Happy Brrrrrr Year!

Posted on by

Oh it has been cold!!! Cold enough that wood that should have lasted us another two weeks is gone. Brrr! And… three people, Morgan, Dan and I in one small main room was… Crowded! We were all snuggling up to the wood stove. Add in texting, videos, dinners, and phone calls for three and chaos reigned. While I was sad for Morgan to go back to school and Dan back to work, I have been glad for the silence. I might even get some sewing done!

I have a number of projects on the back burner so to speak. A coat, SCA garb, woodworking, knitting, and um.. oh yeah.. Writing! Biggest issue is keeping warm enough.

Dan and I had a nice New Year’s Eve. Smoked salmon and salmon paste in little pastries with fresh spinach salad, rye crackers, etc. We did stay up until midnight, and then curled up under the heavy quilt. 🙂

We did finish one major project before the new year. Lighting! We installed 4 lights and one ceiling fan. The difference is amazing! Next up on the Wendy House agenda is a ‘dog house’ for the plumbing connections that are outside, flooring in the living room and then closets.

Here are the lights. The pendulum lights are in the ‘living room’ area. The round ones are in the kitchen area and the ceiling fan is above our bed.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Of Snowdrops and Sparks

Posted on by

While in some ways it has been quiet, in others, it has not. we’ve been trying to get the Wendy House more “livable”. Our efforts with siding showed good results in that the snow storm two days ago was hardly felt. 🙂 Less draughts and cold seeping in. Dan’s filling in the roof ends with insulation worked! In this last week we finally got all of the ditches filled in and the step back in place! No more drawbridge to navigate in the dark!!!

We added 500 pounds of gravel in a drainage ditch and then filled and leveled the ground as best we could. Then we moved the large slab of sandstone into place and it only took minor feats of amazing strength to level it.

On the inside, we have been working on the electric wiring. Grandpa Sudar was a very clever and devious man in many ways. Over the years, we have dealt with many of his building oddities. A six inch long Louiseville slugger stub filling in a hole, drywall Not attached to 2×4’s hidden in the wall, and now the electrical work. We’ve been trying to figure out where the wires ran so we could upgrade the romex. We were stumped. So, Dan began to undo the light fixture we are replacing with a ceiling fan. Lo and behold… Grandpa had built itty bitty soffits to carry the wire! We had always wondered why there were 1×2’s on the rafters… now we know!

So, we will be installing the lights by the weekend. We are also upgrading lights in the ‘garage’ part of the Wendy House. Four LED lights from IKEA. They will replace four 100 watt bulbs with bulbs that use about 9 watts and give the same light. 🙂 I love that our electric bill keeps on dropping! Average so far this year is about $50 a month. We’ve moved from incandescent bulbs to compact fluorescents and now to LED bulbs.

Here are some pictures of our latest works:

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Oh what a crazy month!

Posted on by

This month has been crazy. Chaotic. Dizzying. Now, I thought it was a little crazy, because I spent most of the first week at the CASB Winter Conference. This is the big school board association conference held every year at the Broadmoor in Colorado Springs. It was a very good, although COLD conference. Average temperature was about 13F outside for most of the week.

I went up on the 4th, as I was presenting at the New Boardmember’s Boot Camp Workshop. 🙂 Five minutes of fame. LOL! Well, it started snowing on Wednesday morning and I was taking a school district vehicle. The VAN. A huge 12 passenger van, which made me feel like a five year old. I nearly needed a step ladder to climb in. Granted, it was nice to have the weight, as I was driving in snow and on ice most of the time.

This was also the first time in almost a year that Dan couldn’t come with me. As it was so cold, he stayed home to keep Brandy from turning into a Pupcicle. We had no one to feed her or dog sit her, so there was no choice but for him to stay.

