They said it would…

Posted on by

Snow that is. Yesterday started out sunny and warm. Around noon, the clouds rolled in and it began to rain. Not much at first. In fact, it was just enough to show us where all the leaks from the damage caused by the wind storms. I worked on my clothes for the SCA event next weekend and moved various buckets and cups to catch the drips.

While I was cooking dinner, the sound changed. The gentle pitter patter of rain drops turned hard. We looked out the window and sleet was falling fast. By the time we ate dinner 40 minutes later, there was an inch of slushy snow on the ground. Brrr!

I headed off to the Wendy House and the wood stove. Dan stayed inside and worked on the satellite receiver that has been eating his life. ugh. When he came to bed, we had about 5 inches.

This morning, we woke to nearly 8 inches of snow. Wow! It is a wet heavy snow, which means we will net about 1/2 an inch of water. Yes, 1/2 an inch out of all that snow. The general formula is 12 inches of snow equals 1 inch of water. Or, in other words, the 18 inches of rain that Boulder and areas north of us got last summer equals 18 FEET of snow.

I took some pictures. Brandy was a bit twitterpatted by a large raven that was nearby.

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.

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.

 

Cool Weather

Posted on by

We have had cool, cloudy, rainy weather for the last three days. Dan puts it down to the fact that I cleared the dam across the sidewalk that we built to keep water out of the house. Plus, I finally got the tent and tarpaulin out to rinse off and dry. It almost got dry. Now it has been rinsed off by at least three or four good rain showers.

My squash plants have been loving the damp weather. I have a couple of zucchini that you could hollow out and use for canoes. 🙂 I foresee zucchini bread in my future.

After our crazy trip up and back to Denver, I went up on Tuesday to interview for a position on the CASB board. I didn’t get it, but asked an interesting question… Why didn’t they have a TECH committee? Matt Cook, the board president just sort of stuttered and said they’d have to look into that. 🙂

I went from that meeting and the drive home to a board workshop where we discussed the upcoming elections. We have two candidates running in one district, and we are trying to move to a district wide representation system. For too many years, we have had issues finding people to run for those seats. We end up appointing people who sometimes run for the seat after they’ve been doing it a few years. Other times, we end up having to appoint some one yet again. If we don’t do this, we will end up having to spend money to reapportion our districts. We’ve lost a lot of the population in some of them while other districts have gained. I just hope we can make the voting public understand.

Well, I’ve got to go find a heavier shirt to put on. It’s cold! 🙂 19C, or about 68F.

Battlemoor IV

Posted on by

Ah… back to civilization? Well, maybe. The last two weeks have been nuts. First there was Battlemoor. Dan has been working for the school district as an IT contractor since August. While this has helped the pocketbook, it meant that he had to work the first couple of days of the event. 🙁

So, after sewing a hole in my finger, I packed all of the stuff for the event. Not too bad really. I even figured out how to fill the water butts. I put them in empty and then filled them. I got the last of the groceries and then picked Dan up from work. We got set up, had dinner with the Artisan Lane bunch and then he went home.

Thursday morning, I awoke to a beautiful sunrise. Got dressed, grabbed my fiber tools and after breakfast, went to the Fiber Tent. 🙂 50ft from ‘home’. I had lots of fun. Worked on my socks for the Sock War, visited with friends I hadn’t seen in a year and even managed a few pictures. Dan arrived in time for dinner. It was another pot luck, and we had fun. We went to sleep to the sounds of drums around the bonfire.

Friday was more Fiber stuff. 🙂 Got some pictures of Lothar, aka Dan playing with the forge at the blacksmith’s place. I got lots of comments on my coat and tunic embroidery. We went to Court,had dinner and once again went to sleep to the sound of drums.

Saturday. It was HOT!  Steamy. It rained a tiny bit, but it barely cooled off. Lots of time spent in Merchant’s Row and in the Fiber Tent. Grand Court was awesome. I think there were 8 sets of royalty. Sleep was once again accompanied by drums. (If you’re sensing a theme here, you’re right.)

Sunday. Sock War final. I got one sock and part of another one knit. I was knitting for the Golden West side. We won 87.5 inches to 82. 🙂 Woohoo!!! At one of the Courts,  I got to help hand out ‘largess’. These are things that the Fiber Guild has made and gifts to the Outland Royals.

Just after Court, it began to rain. Rain really Hard! We were stuck in the cook tent on Artisan’s Lane. The ground got muddy really fast as John found out. Dan went to help him and ended up getting his truck to their camping spot. While there was a party that night, there wasn’t a lot of drumming.

Monday morning… Time to pack and return to the 21st century. sigh… We got home by 2pm. I unpacked most of the stuff and we were off to bed early. It was a wonderful time.

By the way… my pictures are so out of order. In amongst them are my coat with the dragon boats I embroidered, the knife that Dan worked on and the pretties he bought me. Brooches, earspoon, pick, tweezers and omega brooch.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

From Drip to Downpour!

Posted on by

About an hour ago, it started raining. Really raining. Keep in mind the ground is already soaked from a week of nightly rain showers. So, I start closing windows and head to the back door when I realize we have a problem. A big wet problem.

