Hardy Perennials

As promised, here is my next blog entry that is not a downer! :) I knew my life would provide some more fun stories. I will begin by saying I was determined to stay on top of the weeds in our yard this year. I even purchased a pre-emergent spread that is supposed to kill any before they showed up.

Since we didn't get it down until after the weeds had peeked out of the ground I had to change my approach. I discovered most large weeds would come up if I used a shovel to pop the roots under the ground and then I could pull the weed out without damaging the grass.

Last week, I was on the phone with one of my sisters who had just spent the day weeding her yard. I thought to myself, "I can conquer these weeds right now." I headed out to the front yard with my gloves and a shovel and Mario and Joseph in tow. (Andrea was in bed with pneumonia).

We dug and pulled until my fingers ached. At some point I began to get frustrated and I called the weeds all sorts of things like, "dratted weeds" and "dastardly weeds" and "dang dilapidated weeds." A relatively unimportant point to make about the weeding, but I was trying to stick to non-swear words for the weeds. The roots ran deep and the leaves were all tangled. Some were so bad I had to squat down to get all of my leg strength to pull them out.

Mario took one of these silent squatting moments to correct my colorful country substitute language and said that I should just call them "hardy perennials." To this suggestion I gave a great laugh that was mingled with a scoff and reminded my darling man that the scriptures called them noxious weeds and said they were here to torment me. In my logic, if they are here to torment me, then I am allowed to give them every hint of where I think they should go and how fast I want them there! Mario just sighed and shrugged his shoulders; and I, without an ounce of shame, continued muttering my abuse to the "hardy perennials."

At some point Mario went back in the house and Joseph and I were trying to get some more weeds pulled. I was still on the phone with my sister while trying to pull/pop weeds, which caused some bit of amusement to our neighbors I am sure. I had the phone tucked under my ear and the shovel in my hands while stepping on the shovel and trying to pop weeds. At the same time I was trying to give Joseph directions about which ones were loose. Why I didn't just hang up the phone I will never know. I guess it was literally glued to my head. Wow, why didn't I hang it up! Haha! I just can't get enough of talking to my sister I guess.

Joseph made only one big mistake during our de-hardy perennialling (de-weeding). He wore sandals. He soon regretted this as dirt kept spilling onto his toes from the roots. Every time a huge glob of dusty, bug-filled dirt, touched his toes he would squeal and grab me for balance and he did a little dance trying to shake everything off.

I never really had warning before this would happen. I would be innocently talking to my sister, he would scream and grab me, and I would scream. One of the reasons I screamed is because Joseph kept grabbing me with the muddy weed still in his hand to balance himself. The consequence was that he dumped a whole mess of dirt down the back and front of my shirt. Yuck!!!!! The worst thing he did occurred when the biggest lump dumped onto his foot. He reached for me again to help balance himself and instead of dumping mud down my shirt he began falling backward and lifted my shirt up for the whole neighborhood to see. "Great!" thought I, "As if this wasn't already a spectacle!" :)

I had reached my breaking point and decided that Joseph needed to go to bed, however well-intentioned he was. This is just another example of the lesson we keep learning. You must have the right equipment for the right job! :) For example, tennis shoes instead of sandals and a thicker shirt tucked in cause you never know!

We have since weeded half of the front bed of flowers and put in new plants. It was worth the work and the sweat to have at least half a decent front yard.

picture taken from: http://stmedia.startribune.com/images/630*420/5gard0622.jpg

The Beast at the Door

Yesterday Joseph helped me to clean out the area of the kitchen by the back door. We hadn't used the back door for a while because the frame was messed up from the screen door hydraulics being too tight. We vacuumed and killed spiders (bleck!) and removed the hydraulics so at least the door is usable. What a challenge it was! Joseph and I took turns using a hand screwdriver and a drill to fix the problem. The screws on the bottom were actually bent. We had to open the screen so that I could get leverage on the very bent screws. Joseph was our wasp guard and would warn me when any came near. We have had a problem with wasps every year since we moved here, and despite many websites spouting their usefulness, I feel a need to irradiate them. At every sound Joseph would come run in and shut the door.

