T - 52 Hours and Waiting for Canon

Trailer is checked and rechecked. We've got most of the "camp" boxes in, and I'm getting DD's clothes washed. He doesn't own enough clothes to pack some and leave some. When he stops growing an inch a day we might get caught up.



I have to do the sewing box and finish the office boxes today. I think my clothes are ready, and the linens are, but they go in last since I need to get them out first. I have this little obsession about getting the beds made as soon as we get there. At least we can sleep. My supervisor checked our apt earlier this week and it should be a-okay. I just hope the new staff that arrives this weekend doesn't help them selves to the furniture that's in there. After all, I had a tough time appropriating it last fall! It sort of all matches. We're going with the NPS Ranch Oak style. I'd steal our DR table if I could figure a way. We also need another chair, as there are 4 of us and only 3 DR chairs.



When we left last fall, there was a 3 drawer dresser in the "Master BR" (lol!!) and an end table between the boys beds in their room, and I think there's at least one, maybe 2 coffee table things in the LR, along with a love seat and sofa. I think there's a floor lamp and a table lamp, too.

Packing with the trailer has been very 'refreshing' in that my worries about how to cram stuff in the car is gone! We can take all the lawn chairs we want! This year we're going to make better use of our "storage" locker, too. And we can leave junk in the trailer, since we can park it right in front of the apt. Yeah, not my third-bedroom-on-wheels, but still good. We even have room for sleeping bags and the tent. What a concept for spending the summer in a National Park!

DH and FTD are off to help another Scout with his Eagle project. It started out as repairs to a dock at a living history place and has turned into a 24 foot long floating, fully accessible dock. The place that needs it has sort of taken advantage of a couple of really nice folks on this one, imho. Anywho, the director was supposed to provide a dozen 55 gallon barrels for the floats and produced nary a one. And he wanted it launched today. Last night we got a note from the Scout asking if we had any clues where to get cheap barrels. DH went to McDonald's this morning, where the old farts from Swantuckey hang out, and low and behold, free barrels. He's gunna get us a couple for rain barrels. Yea.

I was hoping to get our front porch stained today, but it's raining again. Drat. On other house news, the roof is now 3/4 finished. It didn't take the crew long to get the bedroom wing done on the back since it's long and straight. But we counted boxes of "shingles" out there and they're way short. Apparently they are also hard to get because they've become very popular all of a sudden. Great.



We're also having a few days of house weird heating/cooling. In the spring, the geothermal doesn't quite know what do to. It has an outside sensor, so it tries to read that and extrapolate info to the system. But around here, humidity makes a huge difference. Yesterday was one of those days when the temp wasn't too bad, but the humidity was awful. When the temp hovers day and night around 70 degrees, the system just can't make up its mind.

We also have fun news. Last year we wanted to get a new, bigger, badder camera. But the market for them was one extreme or the other and we're middle of the road types. We've had a nifty Kodak PHD (Press Here Dummy) camera for 5 years but the charging dock for it died. Last spring we bought another, somewhat bigger Kodak which totally sucks when being used. It turns out nice pics, but it's a crapshot as to what we'll get because the quality of the live view and viewfinder stink. And the battery situation was awful.

So we've bit the bullet and ordered a Canon T1i. Canon and Nikon both realized that there are amatur pros out here who like a good camera, but don't need true professional stuff. Nikon has just introduced it's D5000 for our market, but we went with the Canon because it has better video capabilties. I've had fun with the imovie stuff, so that was the deciding factor. No one in our area had either of these in stock we we ordered one. If it gets here before 2 pm on Monday, I get it. If not, I take the older Kodak and Tom tries to STOP THE PRESSES!!!!!! AT THIS VERY MOMENT, THE NEW CAMERA ARIVED!


Bye!

Miracle of Miracles! Pics added

My fingerprints cleared! I don't think they were actually "read" but that I received dispensation from the gods. Who cares, I get to work on schedule!

In house news, the front roof is nearly done, just need to do the area around the chimney where each piece has to be cut. Then they'll start the back. I might maybe be able to see the final product, but I'm not holding my breath.


And in other exciting news, the boiler is in for the basement heating project. They'll be back to mess with it some more tomorrow, then it's up to us to get the styrofoam down and the wire mesh. They'll run the pex, then the concrete goes in. I'll just be surprised next fall when I get home.

New Roof, Day 1

The roofers started today. They got the galvanized roof off almost all of the front. The Insulspan panels are a very different color from the stick built sections of the roof. I called the company and they'll send someone down tomorrow to be sure the integrity of the panels is okay.
Beautiful, yet not 100 year old roof--it rusted from the inside out!




ABC Siding and Roofing move into the front yard.


First section of sheet metal comes off.







The darker sections are the stress-skin or structural insulated panels (SIP). In the roof we have 8 inch panels, the walls are 6 inch panels. One of these days I'll post the old pics of the construction process.

The lighter and brand spanking new looking sections are the stick built add-ons. They show no wear or tear at all. We're hoping the discoloration on the SIPs is from maybe the tar paper baking to the panels or something. But the guy from Insulspan has to check before any more of the roofing ice guard and tyvek go on.

We'll see what the morrow brings.

On an Earth Day note, the boys and I joined a few members of the HS Environmental Awareness Club to help pick up trash on the school's floodplain trail. There was a surprisingly small amount of stuff. I also dropped off out-grown clothes for the textiles recycling drive contest. The load I dropped off should put FTD's Junior class ahead.

FTD also took in the newspaper articles with Uncle George's pictures the day they first sprayed that miracle chemical ddt. Long post on that some other day. I'll try to scan part of the article.

Been a long day!