Our Lady of the Yard

Posted by Les

OUR LADY OF THE YARD

     Jeannette has always been the type of gal who loved to kick off spring by planting new flowers in the flowerbeds.  She'd water them and nurture them for a while, but the mundane yard maintenance issues were not on her hit list of fun things to do.  Since we moved to this house with its plush acre of land to boot, she's been transformed into some kind of gardening and landscaping zombie.  I don't really know who this person is (or has become).  She spends every spare moment in the back 40 digging up large rocks, tree roots, rusty metal objects, and all kinds of weird things in efforts to reclaim the natural beauty of this fertile park setting.
   
     Don't let her femininity deceive you.  Don't let her sweet disposition and tenderness fool you.  She's a HARD WORKING woman.  Let me say it more clearly . . . Jeannette is a classic OVER-ACHIEVER.  Once she decides to do something worthwhile, she doesn't just do it . . . she ATTACKS IT!  Practically every day I see her come in exhausted, dripping with sweat, and wearing a dirt bead necklace.  Remember those elevated flower beds with multiple layers of rock.  Well, just look at them now.

 

 

     Everything she has done has been with zeal - be it pursuing her college degree while raising 4 daughters, working for the State as a Social Worker, serving Cottonwood as Women's Minister, or being a passionate grandmother to 9 precious kids.  The thing about all those credits is that they did not involve physical prowess.  She typically admitted not having it when it came down to anything requiring heavy lifting.  Though she had the heart to, she didn't have the hustle to.  THAT WAS IN HER PREVIOUS LIFE.
     Now she's like a fire breathing earth moving machine.  Anything that's in her way or doesn't fit into the overall landscape picture is heretofore warned.  You're about to be crushed, mowed down, chopped, hacked, hoed, and thrust into the trash trailer.  She reminds me of the lyrics to a new song we sing at CR called "Only a Mountain."

This is only a mountain

You don't have to find your way around it

Tell it to move, it'll move

Tell it to fall, it'll fall

     I'm so proud of her . . . whoever she is!  :) 

A Better Perspective on Our Mess

posted by Les

Hey Mister - Stop Your Complaining

     
     We've been living in a dusty, messy, helter skelter, stuff juggling construction zone for 5 months now without much complaining or whining.  Admittedly, it still gets under our skin a teency bit now and then because we are human.  We all have our limits and our personal thresholds for pain and discomfort.  Then throw in a dash of frustration with the work itself . . . like the refinishing of the hardwood floors.  I've got lots of experience doing all kinds of things with wood, painting, staining, faux finishing, etc., etc., but never such a big chunk at one time.  I can see the light at the end of the hardwood floor tunnel, I think.  When I clear that hurdle, I'll give you all my wonderful advise which consists of a lot of DON'TS and DON'T EVENS.
     
     It's been 9 days since the F4 tornado tore up parts of Granbury (virtually our next door neighbors).  Last week I had a gnawing in my stomach that I aught to go volunteer in the cleanup effort.  I belong to a service organization that is supposed to be doing those kinds of things, but nothing was happening.  All week I was unsettled that I had been waiting on others to take initiative to get a crew of volunteers together and go do what could be done.  Then Jeannette told me that our friend Nita from church took it upon herself to drive over this week, walked up to a stranger's house that was damaged, told the people she was there to be of help, and ended up serving 2 days as an act of obedient love cleaning up rubble.  I was pierced through the heart.

     Time to Take a Little Side Trip

     
     It was more like taking a little trip to the woodshed.  Since Jeannette was unable to get a few women to go over today due to other pressing needs, I said I would go instead.  I called the volunteer hotline number Nita passed along and was told that my help was much needed in the Mission Granbury warehouse.  So, that is how my day started, where donations of clothing and all kinds of household items were being received, sorted, boxed up and processed for distribution to the victims.  I was the second volunteer to arrive today at 8 am, and by 9 am there were about 20 others.  It was busy like an ant hill as we moved things about trying to bring order to that warehouse which sees a whole new set of circumstances each day.  Today's priority was to sort through a bunch of giant boxes on pallets from large distributors that were filled with paper goods, cleaning supplies, personal hygene items, you name it . . . all jumbled together.  It was fun working together with a bunch of enthusiastic volunteers who came ready to work hard.