He didn't used to be afraid of paper wasps, but last year he was stung and bit 10 times up his arms so he is a little twitchy now. On Saturday I actually had to walk outside with him for a while to convince him the evil bugs weren't out to get him. This was a difficult task seeing as there were at least 20 buzzing around our grass angrily looking for food. (this heat wave has not made the wasps more docile and lethargic like it has done to we humans!)

Back to Joseph's door guarding. He told me at one point that a wasp had come in, but I hadn't seen it so I persevered with my plyer and drill attack on the determinedly crooked screw. We finally conquered the door and cheered at our great success.

Later in the day, I was in bed filling out some paperwork while the kids and the hubby were soundly sleeping. Just after midnight I looked up and there is a great black wasp glaring at me menacingly from our bedroom door. The wimp in me came  out and I woke Mario hoping he would save the day. Unfortunately he was too lethargic. (we can blame the heat? :)He checked for spray in the kitchen but couldn't find any and he had no other ideas to offer.

I truly felt that mother bear feeling coming out of me as I rushed to the store for poison so I could protect my precious cubs from the evil invader!

The store clerks chuckled at my experience and I grimaced back with a half grin. They offered their advice as I checked out and I left their amused eyes behind to save my household.

When I arrived back home, I found that the lights had been turned off. I had hoped this meant that Mario had slain the dragon, but I found him sleeping soundly without a care in the world. Was I going to be able to sleep? I think not. I kept vigil in my room, continuing my paperwork with one eye constantly on the watch (with the aid of my peripheral vision). The can of Hot Shot was sitting on the bed beside me.

Around 1am I saw a big black winged thing enter my domain and land somewhere around my bedside lamp. Excellent, I thought, I was just getting tired enough to not care! So I prayed a wasp prayer. Now I have learned from experience that I need to be specific when I pray. I can't just say, "I hope I find the wasp" because the answer could be that it lands on my nose. This in mind I prayed that I would see it before it saw me and that I would find it before morning.

Around 2am I found it as I went to put my computer down. It was sitting on a piece of paper on the floor. My reaction time to stressors is usually around three seconds. These three seconds I spent trying to think of the best position to spray it from and I sent a few more prayers to Heaven that it wouldn't move! I also quickly read the bottle which stated that the spray was only meant for outdoor use! Out loud I said, "You must be joking!" (This caused Mario to roll over in bed.) I decided that I didn't care and that I would spray til it died. I took aim and fired one shot. It promptly began crawling up the paper. I screeched and drown the beast with a new flow. It stopped moving. Whew!

The adrenaline was pumping through my veins after this and I stayed up a while longer to calm down. On the bright side,  I was able to finish the paperwork completely. I am glad that the adventure ended well and I am happy to report that Mario redeemed himself this morning my attacking one of the active hives of paper wasps. Another day done and another drama ended!

We shall live to fight another day!

(Image obtained from bugguide.net)

The Good, the Bad, and the VERY Ugly!

The last few weeks have brought the typical household dramas in all their glory. I shall start with the "good" even though I am aware that the good things that happen here aren't nearly as entertaining as the stress that inevitably ensues in this house.

The good news is that I have finally fixed most of the curtains in the house and the deep organizing is coming along. There...... That's the good and, as I promised, it was completely lacking in entertainment value.

Okay, now for the "bad". Last week, when I had pneumonia/bronchitis/asthma, Andrea decided to use half a roll of toilet paper (the really nice thick kind that doesn't dissolve easily). This led to the clog of all clogs. In fact, it was so spectacularly clogged that I think it deserves its own name, King Clog! (haha!)

