Chimney complete & a garden started

This is the chimney and this is Frank - photophobic Frank, but this gives you an idea. The chimney is beautiful and Frank was full of stories. Amazing stories that unfolded as he hung out in our yard every day. An emergency tracheostomy at age 5 with a pen, bit by a rattler while riding a motorcycle and collapsing in front of the ER, saving a drowning pheasant while hunting which he ended up taking home and keeping as a beloved pet for 10 years, once while mortaring a pond he touched an electric fence that was plugged directly into a socket that threw him several feet and he woke up kneeling in the pond about 10 minutes later, and there are many many more. Kinda miss him. But after the chimney he talked us into starting our wall for the garden. This is our next project.

Chimney work

So, Frank, an interesting acquaintance who does masonry work, has convinced us that he needs work and he'll fix our rotting chimney for a good price - but, we hire him right now! So, we did. He was aware of the bees and thought that the cold weather would work to our advantage. He was even willing to try and save the bees and help us get them in a box. Once he got here and started putting up the scaffolding I realized that this wizened man was actually quite worried about the bee situation. This made me nervous so I spent several hours at GloryBee. GloryBEe is an amazing place - top seller of beekeeping equipment in the country and their only retail location is here in Eugene. They were super helpful, but also candid - bees in a chimney is a crap shoot - no telling what is going to happen. This was obvious since I had contacted two bee-knowledgeable folks to come help us. They both were super nice but refused to answer my calls for help after seeing the chimney AND the amount of bees coming out of it.

On Tuesday the scaffolding was ready. Since Steve is allergic to bees I asked our friend Mike to come help as a backup. The guys got up and started to prod the comb with a hoe. They started taking pieces out and hootin and hollerin. The bees were gone! And they ended up pulling two 5-gallon buckets of honey and comb out of the chimney. Mike took the buckets home, heated it, strained it, and brought me a huge jar of the tastiest honey later that day.

I will have to add photos of Frank later, but here are some from the last few days. One is a before shot of the chimney, one is a look down at the honeycomb, another is a piece of honeycomb dripping with honey, and then one of the brood comb (which is about 2 1/2 feet long).

Kitchen is done! well, mostly

Suppose this is the last of the blog - the kitchen is together (mostly!) and I have even cooked a few meals. Steve just left for a 5-day Rogue River rafting trip - well deserved after getting this kitchen together. He plumbed, electrified, sanded, and stained his way through all this. I am still not all the way moved into it, but see that in the near future. Now, you are all more than welcome to visit. Eugene is a pretty awesome place in the summer.

Bees

We have a honey bee hive in the chimney. Steve thinks we can capture the queen and put her to work in a better l0cation. Anyone know anything about bees?

Poison Oak

I was being so careful! I did all the right things. But, alas, I am covered in poison oak pustules. Waist, inner arm, spots on neck, and my personal favorite, the nose. Steve is afflicted too, but he complains less. I will spare you a photo of that but have included the work on the countertops. The fine sanding has begun. The boys also decided to try to kerf the boards that are a bit warped in an attempt to give them more flex. As I see it, this means routering along the length of the underside about every 2 inches to decrease the thickness. The days are stretching out ahead of us without a kitchen, but I am just glad that we have a sink and refrigerator.

Fourth of July & new neighbors

We had a great 4th! Steve and kids built a fire pit and we had some friends over to light the works. Also, the new neighbors moved into our old house today and guess what - three boys! Ages 10, 6, and 2. D is singing in bliss. We got the appliances today - the fridge is in and we installed the range hood today - must wait to get a few more things in order before we can install the rest.

Three months - and more

So, the saga does still continue and I thought I'd keep writing (for my own sanity at least) until we have a working kitchen. We do now have a working laundry room as Steve finished it up today and hooked everything back. Of course, he wanted to run a load to check that everything was working. I walked in on him a few minutes later and he was so involved in some other project that he didn't notice that the floor was flooding! Luckily, 1) there is a drain in the floor that works and 2) we figured out that the plugged sink had overflowed when the drain cycle was running and that we just had to unplug it.

The most interesting stories are about trying to sell our stuff on craigslist. We have this futon with an all wood frame that has a very nice mattress. Everyone sleeps comfortably on it. Well, the people that come into your life! There was the lady who drove up in the tiniest of vehicles and kept saying she wanted it, but then explained that she didn't want it for two more weeks but wasn't going to give me a dime to hold it because, "she doesn't know me." She told me this at least three times before driving off. The next lady arrived today in some Lexus (some super duper series L thingy) and she was well coiffed. She hummed and hawed (we are selling this $800 futon for $150) and scratched at a ding. All the while telling me about how they are building their dream cabin up on a lake that is on the property they bought next to their existing cabin. And, oh yeah, would we like to trade the futon for a night at the existing cabin. She even said we could check in early if we liked. Steve kinda laughed at her. But then we are the ones with a futon in the middle of our living space. Ughh.