2 weeks of vacation nearly done!

Hi all,

So, having two weeks off meant that things were getting done!  Last week was just a starter, as I feel like we got much more finished up in the past few days.  Too bad I have to go back to work on Monday!  Glenn has to go in as well, but only part time until school starts.



Last Friday, Glenn spent the day pulling up the remainder of the sod out back.  He put it into buckets that were to go to the Farm to fill a rut, but unfortunately we've forgotten thus far to get it out there.  Oops.  While he was busy outside, I was upstairs applying the large piece of window film.  This one was much messier (as it was for a 24" x 44" window) and I had gotten a bit confident after the smaller one went so well.  Needless to say, the edges aren't as nice on this one, but it's up and it has been doing a great job (so far as we can tell) of keeping the excess heat out.  Phew!  We finished our day with a lovely dinner at G'ozen, a local sushi restaurant near my work.

Grass!

No grass!

On Saturday GW had the unfun task of moving the soil.  He felt that he needed to remove 4" worth (hmmm) and it got spread all over the place; our front gardens, the spot by the front door that used to be a huge bush, and yup - Colin's gardens next door (shhh!).  I kept on painting the front banister.  I spent just as much time on that as GW did with the dirt... and he got his 'project' finished where I didn't.  I hope to never paint that banister again.  I must say, it looks pretty snazzy.  We still haven't had much success getting someone over to do a couple spot welds on it.  Does anyone local "know a guy"?


On Sunday Glenn headed up to Orillia for a visit, and to give his Mom back one of the bedrooms there :)  He took the Durango so that he could bring home all of his things left over from his youth.  We've decided that a few rainy days will be spent in the basement tidying up our respective youth.  I fear I have more to tidy than he does!

Monday the 20th was a day of celebration, not for us but for 3 pairs of great friends; Sherry & Jeff, Kelly & Davey and Katie & Geoff.  HAPPY ANNIVERSARY to all of you!!  To honour you, I spent another subset of hours ont he front banister.  Now I have officially gone as far as I can before we need someone to weld the broken parts, so I can continue on.  The "no welder" fix will be going out to get some wood and hollowing it out to place overtop of the broken parts. . . but I'd much rather fix it.

Colin's house (next door) is finally up for sale properly.  We noticed this before heading out to Stratford on Tuesday.  It's a super deal financially, given that it's twice the lot size as our house, but virtually the same price.  Check it out: http://www.century21.ca/Property/100805088.  Stratford was great.  We had a lovely lunch at the Boar's Head, saw Much Ado about Nothing (actually quite funny, well acted) and dined on ice cream before coming home.  Upon arriving home, GW realized he forgot his wallet on the counter at the ice cream place, oops.  Guess who had to go back the next morning?

Quite comedic!

The Festival Theatre - lovely!

What did we get up to the rest of the week?  Sand... and stone... and sand... and stone.  Amazing.  The Durango can easily hold 800+ pounds of sand and gravel.  Even repeatedly.  There was 3 trips total for gravel (laid it down first), and then sand (which we put on top of the black weed-block fabric we had put on top of the gravel).  Then the next day, there was two trips of flagstone.  UGH.  Well, I shouldn't be complaining, as I wasn't the one who had to haul the majority of it.  I moved the gravel and some of the flagstone, but anything over a certain weight wasn't going to leave me in a functional condition for the next day.  This unfortunately meant that GW had to be the one to put down, then pick up, then put down, then pick up all of the pieces of the 12' circular jigsaw puzzle we call the new patio.  Amazing.

Unfortunately by Thursday, my camera cable had died.  I noticed this while trying to take a picture of the Durango full of stone, to show that it wasn't riding low on it's shocks in the slightest!  Darn good truck.  I also didn't get a chance to snap a photo of the 4 leaf clover I found!  I've pressed it in a book, and will have to get some resin or something to make it into a charm.  It took nearly 31 years, but I found one!