Loving it

I am speaking about the weather here. It has been in the upper 60's and 70's for several days. This has allowed Sherri and I to get so much done outside. We burned all our scrap building materials which was starting to mount up. Today we are working on cutting the planks for our accent wall in the bedroom. 
I am getting to use my Christmas/Birthday/Fathers day present. Sherri gave me a new portable table saw. It works great and I can roll it back and forth to use it. I have plenty of projects that require me to use it.
The sun is just now coming up over the trees so I guess I better get to work. I have had my coffee and a sausage stick so I am off...

Somewhere in Time

Christmas 2016

Well we had a wonderful Christmas! Everyone got their gifts and were very happy. That means we did real good. 
Now that Christmas is behind us we are getting ready to start back to work. 
Kris has one more week off before he goes back to school so he is going to make the most of it. He has a ton of gifts and one week to break them all in. After that it will be back to the grind of school. 
I hope that all of you out there had a Merry Christmas and you will have a Happy New Year...

Somewhere in Time

It is Christmas Eve

It is Christmas Eve and it is raining here. Such a dreary day but still it is a day of anticipation and wonderment for little people. I remember when I was young and it was Christmas Eve I could not wait for Santa to come and deliver all those wishes I had made in my letter to him. 
Those days have passed and now my attention is on making my little one happy with his wishes. The wish list of today is much more extensive than when I was making list. I guess with all the new innovations in toys and games it stands to reason that things are a little more complicated than in times past. 
You have to know what operating system your game controller is or the games will not work on them. Then you have to know if the games have to have motion devise to run properly. Do you need a hard drive to store information? My goodness it takes a degree in cyber science to get past the first item on the list.
Thank God for Lego's! Now that is one thing I can look at and know if this will work for a gift. The box front pretty well tells you what you are getting inside. No extra attachments are needed to build this. 
Yes Christmas buying for kids is a little different than it use to be. The toys of years past needed more imagination than batteries. Sound effects came from the user and not a speaker built inside the toy. Even your Christmas cards contain music to entertain the reader. How great is that. 
Well I could go on and on about this but then it is getting late and I need to move along. We are still working on our new cabin at the lake and getting ready for tomorrow. We have some kids coming by to spend the day with us to celebrate Christ Birthday...and by the way Sherri's too. I hope that all our friends and family out there have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year...

Somewhere in Time    

Almost done with the bathroom

This is the loft for Kris. He will have a bed up there and space to keep his toys.

Toilet installed and working 

Shower installed. This was a a J O B but we gotter done.

Even with Christmas upon us we have been working feverishly on the cabin to get it done. We had set a date of Christmas to be finished but since have moved that to New Years. 
We have had to go a lot to shop and what not and this has slowed us working. We don't have much to finish...maybe about a week and we should be able to start using it full time.
We will still be living in the RV but this will give us some more space to get around in. Having a second bathroom will be really nice. We also have extra closet space and a laundry room. 
Now that the weather is cooperating I can do some outside chores that I have been putting off. I need to run my electrical to the shop and install an additional door out there. All this will come together...

Somewhere in Time 

Bathroom is painted

We got the Bathroom painted yesterday and now we are starting on the flooring. All things are slowly coming together and we are still hoping for a finish date before Christmas.
We have to take the home on wheels in to the dealership on the 6th of January to get our warranty work done. We have several little problems that need to be taken care of. We will probably have to leave our little wheeled home there for a time so we will be staying in the cabin at the lake. This is another good reason that we need to finish all this!
I am not totally ready for Christmas...and Sherri's Birthday is on Christmas so I have a double whammy on that day. I need to get out and do some shopping before time runs out. 
It is kind of hard to surprise Sherri with any gifts seeing as how she keeps the books at the house. No matter where I go and what I do it is done with a credit card she knows about it. She will ask me what this charge is about when she knows it is not hers. I don't have a chance so I just go and get her stuff and tell her it is a gift. She knows where all her gifts are coming from!
I hope that all my friends and family out there are going to have the best of Christmas Holidays...

Somewhere in Time 

It is raining again

They...the weather guys...said that today would be warm and inviting. Well it may be warm but inviting no way. It is raining again and we are really tired of it. 
I know we need rain but if I could just have a week of dry weather I could get my plumbing all tied into the sewer and then I would be a happy camper.
We are expecting my oldest daughter to come and visit today. She is bringing her grand baby and our great grand baby to see us. We are excited about her visit and have planned a day of time devoted to visiting with her and the little guy. 
So that being said I am not too worried about the rain today but I would like to put together a string of days of dry weather to finish up some projects. Christmas is coming fast and we want to be done with all this so we don't have the big mess. 
I don hope that all our family and friends out there are going to have a wonderful Christmas this year. I am so excited about being able to say Merry Christmas and not be placed in the deplorable basket! I noticed that many of the stores were greeting us with Merry Christmas this season. What a breath of fresh air that has been. I hope we get this politically correct bunch of junk behind us and we can go back to celebrating the season the way we use to. If you are not into the celebration don't ruin it for those of us that are. Celebrate however you wish...and believe me I will not object nor will I file an objection on your beliefs. 