So I plunged for hours, literally hours, to no avail. Andrea even tried her hand at it. There was no movement from the water (except as it tried to exit the toilet!) By noon I called Mario who was planning on getting off work early anyway. I told him my resolve and energy were spent and the kids were hungry (as was I). I told Mario I wanted to take them out to eat for lunch because I couldn't take one more minute of the toilet problem staring me in the face (so to speak :) (Plus, there were three people in the house, two with very small bladders!)

Now, any of you who know Mario well will not be surprised by his reaction. :) He told me that there was no need to go out to eat. He would come home immediately to help. (teehee) (He had no problem facing the toilet if it meant we didn't eat out!)

Mario went  plumb crazy! ;) He plunged and plunged and plunged and when that didn't work he plunged some more. We tried dish soap, which had worked once before and we tried a couple of cleaners. We also tried some CLR. (I know what a crime it is to add to contamination in the water table, but we were desperate. Luckily I don't feel too guilty because I have been tackling the weeds in our yard without chemicals!!) The toilet became more empty of water as he plunged but not because his efforts were working. He  plunged so passionately, determined to not have to pay a dime to a plumber, that the bathroom became sopping wet! YUCK!

After contributing a couple of hours to the cause we finally accepted we needed a better solution. Despite my fever I went to Home Depot to get the pipe snake thingy (I think its called a plumbers drill). (A couple of years ago I had sent Mario to the store for one. He came home with a white stick thingy that was about 6 inches long. It has only ever worked for getting hair from the shower drain.) This in mind, I knew our family would only get "relief" if I went to search for it. Luckily, the tool was really easy to find and I was out of the store in 5 minutes including the pit stop.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Mario was so sure our toilet was broken permanently he had begun to dig a hole in our backyard for our pioneering efforts at sanitation. (no more details needed, eh?) I came to the rescue almost at a crawl and passed the gauntlet/toilet snake. I lay on a dining room bench trying to breath while Mario worked to figure out how the snake worked. He uncoiled and coiled it back a few times. After the first use, the water went down a little bit. Mario and I were excited and he ran the snake down the pipe again. This time as he started pulling it out, he began to cough hard, so hard in fact, that he had to stop working. Little particles had been getting into his lungs. All I could think was, "I don't want to know! I don't want to know!! I don't want to know!!!" as I offered him a mask.

The second time worked out better and the water receded even further. By the third time I was kinda checked out of the process with shock. Mario wound the handle and wound and wound. I thought he was doing it for an unusually long time. After about five minutes I said, "Don't you think you've gone far enough?"We tried the toilet and were delighted to find that it flushed! Next, Mario began to pull the snake back in. He turned for about 5 minutes before we realized it wasn't making progress. (Mind you this was a 25 ft cable, so we didn't know how long it would take to reel in.)

I decided we should open the casing that held the cord to see how much was coiled inside. We removed one screw after another. What a new shock I received when the cap burst open in my face. (Apparently these things are spring loaded in some weird way.) This was when we realized that the 25 ft long cable was stuck somewhere in our plumbing. We tugged and pulled, but not too hard as we were afraid of creating an even bigger problem.

Finally, I said a plumbing prayer. I felt that I needed to pull up on the cord, so I did. I pulled straight up and back and amazingly the cable broke loose. I laughed/cried for a few second until Mario, in his eagerness, began pulling at it fast and spraying me with whatever there was inside the beast. I screeched and retched and began coughing while begging him to calm down! The clean up from this disaster I can hardly describe in one entry but I think it will take weeks before I am convinced that our bathroom is sanitary again.

The final and ugliest part of our adventurous week I will be very brief about. We were trying to fix our bedroom doors. I am usually really good with the circular saw, so the job fell to me to get the door to the height we needed. Unfortunately, the wood was really old inside the door so it was very difficult to keep a straight line, especially when I hadn't marked it with a pencil or something else. The saying goes, "Pride cometh before the fall." I was way too overconfident in my steady hand. (I am sure someone can use this analogy in church for a talk!) As a result, the door looks atrocious. I am beyond embarrassed and frustrated that this project didn't go well. I admit to crying. I try so hard to do high quality repairs. At least I can say I tried my best.

