Graphic Design Efforts

My brother is starting a Mold Remediation business, and he asked me to put together a business card for him. He had a pretty well defined idea of what he wanted but couldn't draw it.

Here are the criteria he gave me:

•  Black background
  
•  BioForce- one word, all caps, but with the "B" and "F" larger,  letters should look like metal 
• cartoonish, tough-looking soldier with exaggerated upper body using the "B" of BioForce for cover as he shoots at mold spores with faces  in the upper right corner of the card

And here are the results:



This might not be what a professional graphic designer would come up with, but I think for free my bro got a pretty decent card, no?

A Word of Advice

If you ever think there might be a dead mouse in your shop-vac, take the thing outside BEFORE opening it to see if you're right.

PEE-EWWW!!!

My crazy family

So my phone rings about 7:30 tonight, and since I'm in the middle of eating my delicious sushi dinner with Jeff, I let it ring. After dinner I check my voicemail, and what do I hear but my mother and 2 youngest sisters (who all live in new york) singing... "happy birthday to you... happy birthday to you..."

they go through the whole thing, and then comes my mom's voice: "we're having a birthday party for you, with special ice cream, so we figured we better sing to you before we ate it."

click.


oh my word, i was dying

thanks for the Birthday Laugh :-D

23 things of Christmas...

1. WRAPPING PAPER OR GIFT BAGS? Wrapping paper, even for he most ridiculously shaped things... don't ask me why, I must be a masochist.

2. REAL OR FAKE TREE? Real. We had an artificial tree my whole life when I was growing up, but Jeff would NEVER get an artificial one, and after the first time out cutting one, I was hooked.

3. WHEN DO YOU PUT UP THE TREE? the weekend closest to my birthday

4. WHEN DO YOU TAKE THE TREE DOWN? in theory around Jan 6th, but in reality I think it was up till February one year...

5. DO YOU LIKE EGG NOG? aghkk-cough hack pbbhhth... GAG! gross. no.

6. FAVORITE GIFT RECEIVED AS A CHILD? Cabbage patch.... I remember YELLING at the top of my lungs THANK YOU SANTA!!!! lol

7. DO YOU HAVE A NATIVITY SCENE? Yes, and I get more pieces for it every year :-D

8. HARDEST PERSON TO BUY FOR? My In-laws and my teenage brothers.

9. EASIEST PERSON TO BUY FOR? Grown/ Married siblings.

10. WORST CHRISTMAS GIFT YOU EVER RECEIVED? not sure

11. MAIL OR EMAIL CHRISTMAS CARDS? umm.... someday maybe I'll send out Christmas cards. When I do, they'll be real, not virtual.

12. FAVORITE CHRISTMAS MOVIE? It's a Wonderful Life, How the Grinch Stole Christmas

13. WHEN DO YOU START SHOPPING FOR CHRISTMAS? around Thanksgiving like all the other schmoes who wait that long

14. HAVE YOU EVER RECYCLED A CHRISTMAS PRESENT? I don't THINK so... maybe for like gift exchange things.

15. FAVORITE THING TO EAT AT CHRISTMAS? Roast beef and yorkshire pudding for dinner and chocolate mousse cake for dessert

16. CLEAR LIGHTS OR COLORED LIGHTS ON THE TREE? Clear clear clear clear. can't stand colored lights, they're so not Christmas-y

17. FAVORITE CHRISTMAS SONG? "O Holy Night" (favorite version - Josh Groban) and "Mary, Did you Know?"

18. TRAVEL AT CHRISTMAS OR STAY HOME? Up till last year it's always been home, but from now on it will probably alternate from year to year.

19. CAN YOU NAME ALL OF SANTA’S REINDEER? yes

20. ANGEL OR STAR ON THE TREE TOP? angel

21. OPEN THE PRESENTS CHRISTMAS EVE OR MORNING? morning

22. MOST ANNOYING THING THIS TIME OF YEAR? politically correct people saying "happy holidays"

23. WHAT DO YOU LOVE MOST ABOUT CHRISTMAS? remembering that Jesus came to earth to die for MY sins

Things about me...

that sort of (but don't really) have some sort of connection to the letters of the alphabet.

Jennifer posted this on her blog and asked me to do the same. Since she's so nice and sends me lots of things like audio books and italian lessons and stuff, I figured I'd oblige.


A - Age: 28 (for another week anyway)

B - Best Friend: Jeff... if you want non-husband best friend that would be Jennifer

C - Choice of Meat: yum! meat! how could I pick a favorite, I love so many meats prepared so many ways

D - Dream Date: wandering the Italian countryside with my sweetie

E - Exciting Adventure: Going to Italy, renting a car, and trying to get by without counting on Italians being able to speak English :-D

F - Favorite Food: Sushi!