Merry Christmas to all...

Somewhere in Time 

WOW...Cold here

This morning we woke up to the 20's! I don't like this kind of temps but then it comes and goes here often.
We are almost south and almost north here in Texas and we do have warm winters but they turn cold ever once in a while...like last night. I wrapped all my pipes yesterday and found the water not to be frozen this morning. Thank heavens...I just got all the water pipes in and would hate to have to repair them this early.
Sherri went shopping yesterday and I stayed home with the school duty. Kris is into algebra now so we can't miss too much class time. If you remember algebra took all your attention and you had to spend a lot of time working the problems so you could learn how it all works. Being away from it is not good when you first start learning it. 
Kris is doing real well in school and I have to spend less time teaching as he gets older. He has to read most of his assignments and do the work on his own. I am just there to guide him through it all. I too have to read the assignments and learn right along with him so if he has any questions I can answer them. It is good that I have something to keep my mind sharp like this. 
Today is suppose to warm up a little as the day goes on. I need to get back to work on the cabin. Everyday that goes by and I am not working on the project puts us closer to not finishing before Christmas...and finishing is our goal. 
Back to work...

Somewhere in Time 

Taping and bedding

We are on the home stretch here at the lake. We have about 3 weeks left of work and we should be finished with this project. I will be glad when it is all done and I can start working on my studio/workshop/storage building. 
Yes one more thing to do this winter while we are not traveling. We have committed ourselves to stay here at the lake for the next 6 months to get all these things done so when we come back off the road we will have a nice place to come back to.
Traveling is fun but when it is time to recoup your finances it is nice to have a cool place to come to. Cool in the sense that it is comfortable not cold...well maybe sometimes cold.
I will have a workshop to tinker in and a studio to paint in and a place to put all my yard tools and S T U F F. That will make coming back a little more bearable. It wont be the mountains or the Gulf but it will be a place where I can save some money and still have an enjoyable time doing it.
The weather is not looking good for the next few days. They are predicting 20's and that is not my favored temperature. I need to get to town and pick up some pipe wrap for my water hose. I don't want to have that freeze up. I have all my other lines wrapped and they should be OK.
Writing about all this is not getting it done so I must sign off here and get to work. I'll keep you up on all that we are getting done...

Somewhere in Time 

More Rain

Well it just keeps on raining! I still got some work done yesterday but with the rain there is just so much I can do. I had hoped to have all the sheet-rock up but that was not to be. I have to move my shower deverter over and that means I have to go outside to to turn the water off and when it is raining is not a good time to do that. 
We will just wait the rain out for now and see if we get some good dry days in. I need to connect all the sewer lines up and that too needs dry weather.
The whole process is taking a little longer than what I had planned but it is coming together nicely. We are excited about finishing but we don't want to rush it along and mess up so we just bid our time.
Our Christmas deadline is coming up and I would really like to be finished with all the work and have all the mess cleaned up. Christmas is not the time of year to be painting. It should be a time to kick back and enjoy the season...you know... be jolly...

Somewhere in Time 

Bumps in the road

The plumbing pipes are in and it is time to pressure test them. I had Sherri there to help me spot any leaks that I might have. She purged the lines at the shower diverter while I opened the shut-off valve next to the cabin.
All looked OK until I spotted a tiny pin leak in one of the joints. Now I pride myself in not having any leaks in copper pipe joints over my years of plumbing but today I have to say that I missed a bad fitting and ended up with a leak!
Well as you might know you have to get all the water out of the lines to repair a leak so this was a great set back for the days work.
On top of that I had two leaks at the "On Demand" Hot water heater. After close study I had left the packing parts on the inlet and outlet points and did not have a good connection. This was taken care of with no problem.
After some time messing with the small pin leak I had the system up and running. We are now ready to button up the siding and move on to the inside work.
I have to hook the electric up to the HWH and then start insulating the walls and pipes. 
Sherri did notice later that day that the shower diverter was not centered for the shower so I will have to move that! And I thought I was doing such a great job.
I will say this we are on the home stretch. As soon as I get the drain lines hooked up we will be ready to top off the bathroom. Sherri can start the painting and then we will be finished with this project...

Somewhere in Time 

Rain interrupts progress

This morning at 2:00 am I was brought out of a deep sleep by the sound of thunder and our chimes ringing. Chimes ringing means that we have some wind and that means soon we will have rain. Rain...yes...big time rain was just southwest of us and coming fast. I decided to check the tarps on the cabin. I have tarps up where we had to take some siding off to remove a door and put in a window. With the rain on the way I knew I should secure everything.
Now remember this was at 2:00 am. Here I was out in the cold trying to get the tarps readied for the onslaught. I felt the cold rain start to peck around on my neck and I knew that I did not have too much time to get this all done.
If I could just have had one more day of good weather I would be changing the tarps out for siding. Best laid plans of mice and men. Tomorrow I will be finishing up the copper and pressure testing the lines so I can insulate and button up the outside. Everything is coming together...

Somewhere in Time