Picture found on http://www.atlantasteemer.com/sitebuilder/images/Toilet_Overflow_Atlanta-305x197.png

Joseph's Bedroom

Joseph's bedroom is the smallest in the house, 8'x8'. Making his room livable has taken many years of hard work. First, we had to take down the dark wood paneling which made the room gloomy and depressing. Next, we closed the bathroom off from the bathroom. (We used to have to go through his room to get to the bathroom. When we remodeled the bathroom we had to tear out the walls. We found that a door frame already existed for a living room connection, but it had been sealed off for some reason.)

The next project had to be the window in his room. There was only one window which was mostly filled with a huge swamp cooler. We wanted more light in the room and although we weren't thrilled about losing the swamp cooler, events soon came to light that made us change our tune. Both of our children are allergic to mosquitoes and somehow we kept getting them in the house. The children were getting more upset and paranoid as time went on because their reactions to the bites were so painful. We searched and searched for the source of the pests but couldn't find it. There had been a lot of mosquitoes in our yard since we moved into the house as well, but we couldn't find any water source from our yard they were using.

One night we saw a moth fly into the house through the swamp cooler. In an effort to avoid getting anymore critters we taped a screen around the opening for the swamp cooler in Joseph's room. We went back the next day and were disgusted by what we found. Pushed up against the screen were some 100 dead mosquitoes. The mother bear in me awoke. Although it took some time to prepare, I knew what had to be done.

Mario and I began tearing everything out. As I pulled off the screen I felt ill. There were thousands upon thousands of dead mosquitoes against the screen now and I had to use a vacuum to clean it all up. We removed the swamp cooler and tore out the window. Mario and I worked late into the night to install the new window. Even though we only had a hand saw, we cut 2x4's and prepped the surface according to code. We were proud of what we had accomplished when the window was complete. It took us another good long while to get the rest of the room done, but at least there were no mosquitoes coming in his room. (Since then we have also noticed that there are hardly any mosquitoes in the neighborhood. I think we might have been providing the local supply, Oops!)

The next stage in Joseph's room was to repair the walls. We had really hoped to do a patch job but soon realized how impossible this was. There were so many holes and cracks the only option was to tear out 2 1/2 walls. This was a hard blow to Mario as he had spent 6 months + scraping wallpaper off of the walls. (We took advantage of the blank canvas and insulated the exterior wall as we had done in the bathroom and we had the room rewired.) Tearing out the walls was a difficult feat as I had to do most of it myself. On a whim I decided to ask Joseph if I could use his baseball helmet while knocking out the walls and ceiling because I was having to make some powerful swings with a rather ominous crowbar. This turned out to be wisdom on my part. Not 5 minutes after putting the helmet on, I hit a piece of plaster that hit back. The crowbar rebounded and hit me square in the side of the head near my temple. I am convinced I would have been seriously injured if the helmet hadn't taken the majority of the hit. After the clean up we were ready to hang the drywall.

Looking back at Joseph's room adventure, I could really only think of one tragically humorous moment. It was when Mario and I were hanging the drywall. The walls were difficult, but nothing compared to the ceiling! We bought 8'x4' pieces of drywall (looking back, we should have bought smaller pieces). Mario was standing on a card chair and I was on the latter. We lifted the huge pieces (which soon felt like slabs of concrete to our trembling arms) over our head and tried to take turns placing screws. The idea sounded easy enough when we were on the ground but the application was a bit more of a struggle.

With arms shaking so bad the board wobbled and heads aching from bearing the weight we scrambled to hand each other screws and the drill. When Mario suggested to me how and where to put the screws in, I had flashbacks to when I was in labor with Andrea and Mario told me I wasn't breathing right. I may have snapped at him both times, but I was and am grateful for his help. When we finished the ceiling we were exhausted and headed to bed.

The room sat empty for a couple of months because school and other drama crept into our life. In the middle of my fall semester Dad and Mom Cyr announced they were coming to town. I knew it was an answer to my prayers when they arrived and Mom helped paint and texture and Dad cleaned up the yard and helped with the woodwork and door for Joseph's room.

