Thursday

How can it be time to come home already? Collecting my things to decide what to bring home. Hard decisions.  Got the things needed for those staying today - Rid-dex, water softener salt, fertilizer, etc.  

Finished the macrame porch chair.. couple of mistakes, but looks pretty good if I do say so myself. Taking home three more chairs similar to this to macrame at home. And very comfortable too.

 Lots of canning is queued up in the living room to bring home. Wow did I really do that much?


Do you remember in high school wearing a sweater over a shirt that you just ironed the collar and cuffs? Well Butch took up most of the rug in the TV room today. Apparently changing the color of the floor around a rug was an "in" thing to do..  This will require some sanding I guess.. Not sure  when that might happen.

Nelson is being a little grumpy about the rug coming up and didn't let Butch move the TV or the desk, so not quite finished removing, But you can see how dark it is in spots.. Apparently just re- stained the part of the floor outside a rug that was once here. Later put wall-to-wall over it all.

In the meantime, made a bunch of zucchini bread today...some going home, some staying with Luci, Butch and Nelson.

Last tennis tomorrow with Mary Jane and dinner with our neighbors, Doug and Kathy.

Now to hear the end of the convention speeches.



Wednesday and counting down

Sonja and Larry left this morning after we had breakfast and watched taped speeches from last night's convention; no one here stays up late enough to see the 10PM speeches (at least not all the way through - I saw beginning of Ann Romney's and parts of NJ Gov's speeches but faded a few times).. Everyone else was long in bed.

24 pints of grape jelly done and still counting.. Still a lot of unpicked grapes.  More grapes than I thought we had this year. Pretty tasty stuff.  Also a couple more jars of dill pickles. and a chocolate zucchini cake (that's half gone already).


Butch painted the door to the fruit cellar this morning after lots of scraping; It's a really nice door! Larry replaced the light fixture in there a few days ago and now the light again works in there..  

Butch has taken the badly papered paneling off the one wall in kitchen that had it and we found some more Styrofoam insulation.  We had some extra bead board so he's going to re-panel that one wall which will cover up the little section of wood (plywood) that has always been showing to the left of the window and bugging me. And put in some appropriate molding. You can see the microwave oven on the shelf in the after picture.

Kitchen wall - papered paneling - wood showing
 

Kitchen Wall now fixed
 



Last week here

Things have continued to be busy. I feel like they are getting to know me at both Harpo's and Lowes (both home supply places) - never thought that would happen! Seems like I'm at one or the other at least once a day, sometimes, like yesterday and today, twice/day. Considering how many tools are sitting on the floor(all Larry's) you would guess that there were no tools we didn't already have to do the jobs around here. Not! I am now proud owner of many tools that I have no idea how to use, but which have been used to improve the house. And of course lots of supplies, nails, screws, plumbing connections, pipes, paneling, moulding, etc. etc.

Old papered panelling where paper came off the bottom

Continues up the stairs

Here's the old hallway pictures:



Weird molding off - might have been a vent

And the new ( still needs painting which most likely will not happen while I am still here this year) .Here's the current status:

Hallway pre-paint

Stairs after new panelling

New Microwave shelf is ready - before and after!






Grapes are ready - here they are cooking getting ready to make jelly.

Busy Week

Ah the joys of having an old house - LOL.. Fortunately I have a great brother-in-law, Butch, and he has a great family Larry and Sonja! They are here visiting now. Before they came, Larry said, "what do you need fixed in the house?" Nelson told him we have no problems; I laughed and gave him a list of things! 

Last year when they were here, Sonja told me about macrame-ing old lawn chairs and offered to teach me how to do it. So I ordered macrame chord and I am off and running.. Here's the 1st and 2nd day of work completed pictured below. I ran out of chord today and have to order another half skein to finish the back - bummer! This chair is taller than most, so needed a little more. Think it will be wonderful when done and I am ready to do more. Have several old chairs to choose from. This one originally had cushions that are long gone and of course, no one makes this size cushions! Just waiting for the orders of more chord to arrive!

