Boppin' with Rachel and Matt!

More Friends arrived on Friday! Another SOS. Rachel and Matt pulled in early afternoon and within an hour were already working to help us finish the house. We are blessed for sure. By the time they left on Sunday, four important jobs were undertaken and three are finished and one off to a great start.
1. Matt and Rachel measured all of our tile and carpet square footage. Done. A huge step toward one of the last jobs we will need to do before we move in.
2. Masking and taping all the window frames so Mark and Morgan can jump in and finish the interior plaster/stucco. Done.
3. Pocket doors installed. Done.
4. Texturing the walls. Matt showed us a cool way to texture a wall and we dove in..... we call it "Boppin'" - ball up a plastic bag, get some taping compound, get some compound on the plastic bag and "bop" it on the wall..... followed by a sweep of the trowel and it looks great.

Mark told us not to focus on the little things.... just look at the big picture and all will be well. He was right. Rachel and Matt did the basement hallway, and Deb and I did the rest of the basement, came up the stairs, did the foyer, guest bedroom and the long wall in the loft. Will do more of that tomorrow. Major accomplishment and a stress release since we were worried if we were going to be able to do the work.
Hated to see Rachel and Matt leave. They are so nice and a lot of fun!
Getting late..... all for now.

SOS 2

Time to catch up on all that has happened over the past week or so. Wow, where to start.? Maybe I’ll try to just give some bullet statements for a change….
- Dick arrives from Colorado for the THIRD time to help work on the house, and we begin to work on window sills.

- Mother's Day was great. Mom "shmeared" Dick and Don in Scrabble Game!
- Can’t find the wood we want anywhere, but called Mike, our new neighbor who gives us a tip to call a friend of his. Sure enough, we can get hard maple sills at a great price.
- Drive out to a farm/sawmill. Buy raw boards, get them planed, use John Penny’s joiner to get boards in shape.
- Dick sands boards to perfection and we install sills.
- Mark and Morgan come out and start "texturing" our living area walls.
- Walls look great! More to come shortly.
- Dick and Don take the rough spruce tree post that we had milled by Mike Bridgeman to another new neighbor named Jim. Joanne Welling finds this neighbor for us so we can get the job done in a jiffy. Joanne and Rich know everyone!
- Lisa and Dick Norris come up from Portland to help (again). Dick and Dick spend all day staining our tongue and groove cedar boards, while Lisa and Debbie do endless amounts of cleaning up and go to the dump!
-Don "benites" the upper level windows using the scaffolding and gets the scene ready to install the new stairwell post.
- Kevin comes over and we remove the temporary post for the stairway and replace it with our new post that came from the spruce tree. Kevin works wonders again. Post looks great.
- Lisa and Dick drive to where Dick and I got our window sill boards and buy a beautiful mantle for their new fireplace. Dick helps out by sanding and finishing the mantle.
- Dick, Debbie and Don install the tongue and groove cedar in the ceiling of the awning in front of the front door. Then, finish the ceiling for the loft porch. Looks great!
- Photos not in order. Deb, Lisa and Dick shot reminds me of Wizard of Oz...

-Deb and I celebrate again for having such wonderful friends!

The Slot

For about six years, Deb and I have noticed that the sun sets right between Orcas and Lummi Islands on May 5. We started calling the spot between the islands the "Slot." And for about six years Don, much more than Deb, goes wild when the sun sets in the slot..... it is beautiful. So, as you might guess, we have been waiting a long time to be able to see the slot sunset from the house. Best day is May 5 but it has been cloudy and rainy so sure enough, today, May 7, we got a beauty.....

And, this is not the only reason to celebrate..... Our friend Dick, has returned for his third SOS tour of helping work on the house! Yep, although the last time he was out in October he said he wasn't coming back till the house was done, he must have felt sorry for us and came back out to help out. He will be invaluable. And it will be fun. Best of both worlds. So, enjoy the slot sunset... It will actually be back in the slot around Aug 7..... Mmmm that is the day Deb broke her back last year..... We'll have to wait on that one....

Goodnight!

Foam gone wild...

