preservative coat

Here is Vicki's 3ed brother, Darren Mathews.......He's been working with paints all his adult life. For the past 3 years, he's been a partner in Diamond X Construction in Garden City, Utah.....that's near Bear Lake, Utah. He's been doing log staining and painting in million dollar houses. I'm so grateful for this talented happy person to come and work on my house. I'm amazed at all that he can do in just a few days. He put a stain on the outside of the house and the color of the wood stands out more and the lovely contrast of the chinking. He'll be doing more chinking later. AND he does it all with his left hand. yep, a south paw. speaking of "south paw" ............Darren brought his dog with him. A friendly guy....but Vicki and I call him Bozo...

See the difference here on the porch. oh so lovely.

yep, you can see his mouth a working and talking and south paw painting. He is so accurate.

This is Clarks Peterson's brother. He was also out of work for a while and so when I asked Clark about him, he said that his brother Sterling Peterson also did construction. He spoke highly of him and so I asked to have Sterling Peterson to come on up from Missouri. What a wonderful mother to raise these sons with such great work ethics. He is fixing a window that would not open or close because some earlier workers didn't square this opening. This is in my sewing room. I call him, Sterling "Silver" Peterson.

squareing a square is no easy task after walls are in....(and not square)....well, as Sterling would say, "it is what it is"....instead of complaining, he just gets the job done. He's also done some nice barnwood finish decoration on my skylights. Another happy person to work with. How can I be so blessed?

Akihito Inouye

Going back to see old pictures that I didn't have time to put on my blog.....He is one that I want to SPOTLIGHT. He was such a wonderful worker and could figure out all the puzzle of the flooring.....WHAT A JOB that was. He was also marvelous in helping Vicki do plumbing as Tomasi was going daily to doctors with Chemo and radiation....

Aki worked with Tomasi doing all sorts of pipe work many years ago in Hawaii. They are the best of friends....he now lives with his wife in Vancouver, Canada. I wish they could move here. We could use some good Japanese guy like Aki in Nauvoo.

He can figure things out that no one else can. He's made a dictionary translation of Japanese/Aribic.......worked in so many interesting jobs. extreemly creative mind.

Progress on floors and other shots.

well, this is what it looks like WITHOUT A LOVELY SKYLIGHT...and the sound inside is not the same either. yep, I was covered with homeowner's insurance and I pay my dedutable of $250. and they will pay for new skylight, shipping and installation. I'm getting two bids on this. I should be in by THANKSGIVING, but I don't think I'll be moved in by then. The floors will put me back some, but all worth it to me.
all this wood and 6 hours more of Chop sawing.........dat's me, "Irene the chop saw queen".
Here is a big cedar log that Dave Hardle had cut for me....beautiful, eh? yep, that's the loft up there and it will be finished before I move in as well. the area below goes into the Kitchen.
my ceiling in my bedroom with a SKYLIGHT. I waw Jerry Brown's skylight above their bed and said that is what I'm going to do too. DID IT. yeah, thanks again for this wonderful idea.
another shot at my lovely cedar tree, yep, I hug her often. you see, wood lives on.
AHHHHHHHHHH, MY AWESOME LOG....that holds up the loft....I love this log....and I hug her often. found her thrown away on the side of the road...had her put up on Vicki's place until I needed her. you can see here also a pile of stuffs that we move around to make room to work on floors. whew....Glenn's photo
my lovely swinging front door.....yep, gonna do something with the glass, maybe put in a stained glass? still thinking on this one. Glenn's photo
more lovely floors. Glenn's photo
bedroom floor going in. yep, there will be 3 varithane coats going on...Glenn's photo
piles of wood ready for flooring...yep, I chop sawed all of these. and again, Glenn's photo
Here is the floor in my sewing/spare bedroom. here the one year old played with scraps of wood. Glenn Hawkes took this photo. and some more here.....same same
Ceiling in our bedroom. yep, Madison Hales did this work....barnwood. I LOVE RUSTIC, can you tell that?
You can see that we need to still do some more chinking. I think that Madison did the barnwood work above the porch opening above here. He really is an artist in woodworking and I hope that he'll do more of it after his mission. Glenn Hawkes photo
This is from a BIG CEDAR TREE that Dave Hardle took to a local mill guy....and oh how I love th smell of these woods in my house....there will be stairs that will go up after the living room floor is done. and yep, there will be "box car siding that will be for the ceiling under the loft here....but electrial light here ready for put light in.....laters.
POOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOR HANNA THE VANNA....yep had to be towed AGAIN. I went through a HORRIBLE rain puddle, where the policeman says........."oh we keep telling the road commisoner that we need to get this road fixed that every time there's a BIG RAIN....someone has to go through it and then their car doesn't start and gets stuck going UPHILL and we have to call a tow truck". The tow truck guy says the same thing...HRUMPH. she still sits in my driveway, not been able to start for a week and 2 days now. yep, this was the same bad storm that sucked out my skylight that was not latched down as it should have been. more HRUMPH.
Tomasi and I have been sooooooooooo grateful for the Peterson Family....he suggested that we have a little Luau for them....first but not last cook at our place. Here he is telling Sterling Peterson on how he's making this fire and food for our lunch yesterday, 6 Nov 2009
good use of the scrap woods after the cut off for the flooring.
HUGE STACKS OF WOOD...each weighs about 1,000 pounds. I've had them stored in Jack's little wearhouse from July 2009. I'm grateful for Jack....JPK construction.
Here are THREE PALLETS OF WOOD.....and you can see they are just cut off planks of the same hight....sooooooooooo they are put into stacks and then cut to one of 5 sizes.....so we can use as much of the wood possible. yeah, no rain for a few days.....so we become a processing plant.
mountain of saw dust in one day's working these dado blade and the router bits.
THE CHOP SAW QUEEN.
This is too serious a picture.....I'm laughing at this one.
Here are two of Clark's children....Joseph and a married sister that just loves doing this work...can you believe? She has a darling one year old that was born on Bob's new baby's date....
I LOVE how the sun comes in the afternoon on this floor and kitchen. What a pleasant room to prepare meals in. The stove is in the other room that has a finished floor. I need to get some "coasters" to put under her legs and then hopefully, I'll get the gas man up there to hook up the gas and get her all going GOOD. you also can see my dishwasher that has a plastic cover on her for protection. yep, she's black....looks good.
the kitchen floor is done...oh what a beauty.
Clark working soooooooo hard....BAMB and and a floor nail is IN. they glue all the boards, then nail every third row.
SWEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEET.
AND HERE IS MY SWEETHEART....feeling good enough to be here. We're saving all the cut off wood for our fireplace and the sawdust we'll let rot for a while and use on our garden next year.