G - Greatest Accomplishment: me? accomplish? I'm more the type to get some great idea and finish it 3/4 of the way ::sigh::

H - Happiest Day of you Life: let's see... I was happy on my wedding day, but also kind of stressed... maybe the day after my wedding? the day we FINALLY got the word we would be closing on the sale of our NY house was pretty happy too :-D

I - Interests: currently-- Learning Italian, getting my Architecture License, Ancient Egyptian Chronology, Old Testament Chronology, Teaching, Photography, Audiobooks... I have too many interests for my attention span, that's always been my problem

J - Joke: How do you kill a blue elephant? (shoot it with a blue elephant gun)
How do you kill a pink elephant? (No, hold it's nose till it turns blue, then shoot it with your blue elephant gun)

K - Kool-Aid: no way you'll catch me drinking Kool-Aid

L - Love: is a good thing

M - Most Valued Possession: sadly... probably my computer. At least, it's (contents anyway) the least replaceable and therefore what I'd be most likely to try to grab if the house was burning down. or can i list the house as my most valued possession? That's certainly the most valuABLE...

N - Name: Audry

O - Outfit You Love: Idk, depends on my mood

P - Pizza Toppings: Everything (yeah, I even like anchovies, though i RARELY eat them because I never eat a whole pizza, and nobody ever wants anchovies even on the other half of their pizza) generally the more toppings the better though

Q - Question Asked to You the Most: idk. i don't think I get asked one question more than others, unless it's something like "how you doing?"

R - Radio Station: 89.9 WDAV Classical

S - Sport: Sport?

T - Television Show: I haven't had TV for 5 years and rarely watched it for some years before that. If you want to go WAY back though, my favorite show of my childhood was definitely MacGyver. I LOVED that show.

U - Umbrella in the rain?: every time it rains I say to myself, "man, why didn't I get an umbrella after the last time this happened?" and yet still, I haven't bought one, even though I'm always looking at them at the store...

V - Video: um.... 2 at a time from netflix :-D

W - Winter: not my favorite season. one good snow is nice, but having the ground covered for months and moths I can do without. also not a big fan of being COLD ALL THE TIME. which is one reason why I moved to NC, where it was 60 deg today while my siblings who still live in NY had a snow day :-D

X - X-rays recently?: not unless you count those bitewings at the dentist

Y - Year Born: 1978

Z - Zodiac Sign: are stupid

Holiday Visiting

Wowsers, are we in for some craziness soon...

First Jeff's parents are getting here Friday evening. They'll stay and visit for the weekend, then leave Monday morning.

Tuesday (yes, the following day) my parents and 3 youngest siblings are arriving from NY. Wednesday I'm taking off from work and going to be making all the stuff I can possibly make ahead of time, while Mom makes pies. Wednesday night Rose and Nate and their 3 kids are arriving from Mississippi, bringing the total number of people at our house to 12. Thursday late morning-ish the rest of the gang (7 adults and 3 kids) will be arriving from Greenville for a grand total of 22 people!!! That's 13 adults, one 17 year old boy (read: eats as much as 2 adults) 2 girls ages 11 and 14, 3 little kids and 3 babies.

It will be the first time my family has all been together since last August (for Shielagh's wedding) and the first time all the current family members have EVER been together (since 3 of them weren't born yet last August)

whoo hoo

It's gonna be GREAT!

Thanksgiving Menu

Dinner
Turkey - roasted in the oven,
...........Bread stuffing with mushrooms
...........Pan Gravy
Turkey - roasted on the barbeque
...........Sausage Apple and Cranberry stuffing
...........Wine Gravy
Mashed Potatoes w/ Horseradish Cream (on the side)
Sweet Potato Gratin
Green Bean Casserole
Purple Hull Peas (courtesy of Rose)
Cranberry Sauce
Sourdough Bread (courtesy of Rose)

Millbrook Proprieter's Reserve Chardonnay
Blackstone Vineyards Merlot
sparkling grape juice

Dessert
Apple Pie (courtesy of Mom)
Pumpkin Pie (courtesy of Shielagh)
Pecan Pie (courtesy of Mom)
Cheesecake with Cranberry Topping (courtesy of Rachael)
Sugar cookies (courtesy of Rachael)

Evening Relaxation
Hot Mulled Apple Cider

Variance

YES!!!!!!! WE GOT IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Unanimous (5-0) vote :-D

Windows

For those of you who know more about these things than I do, I have a question: How come every time I turn on my windows computer I set the screen resolution to 1680x1050 and yet, every time I turn it on it's reset itself to 1080x768 and I have to change it again to make things display normally? Why can't it just stay how I put it? Also, why does it think my flash drive is a new piece of hardware it's never seen before EVERY TIME I plug it in??

Someone, help me...

Jeff is Back!!

YAY!!

Aside from it just being nice to have him home, I actually managed to sleep last night.

ARE here I come!

I have an NCARB Council Record!!!