OK - I will let the photos speak for themselves. Here is a little background followed by photo description..

- Sunsets are getting better and better... I like the ones with clouds better but today it was perfectly clear..... can you believe you can still see a tinge of orange at about 930 pm...

- Don has been doing the screening and whining about how the screen cuts his hands.

- Deb has been "foaming" the gaps in the walls with a spray insulation foam that "grows" after you spray it in the gaps.... It is hard to determine how much it will grow....then she comes back and cuts it flush to the wall with a bread knife.

Top photo.... cool sunset.

Second from top - Whiny Don's hand after much swearing....:)

Third from top - wide shot of foam work done by Deb

Fourth from top - closer shot of foam work done by Deb

Bottom - .................... you make the call... I will say the bread knife part will be interesting...

April Rocks

Funny how things happen. Overall, we would have never guessed that April would become one of our favorite months to live in Bow. But sure enough we have been most pleasantly surprised by all the neat things that have happened.... Blossoms on the fruit trees. Orchard smells fantastic. Leaves come out on the trees and the whole property has started to change. Birds and bats are out in force. Birds singing like mad. Bats coming out at sunset and silhouetted on the sky. Sunsets have been off the charts. We like. It is absolutely amazing to be in the house around sunset time - don't care what window you look out, the view is amazing. Wow.

Been working with the screen that needs to be nailed to the tar paper/plywood we nailed/stapled to the wood around the windows. The screen just plain sucks! Don't care how careful you are, or what kind of gloves you have on, you are going to get cut. You are going to bleed. You are going to swear - a lot! And, ever cut what seems to be like a mile of screen with a small pair of tin snips? The photo shows about one tenth of what was cut. I don't recommend it. Not fun, and sure enough, you get cut doing that too. Looks like we will have to wait till about mid week next week for Mark and Morgan to start the texturing on our interior walls. We will concentrate on prep work for it....such as nailing the final screening, buying the sills, and perhaps staining the window frames. No shortage of work....

Last but not least, we are finding out the month of May could be a big month for visitors.... on tap are Dick (from Colorado), Lisa and Dick, Matt and Rachel, Tom, Dan, and Debbie's mom in early June. Couldn't come too soon.....:)

A little music and a sense of "home"

Another weekend of work, but this one had a little different ending. We started saturday by going over to our "new neighbors" who milled our tree. Picked up all our wood and made two trips to bring it to the house and unload it. Then cut and nailed screening to the windowframes. Ran out of screen and nails.... moved on to other work. Sunday morning we had to take the truck in to a shop and leave it there... Before we left Don made a step stool for his mom so she can fill her oxygen easier. Dropped that off. Trip to home depot. Back to house.... Then, we decided to try hooking up a couple speakers in the living room to see if our wiring worked. Brought down our ipod, an amp and voila! Music. Our music. Deb had a few tears in her eyes. We hugged. Then we worked till about 5 and decided to bring down some hot chili, bread and some wine. Might be one of the best ideas we have had in a long time.... We actually enjoyed ourselves! We relaxed and enjoyed the house and didn't talk about what we had to do next. We put on some of our favorite music and it was like magic...... it started to feel like a home! Our home! We ate, we laughed, we called a few friends, we danced, we kissed, we watched a spectacular sunset...... No more to say than this.... We are excited. Lots of work to go but we are excited! These pics tell it all again.

Mike's Mill

Wow. A pretty incredible morning. Perhaps you all recall that we had to fell a spruce tree in order to build our house. We loved that tree. It was the one we put the ladder against and dreamed and planned where we could position our house and capitalize on the view. We must have climbed that tree a thousand times over six years.

The day we cut it we were both sad, but made a promise to ourselves that we would mill the tree so we could use some of the boards in a special way in the new house. Today was the day we had the log milled. But it was more than that. Don met a new neighbor, Mike, who is another really nice person - really really nice. Mike was a pro with his "backyard saw mill." The photos tell it all. Here I was, on a farm in bow, on a beautiful spring morning, milling our tree and making an assortment of boards and beams that we plan to use for our staircase post, railing posts for our stairway railings, our trim board for the loft, and maybe for a sitting bench! Way more than we thought. Mike made it easy. He advised me on what he could do with the tree, and away we went. It was great and a great part of building our house! Mike was born in the Bow area and is a great resource on the history of the area - like so many of our neighbors.