Vertical stringing

Seat Woven - Looking from top

First item the "guys" tackled together was the kitchen sink and the grey water drainage system. The sink had a small leak that several people have tried to fix to no avail. Wish I had a taken a picture of the sink plumbing before it was fixed; it was quite convoluted. Below is the new plumbing. In addition, the kitchen sink, dishwasher, and washing machine all empty into a grey water line rather than the septic system. We'd have a number of backups and "overflows" on the floor when a lot of water was drained from any of those items. I discovered that when a lot of water was drained, water backed up into the dishwasher and then would spill over to the floor. My solution was to check the dishwasher several times a day and drain it if it had water in it. That stopped the overflow situation. In addition you would hear gurgling in the drain a lot. This was all caused by numerous things, the dishwasher drain line was too low, the plumbing under the sink was a mess, and the drain line seems to have some clogs. So drain line for dishwasher moved to highest point we could get it, new plumbing (with under sink min-vent to keep water from leaving trap I think) and they dug up parts of the drain line, replaced some parts, snaked it as far as my snake would reach from multiple places, and also ran high velocity of water using the hose down the lines. Pictures of some of that below too.  There was also a broken elbow down by the "Garden of Eden" that has been replaced. This seem to be flowing smoothly and no gurgling noises anymore! And no leaks under the sink.  Hurrah.



Open part of drain (now has drain pipe there)

This was the dirtiest project!




Clean-out  now with a top on it

   The biggest project underway is to replace the old papered-panels on walls in the hallway and get rid of the old and very dirty wall to wall carpeting in hall and TV room. Lots of pictures of that will be in next post.

Did I mention this was an old house? Larry and Sonja like to do archaeological digs. They are loving this old house - ha ha. The carpet came up easily in hallway - haven't tackled the TV room yet. Looks good by the back door. Needs to be cleaned but no major issues. Whew.

Floor by side door

Floor by closet - cut out

Okay move up the hallway.. Right outside the hall closet There is a big surprise! There is a big square section that was replaced in the floor. Whoa that's weird! And oh the floor isn't level here! What in heaven's name?



Hall floor (near closet) from basement

"Let's look at it from the basement" says, Butch.  So we removed the insulation that was covering it up, and viola, here are the floorboards - but wait - there is no sub flooring here! And there is a metal support holding up on of the boards that surrounds the new boards. See it on the far 2 by 4? Oh joy.. The guys are working on this problem. Trying to get the floor to be even and be sure it is safely supported. We aren't going to tackle the break in continuity of the way the floor is laid.  Larry thinks perhaps many years ago there was some kind of a space heater in the basement and the heat came up through a grate in the floor. In summer in houses that had such a thing, the grate would be covered by an area/throw rug.  That may be the solution to this section for us for now too.  I have one cousin (Anna Rae) who thinks that might be right but can't remember for sure - but that might have been power of suggestion. She's the only one I've talked to who would have been in this house in the winter since she's always lived in this area.  Her mother and my father were cousins, so they came to visit Uncle Walter and cousin Elaine at this house many times.

You can see some of the in progress work on the walls in the picture, but before and after pictures will appear soon! Time for bed for me!



Stone Movers

Butch has added "stone mover" to his "fire dragon" pseudonym. Thought the new garden needed to be clearly defined and below is pictured the result.. Looks even better than before..

And then while doing that he wasn't happy with the way the stone wall by the road looks, so he is rebuilding it to suit his aesthetic sensibilities! He's not finished with that one yet, so look for a new picture soon on that one.

Falling apart

In the meantime, he has finished the fruit cellar except for one little spot on the drain that surrounds it. It looks better than I have ever seen it. I've put the before picture here again - it's an amazing change. And the fruit cellar should last for years now!


Work in progress

Smooth finish

Yesterday Nelson and I took the morning off and went kayaking on the New River. Started out great, just a calm paddle up the river. Beautiful day, nice scenery.  But Nelson has been wanted to go downstream for some time, so I said as long as we didn't take Max, I would go. So after a nice relaxing ride, we headed for the "whitewater." Now this is not the Colorado River; it's really pretty calm but still a little forboding for me. So off we went- well not really very far.. the boat got caught on the first section of "whitewater" on stones.. We finally got off that and then we got caught again further down.. This repeated itself. Get the picture? (no I didn't take my camera).  Eventually we had to get out - and then there was the problem of how to get the kayak back to the car since we didn't stop at a dock. To make a long story short, we managed to get home with everything in tact. Don't think we will be doing again this anytime soon

When I came home,  I cleaned out the herb garden - those pesky weeds were back! And harvested some herbs to dry as well. So now I have sage, tarragon, and parsley drying. And I separated dill seeds from their heads (this was from my Fl dill which had been drying for some time). Also canned some tomatoes.

Today a little tennis and then who knows what adventure awaits :).