new ace worker

Here is Clark putting in the floor and it's HARD WORK....bambing on this floor nailer....
Here is Stirling Peterson working in the very hard corner of my kitchen. yep it's done now.
this is showing my kitchen sink that I got early on a trip to Utah in 2008 on our return trip...saw it on the side of an antique store and went to find the owner and got it for $50.00. It's in beautiful shape, and just the kind of sink I really want. I have a marvelous view out my window there. plumbing not hooked up yet, I got a wild story about that later. I've decided NOT to get a garbage disposal, but get a little composter instead. a waste of waste....should go into the garden and plants..............not in a fancy septic tank.
my lovely stove in her place...also not hooked up yet...but will be soon.
you can see my lovely Hickory cabinents that are below the lovely cabnet counter tops that Clark made for me. no easy task. The floor brought up the Stove some...more photos coming later on that....

this is a randome picture up close that I took last Sunday of the latch on the blown off skylight. yipes, this was never latched....THAT'S WHY IT BLEW OFF by that heavy wind last Friday....but I'm blessed that I bought home owner's insurance and my dedutable is $250.00 and they will pay the rest.

How can I be soooooooooo lucky....Clark (Kent) Peterson has a brother that was living in MO...and he also was in construction and was very much out of work. I said, "send for him" and he came in 3 days. He also is a ACE WORKER and a wonder on these saws that are making the tongue and groves on all this cherry wood for my gorgious floors. ooooooooooooooooo wheeeeeeeeee.

wood that is stacked up on the porch, then brought in to the person that is working the CHOP SAW, that's me. and for some strange reason, it's "therapy".....I love working that saw, and seeing each and every piece of wood be all squared off. yep, we got wood that can't be used on the floor, we'll use in our Napoliean fireplace.

this is the wood all done and ready to be put in floors. ahhhhhhhhh, it takes A LOT of wood to make floors, but oh sooooooooooooo worth it.

Madison Hales

It was called to my attention that I didn't have Madison Hales, my ACE STAR YOUNG WORKER on my blog site. He worked for us during this summer earning money for his mission. He lives in Las Vegas with his family and he worked soooooooooo hard.....it would be so hot putting up the roofing.........he took on the job of carrying up the shingles....hooooooooo boy....he would sweat like he just got out of the shower. Here we'd just poured the cement on the porch and I put in these little rocks that Madson gathered for me. He would do anything I'd ask him to do. I have to say this, his parents did the raising of this young man marvelously. He's going to leave on his mission soon....
Here is Madison stomping the cement down with these big boots on...Vicki at the corner here. ahhhhhh, the summer was just a short distance away, right?
yep, here he is stomping that cement. I need to take a picture of the art work that he did with some barnwood that we got in a heap....he put up the porch ceiling.....very nice work. His mom said, "I didn't know Madison could do that kind of art work!"....we are all suprized what our awesome children can do, right?
Here he is standing on the rafters of the back part of the house. this was one HUGE PUZZEL to put together. He and Aki did a lot of this work....ahhhhhhh, I need to put up Aki's picture too. I know I need to put up more pictures of Madison when I find them in my computer. Thank you Madison for all the mountains of work you did for us.....I'm extreemly grateful.

Vicki putting in cement in the planter

Vicki's nephew, Mike Bolen has been WONDERFUL to spend time...........working at the building of my house. This is the tree that got planted....and he told me when I came to look at her in her permenent spot. "I named your tree".............I said, "that's great, what's her name?" He said, FRANKIE..................tears welled up in my eyes, my mother's name was Frances and her nick name was Frankie......soooooooooooo my mother welcomes you to my home as well. This is a Ficas tree.....and she'll grow very tall. My mother would like that, she was only 5'2". Vicki has made these planters in her houses in Las Vegas and I so admired these live trees and plants there. I'm also going to get a canary to sing his little heart out in this lovely house as well....
Here is Vicki putting in some cement around the planter that will hold a tree and other plants. She's planned this for me as I soooooooo love trees and plants. This house will be happy to hold plants as the lighting is so good. It has an automatic watering system and a drain. this is from my cell phone...forgot the camera at this time. The photo above was from someone else's cell phone and WOW, what a difference. The next time any of you get a cell phone, get a good camera with it. so easy to send to other folks.