Tomorrow Deb and I pick up the boards, beams, and scraps and bring it to the house to store it till we are ready to use it. Can't wait! Note: the "stairstep" photo of our log was taken when we were cutting true 4x4 inch posts for our stairway railings....

Day after earth day

Ok, not too creative of a title. Deb came home today! We did some work cutting screen for the windows and used a bread knife to cut the excess foam insulation so it planes out with the walls. Will nail screen on this weekend. Tomorrow we will have the spruce tree/log milled. Since it was the special tree we used to climb to see the view, we plan to use the boards from it for some special woodwork in the house...

All we have... Another sterling sunset. The lighting is wonderful inside and outside of the house.

Earth Day

Yep, April 22. Earth Day 2009. Crazy day too. Spent way too much time trying to get my mom a few tests.... mainly due to "miscommunication" with doctor offices..... Yoy! When I got home from work, I ate dinner around 430 and then headed to the house. Decided to take a photo from our photo point in the driveway. Sure enough, I found a photo taken from the same point last year. WOW. It is very hard to believe the first photo was taken one year ago!

I spoke to our friend Patty Wincek today. She said to me that we should take stock in what we have accomplished - that many people have dreams, but very few actually make their dreams come true. Well Patty, these "before and after" pics allowed me to take stock and reflect, if only for a few minutes, and sure enough it brought a smile on my face and a sense of achievement.... thanks!

Other updates here include a couple sheetrock shots, and my latest challenge of framing in our windows with plywood which I finished last night.... then tonight, I tar papered all the framing. Pretty easy with a staple hammer.... love that tool. Next, nail screening. Should be done in a couple days. Sunset for earth day was wonderful... the lighting this time of the year is just perfect for the view.... I lit a fire too but, I got a "small boulder" in my eye earlier and it was killing me so my thoughts of enjoying the fire and the sunset went out the window..... ended up going over to Ardie and Larry's and they did some voodoo magic (just kidding) and helped me get it out.... Thanks!

Bedtime..... have to say it again......the before and after pics are amazing.....

Hello from Deb

Hi There!!! Don's been doing such a great job keeping this blog updated! I wanted to tell everyone myself that it's been so nice to hear from all of you. We appreciate the comments on the blog, the emails and the visits from neighbors and friends - this keeps us motivated...because building our house has it's ups and downs. We have been working on this for a little more than 1 year with (it seems) more lows than highs. Thanks for all of your support!

As for my recovery - it still progresses. The surgeon said it would be 1-2 years for a full recovery - if that ever happens. I continue my daily exercises for my back - with the MUCH appreciated reminders from a friend and co-worker! I still take tylenol, but typically in the morning and at night. This week, I'm in the field doing stream surveys - so I'll be hiking and walking in streams with my waders - I'm just very cautious and slow!

Again, Thanks for your encouragement and support! We truly appreciate it!

Deb

Lisa comes to help!

Like an angel arriving from heaven, Lisa came up this weekend to help out. Needless to say we weren't shy with work. Saturday, we worked about eleven hours straight! Had dinner at about 9 pm. Lisa and Debbie "foamed" the outlets with insulation foam in prep for our wall texturing/plastering. Don framed out the big picture windows and then lisa and debbie cut tar paper that needs to go on the wood... then mark will put on the lath (screen) and get underway. Once again we have way more work to do than we thought per the windows.... Many of them will need to be framed out with half inch plywood, and then tar papered. Its not easy work but just gott do it and move on.

Bottom line - we are so grateful to have friends like Lisa (and Dick). To come up here and work all day, then sunday morning do it again, is just unbelieveable. Then she went over to Margarets apartment and had lunch with her, and cheered her up! Not only is the labor really helpful, the cheerful and positive attitude pumps us up. And, she loves the house. We love her! Enjoy the pics!