The rain is coming down so hard that it is forming rapids on the stairs from the back yard. It is flowing so fast that the water is coming IN the back porch. I holler to Dan who looks at it and then heads outside to start diverting the water. That’s when I realize that if we don’t move the mud and debris from the side of the house, the water is still going to flow in the back porch. So, out I went.

It hails. It rains. It soaks us both, but we get the water diverted. After we dried off, changed into dry clothes and got a cup of tea, I looked out the front door. Oh My! The alley had washed out. So, I took pictures.

Oh, and it keeps raining about every 15 minutes.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

Drip! Drip! Drip!

Posted on by

I think the appropriate wording would be “state of shock”. Why? Well, it is raining. Still raining. In fact, it has rained almost every night for at least the last week. Some are just little showers and others are drenching downpours which make us scramble for buckets to catch the drips. (remember those leaks I mentioned?)

It has rained so much that I haven’t been able to mow my front lawn. The weeds are about 18 inches high. And, it is so green! We went for a drive to Pueblo the other day and the prairie was so lush. The stock ponds were filled and the squash vine that grows on the side of the road was spreading everywhere. (What is that vine? Does anyone know?)

It was foggy and cold this morning. 60F. Brrr! I had to grab a blanket in the middle of the night kinda cold. Overall, it’s been kinda nice. 🙂

However, it has meant that we’ve done very little gardening or house repair work. Guess that will wait until September, after Battlemoor.

Hot and Windy

Posted on by

Right now, it’s about 93 with wind gusts up to about 15mph. The fire is down to about 5 major hot spots that we can see when we drive up to the football field. Oh, and it has eaten 13,491 acres as of this morning, and is considered 50% contained.

Today we are officially off pre-evacuation status. Phew! What it has shown Dan and I is that we need to re-evaluate how things are stored. I’m returning items to more concentrated and/or collected spots. I also plan to scan all of the umpteen million family pictures when the weather cools. This way, if they burn, oh well. I have digital copies.

Another thing I’ve been looking at are family treasures. Some I’m going to pull out and use! Others, I will do my best to figure out which of the 6 kids would want some of them. Other items, I may simply give to my sister and hope she has something to do with them in the next 30 years. 🙂

Meanwhile, amidst the fires, and hectic weekend, we got a bit more plumbing work done on the Wendy House. And…. We’ve Filled In The Ditch! Okay, 95% of the ditch. 🙂 What this means is that I now have more of a back yard and can move on to other projects. A compost bin and a keyhole garden are next up on the agenda for outside work. Oh, and finishing the last 5% of the plumbing. 🙂

Now to go work on some embroidery. Battlemoor is only two months away!

Weekend Entertainment.

Posted on by

Oh my! At least it was entertaining for my Dad and anyone watching.

A better title might have been “working on the chain gang”. We started on my Dad’s yard at 9:30am on Saturday. Dan cut up wood with the chain saw and I carried it to the truck. About a quarter of a cord. Then, while he mowed the front, I picked up about 30 gallons of twigs and sticks. While he mowed the back, I weeded in the front and trimmed up a rosebush that hadn’t been pruned in probably 15 years. The lawn mower had a sense of humor and ran out of gas when Dan had a 10 yard strip left to mow. We finished at 12:55.

When we got back to the house, we had to unload the truck. We had the wood to stack, Spearmint for the front and an Italian plum tree sucker we hope will transplant.  I pulled weeds and did gardening out front with Morgan while Dan washed dishes.  Then it was time to collapse. We finally recovered around 7pm.

Then I made pizza. Yes, homemade pizza. Morgan nearly burned her mouth again, trying to eat it when it was too hot. 🙂

Sunday… we did not sleep in. Instead, we got up and I made bacon and fried potatoes. After breakfast, I had a board meeting with Mach 30. Once that was done, Dan and I started to repair the roof of the Wendy House. He tarred and I sifted dirt for the cover layer. I also did a bit of weeding in the alley while he was on the roof. We will be touching up things for the next few days as everything soaks in. There were a ton of nail hole leaks. Oh, and the drips. It was 90 yesterday. Brandy of course walked right under some of them. She’ll just have to wait until the tar wears off. She’s speckled.

We pulled off some of the old tar paper siding on the west side of he Wendy house to see what was under there. Wood! We will need to replace some of it and then put siding on. I told Dan it WILL be before winter! I can see daylight through the cracks. However, the paper being gone will help in doing the plumbing.

Next up, Dan inspected the lower chimney on the main house. OMG! Nearly 3 feet of damage. Loose bricks, crumbling mortar, etc. He took it down to a safe level and capped it. I am very glad that we do not use that chimney. Funny part is that use to be the furnace chimney and supposedly safe. And… Grandpa Sudar wouldn’t use the fireplace chimney as he thought it was damaged. Nope. Other way around. We are lucky the house didn’t burn down.

While Dan threw bricks off the roof, I cleaned up part of the back patio and did more garden work in the front. I planted the yarrow in the yard and watered the transplanted mint and plum tree. The mint looks like it will survive. I’m not so sure about the tree.

Exhausted doesn’t even cover how we felt. We cleaned up, ate dinner and were in bed early. It was a lot of work, and while it may not seem that much was done, we were very busy.