After sitting around being ambivalent for 5 years, I've suddenly gotten it into my head that I NEED to get my license. So, I created my record online today and am currently in the process of getting my hours straight for my employment verification. I also need to request a transcript from RPI to prove I actually graduated. Once I send all this stuff in and they approve it all, they officially say I'm eligable to take the exam. However, if I want them to actually send my record to a state registration board so I can sign up for the actual tests, I either have to wait a year, or pay them an extra $570 to do it within a year of my creating my record. The reason for this, I believe, is to encourage people to start the record when they graduate and start working, and gradually submit hours as they're completed, rather than doing it all 5 years down the road and basically making the hours up, like I'm doing. (I have the experience, but do I really know how many hours of Construction Documents I did at Sacco + McKinney vs. at Crisp? No.) But, I am a procrastinator, so this is how I'm doing it. I don't want to pay the extra money, but if I wait a year I'll be taking a totally redesigned version of the Exam and I'm not sure I want to do that either. ::sigh::

Jennifer is also thinking about getting herself moving again, and finishing the exam, so we've decided to study together. She scans her practice books to work on them anyway, so she's going to e-mail the scans to me and we'll work on them at the same time, and she's sending me half her flashcards, so we can ask them to each other at lunch. Should be fun. She has so ridiculously much energy and motivation, it should keep me going :oD

**update** I found binders of review materials, practice tests, and flashcards at my office, so I actually have prep material to contribute to this joint effort.

Updates

Well, it's been a while since I wrote anything of any consequence, so I'm thinking it's time for an update. The problem is, there's not much to update. Our variance process is at basically the same stage as it was after the meeting-- we have talked to an engineer, but at this point we haven't actually hired him as we haven't actually determined what he's going to do for us, other than accompany us to the November ZBA meeting to use his professional engineering authority to squelch our neighbor's whining. He's also going to come to our house on Wednesday to meet with us, someone from the Mecklenburg County water quality dept., the Matthews Town Engineer, and possibly one of the Town Planners to talk about impact and mitigation, and the impossibility of anything we build affecting drainage in our neighbor's yard. We've also invited our neighbor, but I'll be really really surprised if she comes.

We've also been getting some quotes on things like appliances, and looking into financing. Since we don't really have any equity, we need to get a construction loan, which might take some fancy finagling since we're planning to only contract out a small amount of the project and have Jeff do most of it on his own. However, there are options, we're just going to start at what's likely to be the least expensive way and go from there.

Another inconsequential (to anyone but me) update is that Jeff has to go to Chapel Hill for a week for job training. He's going to be away for 5 nights... the most we've ever spent apart since we've been married is 2 nights, and we've only done that twice in 5 years. ::sigh:: (Rose, if you read this, just ignore me :o)

Other than that, I can't really think of anything. Life is just mooching along. Will update if there's any news.

Salesmen

No matter what they tell you, don't ever let a salesman into your house. These gutter guardian guys just took up our whole night and they are so pushy. All salespeople are the same. Their tactics are the same.... it's almost funny to watch the step-by-step as it unfolds the same way no matter what they're selling. And yes, they ARE all the same. Even if they don't start out that way I think the companies have rules that MAKE them all act the same. Pushy beyond enduring.

Variance

Soo.... were you expecting

YESS!!!! we got it!!!!!

or

BOO HOOOOO, we didn't?

Well, I thought I'd be writing one of those last night, (we didn' get home till 10 o'clock) but what actually happened is they continued our case till the next meeting. For those who haven't heard the story, our next door neighbor has this ridiculous and illogical fear that, if we're allowed to change the buffer in any way, it will make the water in the creek back up into her yard and maybe even her house. It doesn't matter to her that we're not going to disturb the creek, that we are not going to be building in the drainage easement that existed before the houses were sited, that our addition will be at a higher elevation than her house etc. In fact, though she stated in her original letter that if an engineer could assure her that our addition would not impact her, she wouldn't oppose the variance, a letter that I got from the town engineer stating exactly this was dismissed out of hand by her at the meeting.

From the way she stood at the microphone last night and talked and talked and talked, and not one question, comment point, or suggestion made by us, the board, or the town planner made any difference whatsoever to her, we have begun to believe that she's just enjoying being able to meddle in something. If she'd just be slightly reasonable, if she'd just give some hint that she's actually listening to anything anyone says with the mindset that SOMETHING someone says MIGHT POSSIBLY have the ability to change her mind it wouldn't be as frustrating.

Now, in the Board's defense, I don't think that they really think she'll have any trouble with water based on our addition, however, the way the meeting went last night she is definitely what got them going down the path of thinking that no one involved has quite sufficient knowledge of how the creek behaves during a heavy rainstorm or flood, so they've suspended the case until the next meeting (first Thursday of October) so that, during the intervening time, we can find out whatever it is we need to know and come back to the Board with more information. One of the 2 Town Engineers is apparently a stormwater expert, and she, (not the guy I've actually been talking to) recommended in her report that 50 year flood calculations be done in case our addition, located so close to the stream, should be in danger during a significant flood. (notice, not because there's any danger to our neighbor!) So we're supposed to start with a conversation with her about what those calculations mean, if she can/ will do them, if not will she recommend someone who can, how much will THAT cost, etc.