Thursday was great. I went to my first session about Rural districts and then presented that afternoon. Five minutes on ‘how data is important.’ The rest of the conference was good, and I was very glad to get home on Sunday. Once I got home, we went and picked Morgan up from La Junta. Monday, I spent time with Daniel and Angela. We went shopping in Pueblo and had a great time. I should have gone to a District Accountability meeting, but I didn’t make it.

Tuesday was our board meeting. A long one, but good. Thursday was busy. Two events. A school holiday party and a school district office party. Sort of stacked together, but we managed both. 🙂 Good thing they were next door to each other.

Friday, we drove to Denver. We did a bit of shopping and on Saturday we saw our computer client. Got home late Sunday. The week started out busy. A trip to Pueblo, work for Dan, the holiday program at Gardner on Wednesday, cleaning my parents house and then up to Denver again on Thursday because our computer client was having weird issues. Friday we did shopping and then drove home late.

Saturday was Solstice. Yule. We got up at dawn and enjoyed the sun rise. Then instead of a nice breakfast, we had to check on the school wrestling tournament. Should have been a 10 minute stop. Nope. It wasn’t. At noon, I left to go help my dad stack a cord of firewood. I was done in 90 minutes, and went back to the wrestling tournament. We were there till about 7pm. Afterwards, we grabbed dinner and then collapsed in bed.

We woke up to snow this morning. Today we did odd jobs around the house and tried to relax a bit. Oh, and Dan built a faux satellite transmitter to test his ground station. The rest of the week isn’t looking much calmer.

This is the song that I woke up with on Solstice.

Just a Flake or Two…

Posted on by

Remember that we got a dusting of snow on Thursday and Friday? Well… it snowed a lot on Saturday, and even more on Sunday. We woke up today to over a foot of snow. This is wet heavy stuff. Not the dry squeak when you walk stuff like we had on Friday. Lucky for us, we got a load of firewood on Friday. Amazing how a bit of tree can make you so happy. (and warm!)

Today we slept in a bit, and we had just gotten dressed and finished breakfast when the phone rang. It was Dad. He needed help with the snow in his driveway. So, we got in the car, slid down the alleys and paid our water bill. (the Big job for the day). Then we drove, slid, rolled to my parents house. For all of the ten blocks difference, they got less snow than we did.

Dan used my parents snow blower while Dad shoveled a bit of the walk way. Funny bit is that at one point, I looked out and Dad was playing out the electric cord for the snow blower and all I could think of is “On Belay!” (Dad was a technical mountaineer for years, doing lots of rope work)

Then Dan got the truck stuck in the middle of the street. He grabbed the chains and lo and behold… when you change your tires, Always, ALWAYS check to make sure your chains fit! Ours didn’t. The two of them had to dig the truck out and use the chains for traction on the snow than on the tires.

After the truck was free of the snowbank, we headed to the grocery for Thanksgiving dinner. I’m bringing the pies and Dan is making rolladen. Yum!

As I was taking pictures, I realized that many of the pics look exactly the same as I’m using the same spot. So, I tried to change them up a bit this time. Two of the pics are at my parent’s house, and the rest are here.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

1 Room School House and a dash of snow

Posted on by

Every November, Gardner School celebrates the one room school houses that use to exist in Huerfano County. Malachite, Redwing, and Chama are just a few of the schools represented. Gardner School, which teaches PreK through 8th grade divides itself up into the 6 or 8 schools. They are populated by families instead. So, one school might have three Vigils, two Thomas’ and six Cordovas of mixed ages.

Each year there is a theme as well. This year’s theme was the Ludlow Massacre and Mine. The entire state is commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Coal mine War which started in September 1913 and had a ‘high point’ with the Ludlow Massacre in April 1913. Our local newspaper, the Huerfano Journal has been running a series of articles about the Ludlow Massacre.

The front door of the school was covered in paper to recreate the coal mine. The students were miners or ranchers and many of them dressed up. A local historian, Carolyn Newman came out and gave a presentation as Mother Jones.  At lunch time, a thanksgiving dinner was served. They had a contest to build the best supports for the mine and below are pictures of that contest. I thought it was very brave of Mr. Purnell, the principal to be the “Sheriff”, as the sheriff of that time period was not a well liked man.

