more forms....

Vicki and I went into Burlington to get more "anchor bolts"....and other building supplies. We then took these out to Ralph who worked more on the round house. It was so cold out there. I took this picture with my phone and it must have been too cold to take a good picture (ha, I can blame it on the phone, and not the photographer?) You can see these forms that need to be accurate. Ralph is totally accurate. snow on teh ground, wind blowing, maybe 10 degrees? burrrrrrrrrrrrrr.




these are the forms up close. see the rebar in the middle? well that's an anchor bolt. and must be drilled into the already poured cement. interesting, eh? (you're saying what?)
Now THIS IS INTERESTING....this is the front of the building and you can see that there's more done here. you can see the Mississippi in the background. If you can get up close in the picture, you can see where the rebar is screwed into these boards. Vicki has them all numbered and where a window goes, doors go and etc. If the weather would warm up some, more could be done. God Bless Ralph and Vicki.....folks who love me enough to work on Irene's dream of living "in the round".....

"A @ 440"

Okay, soooooooooooo I wanted this post to go on my blog site so I can add some pictures later on. I posted this on my harpvision@gmail.com and felt to add here as well. Dated 18 Jan 2009.

Well, folks, I've had opportunity to do thinking.....inside.......as the weather has been extremely cold. (minus 20 degrees with wind chill, burrrrrrrrrrrr)............... I had a friend years ago, Janet Christensen, that was raised in Canada and said that she loved winters, as it gave time for her to do her "inside projects".....photo albums, reading, writing, genealogy, late canning and sewing. I have also taken advantage of this time to do the same. Not all these things at once, but taking Janet's advice, to find inside things to do that are enjoyable and not complain about the weather. I'm still so excited about the building of my dream round house. Yes, this home will have so many features within and without that the dream is becoming a reality. I saw something on a dulcimer builder's web page last night that "rang true to me".......by Vincent Van Gogh....."I dream my painting, then I paint my dream". soooooooooooo I can dream my house and then I can house my dreams.

I woke up this morning thinking about the girls that I teach on Sunday in Church. I thought about what "rings true to me"..........what makes things "ring true"????....What makes things "ring true" for a 13 year old girl? How might I teach truth that will be a joyful ring to anyone that I communicate meaningful ideas............... or music? For years, I've known of the tuning fork. For those of you that would like a little more, but not too much information on the tuning fork, read a little here. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuning_fork Even now, I find this information fascinating.

Our bodies all respond to tones....we all have a "resonating tone" within us. Think of your times when you have been most open to the sounds of nature, outside by a stream, to hear the various tones of a small or large stream......you can hear them if you really listen. I think of the times that I have sat by my stream in Punaluu, Hawaii and felt to hear angles humming....and then added to the orchestra of that stream, the birds and other moving things.....ahhhhhhhh, walking under the ancient ironwood trees of Tonga...........their whispers, loud and soft...........I feel that every tree has his or her song being played by the hands of winds glissonding by. An orchestra has to be in tune with each other to be able to play together and make harmonies for all to hear and enjoy. Now if each instrument had a different idea of where "A" is.....then what a cacophony it would be. Total chaos it would be, we could not stand to hear it...........our insides would have us run out of hearing distance.....and we would shutter even after hearing that horror of sounds. So I'm grateful along with zillions of others of the world that an established pitch of "A @ 440" beats per second is the Concert pitch of the world. Any orchestra from any country can play the same music placed before them if their concert pitch is A @ 440.

This winter has brought the blessed opportunity for Tomasi and I to play our instruments together alot. Of course, I need to tune them often with the weather changes. I have a little electronic tuner that can tune everything to pitch of A @ 440. All other tones in the scale are tuned relative to that pitch. If I am tuning the large harp, Tomasi has to stop playing as this large harp has such a resonating box and picks up another tone and resonates sympathetically............The dulcimer the same. Ahhhhhhhhhhh, when they are in tune, we soooooooooooooooo enjoy our music together.....and we vibrate within and feel well hearing and playing the tunes we love together all these 44 years. Our "A @ 440" becomes more in tune the more we play.......

