Seriously.. Pantry moths!!! (part 2)

Got a bitter enemy.???Give them a moth infested gift.  You know a "loose lid" just add eggs cookie mix jar. (Just joking) Trust me when I tell you it is a nightmare.  These things are industrial.


Okay the moth saga was longer than a week.  I kept getting moths.  I had a couple of days that were bug free, I got all excited.  Well, I counted the chickens before the eggs hatched.  These little SOBs are not easy to get rid of.  So I called in the professionals when I had a dozen one morning when I got up.  They came and "bombed" the room sprayed the corners and walls down.  Leaving me this wonderful mess.  I was told to leave the door closed for at least six hours.  Which I actually left overnight.  The next morning I started the battle again.

Lets just say there were tons of dead bugs everywhere.

I am NOT looking forward to cleaning this up. But I am getting ready to complete empty this room again. I am tempted to stack the food outside on the porch for a couple of days while I figure this out.

I will tell you that for the first time and to my horror I had three live moths flying around my kitchen when I got home.  They escaped the pantry and the poison kept them out.  I about lost my mind.

The issue with these damn things is that if you miss ONE larvae you start the cycle all over again.  And the worms are in the strangest places..  Like a tote of cookie cutters.  WHY?? 

They crawl all over the place after they eat to "spin" themselves into cocoons.  So the "mobile" worms are full and moving to their intended cocoon area.  The moths do NOT eat anything.  Their sole purpose is to reproduce.  By the time you see worms they have left the food source and are going to the next stage of the cycle. 

Which makes absolutely no since where they decide to cocoon.

Like the top of the lip of the vinegar bottle.

Flip all the containers over.  Sadly I did this the last time to no avail. 

This time I completely emptied the room.. The next morning I had live MOTHS.  "Are you f*ing kidding me!!"  This is where a crazy person says burn the house down.. OR moves. Well, I don't have either of those options.

 But I found the issue.  This wonderfully worthless dead space.  WHAT THE F*CK.  Some man did this you just know it...  Women don't waste any space in a pantry.  Pantry shelve space is premium.

You can't really see the issue but this is LOADED with hundreds of live larvae, moths, and  the cocoon stage... 

And they are ALIVE, even after the pros sprayed.  They can bomb the room with a product that kills even the eggs.  But you can not be in the house for 36 hours.  I am not quite there yet.  But honestly I will do that if this doesn't work.

But I did do a TON of research on these damn things and saw a post late last night about a woman's grandfather use to pour boiling hot water on the cellar shelves.  So Me being ME, I got scalding hot water from the tab and started dumping cups down the corners.  Well, that made me worry about mold -we live in Houston.  AND it wasn't appearing to do anything.  So I boiled a gallon of water.  I mean a rolling boil, I added 1/4 cup of bleach to it and climbed back up my ladder.

There were TONS of bugs.  The white stuff is Sheetrock dust.  Which the larvae will eat as well.

I dumped one cup at a time down the corners, and along the wall.  I looked down the hole and I was so shocked that I did the gig on the top of the ladder.  The boiling water melts the silk, it knocks them down and kills them at the same time.  It TOTALLY works... I dumped a couple more cups then I cleaned up that mess.

I bleached the shelves and even if I didn't want to, it was time to put the stuff back.  I have been wanting to rearrange things.  But I have never gotten around it.  Again, I have no idea where the first moths came from, because I keep everything in plastic.  I went and got more jars for ALL my pasta now.  I would love to say that this did it.  But at the moment I do not know.  I have killed a good six moths in there since I put all the stuff back.  I also put out moth tape and I have a good ten in that.  But I am told they could have been flying around the house and waiting for me to leave the room alone.  I am hoping that this time works.  

Happy Bug killing.

(From the moment I saw the first moth until it was a full on infestation was maybe two weeks.  The moment I started the battle until I was moth free was maybe a good two months, but was honestly only a couple of weeks after I found the corner problem.  It took the pros three "bombs" or sprays and the moths were finally gone.   They came and sprayed the room once a week for a month. I am now a month moth free.  Which I am told means they are gone.  But I won't lie, I still look around the ceiling and shelves every time I go in there.)