At the end of the day, they got in a big circle, or as Cathy Cordova, a teacher said… “We are one big Family.” Then they called out a series of names. All of the people who died during the massacre. As each name was read, a child stood up and moved to the center. Many of the students were surprised at how young some of the victims were. It gave the students some perspective on the event.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

And as is usual for this time of year and the day an event is held at Gardner, it began to snow. We’ve had at least 8 inches fall, and the temperatures have been very cold. I was very happy to have a load of firewood delivered this morning!

Dan’s Dominos

Posted on by

Or how to knock over a whole slew of things with just one pull. 🙂 Yeah…

This weekend, we were finishing up the trim, electrical work and a few other bits and pieces on the Wendy House. I started on the brick wall in the main room that we use for a bedroom and my office. I took down all the bricks and then cleaned up a few of them. Then I put them back up on the wall with liquid nails. I was amazed at how fast and easy it went up. Better yet, how nice it looked. WendyHouseWork22 WendyHouseWork25Once I got the room put back together, I started working on the yard and doing a few other bits and pieces.

We had Daniel and Matthew as visitors too. Daniel borrowed some tools and Matt helped knock cement off of the bricks for me.

Dan started with the trim work and the shutters. He made me some cute ‘rustic’ styled shutters which I really like. As soon as we have the lumber, he will be making a planter to hang under the window.  We’d been talking about paint, what colors, whether we could manage this at the weekend, would the weather hold, etc. So, I started taking pictures. We were was almost finished when he realized that he had to add another piece of trim.

WendyHouseWork21 WendyHouseWork24 WendyHouseWork19

Could he leave it alone? No. As he’d already put some of the tools away, he walked back into the garage and pulled on the cord of the drill. It was pinched under the chunk of drywall. As he pulled, it knocked the drywall, the siding, a few other things and… the bookcase. It was a beautiful (wince) domino effect.

We took a break. After a sandwich, a phone call and some planning, we started picking up the mess. I stacked stuff and he moved the big pieces.

Then he finished up the trim. About twenty minutes later, he was up in the ceiling doing the electrical wiring. The area he was in will eventually be a loft storage area and the ceiling to the kitchen area. After all that was done, we had to decide where to put the bookshelf. Moving that, we came to the realization that we needed to clean up the rest of the area too.  Mice droppings, dust, sawdust, spiders, (three black widows the size of dimes!) and leaves were everywhere. Up until last weekend, it had been only separated from the great outdoors by a rather old garage door. Not air tight or even dust tight.

WendyHouseWork23  It took a little longer than I thought it would, but it was worth it. We tossed all the lumber scraps in the firewood pile and placed the shelf in a different spot. Oh, and we tested the wiring job. That new kitchen light is bright! LED, but bright! We may replace it with a less intense one later.

Once we had everything cleaned up, sorted, and stuffed in the right spot or pile, we had dinner and then crawled into bed. It had been a long day! Productive too!

WendyHouseWork20

Wendy House Renovations

Posted on by

Well, by the time the weekend rolled around, the weather was back in the mid to high 60’s. So,… we decided to do some work on the Wendy House. First though, we had to go see Morgan. What neither Dan or I knew/remembered is that she wanted to come home for the weekend.

Bonus!!! We had extra hands to help with the work. So, Saturday morning at the crack of 10am, after a lovely breakfast of bacon and pancakes, we started the great destruction. Twelve hours later, we had 90% of the work done.

Sunday, after crawling out of bed by lips and toenails, we got moving again. We were fueled by bacon, orange rolls and plenty of tea! While Dan did some electrical work, Morgan and I tackled some outside work. We dug a ditch for a drain and then did terracing work on the driveway. The alley had been falling into the driveway for probably 3 years. Now, it isn’t moving… we hope.

