Come Into My Web Said the Spider To the Fly

Or in this case, come into the West Wing through the side door!

 Yesterday it was snowing in April so Bill left work to go home and work. He moved the electrical wire for the light switches by the door between the West Wing and the garage. He had put them on the wall where they would have been behind the door when it was open. He thought that would be okay since we have so much natural light in the hallway but I insisted they go on the other wall. What's a little more work for him. After moving it he agrees this is where they should go. He wasn't thinking door when he put them in the first time.

When I got home he was ready to cut the hole in the wall.

I held the metal while he used the Saws All to cut our opening. Saw blade jumping all around while cutting loose metal, was just a little disconcerting.

 Next framing the opening. Everything was pre-cut and ready to go. It was too windy and cold to fool around.

 Adding the scabs to have everything the right height.

Checking for level.

We have a door!!!

 The is the door that leads from the garage into the West Wing. It is the one we will use to go back and forth between our living and work areas. Decorator gave me paint color suggestions for all of our interior doors now off to the paint store and start making things pretty. I told her I wanted warm off white colors, that's what we had in the South Bend house and loved the color.

Bill is trying to figure out how to do an arch over the door. There is a structural beam going across the top that is impeding his creativity. I said a plant ledge would be fine but he thinks he can figure it out. His thinking outside the box brain is really impressive.

Dusty Dusty Oklahoma

Our apartment, that we love, is a dust bowl. I have never llived anywhere that gets so dusty so quickly. The wood floors are always gritty to your bare feet. I sweep out the garage every two weeks. Yes, I could do it more often but there are only so many minutes in a day. We walk through the garage to get to the front door so we track all the grime into the house.

You can see why the garage gets so dusty. Lots and lots of air holes for the Oklahoma wind to blow the Oklahoma red dirt into our space. Yes, that is light you see all the way around the walk in door. We won't be doing anything about these until we are ready to frame in the front of the house. We will need to live this for awhile.

Little Projects

The previous owners idea of good paint color and mine are different. I find his main color a dirty color. Certainly didn't stop us from buying the place, because we knew it was all going to be changed and repainted.

The front door has really bothered me. Since it seems we will be using it a while longer, it needed to be painted. He had trimmed it out in red and painted it the same color as the metal walls. I feel your front door needs to welcome people to your home and not blend in. It was also done in a flat paint and I couldn't clean it very well.

I went to our paint room and found paint we had on hand. I used Biscuit, which is a paint three of our rent houses use and Winter Wheat to trim. Winter Wheat is one of the samples we bought to figure out the color for the Trophy Room.

Not a drastic change; just a fresher look. Now the walls really look muddy to me. The red ceiling accent has to go. But, until I decide what color I am painting our bedroom walls we will live with it.

Fixing Someone Else's Problem

When the previous owners took their mobile home out they took it our across our meadow and left huge tracks. We had a Gentlemen's Agreement they would fix all damage. They obviously are not gentlemen. So this weekend we started filling in the tracks. This needs to be done before the grass grows in and we can't see them. Bill will only feel them when he bounces over them when mowing.


We used a Load Handler (for sale at  your local Rock Yard) to unload the soil. This thing is great!  It is a teflon sheet you lay out in the bed of your truck. Load the product and when you get where you are going you just crank the stuff out. No shoveling out of the truck, it saves you so much work.

We used two pick up and one trailer load and got 2/3 of the tracks done. We didn't want to do much  more because of the rains coming in and didn't want the tracks on the steep slope to wash away.

Next weekend we will do the slope. This will get rid of  the constant reminder of  people not keeping up their end of a bargain. And will stop aggravating us every time we come home.

Major Upgrade

About 15 years ago we bought a little table saw to help with our projects. We probably spent around $130, if even that much. Bill is wanting to make his own I-Beams for the Trophy Room. To buy they are $80 a piece; to make they will be $14 a piece. Huge savings. We started ripping 2x4's and our little table saw started smoking.

Too Much Work for The Little Guy

Call out to Daddy for help. Daddy is loaning us his professional table saw. This baby is an antique but is incredible. Many many years ago Daddy would work on a building crew during the winter. He was a farmer so had the winters and a large family; winter money was needed. He went to Sears and bought this table saw, took it to work, started cutting with it, and they were fired from the job that day. The guy framing had framed all the door openings too small. Daddy was having to cut all the doors to make them fit. Home owner was not happy with the too small of openings so the crew was gone. Daddy's only concern was how was he going to make the payments on this new tool. They were  out of work less than a week. This table saw was also used to build the house I grew up in. Daddy doesn't remember exactly when he bought the saw but the "new" house was built when I was 7 years old which makes it at least 51 years old.

Another thing cool about this is that Daddy made all the wood pushing blocks. They are made out of fine wood and are works of art.

 It Can Handle Anything

When Bill was setting it up in our work shop he became emotional. He and my Daddy are very close and this means so much to him that he is building our home with what Daddy built my childhood home with.

No Sprinkler System

We have 7.5 acres to keep green and no sprinkler system. Luckily, it is all Bermuda grass and that grass can take drought conditions. The reports are that we will be having an El Nino summer so very little water. Along the concrete drive and parking the previous owner put in shrub beds. You can tell where he watered and where the water didn't go. Where he watered; the shrubs are nice and healthy and then you have areas with nothing but dead roots.

So one day Miss Mallory and I set out to solve this problem. We put soaker hoses under the rock encircling the shrubs to get the water where it needs to go

 
It's wonderful having a two year old dressed as a princess and her matching princess doll helping with projects like this.

We laid out our pattern and then started moving rock and laying the hose. The princess dress got a little dirty with this project. The plants will love getting water this summer. Also put in fertilizer spikes. I have no idea if these plants have ever been fertilized. They may go crazy this growing season and  have to be trimmed. So I may have made more work for myself.

Mister Ant is watching to be sure we did this right.

Country Living At It's Finest

When we pull out of our drive this is what we see. If they aren't there then their friends the horses will be. You never see the cattle and the horses mingling. They share the same pasture but are always at different parts of it. There is very little cooler than a herd of Texas Long Horns across the road from your house. The neighbors out there love the Long Horns and our Buffalo being across from each other.

 We may be 10 minutes from Wal-Mart & Braum's, 15 minutes from our doctor and the hospital but we are definitely in the country.

More signs of country living. Constant dirt on the floor and now scorpions. We have only seen one but if there is one there has to be more. Oklahoma scorpions are not poisonous but you will have a reaction to them. Our friendly exterminator is on his way out.