little yellow birdie

We often hear "thud" on our windows, but this time we didn't hear it, but Tomasi was working outside and came across this darling little yellow young birdie. He brought it to me. I took several photos of it...and brushed off it's very tiny loose feathers around it's head. I set him down on the table and it was not natural for him....so took him to my wisteria bush and he hung on to his little dear life for a few hours and then I guess he recovered and flew off. yeah.
here it's truely said, "a bird in hand is worth two in the bush".

quilt as cupboard

I went to visit my dear friend Ramona Hallman. and because Pat, her marvelous carpenter husband has been so busy working elsewhere........he didn't ever get around to making cupboards for the kitchen. I think these are wayyyyyyyyyy more cute then board cupboards. I just had to post this of Ramona's kitchen. I love this family too. Pat is the one that set my stained glass windows in my house and took down the big tree that was sitting where my shop is now....and did other very creative work in my house.

Peter & Sheryl Uluave

We had such a wonderful suprize to have Peter and Sheryl Uluave come and visit us here in Nauvoo. We were young married couple friends years ago in Hawaii. Peter was one of Tomasi's fishing buddies. She used to play the lap dulcimer...I just love this couple and we will be friends forever.

#63 bowed psaltery

I'm so excited to work in the shop and it really calls my name. All but one of my Manger puzzles are sold and I'm working on this bowed psaltery.....oh what a joy to work in my little shop. I've got orders for 2 more psaltery's and I just got another one in the mail today. WHOOOOOOOOOEIS. going to get all this canning done in the Kitchen as my shop CALLS MY NAME.

canning times

Got a WINDFALL of roma tomatoes. paid $1.00 for 30# and then he gave me 30# more of "seconds" I thought I'd NEVER see the end of these. 4 boxes and one bucket. whew.
V8 juice here

zucchini Jam. can you believe that? and using jello for the coloring. interesting. but I learned something on this....and after a day or so, it tasted good

these were SWEET...pears in cranberry juice and spices. FUN FUN and yummmmmmy. I didn't know I could have blanched them and slipped off the skins. I pealed every one. oh well. but I'll do pears again like this.
and here's DRYING tomatoes. wayyyyyyy easy and good. and all now in a quart jar and pint jar. easy cheesy to do.

puzzles and pears

While I'm working in the shop or the house, Tomasi has a new thing that he's doing with the throw away shingles from NRI. .....whooooooooooopies, it's putting it on that GAP from where the board ends and the roof of the house comes and it's really finishing up the back of the round house sooooooooooooo nicely. I love his SHINGLE ART WORK.
the first thing that I've done in my new shop is make these 5 NATIVITY Christmas puzzles. they are for an order from some missionaries that I work with in the Temple. I oiled these down at the end of the day.....after making bread (can see on the big table) and also some time consuming CANNED PEAR HALF'S in Cranberry juice. oh yummy. I did 7 pints of these. I'm having soooooooooo much fun learning all these canning things. Out of the same book I've talked about before.

Inside the shop

Here's my lovely sanding counter and "put stuffs together" counter....overlooking the lovely Mississippi. Surely no harp shop has a view like I do!!! yes, wonderful Pella windows that I was not able to use in my house. I've got some peg board that Worth got me and I'll be painting that white and then putting that at different places.
Here's the big belt sander that I use for all sorts of things. and the one next to it is a great sander that I need not too much. This roll thingie that they sit on....I can easily roll out and clean out when I'm done sanding. OR if it's a nice day, I'll just point it out the open door.
And my lovely work bench that does more stuff then I knew it could. and my drill press. It has a broken spring that I hope I can either replace or just get another one. He's been sitting on my porch all last winter and when I could work with it, I would...but not good for machinery to be so exposed to the weather.
some barnwood that was going to get thrown away. NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO....so saved it and put it around the air conditioner. I love these odd pieces. oh so fun now working in "IRENE'S HAPPY HARP SHOP".
I saved these piano legs from Lungrin's throw away piano and knew I was going to use it somewhere. THIS IS THE "WHERE". I will put a bunch of lovely cherry wood on it. My BIG TONGAN will get all of it from under a tarp tomorrow and I'll have it where I can get to it. I have a lot of plans for that wood. Mostly Pioneer bread knives. Scroll saw is now in her place.

THE PARTY

here are some of our 40 guests. We love all the folks that came. We did some performing and then later on, when we had just a few folks, Dave Hardle brought over his girl and the dear Adam's girl and they played some flute duets. What a treat for us. Sorry these photos are blurry....but you get the idea. I served a big square cooker pan full of Hawaiian Meat balls....and we had plunty left over. We took it and Rice to the Temple the next day.