So we'll see. We're going to go back not just with engineering, but with photos of that part of the yard, information on exactly what a rain garden is, how to size one, and a plan for where ours will be (that came up too-- how do they know we'll build the rain garden, and properly?) maybe i'll even do some other pretty presentation type thing (they seem to like that, based on the case before ours)

We are both seriously annoyed at our neighbor now, especially since though it's completely her fault we're in this situation, even if she changed her mind comepletely at this point it wouldn't do any good.

i was going to post some long-winded rant...

...but I don't feel like it any more. Stay tuned for the outcome of our variance hearing tomorrow night.

Kids and Money

This post was prompted by a facebook discussion (maybe facebook isn’t all bad!) so if you found this via the link on that facebook page and want to post comments, consider posting them both here and there, so as not to steal the discussion away from where it started.

The original question: “What is your children and money philosophy? Do you believe in wages or allowance? How about that first car.. do you buy it for them? What if you were rich.. how much is too much?”

Originally I was for a small allowance, probably called a wage, since it would be docked if chores weren’t completed on time. (But the chores would still have to be done, regardless) I also might allow kids to complete extra chores to earn more money if they wanted, provided they hadn’t slacked on their regular chores. But someone pointed out that they wouldn’t want their kid asking them how much they’d get paid every time they asked them to do an extra job, and I think that’s a great point. Now I don’t think I’d want to give any option of earning extra money for extra chores. Kids need to do what they’re told and to understand that as part of the family they have responsibilities. The same person suggested that in their experience allowances “don’t work” -- that parents don’t follow through, that kids don’t do their chores, but still expect money, etc. She doesn’t think parents should give their kids any money at all.. that kids should earn their all their money outside the home, just as they’ll have to later in life.

I agree that once kids are old enough to get a job outside the home, whether it’s a “real” job or babysitting/ mowing lawns, they should work for money if they want it. A nominal allowance given to a small child should not grow to meet the wants of a pre-teen/ teenager. But the opposing viewpoint focuses mainly on younger kids. Little kids really can’t mow lawns or baby-sit or any of the standard kid jobs, and that the neighbors shouldn’t be bombarded by kids knocking on the door looking for work every time they want money for something. And some of the people commenting on the original discussion focused on the goal of using an allowance to teach their children to tithe, budget and save. I think that’s a nice idea, but I wonder how realistic it is.

Here’s the thing - little kids don’t need money.

There just aren’t enough demands on a kid’s bank account for the concept of budgeting to sink in. A kid can save up for something he/ she wants, (I remember saving forever for a Nintendo) but when the weekly income doesn’t HAVE to pay the electric bill and the mortgage and the car insurance and buy groceries, it’s just a whole different mindset. I think you can teach a kid the theory with or without real money but they’re never going to really understand it, deep down in their gut, until they actually have a car that needs gas, and probably an apartment and bills to boot, and it becomes a lesson in being able to eat, rather than a choice between instant and delayed gratification.

I think that in the area of money management, as in most other areas of life, kids are probably going to get more out of how they see their parents behaving than out of what they hear their parents telling them.

I think that if parents manage their money well and carefully, if kids are allowed to see that their parents have a budget and are conscious of the cost of things, and that they don’t make impulsive purchases; if they can see their parents tithing, and they are aware that a certain amount of each paycheck goes into a savings account, etc. then that leading by example will be far more effective than all the “teaching” parents may do by giving the kids their own money.

I personally got an allowance (it was actually referred to as “wages”) only for a few short periods during my childhood. Most of my life I was not given a regular income by my parents. But I did watch how my mother handled the money/ budget and it had a lasting impression. I never had a budget as a kid, yet I am (if I do say so myself) a very good budgeter and saver now that I’m an adult. I don’t think that having a small allowance as a child would have hurt me in this regard, and I also doubt that I would be a better financial manager today if I’d had one. I think as long as parents are careful not to spoil their kids and to be consistent, it probably doesn’t matter whether they give their kids an allowance or not.


Cars will be tackled in another post. If you actually got through tis one, congratulations, I’m impressed.

Butterfly

We have these really pretty butterflies in our backyard, and they're not afraid of people at all. There was one on the deck this morning and he let me walk right up to him... he appeared to be eating (or trying to eat) some of the sap or juice out of the bits of hickory nuts that the squirrels are constantly dropping on the deck. Very interesting, I thought they only ate from flowers.

I just looked this guy up, he's an "Astyanax" Red-Spotted Purple:

Hard worker

Jeff spent another long day working outside in the heat. At least it cooled down a little and was only 95 this weekend :-P (compared to 102 on Wednesday and 104 both Thursday and Friday)

He chipped all the brush piles that he cut down about 2 months ago. Unfortunately 2 months in the North Carolina sun is enough to really dry out 3" and smaller branches so they took quite a bit longer to chip than if they'd been fresh.

The pile of chips in the picture is the second one that size, the first one is a bout 20' closer to the house... anybody want some free mulch?

Screens!