The room only has a few more touches left before it is complete. It is so peaceful when we go in there. It is the warmest room in the house with all of its insulation and its new window. Joseph is sleeping peacefully and he feels loved and safe in his new room.

We are relieved to have this age long project out of the way so we can focus on the next project. We will continue to survive this house one room at a time.

P.S. We have installed a wardrobe into Joseph's room now, so it is officially a three bedroom.

2013 and Still Dreaming

What an adventure this house has been.  I have often wondered why we needed to go through this experience.  I believe I might know the answer now.  My heart's greatest desire has been to help other people. I believe I needed a time of humility. A time where I had to swallow my pride and ask for the help of others because my body wouldn't let me do the work I needed to. I believe we had to pass through these trials so that we could empathize with other people who are struggling.

I have felt so much sadness and pain as the years in this house have progressed. I have also found a great treasure.  I believe I now know what real and abiding joy feels like. In the midst of the trials, moments have come when I know that God is watching over us. I have learned to appreciate the children's laughter and noise more. I appreciate every precious moment I get to spend with Mario and the children. They are golden.

I do feel discouraged at times because I have a dream of so many better things for my family. I dream that my children can be in the country. I dream that we can run a farm together and they can play outside unrestrained. I dream that Mario can focus on his work and not have to worry about a house falling apart while he is away. I know he worries about how to pay for all the fixing this house needs.

I dream that Andrea will stop getting pneumonia from a drafty room (second time in two months). I dream that we have a house that I can have space to pray and read my scriptures, exercise and sew, without waking my family from their sleep. I dream of the children sleeping in real beds instead of beat up mattresses on the floor. I dream of the day that the air ducts will be clean so Joseph's asthma won't flare up. I dream of peace and comfort for my family. I dream that I will be able to have a beautiful garden to tend to and time and space to write my books. But most of all, I dream that I can feel my family is secure so that I can go about doing God's work. I want to lift up the heads that hang and comfort the weary. I want to use the skills I have to help build houses for other people in need. To everything there is a season and a purpose under heaven.

All of these dreams may seem far away but I believe that our season will soon change. I am so grateful to God for all of his blessings and his lessons. I will continue to hope and dream. I know that this life will never be without stress and sorrow. I also know, that God wants His children to have happiness and peace. When the time is right, and not before, we will be able to move forward in our lives.

The trees are GONE!

 When we first moved into this house, I thought, what beautiful trees!  My affection quickly changed for the Colorado Blue Spruce as we started using the sidewalk on the side of the house. Every time, never failing, a branch, riddled with needles, would smack us in the face. Not even the children were spared. (The tree seemed to be reserving a few wicked branches for them.)

In desperation to defend our home we began to take drastic measures. We went to the store and bought pruning shears. Little by little Mario wittled away at the tree. By the time our arborist came he couldn't help but notice that our tree looked a little like a PacMan. (I had been so busy that I hadn't really noticed how much Mario had removed.) We had been trying to save up money for the tree removal since we moved in, but this year we both felt it was critical. That summer the tree produced its first pinecones (which is a sign of stress). That combined with our newly found knowledge about this type of tree's tendency to suddenly fall over we called the tree removal company.

The tree felling was a huge project and was done in the winter. Our tree tech was actually recovering from a major surgery, but he insisted on being there the entire time to oversee the work. I will admit to you that I cried as that blue spruce fell. The nature lover in me couldn't stand to see a tree felled. The tree tech was a true professional and felled the tree in just the right spot. When it fell, however, a family of quail managed to escape. This made the situation even harder as I didn't want them to lose their home.

The second tree to go was an Ash. Again my heart ached. It wasn't the trees fault that someone had planted it too close to the house. We couldn't trim it back from the roof without cutting half the tree branches off. I knew that would have caused even greater damage.