Tomasi cleaning windows & UMU MAKING

WELL, things don't go on my blog as I'd planned, but you get the idea. Here is the last step in doing a Umu.............Tomasi's style here in Nauvoo. I took these through our front CLEAN window.
all backwards. It it wasn't so late, I'd switch these, but oh well. you go figure it out. Here he's putting on wet newspapers (instead of lovely banana leaves)
Moving the hot rocks around and taking out the still burning hard wood.
he's planning what to do next. he didn't know I was taking these photos. ha. Do you see the little red Hummer feeder on the window here. oh my, my love for humming birds has increased 100 fold. We have around 6 birdies. they are very territorial....one is a "king of them all" I have another feeder on the porch. What a JOY to watch them.
Here he's cleaning the windows. Yeah. He did all the window of this house and also all the screens. This was in preparation for the big party that we had on September 2 for all the paid workers at the Temple and their families. We had a wonderful time as always.
I was too busy to take photos when he was taking all the done food out. The turkey fell off the bones and ham was done perfectly. I might be able to add someone else's photos of this fun event.

Tomasi cleaning windows

Worth and Barbie Holmes come for a 3 day visit

This is my dear Brother Worth Holmes. He and Barbie have been married 47 years like we have. what a joy to have them come and he did so much for to finish my shop. They came on Thurs 25 August and stayed only till Sunday Morning. His purpose was to help me finish the shop and put things away. He gets in the shop and I turn on my scroll saw and he said, "the floor needs another layer of plywood....not only OSB wood....it's just not strong enough for all your equipment." He's also a woodworker and turns bowls and has a perfect shop that he built. They live in Tyler, Texas. He's still a computer programer. He's also a lead singer in a Barbarshop quartet and belongs to a big group there in Tyler. We did get to do some singing while here.
Of course, there's the scrabble game with all four of us.
Breakfast is the most important meal of the day....
and here he is....and I also was gluing and screwing the plywood down. It's made it much more sturdy and after..........Tomasi got right in and painted the floor and they together put in all the "base boards" then we brought in most all the tools and ran out of time. My brother is quite a clown and makes a lot of jokes that couldn't be written down here. I love him dearly and we're hoping to go to Tyler, Texas for Thanksgiving.

Dave on the roof

Dave Hardle came over and helped Tomasi finish up this side with the throw away shingles from N.R.I. He just jumped up on the roof and then laid the black roofing stuffs and then they covered it over with the shingles. YEAH it rained that evening.
Notice the cute throw away lights I got from Vicki. I have two of these and Peter put those in for me too.

Tehani and insulation and OSB boards

Here is Tehani helping Peter Alberts put in the OSB boards. She's really strong in putting those screws in and Peter really appreciated her help....SO DID I.

these posts will be out of order as I've been so swamped with all going on in our lives....but here is Tehani Sewell, my granddaughter that helped me put in the Insulation before Peter Alberts came to put over the OSB boards. We learned a whole lot about this process. I had to go get some more at Menards.

Crew of Two

Last cut on the floor "kick boards"
filling all the cracks with foam. this shop is WELL INSULATED!!
and Irene is well pleased with all this work that's been done!!!
Peter cutting the last OSB board for the walls. yeahsville
Peter putting in the air conditioner.
these are the cool cabinets that were giving to me by Clark Peterson. they fit perfectly in the "bump out space" this will be where I'll do all my sanding.
When Peter left on Saturday 6 Aug 2011, we came home after the Temple to see this Scrabble set up note for us. After Peter and Tomasi would work or even in the day when it was just too HOT....they'd play a game of Scrabble and then sing songs while I'd made food. I loved their blended voices as they sang.

crew of Two, Tomasi and Peter Alberts. After Kim left to go back to their home, Peter Alberts stayed on and did so much finishing work on my shop. Everything had to be measured and then cut oddly as things were not too straight. I wanted to have OSB boards for the walls because I want to hang things and have it not be DRY WALL....as nails and screws don't do well on that material. I got 17 (4'X8') boards @ Menards and This is what Peter used. It was hot and muggy the whole time...he just kept on working and called Tomasi when he needed him. I helped some too. Mostly in "praise". They then painted the walls white and floor green and put the barnwood around the floors. This day they were really tired. The intended goal was to have this shop done before by brother came to help me set things up in the Shop.