Woo-Hooo!!! my wonderful husband worked outside all day today in the 95 degree weather and we have SCREENS on the porch! ALL of them! Yay!! The doors (which were fitted last weekend) will go on tomorrow. I'm not taking pictures till it's all done, but expect them soon.

My Thoughts on Myspace

First there was xanga. Actually, there was probably something before xanga, but xanga was my first encounter with one of these monster websites where people can combine blogging, text messaging, and photo hosting along with a collection of links between themselves and all of their friends who are doing the same thing.

I never had a xanga, but at least one of my sisters, and quite a few other people within a few years of her age had them, and I had some fun occasionally looking through the comments they posted to each other, looking at pictures they uploaded, reading their blog entries. Then something interesting happened. Some of these kids' parents started having xanga sites. And the kids themselves were posting less and less. I realized that most of them had started something called myspaces, and were abandoning xanga for the newer and less populated network.

I have a myspace. I don't really use it. If I want to write something for more than one person to read I put it here, and for personal conversations I have e-mail, Instant messenger, and a cell phone. Who needs myspace? But it lets me look at my siblings' myspaces, and my cousins' myspaces (although sometimes that's just depressing) and if someone sends me a message there, I can read it and will usually reply. Lately it seems like everyone has a myspace, including, most recently, many of the parents of the kids who've had them for a while.
Recently I've noticed a serious downturn in Myspace activity. In fact, among the younger myspacers- the same ones who used to have xangas- that decrease in activity happened some time ago, probably a year or more, but lately it's become widespread. I knew many people were going to facebook-- from those in the know about this sort of thing, "facebook is better" is something I had heard more than once. But now practically nobody writes on their myspace anymore, and this turn of events has gone hand in hand with another one:

I also have a facebook. I actually started in a few months ago, when I was bored, and for the sole purpose of "poking" my uncle, who I had discovered also had a facebook. I didn't add any friends at the time, and after that initial "poke" I never went back until the other day. A friend of mine was invited to join by her cousin, and implored me to remember my password so that she could add me as a friend. In the process of locating her based on my e-mail contacts, I found some of my siblings' pages and, what the heck, added them as well. Since that day only a week or so ago, I have not only gained a number of friends, but I've noticed that many of my friends have just signed up. And THEIR friends have just signed up. It's like everyone I know just discovered facebook this past week. And I'm wondering, is facebook big enough for everyone, or am I part of the beginning of the wave that will push everyone on to the next big networking site?

I have the coolest Uncle...

My Uncle Rene is, among other things, an awesome artist. He just sent me a link to look at this installation he's been working on for 8 years, which he's finally finished. (the slow progress was part of the concept of the piece)

here's one overall photo:

"Shaker Seeds"


to see the progress along with some cool detail shots and commentary, click on this link:
http://picasaweb.google.com/renterprize/ShakerSeeds

More Clearing

Yay, it was cool again today! well, not as cool as last weekend, but it was a beautiful day and we got about 4 hours of jeans and boots work in without dying of the heat. We lopped for 2 hours first thing this morning, before even showering (why shower just to get dirty and sweaty?) and then spent 2 hours this afternoon chipping. There's still a lot to chip (everything from last weekend plus everything from this morning) but the new chipper works great, and it's fun too :oD

then of course, there will be more lopping, cutting down everything that's too big to lop, chipping it all... going to be a long process.

Here's a couple pics of where we were working today. In case you haven't been to our house and seen what it looked like before, this whole area was impenetrable brush right up to the path, pretty much everywhere you see skinny trees standing:





and here's another project for the not-too-distant future, the poison ivy field:



work on the screened porch will resume tomorrow afternoon.

Ridiculous

You know what drives me crazy? Going to Wal-Mart (or anywhere) and seeing 3-year olds with pacifiers stuck in their mouths.

Clearing

It's not very warm today, so we took the opportunity to do some work that requires wearing jeans and boots-- not fun when it's 90, but not too bad at 70. Clearing!!

Jeff already has 2 pairs of loppers, but he bought the second pair because he'd worn out the first, and the second has had it by this time too. So, we went to our favorite money-hole, Home Depot (ok actually our favorite is Lowes, but HD is closer to the paint store where we also had to stop) and bought 2 more pairs. Some Home Depot Employees teased us about "his and hers" loppers.



We started next to the house, intending to clear out the bit of brush keeping you from seeing the creek that's right there, and got through that so quickly that we just kept going. And going... and going... and going... we went along up the creek, clearing anything small enough for the loppers to handle, (that's about 3/4" for me and 1"-1 1/4" for Jeff) pulling down vines, battling prickers, sweating and exclaiming over how much we could see each time we cut something down. We made it a good 50 feet up the hill from the farthest deck, clearing from the stream to the path, and then hopped over to the other side of the path a cleared a bunch on that side as well. We spent about 3 hours out there, and the backyard is a totally different place.