Nothing Like Seeing It For Yourself

     During our lunch break, someone asked me if I had been down to "the site."  I said no, assuming that security was tight and people had to have special clearances to get in and get their hands dirty.  They replied, "No, you can just go in and show up."  As I finished eating my sack lunch, I realized that I couldn't finish the whole day just doing that.  I needed to do what Nita did and get down there.  Heck, I know all about moving demo debris piles.  That's what I do nowadays.

      So I asked for directions to "the site,'' which was about 3 miles away from the warehouse.  I was told "you'll know it when you see it."  Dang, he was right.  First I came upon some debris here and there, then BAM!, a whole neighborhood smashed to smithereenes!  I could see dozens and dozens of work trucks, and hundreds of orange shirted volunteers scattered about in groups of about 10 working this giant landfill, which used to be streets and houses.  In spite of the fact that Moore, Ok had a much worse tornado, this was bad enough for these eyes.  It was really sad.  The news video we see each day doesn't capture the punch in the gut you feel.

Don't Ask For Permission - Just Do It

     I drove around the perimeter and stopped at a "once was house" and went up and started working.  The pile of debris was a mobile home that had been lifted and tossed about 80 yards from its original spot, landing in a neighbor's back yard.

     
     Sadly, this was one of the home's with a fatality.  Some of the orange people had rakes and shovels, while the rest of us sifted through rubble like archaeologists at a dig site.  Every effort was taken to search for ANYTHING that was a keepsake or of value like jewelry.  All furniture, appliances, clothes, etc. were basically non-existent.  Just a big pile of little pieces of this and that.  Nothing was in tact.

   
    

     I was humbled by the sympathy among the diggers hoping desperately to find the lady's wedding ring, or anything that would preserve memories.  We heard that the lady who perished lost her husband 5 years ago, and that he had been a coin collector.  When a few of those collector's coins were found, we rejoiced as if we had struck gold.  Maybe we did. 

  

Friend to the Rescue

Once again, a friend came to our rescue.
Les has been working on our floors for the last few weeks. The living room and front bedroom have really nice hardwood floors, which were in bad shape, so he has sanded and varnished them, sanded them some more... still working on them. The master bedroom and the third bedroom have poor quality pine floors, really a subflooring, with a lot of damage, but our plan was to sand and refinish those floors also, just make it work.

 
  A few weeks ago, on a Sunday, our friend Pam told Les that she bought a house which she is remodelling, and asked if we would like the wood laminate flooring she is removing. Yes. Sight unseen, not sure is we could use it, but yes. Last week, Les went to Pams and picked up the flooring, which was good quality and very usable. BONUS, the color went very well with the dark walnut that we have used on the living room floor. What a blessing that was. It could have been blonde or a red tone, but it was a brown that looks great with the other floor colors in the house.
Thinking that installing laminate would be a pretty quick job, I suggested that we stop working on the living room, and do the master, which is what we did last Thursday.
First, we moved everything into the living room.

The bedroom was a little lower than the living room, so we bought chip board for the first layer. This raised the floor to the same level as the living room, and also would help the floor have a more solid sound and feel.

 

 We then laid the ...whatever it is called that goes under the laminate...

 
Next, we brought the flooring in. Because the floor had been removed from another house, the boards were a variety of lengths.  We did not want to use all the long pieces and end up with a bunch of small pieces at the end, so we carefully laid the boards out, using smaller sections on the ends. It was a little like fitting a jigsaw puzzle together.

 We worked out a system where I measured the end pieces and passed them through the window for Les to trim.

 

When we finished laying the boards, Les did some clean up, repaired a few spots, then put a final coat of varnish, just to cover any scratches. And, here is the finished product. 

 

 
Beautiful! Right? I am so grateful. God provided flooring in a very unexpected way. Thank you, Jesus. And, thank you, Pam.

Look What I Did Today

Whoo. This is what I did today.

I drug, pulled, carried, and pushed a stack of limbs, used lumber, and rocks and loaded it all on the trailer. Here is the location of the pile. 