BOG FIRE

After we did so much work on the Shop and we knew we'd not be using so much woods and other things we'd stored "just in case we need it"....Tomasi put that old wood and stuffs over to the Mississippi Side of the road. Not poisonous stuffs....and had a big bonfire. Everyone does this here. Well, we've not had rain for a long time and this fire started crawling along other logs that float up here when the Mississippi is flooding. He became worried about those two trees that we love....and so was taking buckets of water down there....3 days...and it wouldn't go out. So I called my fireman friend and he told me it was a 'BOG FIRE' and for me to call 911 and they'll send the firetruck. YEP YEP they came in about 10 min....sirens screeming at 7:30 a.m. I was so impressed by their speed on getting here, and getting down in that muck and getting that fire out. There were still some little "smokers" a day or two later then we had a good rain and that did it. Bog is a mixture of dirt and wood and whatever else...but it burns. That's what the Irish had to use when England took all their trees to build in England and for the stained glass trade and making of bricks. That's why you see Ireland with mostly green grass and rocks. It used to have forests. They used bogs peat to heat their houses with. I think they still do.

Plantain plant/healer

I just wanted to post this for any of you not familiar with this marvelous weed/plantain/healer. This grows all over the world and you can look it up on google and learn more. Here is a big one that Tomasi saved when weeding. When I had a class in Hawaii in Relief Society, we had a very knowledgeable Hawaiian man come teach of of so many healing plants growing in Hawaii. This was one of them. He had this one, and called it the female and another one that had skinny leaves, male one. both are healers. When stung by a bee, wasp, spider, centipede, get these leaves, heat 'em up on the stove/fire a little bit and squeeze the juice out on the affected area. then wrap more leaves on it and tape it up. It will heal very fast. When Tomasi got poison oak so badly in Ashland, Oregon, I took him to the doctor and nothing was working....he was breaking out with it everywhere on his body. So I went to the park and gathered up sacks full of these leaves, put them in the blender, added honey and lemon and had him drink it. It didn't taste badly...and in 3 days it was totally gone. I have recommended it to many here in Nauvoo. IT WORKS STILL.

Hot and COLD baths

Folks, you can figure what has HOT baths and who has COLD baths. yep. These are HOT pickled Zuks....and the directions is that they soak in a brine, then cook some with the vinegar and spices and then I ladel 'em in the jars and put 'em in a HOT WATER BATH on the stove for 10 min. boiling. yes, it does get "hot" in the kitchen, but I'm having soooooooooo much fun learning how to do this.
ahhhhhhhhhhhh, and when it's REALLY hot...like almost 100 degrees plus that "heat index"....it's a TWO bath day....I just "lollygag" in this lovely bathtub and enjoy the critters outside. tired grasshoppers, slow moving birdies and sometimes a squirrel or two. Do you see my "ocean view" here? yep, that's the only place that wonderful seascape would fit and I like it in the bathroom too. I have a lovely angel watching over me.

Kim and Peter Alberts

Here Peter Albers is measuring the door side to put that board to stop the door from swinging inside. He can see the numbers of the tape measure way up there....his wife, Kim checking. He suggested that I have the door swing outward so I'd have more room in my shop and I'm so glad that this is what he did.

the OSB board was hanging over the edge of the 2X4 and he used my Jig saw as a "sawsall". amazing to watch someone do things with my tools that I'd never think of doing. One time he bent the blade, just stuck it in the crack and straightened it up again and kept on going. I found out today that he used to replaire coo coo clocks, but now doesn't like the sounds of "tick tocks" after he had a heart attack.
Here is the last of the door being put together. He's dad came from Holland. After this photo, I asked him if he had Jewish ancestors and he said he did.
They have built several houses together...and worked together well....she knowing what tool he needed next, would plug it in....and what screws needed and hand it to him.
this is Kim and Peter Alberts. I knew him when he was a little boy when he lived in Hawaii. They have 9 children and usually live in Missouri. A few years back they lived in Nauvoo for a short time. Now they have that little pineapple freeze place in Duck's parking lot. I had asked quite a few folks to come and just PLEASE, CAN YOU PUT MY DOOR IN? All asked if I had a frame for it, no one would do it. Peter and Kim are my answers to prayer on this. A beautiful big door that will let light in the shop in the winter time. He told me that ,"for a shop door, it's good to have it swing out as you'll have more room in your shop". They came this morning and had to straighten the sides, and hammerjang other stuffs....sledge hammer the top frame....hoooooo boy. no easy task. I think it takes a great deal to "bush carpentry" then what first meets the eye. He has been a contractor. whoooooooooopies for me.
this picture Peter is using my big jig saw to make it square on the top so the door will fit. odd cut for sure.