Summer going to Quincy 2009

I've written about falling in love with Illinois while driving to Quincy for those 6 weeks (five days a week) for Tomasi to take his radiation treatments...well, this is just one of the flowers....and these smell lovely as well.
and the Water lilies or really these are Lotis blooms on the Mississippi outside of our house.
This is what my dashboard on Hanna the Vanna looks like. my Hula girlie (Ma'ata made the lei) and visor when I need it. Do you see my little tiny angel up at the top? Lynn Conklin gave this to me years ago. I've heard the saying, "don't drive faster then your guardian angel can fly".....
this is a old wagon that is in someone's front yard in Lima, Illinois. I just love it that they planted all these around this wagon. wayyyyyyyyy cool. yeah, I know these are late, but wanted to put them in my blog anyway. I loved stoping at the roadside vegie stands and the rolling green hills. I guess I don't have a lot of pictures as I was the one driving all this time. although in the beginning, Tomasi would drive in and I'd drive home. Quincy is about 50 min. south from Nauvoo.

Halloweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeen. 2009

Here in Nauvoo, they have a tradition of carving around 200-400 pumkins. yep, folks come for all over and it's a big crowd that shows up. and they are all lighted. I took many more but you are lucky, I didn't post them here.
this is Amy Andrus, Vicki's youngest beautiful daughter, 19 and attends a college in Keokuk, Iowa. She also works at the only little grocery store in Nauvoo. She was all dressed up in a 30's outfit and I thought she looked so beautiful.
this was my favorite pumpkin....I sooooooooo love trees.

MY FIRST UKULELE

I made a uke for Larry Osler. He used to work with Tomasi in the Provo Temple. He and his wonderful wife came over to our house and he tried a few of the insturments that I had in the house, took the dulcimer home........brought it back and said that he wanted a Uke....one like I had on the wall. Well, it's really a mandolin and I just made it into a 4 stringed insturment and used nylon Uku strings. I've begun putting the Nauvoo star on my instruments. more fun. yep, "made in Nauvoo". I used some ideas from a Uke book that I got that showed more ornate peg heads and decided I'd have some fun with it. sure did.
you can see the inlay on the sides. This is made of Cherry wood.
Mahaganoy soundboard.

Larry Osler here, and I asked him to smile, he said, "this IS my smile". cute yeah? He also plays the banjo and something else. We shall miss these folks a lot. They have served here in the Nauvoo Temple for almost 2 years.

Friends to visit....and Tomasi working outside

We had some old friend come to visit from Green Valley of long ago. Scott Glouser...this photo is in front of one of the houses Vicki built 2 years ago.
another shot.
Scotts business partner.
Tomasi is burning some leaves in the back yard. yep, a lot slimmer.
Tomasi is doing very well and is beginning to gain back "his time"....doing more writing and reading and for me..........playing his music. I'm soooooooo blessed to have him forever.

house update 1 Nov 2009

this is the hole that was planned in the beginning and so it's being "refined" to Vicki's plans. some board thing here, she's got a automatic drip system that is in place. AND a drain .....Yes, the tree is in....but need to make more pictures.
this cement post was tooooooo big for Vicki and so it was cut some and then jack hammered and well, got to the point that Vicki wanted it to plant the tree in.....
Even Vicki used this jack hammer.....WHAT A WOMAN.
No easy job I tell you..and the noise in this round room...hoooooooooo boy. I asked Vicki if there was something that I could go and get at Menards..............the large hardwear store in Birlington, Iowa, that's about 1/2 hour from here. yep, I got a list and went happily there this day. yeah.
Here on our front porch is only ONE PALLET of wood that somehow got DUMPED instead of laid down right...oh well again..............but Clark's wife was making grooves on the wood to be ready to lay the floor down. Now I've got all that wood organized so we can use the "pattern" pieces to have 3 different sizes.
Because I bought this GORGIOUS LOG BED that Dave Hardle's son made for $450.00 (yep, it's in my basement gonna sand some more and varnish before taking to new house)...it's 6 feet tall, 7 feet wide, 8 feet long.......................Vicki had to bump out the bedroom wall and add some to make my bedroom so it could be more then a BED INSIDE the room. ha. so this is the treatment. It's been painted lately, but didn't take a pic. yet of that lovely moss green. Do you see the skylight above the bed? ahhhhhhhhhh, someday stars at night above our heads.
These are the three windows that look out from our bedroom. ahhhhhhh, lovely Pella windows. Their factory is near here....good buy on the windows that move lovely and open. yep, bot screens, but won't put those on till we move in.
My stove was being set to where we wanted it, now I have cabinets and need to take pictures of that, and tomorrow I'll do that....okay? well, we'll see how long it takes to put on blog with so much else going on in my life as well. oh well....this is wellllllllllllll....
Mike Bolen and Clark's son Joseph. interesting how the "orbs" in here show up. seems it's the dust in the air? maybe?
living room is now the place for cutting and sawing and what a mess, but no can create without chaos.

the beautiful sewing room all drywalled in.....yep, what you see above is the barnwood ceiling that will be rustic as well.....I love the mix of it all.
Clarks' son using the hardwood floor nailer that Mike Bolen sent for. WAYYYYYYYYY COOL.
yep, a pile of angles that would drive most other folks NUTS...but not Clark (Kent) Peterson. What a blessing to have him and his family come into our lives at this time. He loves putting in this floor. Remember when I wrote of the 5 pallets of cherry wood that I got delivered to Jack's storage place down the road from me? Well we got one pallet and Clark said it needed to be tonge and groved....and and that is what we're doing with these pieces. yep, a challenge, but after I went to get a DADO blade kit (whew, expensive, but worth it to the max)....then this went much faster. This room shown here is done, then they've also done my sewing room also. I LOVE THE LOOK OF RUSTICNESS. to me, perfect. I went to see a friends "perfect cherrywood floor" and it was very beautiful, but this floor I'm getting is wayyyyyyyyy more gorgious to me. On Monday, we'll be working on the kitchen.
Clark has laid floors like this before and knew just what he was doing. yep yep....and said that after we sand it down some and put on 2-3 coats of polypaint, it will be more then marvelous. I love all the different colors of Cherry wood, and where I got these palets of wood was from the Amish folks that make LOTS of furniture in Shipshawana, Indiana. these were cut as perfect as could be done for those maticulous crafsmen.

globblins blowing HARD.

here is the small latch that came with the skylight.
a close up of this hinge. aluminum framing....small hinge....this is not all that heavy and I can see the flaw in this design. I wanted to have a open and shut skylight and this is how it came....We thinking it a wise thing to be able to open and shut the skylight as we had that choice when ordering our roof kit.

On Friday, we worked at the house and all was well when we left. I went into Keokuk an met with some appointments. Then it started raining and storming like crazy and even my poor Hanna went through a puddle and I had to call a tow truck and have her towed home. She's still not started. BUMMERS. We didn't find out about the skylight blowing off till Halloween night when Tomasi went up there to check on things @ 6 p.m..................found the skylight on the ground. came home and called me and it was too late for me to go and see. sad............took pictures this morning 1 Nov 2009.