 
I took this picture from the location of the pile, looking up toward the trailer, which is just out of sight, on the other side of the garage.
I realize that this was not a huge accomplishment, but really, it was for me. That pile really bothered me. There was not one place in the yard where I could sit and not have some kind of ugly pile in my view. I thought that I would not be able to move the pile to the trailer, but I decided to give it a try. Sure nuff, I did it. As I completed the job, I was thinking about how a difficult job is relative. We have sons in law who could do this work without any effort, really. And, Les could have done it much more easily than I did. But, for me, it was big, and I am celebrating that!
Les mowed, and we cleaned out some more debris to create a little oasis.

 And, after my labor, and a shower, I took my books and computer outside and did a little work! (the kind I am good at)

Just because we aren't blogging doesn't mean we aren't working

It is fun to write a post to share a finished project, or a big work day when we got a lot done.  Right now, we just have a lot of unfinished projects that are not fun to write about.
Les is working on the floors. He began last week sanding and refinishing the hardwood floors in the living room and front bedroom. He will report on that project when he completes it. For now, I will just say it is a long process.

Remember our beautiful, finished kitchen? Well, this is how it looks now. All the furniture from the front rooms had to go somewhere. 

And, this is our bedroom. 

After we tore the walls down, we ended up with a huge pile of rocks. Les used some to outline a flower bed in the front, and I began a walkway with some. 

 

We had found out that a lot of the plants growing in rows are garlic. So, Les has been harvesting garlic.

 

Of course, there is the yard. we brought some dirt up to fill in holes in the front, which could use some weed and feed.

Then, there's the back...clear brush, trim trees, clean out trash, tear apart old barb wire fencing...haul  limbs to burn pile, haul trash to landfill, haul metal to recycle...again and again...

 

 
 can we say long-haul...perseverance...stick with it...determination...don't grow weary...stay focused...never give up...

No More Walls

Last week, I completed tearing down the rock walls. I had to leave 5 huge boulders that I couldn't carry, but they are not connected to walls. They are lying on the ground, isolated, not part of any building. Les will carry them up to the rock pile. Whew! That was a job. (Les was hard at work on another project he will report about later.)
Those walls were shockingly solid. When we started taking them down, we assumed that the walls were the two layers of rock we could see. We had no idea that there were layers underneath.
All the time I worked on the rocks, I thought about the walls that we build between people, that the walls are so often deeper than we realize.
I enjoyed seeing the movie, Lincoln last year, an excellent representation of the passing of the 13th amendment, which abolished slavery in the United States. What we all realize, however, is that the passing of that amendment was only the first layer of the wall that kept the races separate. Freed slaves did not experience true freedom. Black men and women were considered inferior by most white men and women, and were treated as such. Most states passed laws which made it hard for blacks to vote, to be educated, to own property, or to even support their families. We are still digging out rocks of the wall of discrimination today.
My thoughts did not stop there. I don't think we realize how deep the walls are that we build. In relationships, we realize that we have a wall that we don't want, so we start to tear it down, and are shocked to see how difficult it is to do.
A friend may hurt your feelings, so you put a wall up to protect yourself. The next interaction is somewhat tense, and the wall gets a little higher. Eventually, you want to tear the wall down, but it is more difficult than you thought. It is hard to get the friendship reconciled. The same is true in marriages,  between Christian brothers and sisters, in all relationships really. Walls are built one stone at a time, one little remark that hurts, then a cold shoulder, then a sour attitude, a quick reply, pretty soon there is a wall that is hard to tear down.
Tearing the wall down takes determination, hard work, and perseverance. Wouldn't it be nice to have free flow of communication and emotions in all of our relationships?

New Grandbaby!

Our youngest daughter had her first baby on Monday. Meet Nora Greene Davis, 7lbs, 19 inches, born April 29, 2013, welcomed by 2 adoring parents, 4 excited and grateful grandparents, 4 admiring aunts, 4 proud uncles, and 8 crazy cousins!

Here is more of  her story. 

This is her mommy, Katy, 2 weeks ago 

This is Mommy and Daddy 2 hours before her arrival. 

And, here is her introduction to the world. 

Getting to know her family...

 

 
And, heading home...