How do I reach others that are within my responsibility to teach if their "A" is at some other frequency? How do I help them become in tune? Do I need to adjust my "A @ 440" to be their thinking that "A is @ 550"? What will harmonize and ring true and bring joyful learnings to us both? For that is the frequency of the spheres of our planets for eons of time......It's true that in medieval times, they tuned their instruments at a lower pitch because the strings would break if too tight.......but they tuned to SOMETHING that was the same for all instruments in the group. The Hawaiians also had to "slack da strings" to keep the gut strings from breaking in the moist weather of Hawaii. Yet, there is a way for them to "play in the pitch of A @ 440".

We begin this new year of 2009 with the hearing of soooooooooooo many "pitches". Has the world of people lost their inside pitch of "A @ 440"? Has the government by the people, for the people and of the people become so discordant that they can't communicate with us all in some meaningful honest way? Can we get in tune with each other and "orchestrate" our "United States" as well as the rescue of all those on that plane that went down on the Hudson River? Can our Medical Services all over this great country become an affordable caring place without EXTREME cost that only the rich and insured can afford? What makes this all out of harmony?

I don't know the answers to all of the world's disharmony, but I do know that when little groups get their pitches in harmony.....others will want to join in and be refreshed to go on with their lives. They take back to their homes and businesses and government the harmonies of Peace and Joy and Caring. I pray in our various fields of labor that we get out pitches at 440....and spread harmony as far as we can.

aloha from a frozen, but soon will come spring...............Irene, MOM and grandma.

keeping WARM

Last night it was just sooooooooooo cold. I got up and took a shower with the hottest water I could stand....then when it got cooler, got out. When I got back into bed, Tomasi says, "do we have another blanket?" so I got my Christmas present present out from Vicki, a Cardinal pair of birds on it and we got to sleep real pronto and kept warm. The temp last night went to 10 below and with wind chill factor, got to 30 below....this is the same tonight. really, record lows for this area. so I can say this, FROZEN ALOHA.

Bon fires and Jack

Hey, folks, I'm getting better now.......took these pictures today and got them uploaded and yah.....getting faster in the blogger department. Here is Jack, the guy that did the big clearing of the land, ditch digging in the hard rock, making a little road, and moving all those trash trees into 5 piles that were blocking our view of the Mississippi. I just love fires....and asked him to tell me when he was going to burn these. Another family came also to look see. I was 30 plus feet away and was warm. I was a little worried that he was going to use a gas can to get this stuff going, but he's been living here all his life and soooooooooo 60 plus years, he knows what he's doing.

There is a lot of land that gets flooded in the spring, and these had to be burnt so as not to float down the Mississippi and get caught up in the Keokuk dam. The wind had to be just right also.

After all this is burnt and some non burnable trash cleared away, we could also make a pier.....as it says we can in our deed. fun yeah? I want to see what comes up naturally.

FOOTINGS POURED.

It's hard to get "perspective" when things are on a slope. You can now again see that big machine and the pile ready to burn. Jack (the machine guy/contractor too) has 5 of these ready to burn........previews of coming attractions. Here is where our bedroom will be. It is an extended circle. ha, hard to explain. just more footings. okay? the wood part is getting formed up by Ralph and he's a perfectionest and wants the ends of each 27 side to fit PERFECT.....I'm grateful for that. Foundation is so important to be perfect as much as possible. I do say that "perfection is for the next world"....though.

Tomasi's back is facing South. We have a nice nighbor to this side and they come only in the summer time. I'm looking forward to meeting them. I will have to put something on our side of the fence to cover that UGLY propane take. yep, we'll have a propane tank as well, but we'll bury it.

I'm standing facing South....Tomasi takes few pictures... You can sure tell this by the bluryness of this picture. ha..........this is the day it was ZERO degrees. There are 27 (4 foot) sides to this main circle. the walls will be 12 feet tall....then a pointed roof with a 5 foot skylight at the top.

We'll have an open porch or deck here and this will be our view.....without the machinery and brush piles. ha.

You can see that the piles of brush and trash trees that were below our property are getting ready for a big burn. the bulldozer thing to the right and Tomasi's truck here. Then here's the footings poured.

More footings poured. There is a piece of property north of us that is also 100 feet frontage and 140 deep. this used to have a trash trailer on it. The owner of that piece of land and the house beyond ..............well that house need to be trashed down as well.

More footings. and you can see all the rocks that came out of the trenches. Tomasi will build a rock retaining wall on this dirt. We'll have some sort of a garden in the back here and I'd love to have a little green house for Tomasi. We'll see as we go along. "Rome wasn't built in a day".