Today is a day of rest- ha! Yesterday one of my neighbors brought me some produce from her garden, so started out this morning canning some of hers and some of mine.. I get to keep it all though. Unfortunately one of the canning jars broke in the water bath - bottom just left the rest of the bottle.. what a mess.. Didn't really impact the other jars but had to clean out the water and start over.. Missed Sunday School today as a result.   Then thought I'd try a cucumber-pineapple salsa to have with dinner tonight so have that in the refrig to let the ingredients blend.  Planned dinner with my sister-in-law and now really can rest until dinner time.

Yesterday was a busy day.. Moving lots of logs from trees Butch is cutting down. Cleaned out one section of the "garden of Eden" (my aunts name for one section of the property). I wish I had a good "before picture" to show you so you could appreciate how much work was done. This one was taken about this time last year and looked pretty much the same this year; look past the weeping willow. This is the same area you will see below.

Butch has cleaned out a bunch of stuff on the banks surrounding it over several days and then I cleaned out the garden area itself yesterday. I didn't even realized there was a stone wall under all the junk that was growing there. Think it looks pretty great. Aunt Elaine would be very pleased.  Still need to cut the ivy back a bit more, but it is definitely looking good. Here are two views of same area taken from opposite sides. The hole in the stone wall is a drainage area under the road.. comes out on our neighbor's property. There used to be water from a spring running through this pipe that fed our houses and the community center. But we all have wells - long time now. The spring and Spring House is still there, but not used. The leaves you see on top of the wall were tree limbs to be burned and are gone today. An amazing transformation!

Sneak Zucchini onto your Neighbor's Porch Day

Hard to believe that there is such a day, but according to the Internet (and we all know everything there is true) that is what today is! Most summers I could go for a day like that, but this year the zucchini is not doing so good. Cucumbers however, that's another story.. Wonder when sneak cucumbers onto Neighbors porch day is.   My sister-in-law made Gazpacho and salad for dinner tonight so we used quite a few cucumbers between those two.. They grow faster than I can do anything with them of course.. How many pickles and relish can you can?

We've been working early in the morning and then watching the Olympics most days. It's pretty fun - loved the beach volley ball and got to see rhythmic gymnastics today - so beautiful and inventive. I can hardly throw a ball up in the air and be sure it will come down where I can catch it.. Today was the team event where they do a synchronized, very artistic routine - today with balls.. It was amazing. Tonight the US is winning so far at team volleyball. I will be glad when it is over though - too much TV.

My brother-in-law continues to work on the fruit cellar and he is now putting on the finishing coat and it is going to look great! He is so talented. The picture here is of the side he is not working on right now- so this is not the finished product,. but there is just one rose that was blooming there and I thought it was pretty.  Need a trip to Lowes to get some more mortar for this job.

The Hostas are starting to bloom and look really pretty right now.However, it's pouring rain tonight so flowers may be gone in the morning.  But more will bloom probably.

Tomatoes are all ripening at once, so have to figure out what to do with them soon. Quite a few went into the Gazpacho ans some in salad, but still many to do something with.

Also spending way too much time looking at Medicare plans - how can I be old enough to be going on Medicare? And why are there so many different plans? 

Well I just discovered it's National Watermelon Day and we don't even have one in the house. Will have to rectify that soon. We do have another melon but it's orange - cantaloupe.. I suppose that does not count?? Oh well.

I did play golf yesterday (if you want to call it that). If I'm planning on fun, I will no longer be planning to play golf.

Seriously though it was a beautiful day and the outdoors was great. The course has beautiful hills and views of the mountains. This is hole 12 - how could I not love being out there??

Rest of the day was going to Lowes to get more stuff for Butch to continue to fix fruit cellar - Nelson went to get something for the chain saw and sent me off to get the three 60 lb bags of masonry stuff.. Does this seem right? I made him put them in the car though.. Then home and more pickling and made a chocolate zucchini cake. Yum.

Took a walk around the property too. On the Black Lick Rd side, there are numerous pretty weeds - uh - I mean wildflowers - growing. Seems like I identified the orange ones and the silvery ones last year, but don't think I ever found the yellow ones.. And cannot remember any of their names right now. Will have to look at last year's blog!



Today was a lazy day. Deposited some tennis money in the bank and paid some of the league's bills. Looked in a store and found just what I had been looking for before I bought something else for same purpose last week - does it ever fail? Went to Walmart and grocery store, Watched Olympics - like everyday this week! And we had a pretty all American dinner - burgers and hot dogs, cole slaw, and tomatoes. Yum.

Olympics are back on again, so need to get watching.

Remember as Mark Twain said, "When one has tasted watermelon he knows what the angels eat."

Au Revoir for today!