Front door

My front doors faces the west.  Not quite dead straight on but almost.  With the lake house every summer for the last few years.  Then selling and moving out of that vacation property the door got ignored.  That and how often do you go in and out of that door.  I never do, I park in the garage.  

Well the door was sad, sad sad.  The bottom didn't have any finish left at all.  I am not a "pro" so I didn't risk ruining the knobs, I just removed them.  I taped the holes every night for the four days it took me to finish the doors.  Yeah I know "real" home security at its best.

This is after the first layer of stripper.  I could not find the color changing stuff.  It was so hot that it wanted to dry out before it was actually ready to be scraped off.  This took more than double the time it should have.  I would say wait until spring or fall, on a cool day.

This is after three strippings and a ton of sanding.

I knew two things, I was never getting this totally smooth and that I needed to stain this very dark to cover the old stain.

Because of the weather issues I decided on a Spar Urethane, which I had never used before.  Things I learned.  Not anything like Poly.... Way thicker, stinks like nobodies business, and the dry time is HOURS.  You have to be careful it will sag and run if you get it too thick.  You MUST sand between each and every layer -this stuff raises the grain from layer one to layer four.  You MUST use at least three coats to get rid of the splotchy gloss look.

This is after four coats.  I am finished even though it is not perfect nor is this my best work.  But It is getting too hot in the Texas "spring" to do anything else to it.  I may lightly sand it this fall and add a fifth coat to get it more even.  But it is a TON better than it was.   I would never put solid wood doors on a home.  I never have in any of the houses I have built.    The next time this needs stripped I will paint it.

Happy Stripping.

Pantry Moths...

***Pantry Moths***

Who Knew

So I lived in Texas for the last eight years.  The bugs are VERY different than the Kansas bugs, wood roaches that are three inches long and scare the living h*ll out of you.  But I never in all my life heard of pantry moths.  So I saw a moth in my pantry and thought absolutely nothing of it.  A couple of days later I say several -six to ten.  I killed them and went about my day.  Less than a week later there were over twenty visual moths.  I did not have time to deal with them.  So I planned to get to the bottom of it the next day.  I embarked on the WORST infestation I have ever dealt with.

I have had weevils, so I keep everything in plastic.

Moths. This does not do the situation justice.  There were a good hundred.

I went and got OFF flying bug killer and sprayed the p* out of them.  That was JUST the first step in an all day cleaning embankment.

Here is the larvae that I had to scrape from the surface, they stick to the surface and are not able to be just vacuumed off.   I have five shelves they were along all the corners, top and underneath side.  There were hundreds of them.

So I threw away anything that was in a box that I was not sure of, crackers, cake mix, ect.  But that was not the "nest" which I didn't know at the time.  All the research stated that they are drawn to grain items.  Which is a problem in my pantry.  I store everything in PLASTIC.

I mean everything.

Pasta, rice, chocolate, all sugars, to beans and dog food.  We buy in bulk so I am all about plastic storage.  So I was at a loss.  I cleaned and got all the bugs.

But day two I got up to four moths and a handful of the damn worms.  I was furious and confused.  But in my cleaning I had put an open bag of puppy food in a plastic stack container.  You know the kind that are not air tight buy allow you to stack them.  Well the container was full of worms.  BINGO the nest.  I put the bag in a plastic bag,  that in the trash and rolled the trash can from the garage.  All day long I would find a random worm (larvae) or a moth.  But I was sure that I had the only food source.  So I stayed calm.  On day three I had even less random missed worms.  They are tiny and hard to miss.  They are on the bottoms of all the cans, in the creases of the plastic containers.  I mean EVERYWHERE.  But I would get them and stay calm.  Day four was even better just a couple of strays, nothing like day one.  Day five NOTHING...  You have no idea how happy I was.  SO the lesson here is that moths in the pantry are NOTHING to ignore.  And is takes a good week of gathering the strays to completely rid the pantry.

Happy bug killing.

Ikea hack

Ikea Hack

Okay so we have all heard of the "Hacks", well I got around to doing my first one.  I made this for my now two year old grand-daughters when they come to visit the lake house.  