ICE CHUNKS ON THE MISSISSIPPI

When we went out to the property tow days ago, I was soooooooooooooooooo amazed by the HUGE chunks of ice piled up by the wind of the week before. Seems like a person could build a house of ice blocks. How about a picknic near the ice? It was ZERO that day. burrrrrrrrrrrrrr. I'm told that sometimes the ice get piled up 40 feet when the ice breaks in the Spring and the wind blows. I'm looking forward to seeing that feat of God's blowing. this sign needs to say SYCAMORE HAVEN DRIVE.....seems like the wind blew off the "Sycamore" part.

There is beauty in bear trees............silhouetted against the changing skys.

and check this guy looking on me taking the photo. ha.

Ralph Andrus and my little flower cart.

Here's Ralph Andrus. He's inside Vicki's resturant that didn't get finished for various reasons. She thought up this idea of building my 27 sides for the round part of the house inside this building. So Ralph got this turbo gas heater, that is heated by the old tank that he found floating in the Mississippi. He took it to see if it was okay to fill and yep, it was.....so there's some heat in there. Ralph is out of work for two months, so he's working for Vicki and on Irene's house. YEAH. I just wanted to show you the ice and snow on my little flower cart. It was soooooooooooo cold during Christmas time. I just didn't get out walking on that ice. We just stayed inside. boo hoo. Whe the sun shone on this, pretty sparkles, but cameras seem not to pick up the sparkles in the glissening ice formation.

ground breaking with Vicki Andrus

I got a comment on my email about this post from Kapua Sproat Fonoimoana that put it all into the long and short term perspective......gonna write about this some more laters. her quote here is......"On Sun, Jan 4, 2009 at 9:55 PM, Kapua Fonoimoana wrote:
Congratulations on the start of your deam house! yea. Yep, no wonder you waited. Sometimes waiting is better than forging ahead. The secret is knowing when to wait and when to charge ahead..." Soooooooo here's Vicki "forging ahead" with me now a days in Nauvoo.

Many of you do not know Vicki Andrus. I've known her for 29 years. They came to live with us in a little tree house in Hawaii for a short time while they were building their house on Oahu, Hawaii. (I found a great piece of land locked land for them to buy) They had two children then. She was pregnant with Seth, and I with Bob, our 12th child. After Vicki and Ralph left the Islands, they lived for a while in Spanish Fork, Utah............then moved to Las Vegas. She also became a contractor there and built many homes. She also worked for K.B.Homes and supervised the building of over 300 homes.

Vicki loves animals. Here is a little darling Scottie that goes with her in her car and now on her little bike deal. When he was born a few summers ago on the lawn, he would open his mouth to bark and no sound. Sooooooooooooo he was named "Silent Bob". She made the hat/scarf/and Bob's little coat. Dave Hardle, Ralph Andrus and Vicki will be the main workers on our round house of logs. This is only the beginning.

Here are the more easier ditches to dig as they are the front part of the house, but SMACK down to the rock foundation.

okay, here is ONE HUGE ROCK.....and it came out in one piece. We had Jack (JPK Construction of Nauvoo, Illinois) guy with the equipment come and under Vicki and Ralph's direction and mapping out the round circle and the larger half circle behind that....Jack dug the trenches. He got down to the solid rock and then pounded it with some big equipment and dug a ditch. This was the largest rock. It's now busted up to be able to use elsewhere. Tongan's are famous for their rock wall building skills. It's in their genes. Tomasi was very happy to see all of these rocks. Here are more of the ditches....and you can see the little road and the Mississippi beyond.

You can now see where the equipment dug in the back and where it is now down to the rock foundation. Tomasi will build some rock retaining wall on that dirt back there with these same rocks. These are limestone. The same rock bed all along this area of the Mississippi. the same rock that the original Nauvoo Temple was carved and made from. They did not have this equipment then of course.

Here is where Tyson Mathews (Vicki's nephew) cleared out the rubble. Ralph has since put the cement and rebar in for the house to be built on. This house will NOT BE MOVING in any mudslides. A FIRM FOUNDATION.

You can see more of the work that's going on....and a car there also and the Mississippi beyond. All of these pictures were taken by Vicki's Cell phone and sent to me on my cell phone while we were in Utah. I then sent them to my email and figured out how to put them on the "save in my pictures" and pull them up here. ahhhhhhhhhh, am I not amazing? (ha ha ha)