivet gun belongs in a museum, but it still functions like it did when it was new.

To use the gun, simply drill an 1/8 inch hole in the pieces you wish to connect. Load an 1/8 inch rivet in the gun like the picture above. Stick the little peg in the hole you drilled, making sure that it rests snug against your project. Squeeze the handle several times until it "pops". Since they are aluminum, you could have the grip of an 80-year old and still manage it.


I am off to see what else I can rivet . . . 

Old window re-do

I've already sold a few Paris windows so I thought it would be fun to change it up a bit. Since this window had a little green paint on it, I decided that would make a wonderful garden themed window. I just love the late 19th century graphics. For the background, I used pages from an old book that I picked up at the recycling center. I know that I'm cheap resourceful. I admit it.

S and H Green Stamps

Remember S and H green stamps? I do! Each time you bought groceries, the clerk would hand you stamps equivalent to what you bought. There were blank stamp books available. Once you filled up all the pages, they could be redeemed for cool stuff at one of their redeption centers. I remember riding into Oklahoma City with my mom, sister, aunt and cousins to visit the S and; H green stamp redemption store. It was lots of fun.


After I got married, I went to our grocery store and they offered Texas Gold stamps. I would LOVE to make a necklace with some of those stamps. I just haven't come across any. They stopped issuing them sometime in the 80's.

Scary Paris traffic

Lucky, lucky me! While in Germany, my husband insisted that we go to Paris.

I had heard horror stories about the Paris traffic and wasn't so sure that I wanted to endure it just to see Paris. As far as I was concerned, there were many, many wonderful spots in Germany that we hadn't yet explored. I had also heard that people were so rude there. (We didn't experience any rudeness. Everyone that we encountered was very gracious and polite.)


Each time Howard would talk about us going, I would say that we didn't have to go. He never heard me say that.


Between all of the one way streets and people just walking right out in front of us, we were so scared that we would be in an accident or run over someone.

We had no idea how you were suppose to drive in these roundabouts that had so many lanes.

They park really close on the street.

I mean really close. If the space is too small, they will just keep bumping cars until they make enough space. There was no way we were going to put our rent car on the street. Instead, we found a parking garage and paid 30€ per day. Since we were so unnerved trying to drive around we went to the first one that the GPS listed. The parking garage was almost a kilometer away from our hotel. There was one that was closer, but we didn't find it. We took our GPS with us so we could find our hotel. Once we parked, we didn't move the car until we were ready to leave. 

We walked to the arc where we found the red touring bus and purchased a couple of tickets. It was only then that we started to relax.

The bus took us down the Champs-Elysees and we saw the big Louis Vuitton store.

We hopped off the bus at the trocadéro where you can get a good view of the tower.

We hopped back on the bus and rode it over to the tower itself. It was well-protected. Before I left for Germany, someone had left a mysterious package there at the tower and it had to be evacuated. Fortunately, none of that drama took place during our visit.

The view from here is simply stunning. The tower is so massive.

 

We went back to the hotel and had some dinner, then got on the bus again so that we could see the tower all lit up.

The arc de triomphe is lovely at night.

Gorgeous, isn't it?

Medieval city of Rothenburg ob der Tauber

Rothenburg is one of those Bavarian places that you must visit should you find yourself in Germany. It is a gorgeous medieval city right on the banks of the Tauber river. Can you believe this was our view from our room at the bed and breakfast. Pinch me!

We went online to find a place to stay and boy did we luck out on this one! We chose the Hotel Hornburg Garni.

We had a marvelous room on the 2nd floor. This picture only shows half of the room. The other half was another bank of windows and a roomy marble-tiled bathroom.

The place was so historical that our room key was an actual skeleton key!

I see you!

The first thing we explored was the wall itself. 

I loved the clippity-clop sound that the horse made on the cobblestones.

This part of the city square.

Some of the streets were only wide enough to walk down and they were all cobblestone.

Gorgeous, huh?

In the evening, we took the Nightwatchman's Tour. It is an absolute must if you visit this city. Be sure to click the links. You will enjoy them.

Concorde Hotel

I was greeted by my husband with a rose at the airport after my 9 1/2 hour flight to Frankfurt. Isn't that sweet?

We had a nice view from our terrace of other buildings. The terrace was available to everyone in the hotel, but few knew about it.

It was nice having the terrace just outside of our room. We liked to sit out there in the evenings and relax. I also liked sitting out there during the afternoons drinking tea and reading a book. Sometimes, I would almost pinch myself because it just didn't seem real. I thought I must be dreaming.

Our room as simple, but nice. I didn't watch much television while I was there. I tried watching The Big Bang Theory, but since it was in German, the jokes tended to be lost on me. I could only watch so much of BBC news.

The bahnhof (train station) was a mere 1/2 block away, making it soooo convenient.

I still haven't figured out how I ended up with the smallest closet . . .

My 15 minutes

Somehow, my 15 minutes of fame isn't exactly what I had in mind. Yesterday, I posted a comment on Facebook on the local news page. KIII TV news posted: AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - Texas Senators have voted to allow concealed handgun license holders to carry their weapons into public college classrooms and buildings. Today's 21-10 vote is a major push on an issue that had stalled in the Senate and House despite overwhelming numbers of lawmakers in support.

I commented that I thought this was a dumb idea and the news station has reported both last night and this morning that I made the comment. Dang! If I knew that I was going to be quoted on television, I would have made my comment a little more profound. LOL