It’s time to tackle that indoor list. Our living room has been an absolute mess, so I’m building a storage bench for the hallway. I also deal with about 50 eggs from the garden neighbor, and use the egg cartons for my potatoes.

There are a lot of sunflowers growing on my balcony. The birds plant them. To help combat the fungus gnats, they got a visit from my little seedlings.

My neighbor’s chicken have been laying a lot, so I have a lot of eggs right now, because he just can’t eat them all, so he’s been trying find [people] to take eggs from him. So, I’ve got about 50 eggs on my counter and in my sink right now.

I needed the egg cartons for my potatoes, so I’d moved them all out of the boxes. Some will go to neighbors.

But I still had a lot of eggs, so I decided to use some up in meat balls that night for dinner. They also use up some more of those oats. They stayed in the fridge until we were ready to eat that night. This also gives the oats a chance to soak up the liquids.

I placed the eggs for the neighbors back into the boxes, and the rest into reusable crates. I also boiled some in the air fryer.

I made myself a quick breakfast with two of those eggs. I needed some rest before dealing with the potatoes. As Marvin (the food processor) was still in the shop, this was bread from the local farm. This old butter dish from the thrift shop is making me very happy.

After breakfast, I checked on the balcony. The first radishes sprouted.

Unfortunately, the only thing I managed to get done that day was the dinner I’d prepared. The potatoes would need to wait.

I still don’t know how the meat balls were intact with how many oats there were in the sauce after. But it worked.

My potatoes have been chitting all over our windowsills for weeks. I’d been meaning to spread them out. But it wasn’t until I got 50 eggs in cartons and reusable racks for the fridge that I could deal with them properly.

I have five varieties of seed potatoes here plus some sprouted potatoes from the kitchen. It is raining buckets as I’m editing this with possible ground frost on the forecast. But, these will be first to go into the ground in the garden plot this year along with some salsify and peas.

Now that the potatoes are spread out, it’s time to transfer some seedlings into larger pots.

I am using the discarded soil for the bottom half of the pots as filler. They will go into the ground soon enough. I’ll try not to harm any of the bird-donated sunflowers growing there, so I can transplant those, as well. I need to get this bin off the balcony soon to make room for some plants, so any removed weight is a bonus. Right now, even my husband would not be able to carry this bin to the car.

Some of the tomato varieties I planted are doing very, very well for themselves. They are growing fast and strong.

I added some containers to prevent water running down the shelf. This is a bedroom after all. I also moved some of the tomatoes into the empty trays where the peppers hadn’t sprouted as they are larger. I have some empty spots and an entire tray to try resowing the peppers now. But first, at least the potatoes need to move to the garden to make room here for new things.

While I wait for my greenhouse to arrive and the weather to cooperate, let’s focus on that indoor list.

Our living room currently looks like an absolute mess, because we don’t have a spot for the NAS system. Don’t worry. You don’t need to know what a NAS is. It’s just an ugly-looking computer that stores our digital things. It is also quite loud, so we’ll add some sound dampening and air circulation.

And I still don’t own a track saw, so it again won’t be a perfectly straight fit.

I am happy to report these are the last of the screws the former garden owners left behind. I got good use out of them but they were bad screws nonetheless. They were the ideal length for this project though.

Okay, time to show you how bad the “straight” cuts are. The bottom cut here is mine. Yeah, I know. Cheap screws, the wrong tools. Please don’t learn from me here. I am the one learning–and even I know better.

Function is what matters. The tiny gaps where the straight cut of the jig saw wasn’t straight enough won’t. Which is really good, because the other side is worse.

It also won’t matter that it was a pain to get these screws into the soft wood even with the perfect bit on the drill. When we move, we can take it apart and then replace the screws. It’s all good.

I’d gotten the wrong hinges, so I improvised a lid… with more imperfect cuts.

This was a quick and easy project. I am happy with the design of the bench. I’d build it the same way again. I’d use boards of the exact same length, though, not the way the hardware store cut them. I’d use the proper tools for straight cuts. I’d use good screws.

But I’ve learned that I can build a storage bench. And I learned how not to use a tool. But most importantly: the bench will do the job I built it for. I’ve definitely added a track saw to my wishlist, though.

Finishing this project will require some more parts, but the wooden structure is done.

The bench that was in the hallway before will move to my room. I was using the table as storage surface anyway.

So long, and thanks for being here.