The project was finished in good time. Again I feel blessed. I said in my last posting that I knew God would provide for our needs. As evidence of this, Mario was given a bonus from work that year that just covered the cost of the tree removal. There was not a penny to spare. I knew that we could have used that money for other things in the house or for the children's clothes, etc. I also knew that God provided the money to us for the purpose of removing the trees.

Update: We have been really grateful the trees were removed when they were. There have been several major storms since then where we have been sure that spruce would have come down on our home. 

Plumbing

I have been promising an entry of our plumbing/bathroom redo adventures for a while. I think the time has finally come so get ready for the water works. I will try to keep this light, but the plumbing and I had quite a battle.

The first plumbing issue that we found when we moved in was in the basement.  Someone had shoved a log into the end of a drain pipe to keep it from leaking. I am sure that they were trying to go for the cheapest solution and they didn't have the 5 dollars that is cost us for the proper end cap. Maybe they didn't understand the effects that water has on wood which explains the leaking that began every time we washed dishes. The next plumbing issue as I said before was the toilet breaking but we again went to our lovely home improvement store and got the parts to fix the toilet. I was impressed with how well the toilet worked after we were finished.

Now we come to the part of our story where we run out of options. One fine day I went to the mall to look for something for the children. When I parked I noticed a plumber and his vehicle. I felt very strongly that I needed to stop him and get his card and ask why our drainage was so slow. All the way into the mall I was plagued with this feeling but I pushed it aside because I was too embarassed to just walk up to him.  I went about my shopping and we were soon on our way back home.

When we arrived home I washed the dishes while the kids played outside. At one point I could see them so I went outside only to find them covered with mud. (It was a warm dry day.) I asked where they got the mud and Andrea said from the waterfall. What Waterfall?!  I ran outside to find water pouring down our wall around where the kitchen sink was located.  At this point I really wished that I had that plumber's number. I called Mario at work and shut off the water.  He came home shortly and we went downstairs to see what was wrong. At first it was hard to find the leak. Someone had hidden (wrapped) the pipe with a tarp, a trashbag, pantyhose, a bra, and some underwear! After prying those items off of the pipe we discovered that there were large rusty holes in the pipe. (I was in shock that the inspector could have missed that.)

We knew we had no choice but to bring a plumber to help. Both plumbers said that all of the pipes had to be replaced. Most of the pipes were being held together by the layer of silver spray-paint someone applied (in an effort to make the pipes look steel instead of cast iron. The inspector was right that the plumbing had been updated, he just didn't clarify that it was with spraypaint, pantyhose, bras, two copper pipes and a radiator hose. Since we were going all out with the plumbing we knew we had to replace the toilet, tub and sink in the bathroom.

That may seem a bit excessive, but there was reason behind our madness of tearing those accessories out. The toilet was ancient, but more importantly, it wasn't sealed properly. Someone had used spray foam from the basement to seal it instead of replacing the old wax seal properly. Also, the bathtub wasn't properly supported in the basement so we would avoid stepping on the back end. There was actually no shower at the time either. The sink was impossible to maintain.

The work began a little later than we hoped, and as usual, we found many more problems along the way. First, the floor in the bathroom was covered in carpet. This kept all moisture on the subfloor which we discovered to be severely rotten (especially directly around the toilet.)  The subfloor had to be replaced.  Second, the walls and ceiling all had to come down because of water damage.

We had a completely gutted bathroom and bank account by the time we were done with the repairs.  We were without water for 4 weeks and without a toilet for 6 weeks. It was a trial for all of us, and unfortunately, my health took a hit, I think as did everyones.

I survived this event by the grace of a loving Heavenly Father who carried me when I literally could not get out of bed for fatigue. He sent help when we were completely spent. He gave comfort in the times we felt most afraid it wouldn't work out. And even though our savings were gone and our home value depreciated right after we moved in, I had faith that God would provide for our needs. I am grateful to have running water. I am grateful to have a shower and a working toilet. This is how I survived this old house.

(the picture was borrowed from longmireplumbing.com)