After that, we drove to Pueblo for steak and then took Morgan back to La Junta. Dan and I took our sore and aching muscles to bed. 🙂

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

And for anyone who doesn’t understand why I call it the Wendy House… it’s a Peter Pan reference. 🙂

 

First Real Snow of the Season

Posted on by

Tuesday night, on the way back from a candidates forum, we stepped outside into a gentle snow storm! Wet heavy flakes. We lit our first fire of the season in the wood stove and enjoyed the warmth as the world turned white.

We woke up on Wednesday morning to 4 inches of thick, wet snow. Gardner got 14 inches and lost power, so there was no school. I took some pictures. By the time we left for work, it was warm enough to not need a jacket. By the afternoon, you could barely tell it had snowed in town, although the Spanish Peaks were glorious.

We are suppose to get more snow tomorrow morning. I’m hoping it is light as we have construction work to do on Saturday.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

CASB

Posted on by

Thursday night we headed for Denver for the Fall Conference and Delegate assembly. There was a lot of good information, and the assembly was short and sweet. There were good conversations and I got to see people that I enjoy talking with about school board and education issues. As usual, I took Dan with me. 🙂 He enjoys the conferences as well and participates which is great. It’s like having an extra board member with me.

Friday night we had planned to drive down to LoDo to have dinner at the Rio Grande. We were both too tired, so we ate at the Modmarket. Yum! I had a lovely salad. Oh that there was one in Pueblo!

Saturday, we finished the conference and then headed to a computer client’s house. We got to have our appointment a week early. 🙂 This means we can go visit Morgan on the 18th. Then it was off to IKEA.

Yeah, we’ve been there a lot lately. This time we picked up the light fixtures for the Wendy House. We got these cool lamps. I also found some cheap rugs for entranceways, light bulbs, a couple of holiday candle lamps, and fabric out of the discount area. 🙂 Once the fabric is washed, I’ll be making adjustments and will have curtains in the kitchen!

Sunday, we should have been doing work on the house. Instead, we went to Pueblo and went to Target and Home Depot. We were too tired and brain dead to do any actual construction. That will happen this weekend. Just in time too, as it is getting cold There was snow on the Spanish Peaks this morning. We had a cold slushy rain in town last night.

Home Improvements and SpaceUp Denver

Posted on by

The last week has been busy. We’ve been doing lots of home improvements and we went to SpaceUp Denver. While the weather is good, we are working on replacing the garage door with a door, window and wall. We’ve cut all the joists to level the ramp and make a real floor. Then we got the chance to go to SpaceUp.

We went up the night before and stayed at the Hotel VQ. It’s this sort of geometric hotel next to the Bronco Stadium. Dan called it the 14 story Yurt. 🙂 It was. Better yet, as I was looking at the hotel layout, all I could think of was 1) Adafruit Flora and 2) Ironman’s reactor. We giggled a lot.

SpaceUp Denver is an Unconference. There were about 25 people there, and I was the only woman other than SpaceUp staff. Oh well. The speaker, Dr. Alan Stern was interesting. We had another gentleman speak on Citizen Scientists and then Dan spoke on Mach 30 and ODE.

Best bit of the whole day though was the Trivia quiz. You could get two points of you answered it without prompts and 1 point if you used the prompt. Well, Dan was wizing through the questions, so I just listened. Then they asked…”Who was the 1st American in space.” I KNEW that Dan knew the answer, so I didn’t even check. Especially after he’s been working on the Shephard Test Stand for almost a year. Even I knew that it was Shepard.Then the prompts go up and Dan gets this funny look on his face and I realize…. Mr Always has the RIGHT answer had gotten it wrong!!!! I laughed! It was great!

When we finished, we visited my sister for an hour and then went to IKEA. We found a sink for the Wendy House for 1/2 off. It was a great end to a lovely visit.

And yes, I am still laughing about Dan’s wrong answer!

This slideshow requires JavaScript.