On the screened porch front, we now have blue soffits:



and a mostly black ceiling fan:



Note: I thought I was doing good this morning, lopping away, not even taking breaks, totally keeping up with Jeff.... but after lunch, he went out and painted the soffits blue (and is out there now, working on the white) while I totally crashed and fell asleep on the couch for an hour and a half. oh well, so I'm not as tough as him, surprise surprise :o)

Alethea Grace

I'm afraid I can't remember Alethea's exact birthday (I have to start writing these down) but it was just before Thanksgiving which makes her about 7 months old or so now. I took these the same day I took the ones of Logan, but unfortunately am just getting around to posting them. Isn't she a cutie?

The Continuing Saga of the (un)Screened Porch

So, on Saturday Jeff had this brilliant idea.

Let me start at the beginning. On Friday we were talking about staining the deck(s). We've been going back and forth about what color to use, and whether it should be solid or semi-transparent, etc. Part of the reason for this is that we don't like the railings. They're made from alternating 1x4's and 1x6's on the flat, with about 4" of space between them and they're just very rustic and camp-like and not at all our style. There are pictures somewhere in my old posts if you want to look. So anyway, we want to rebuild them, but it's really not at the top of our priority list right now. But staining the deck is, cause otherwise it's going to rot away. We like the colors our deck was on our old house (dark brown deck with white railings) but we can't really see those huge in-your-face railings being WHITE. And, of course, railings like that have so many darn surfaces that they take forever to paint. Anyway, we were out there Friday and realized that most of the deck is only 18"-24" off the ground, and you don't even NEED railings until you're 30" high (we won't mention the railing-less stair inside) so, we're going to take most of the railings right off and not stain them at all. We'll stain the remaining ones for now, and plan to rebuild them in the future.

So, back to saturday and the brilliant idea. The bottom and top of the screened porch are built in the same design as the deck railings (and therefore have 50 million little surfaces everywhere) and it is taking FOREVER to prime. Anyone who has never painted old, dry pressure treated lumber (especially in the shape of a porch) with icky, sticky oil-based primer just can't understand how miserable it is and how slow-going. So we're standing around out there, trying to get motivated to prime the last few bits, when Jeff says something to the effect of "Why don't we just cut all those flat boards out?"

**dead silence**

um, yeah, why not?

HELLO? WHY DIDN'T WE THINK OF THIS BEFORE PRIMING ALL BUT ABOUT 4 BOARDS??

It's funny, because all along neither of us has been crazy about the design of the porch, and once we talked about killing all those railings, I was even thinking about how much the porch REALLY wouldn't match once we rebuilt the rest of them. The problem for both of us, I think, is that when we thought about changing it we immediately thought "rebuild the screened porch" and that's just way too much project right now, with the bump and the kitchen looming. I for one never thought of just cutting out the part we don't like.




You can see from what's done in the photos that it's way more open this way. It's much brighter on the porch and in the kitchen, and you can see the blue ceiling from the deck without having to look for it. The whole thing also looks a lot taller, which is neat. We know there's a chance that little kids visiting could be a hazard to the screen on the bottom portion, but if it ends up being an issue, we'll probably just reinforce it with heavier-weight mesh. And even though we didn't save time priming it all, we're still saving the time it would take to put 2 coats of paint on, and we've done away with the little niches the bats like to sleep in too :oD

Owls

We have a couple of barred owls living in our yard, in fact, in a nest in a tree that's visible from our bedroom window. They appear to be an adult and a younger one... the smaller one mostly sits around making whiny screeching sounds rather than the hooting sounds the larger one makes. The craziest thing about these owls is that they don't seem to understand that they're supposed to be nocturnal. They're out flying from tree to tree by about 6 pm every night, and sometimes earlier. They're also not too afraid of people. Yesterday the small one was sitting maybe 40' from the un-screened porch on a low tree limb, and actually stayed there long enough for me to run and get my camera AND go OUTSIDE and take some pictures of him. In the second one he looks shorter because he's sticking his head out toward me, just before flying off.

Trees

Well, I can always count on Jennifer to give me a hard time if I go too long without making a post, so thanks to her, here's the latest.

Yesterday we had a crew of tree-service people here from about 8:15 - 5:45 to take down 8 trees. Our backyard is so wooded that we barely get any light in the back rooms at all, particularly the kitchen. we're planning to eventually cut down quite a few more, and transform the backyard from woods to lawn-with-large-shade-trees-scattered-about. These 8 though, are too close to the house, leaning toward the house, hanging over the house, etc. for Jeff to take them down, hence the tree service. Yesterday they got 4 trees totally down and all the limbs and about half the trunks off of 2 more. They're coming back today to finish up. They hauled a truckload of wood out with them when they left, but here's how our yard looks:




The other project we have going on now is the screened porch. We were really happy to have a screened porch when we moved in, but of course, like the rest of the house, we couldn't be happy with it as is. The 14 year old pressure treated lumber had never been stained/ painted, and was kind of mildewed and very dirty. The screens themselves were aluminum and bent/ torn in places, the doors were rotted at the bottom. etc. So Jeff took out all the screens, pressure washed the whole thing, and we're in the process of priming it right now. I took all 10 million nails out of the little 1x1 strips that hold the screens in :o) Once it's painted, we'll put new nylon screens and new doors. Another thing we decided to do while we have it taken apart was to rearrange the doorway. It used to have double doors out to the deck way to the left as you walk out onto the porch from the kitchen, but we're planning to have the grill just to the RIGHT as you walk out, so Jeff took a portion of the rail from the right and used it to fill in part of the existing doorway, and built a new doorway to the right. So now we have 2 single doorways instead of one double and we're really happy with the new traffic pattern. That description probably makes no sense, but in this picture you can see the old doorway is to the right (cause i'm facing the house :oP) and the new one is to the left. The grill will be against the house at the very left edge of the photo:



Also, we're very excited about painting the ceiling blue :oD here's the first coat (couldn't wait to try out the color):



Well, I think I still owe nasty carpet pictures.... we'll see if I ever get to that!

Baby Pictures

my new nephew, Logan Matthew Clark, born May 27, 2007

Back Online!

My compupter has been packed away in its component parts for 13 days... I think that's an all time record. But now, after 2 visits by the cable guys, a new coaxial cable all the way around the house and deck, and an hour crawling around the floor running wires and plugging things in, I am back online. So much has been happening that I think i'm just going to post a bunch of little posts... one about each project we've tackled to far. First though, I have to find my card reader so I can get some pictures up.... ::sigh::

I lifted 2 tons today

Yes, with my own two arms.

No, no pulleys.

Well, no. Not all at once.

I never really thought about how much 1836 square feet of solid oak flooring WEIGHS until last night when Jeff and I suddenly had to come up with somewhere to store it and a means of getting it there... by 9:30 this morning.

Most people who read my blog know that we're buying a house in 2 weeks and that we plan to do some major work to it as soon as we move in. You may not have heard that we bought enough wood flooring last weekend to do the entire house except for the 2 full baths and one bedroom. It seemed a little like putting the cart before the horse, so to speak, but the price was unbelievable... less than carpet... and they said they were happy to hold it for 3 weeks until we closed on the house and had a place to store it.

Well, fast forward to last night when we got a call from the store manager who sold us the floor saying that a deal for someone to buy the chain had fallen through and the store was closing, his job had ended that night, but he still had a key and could get us in to pick up our flooring the next morning, provided the security company that had just been hired didn't put the store into lockdown mode before then. He didn't seem to think we'd have much of a chance of getting our hands on it after then-- the store claims no responsibility for merchandise not picked up at point of sale. Oh, and we'd paid by check. It had already been cashed.

So, what's the cheapest way to transport all this wood to wherever we're going to keep it? Will it fit in a u-haul pickup, or would we be better off with the cargo van? wait a minute, how much does oak weigh? 48 lb/ cubic foot... let's see... 1500 square feet x 5/8" thick = 78 cu. ft....... um, 3750 lbs. Yeah. No 3/4 ton pickup for us. Nope, the Home Depot truck can't carry 2 tons either. And the 10 foot u-haul box truck costs 89 cents/ mile in addition to the rental fee, and the flooring is like 20 miles from us. Oh yeah, and WHERE are we going to PUT this stuff???

Well, to make a long story short we found a storage place, Uncle Bob's, where they have a 12' box truck that they'll let you use free of charge if you rent a storage unit. Amazingly, not only do they have climate-controlled storage, but they also rent month to month, they rent from the first of the month to the first of the month, and if you sign up on May 12th, yes, you can rent only till June 1st if you want. And if you found them on the internet you get 1/2 off your first month. I think this place was MADE for us. We got truck rental and a 5'x10' climate controlled storage unit for 2 weeks for $39 including the $15 administration fee.

Now we get to the lifting 2 tons part. When we got to Pineville, the now unemployed store manager was waiting with 2 pallets of material and a forklift. He also threw in all the rest of that flooring that was in stock for another $100, bringing the total to 1836 sq feet.... and 4590 lbs. (The truck was a Ford E-350 and both of us, believing the -350 to mean that the max payload was 3500 lbs, were extremely stressed out the whole time we were driving around with 1000 lbs more than that in the back. I looked up the truck's specs later, and depending on the wheelbase it actually can carry from 4600-6600 lbs, but that didn't help our stress level at the time.) Getting it onto the truck was no problem. Getting if off, on the other hand, had to be done 1 box at a time: 136 33-lb boxes of wood flooring. When 33 lbs is about 1/3 your weight this is no easy task, but if Jeff had had to climb into the truck to get every box, it would have taken 3 times as long, and he'd have been even more tired at the end. So I stood in the back of the truck and moved each box to the back, where Jeff picked it up and carried it into the storage unit. 33 lbs at a time, I lifted 2 TONS of flooring and carried them a few feet, and put them down again. A few months ago I did 3 two-arm curls with one of Jeff's 33-lb dumbells, and I was sore for 2 days. I'm very worried about not being able to move tomorrow, but we'll see how it goes.

Pictures!

