Winter Project - Outdoor

While we are working inside on the basement remodel - one of the neighbors seems to be busy working on his own projects in the yard.

This pile of sawdust is at the base of a pine tree in my backyard.
Here is the culprit. Mr. Woodpecker has been very busy.

Mrs. Woodpecker was watching him when I first went to get the camera, but she must have had some shopping to do - new curtains maybe?
Look how far he is in this hole!
If he keeps that up our summer project might be replacing some fence after this tree falls on it.

Winter Projects - Indoor

This winter we have taken on a huge remodeling project in our basement. There are three parts to it. The first was in November when we installed a heat pump to supplement our wood stove.

That means if the stove goes out if the temp in the house drops below 55 degrees the heat will kick on so that we don't get up or come home from work to a cold house. So far it hasn't run too much since we have also been working on the second part of our remodel. The insulation of the concrete block walls.

We don't have a moisture problem above the floor at all so we glued 1/2 polystyrene to the walls and then attached furring strips over that so that we could put moisture resistant dry wall on the inside of all that.

We have since had to back off on the amount of wood we are used to putting in the fire. Who knew there was that much cold air seeping through those block walls!

Another part of the second level project is to insulate the upper basement windows. When we built the house originally we believed the standard single pane window would be good enough. With this project we decided to make a change and put some glass blocks in those holes. You can see how deep the window ledge is with all the insulation, furring strip, and drywall inside the block.

We put a piece of marble under the blocks to create a level sill for the blocks and then filled the hole to the top. Light still gets in, cold air stays out.

The other addition is a mud room from the basement door. We added a wall and door to seperate the entrance. This will hopefully be a way to keep the dirty boots and wet coat odor in its own place.

After we got all that done a nice coat of "Pale Vista" paint lightened the whole place up. Next is finishing some interior walls so that we can get the ceiling tiles back up and then the floor needs to be figured out so we can get the furniture where it belongs.

We also need to get the trim around the windows so I can put the curtains back up and get the drywall out of the holes. These lower windows are at the perfect height for the winter sun to come right in under the porch and blind a person - if it isn't raining or snowing anyway.

Part three of the remodel will be putting a bathroom in the basement. The one big 7x40 foot laundry utility storage room is getting split into three pieces - laundry/utility room, bathroom, and storage room.

So that is where our winter project stands now. Later!

Winter Picture

Okay, one more post for today. I have to make a correction to all the winter posts that I have made so far this year. This weather keeps getting better and better, but when Winter makes you dress like this... you know there is real cold out there on the ridge. Most of the purpose for all the clothing is because feeding the cows takes place on an open tractor and 4x4 Gator. The layers really come in handy when the cows hide their calves in shelter that make them hard to find.

Christmas with Garrett

We had a pretty good Christmas in Georgia. Of everybody, Garrett did the best in the gift department, that would be expected of course. His pile is on the left and his mom's is on the right.

Mom likes having her picture taken when Garret is on her lap. FabHub doesn't even mind too much - and he is hard to catch in a lens. He can laugh at himself pretty easily too. He wanted new house shoes for Christmas. So my sister got him some.

Garrett likes to read too. I hope he keeps it up.

The craft project for Garrett's album finally finished. Mom and I took the cross stitch pattern and turned it into the front cover of an expandable album. He looks impressed doesn't he.

The cover turned out pretty good. It is meant to be expandable so the binding is not connected across the back so that left it a bit rough. I hope they are able to use it for years.

That was our holiday in Georgia.

Progressive Christmas Craft

The Holidays in my office aren't really decorated too much - last year I put clings on some windows in our cube space and brought in a poinsetta that I didn't really want to keep at the house.
That flower is doing pretty well, it even got some red leaves again this year. I didn't do any of the "proper" poinsetta preparations to make sure that it turned, but there must be the right mix of darkness and atmosphere in the office to make it happen a little bit naturally.

I also did a progressive holiday scene drawing on the white board last year, but didn't think about taking pictures until I was halfway through the season. This year I remembered to take the pictures, so let's see if the story makes sense to you.

I hope you enjoyed this story and had a wonderful Christmas and a Happy New Year.

PS.

I really do have things to keep me busy at work, I just like to draw stories too. All of the pictures lasted at least a half day, most of them a full day or more.

Christmas in Georgia 2009

My netbook doesn't have Java to load pictures on FB, so I will create a Blog to show off my new nephew and some other Christmas adventures. Probably better anyway since I usually like to blabber on.
This is Garrett, he is four months old, loves to be hugged on by everybody, and though he is being raised an OSU Cowboy, he tolerates all sports affiliations.
We were going to bring him some WVU products, but thought his parents might not be so tolerant.
This is FabHub NOT napping in the middle of the afternoon.
He Claims to have been watching TV, but that eye looks closed to me.
This is a project that I started better than two years ago. There is a blog post from 2007 that talks about my progress toward finishing it. I told my sister to give me six months warning if we were going to need it since I probably would need that much time to finish needle work. I finished it last night at about midnight while we waited for Garrett and family to arrive at Mom's. HEY, it is done! Sort of anyway. It still needs to be washed, ironed, and attached as the cover to the scrapbook that will hold many, many pictures of the newest, cutest - my nephew Garrett.

Winter Is Here

No matter what the calendar says Winter has arrived.
A few weeks ago we thought this was a lot of snow.
Turns out we were wrong.
This is a lot of snow.

These dogs were staying warm in what seemed like cold, snowy weather.

Turns out they were in pretty good shape.

This is a dog wishing she were warm. The frog has a nice hat on and the house is wearing a pretty thick blanket too.

The day it started I was staying with my mother-in-law. We made fruit cakes and watched it start snowing at about 2pm.

At 4pm I went out and cleaned the snow off the windows of my truck. Snow was up to the tops of the roof racks.

At 5pm I went back out and cleaned the second layer off of the windows. Snow was now piled high above the roof racks.

I cleaned another inch off at about 530pm. And then another right before 6pm. I was trying to keep up with it because my office holiday party was being held that night and as soon as my sister-in-law got home from work I was heading home and then to the party. It took her about 2 1/2 hours to make her 45 minute trip.

And yes we did go to the party. It took us about an hour to make the 15 minute trip to Pipestem. It was snowing, cars were in the ditch, the forecast was for the storm to keep getting worse. We went anyway. We already had a reservation to stay the night. Dinner and an open bar were part of the draw, but there was also a retirement to consider, and that was really why we went.

We did take one precaution. The farm truck was our chariot for the night. 4-wheel drive, chains at the ready, and not a a lot of drama if it earned more "character marks" in the process of getting there.

This is what we found in the morning. The truck was pretty well buried. A lot of snow fell over night. There weren't too many other people moving yet by the time we got ready to go. One of those cars belongs to a guy that I work with. We gave him a ride to a friends near Princeton and then headed back home.
Now it is Sunday night. School is closed tomorrow. Main roads are probably clear enough for me to get to work. Darn.
That is a lot of snow.

Used the Apple Pie Jam

I made my usual buttermilk pancakes for breakfast this morning. Instead of the normal syrup, I warmed up a jar of the new Apple Pie Jam, which didn't have many Jam qualities.

It made really good syrup for the pancakes though!