I know that I have been neglecting this blog, I have been my usual busy self just not sharing my adventures.  Well here is my kitchen.  I turning the black cabinet into a Frig.  I have already put the back on I just need to put the door on.  This is a super easy project.

I decided that I wanted stainless steel appliances, I also decided that I was not spending any additional money so I painted the handles.  

I painted a piece of 1/4 inch plywood black and attached it to the back of this cabinet.  It was $30 at Ikea, the large bins where $4 and the small are $2.  Great deal.. I'll post when I get the door done.

All I did was paint the parts with the stainless spray paint.  It took two coats I left the interior of all the areas white.  I figured that would be the best for wear and play.

I painted the handles black.  I also put a piece of dry ease board on the back, so I can get double duty from this toy.  I got this for just a couple of bucks at Home Depot.  It was a damaged panel, I have a table saw so I cut it down, but they do cuts as well.  I would loved for it to go to the top but for the price I am good. 

  

I am going to put a tray at the top to hold the markers so you'll never know it is too short.  And right now the girls are just using the kitchen.  I painted the other side with the stainless paint.  I attached one of the $4 push lights from Ikea as a sink light.  I will tell you I wish I had gotten two one over the sink one over the stove.  Oh, well.  I am very pleased with how it turned out.  I am going to do another one for this little girls birthday, it is going to be very different.  I'll post it.  

As you can see this girl approves.

Happy Hacking.

Gotta love Ikea

I have to sleep in a DARK room.  And even with two inch blinds the lake house was not dark enough.  The master bedroom is on the east side of the house, so the sunrise is a BIG problem,  When we are at the lake we are suppose to be relaxing so to be awake at sunrise it not a fun thing for us.  

But I am on a budget with everything I do with the lake house.  So I had to think outside the box.  I decided that I wanted a wall of curtains rather than one on each window and another one on the door.  I also wanted floor to ceiling to make the room look bigger.  Yes that is popcorn ceilings you see, we didn't scrap them because we were running out of steam and it is a lake house.  I painted the ceilings the same color as the walls to make the rooms look as big as possible.

The Rods are the longest rods I could get at Ikea they were $8 each and they are adjustable.

I used these brackets and I need two sets.  $1.50 each.

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/60268642/

I splurged on these (ha ha) $7 for the set.

http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/40217248/

I connected the two rods with a threaded rod.  I picked it up at Ace hardware store, it was $1.19

I mounted the curtain brackets on each side of the door and the outside of the windows.  So yes I am only using four brackets for the entire wall.

So for $27 I have a full wall curtain rod, brackets and decorative finial ends.  Trust me that is a great price for over twenty-one feet of curtain rod.

I sewed the panels together.   Yes the middle is a different color. Long story. (Somebody Gary was wrong on how many it would take and when he reordered they were not exactly the same.  But that was the only option.  Again this is a lake house.)  I sewed three together  on each end then the four in the middle are sewed together in groups of two. So we could open them to hang on both sides of the windows and both sides of the door leading to the back porch.  I should have taken an open photo.  Sorry.

Gary is the Groupon king in our house.  He got two dark out curtain panels for 19.00, only flaw they are narrow.  If you haven't been shopping for dark out curtains lately, hold on to your nickers.  They are outrageous.  So for $100 I got floor to ceiling room darkening curtains for the whole wall.

So for $127.00 I have room darkening curtains and the rod.  I am going to customize them.  I will post that when I do it. 

Happy room darkening.

Vents

The lake house vents are in BAD shape.  But there are 15 vents, four HUGE, five large, five normal, and tiny one.  I priced new vents and was not going to spend three hundred dollars on new vents.  SO painting them is my only option.  I got two cans of spray paint to match the hardwood floors. 

First I laid an old towel in the bottom of the tub, I sprayed the vents down heavily with 409, then I filled the tub up with scalding hot water.  I decided to soak them.  Let the water do the hard work.

Confession, I didn't mean to soak them overnight, but this tub is only used when we have guests.  So I was able to leave them there without worrying about it.  This is what I found the next day.  I always use rubber gloves on all gross jobs.  I scrubbed all the vents with my scrub brush.

