Yes, I’m behind - way behind. I really didn’t want to post anything till we got that stupid driveway finished. Then I got busy in other projects and never got around to dumping the camera. But here we are, a post to conclude the concrete project!

The weather had been pretty wet all week, with the weekend looking like it was going to be pretty bad too. But the concrete had been scheduled, and we weren’t going to get it done, and since the weather looked pretty bad everyone was canceling their appointments for concrete. Is that a bad sign or what?

But let’s recap a little, a few weeks ago I had gotten it framed in. There were a few issues, but we worked it out. Then we had the gravel delivered and I set about smoothing it out. It also happened to be like one of the hottest days of the year (not last Saturday, but the one before) and I just about fell over in a gooey pile of nastiness. But I recovered and got it all fixed up.

Posted in Do It Yourself, Family, House and Garden, Saturday Recap 2 Comments »

It’s Saturday again (well as I sit and write this it’s past Saturday), and what did we find ourselves doing? That’s right, if you’re any sort of regular here - you know it’s just another work day (I’ll fight liking it till I die I think).

This Satuday, I was tasked with framing in the cement pad - no biggie, I’ve done it before (and I would have linked to a post about it, if I hadn’t lost everything earlier this year).

My father in law dropped off some 2×4s and metal stakes to set it up. So I started getting everything in place by measuring 20ft from the sidewalk - marking it and then measured from the drive way 8ft.

Posted in Do It Yourself, Family, House and Garden, Saturday Recap 2 Comments »

As some may remember, last Saturday we started digging out a pad for a second driveway, we also were working on our fence.

Well this Saturday we worked on them some more!

My father in law brought over his little tractor and finished digging it out, compared to last week (digging by hand), this was WAY better. We only had to dig it once - by that I mean he dug it up and dumped it in his truck and we went and emptied it, instead of digging it up and then dumping it out (digging it twice).

Then we finished up the gate, got an extra 2×4 on the edge of one of the doors (did I mention we somehow ended up with some extra space?). My father in law also helped design a door stop for the left side door. It was just a tube driven in the ground, a piece of rebar held to the door so you basically pull it up and the door will swing open. Pretty neat. We also got the hardware back on the door too.

Posted in Family, House and Garden 2 Comments »

It’s Saturday again, and we all know what that means around my house - well what it means when the weather is nice.

It’s project time!

We started out knowing we needed to goto Lowes (trip 1) for some supplies. We got some fertilizer for the lawn, some paint brushes, various other little things. We also decided that since our ~7 year old craftsman screw gun has failed (I suspect the batteries) we better get a new - enter Karma (round 1).

There just happened to be a sign by the power tools that read something to the effect “Power Tool and Pneumatic combos 20% off”. My wife and I figured this would be great to help get us into a new one. So we grabbed one of these off the shelf. A WH12DAF2 12V Cordless Impact Driver. Which I thought was the right tool for the job.

Posted in Family, General 4 Comments »

On Saturday, we had the opportunity to watch The Messiah. Yep, Handel’s Messiah. I had never been to a production of it and really had no idea what it was about.

Was I in for a treat!

Let me give a slight bit of background and context. This was a matinée, it was suppose to be shorter. It turned out that there was a lot of younger visitors. So because of that, one of the conductor’s sons sang the base part - he also happens to be my oldest son’s art teacher (the other brother is in our church). Also, the conductor dressed up as Handel (no one seemed to know he was going to do that). We also were treated to a spanish translation along with, and I think this was the best part, a performance for the hearing impaired.

Posted in Family, Music 2 Comments »