Well, we went over to the new house for a couple hours this afternoon to watch our home inspector inspect, and, as promised, I took a bunch of photos so everyone can see this house I've been talking your ears off about. Most of the photos are exterior, in part because it's hard to get interior shots that show more than a corner or a door, and in part becuase the outside of this house is so much more interesting. There will be a bonus at the end of this post for anyone who's really interested in the inside :o)

(click on any photo to see it larger)

First the front:


close up of the porch:


If you turn around and look back toward the street you see one of our favorite features- the long, slightly curved driveway :o)


We never even saw this before we made the offer, but inside the garage is this huge array of cabinets and a built-in workbench. Jeff was drooling:


Above the garage there's a huge amount of storage (just needs a floor.) You can see the doors in the outside photo as well:


Heading inside, step into the Living Room and see the lovely "Octagonal Tray Ceiling" (mentioned in the listing as one of the house's features.) Isn't this one of the silliest things you've ever seen?


Here are 2 pictures of the kitchen. I took two in order to show the whole thing. The kitchen needs some help. I just don't understand having a house with 4 bedrooms, 3 1/2 baths, and 4 feet of counter space!



Out the back of the house and you see the real reason this place was such a find. There are 5 decks out back (if you count level changes as going from one deck to another) one of them a really nice, LARGE screened in one. And one holding a (non-functioning) hot tub. This photo doesn't really do it justice, but it was the best I could do (click on it to see it bigger):


Right next to the deck is a little stream that runs roughly along the property line:


And, finally, the vision. We stopped by Sunday after church, (since the house is between church and our apartment,) knocked on the door, and introduced ourselves. The people were very nice, showed us around a little, and, most importantly GAVE US THE ORIGINAL DRAWINGS TO THE HOUSE! So I've been feverishly drafting them up and working out how we'd like to remodel the inside to make the floor plan work better, and add some space to the living room. The plan is pretty dysfunctional right now, but by adding a bump off one side and reconfiguring the interior walls, we can make it A LOT nicer.

(if you want to see an aerial photo of the lot, check out Jeff's post)

Splat!

One of the worst things about living in the south, I've discovered, is the bugs. Roaches to be specific. So far this year we've only had a couple in the apartment, but tonight there was a huge one- a good inch-and-a-half plus. But tonight, rather than try to catch the thing under a container, and then slide a cardboard underneath and transport it to the toilet, all the while worrying that it will manage to slip out, Jeff has this great idea to SHOOT it- with a rubber band gun that is:

The bug actually took 3 hits- the first one knocked it off the wall, and i think took off a couple legs, the second slowed him down as he ran frantically in circles, and the third one literally shredded him:

Pretty effective.

JOB!

Yay!! Jeff got the job with Union County he interviewed for on Wednesday! The best thing is that even though it was a long time coming, this is really the best job he applied for the entire time he's been searching. To read all about it, look at his post on the Blah Blah Blog.

On the Porch

The last firm I worked at, Crisp Architects, did high-end, very traditional, single-family houses, often with large, beautiful porches. After one of their projects was published in I don't even remember which magazine, Taunton Press approached the owner and the senior project architect about writing a book about porches. Well, while I worked there they were always jetting off to meetings with their editor to go over text, photos, marketing and goodness knows what-all else, and now, the fruits of their labor are finally available to all. On the Porch, by James Crisp and Sandra Mahoney is available at bookstores everywhere. If you want to see some really nice photos of porches, check it out next time you're at Barnes and Noble, and if you're thinking about building a porch, well, you might find the helpul advice inside more than worth the cost of your very own copy.

Newsletter

Jeff and I just got back from a nice dinner at Showmars with our Pastor and his wife, where we discussed the Newsletter we're going to be putting together. We edited the newsletter at one of the churches we used to go to before we moved down here, and when the pastor of our current church found out about that he didn't waste any time pegging us for our new ministry. They had started one a few years ago, but quickly realized that they didn't have the manpower in house to keep it going. He's very excited to have one again, and we're excited about starting this one fresh. We enjoyed doing it before, and this time it will be fun to really design it from scratch and not have it handed down to us with it's quirks already in place. We still have to choose a title... any ideas?

Grump on a Rope

Our lizard, recently dubbed "Grump," has been acting up lately. He'll run around his tank furiously trying to get out, literally THROWING himself at the glass, until we finally let him out, and then he'll run over to the sliding glass doors and do the same thing until he tires himself out and goes off to sulk behind the TV or the paper shredder (his 2 favorite spots.) So Monday I bought a leash so we could take him outside. I think he likes it :o)

House!

We FINALLY bought a house!!! Well, we're under contract anyway. Inspections are scheduled for May 1st and all that's left to do is set a closing date.... May or June? The house itself needs work (nothing that makes it un-livable, just some updating and layout issues) but it's on 2.3 acres! I'm very excited about the potential of the yard, and these great decks out back. I'll take some photos on the 1st when we go over for the inspections.

So now I have a blog. Are you happy?

Content, on the other hand, is still up in the air :o)