You can see how much dirtier the water is after they were all scrubbed.  Always clean before you paint.  So you won't get flaking paint.

I stacked them to dry.

Like I said they are in bad shape, and that is the factory paint.  Before I put them back I will vacuum out the ducts.  I am also going to put weather stripping along the sides to hold them in place.  After we put the hardwood floors down they slide in the openings.  Drives me crazy. 

Getting ready to paint. I am just using an old sheet as a drop cloth.

First coat.

Never fails I start a project and Gary decides to do something.   He decided to mow today.

So no second coat today. 

I decided to paint the louvers, after I did the first corners with weather stripping.  I did the second top coat at the lake.   So two cans of paint did the insides and the tops twice of 15 vents.

I only painted the inside of the vents with one heavy coat of paint.  Then I put peel and stick weather stripping on the corners to stop the vents from moving.   I vacuumed out the vents out while I did this.  I do that once a year.   It will shock you what they gather. Love my Dyson, great vacuum.

The vents look 100 percent better, and match way better.  I am pleased.   I am doing the master bath two next.   A different color to match the tile.  

I didn't paint the master closet vent.  Honestly I just missed it.  Like I said it took two cans of spray paint to do 15 vents, I have $7 in paint and $8 in insulation to make the vent stay in play.  So for $15 I have a whole new look.

Happy Venting.

The RV thingamabob

Confession,I have this burning desire to RV the Grand Canyon, and as many of the state parks as I can squeeze in before Gary just blows a gasket.  He claims he is game if I do all the driving.  Well I know that we want a class B.  You might ask what is the difference.  Well size.  I want the smaller van chassis, but I want what they consider a B+ unit they are between 24 and 26 feet long full bath, full kitchen.  (well RV standard full).  There are three companies that I am looking at simply because they have a murphy bed.  This is a great use of space.  Here are the companies I found and the links to their websites.  I am going to go look and test drive the units sometime soon. (I'll post and get actual photos of the units)   There is a fourth company just because the price and the floor plan is doable.  Note- the murphy bed is so new that finding used models is literally "like finding a needle in a haystack".

So what I learned from this hunt is that the maker of the RV is the company like Leisure Van, Pleasure Way, Coachmen, and Viper.  The chassis can be any company they want to use, Ford, Chevy, and in most of these Mercedes. The GVW makes all the difference in MPG. Which is really like 15 MPG not the 20 most companies say.

First Leisure Van  Unity MB is the unit I like here is their website.

http://leisurevans.com/unity/floorplans.html#anchor

Floor plan

 Pro- Great queen murphy bed, 24 feet long.

Con- Tiniest kitchen sink EVER.  Cost a kick in the gut at 120,000-149,000

The next option is Pleasure Way XL they offer a unit called the Plateau.

Here is their link.

http://pleasureway.com/pleasure-way-plateau-xl/

Floor plan

Pro- Murphy bed, no slide outs, best open bathroom plan

Con- 25 Feet long, again the cost is steep at 132,000+

The option to offer the bed I want is Coachmen Prism 24M
Here is their link.
http://coachmenrv.com/product-details.aspx?LineID=53&Image=742

Floor plan

Pro- Bed, large sink, and chase lounge. Price 87,000-95,000, Thought it was just 24' long

Con-  25'4" the 24M lies, Honestly not as nice as the others, yet the price is better, still not great at 87,000.   To be honest for that amount of savings it is a great bargain, so it is the leading the race.   The issue is who expects to pay that much for an RV.   Not me.

This is just because of the price, and the layout is not bad.  The Viper 27V
http://nexusrv.com/product/2016-viper-27-v-class-b-motorhome

Floor plan

Pro- floor plan is okay, Price 79,000+, sink size

Con- size it is 27 feet long.  And no real living room space, the dinette takes up all the space.

I have no idea what we are going to do.. I'll post that later.  But hope all my research helps you save some time.  Good luck.

Quick update.... 

Another company offering the Murphy Bed.  This company is HARD to find, not very many dealers.  They don't post their prices which is not a good sign.  The model is the 

Platinum II 241XL MBD — Murphy Bed Dinette

http://www.coachhouserv.com/model-241xl.php

Happy RV hunting.