Tag Archives: dried fruit

2015/05/05 (T) BAF & MEF3 Visit

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Today was a family visit day.  We were up a bit earlier than usual and enjoyed a light breakfast and a quiet first half of the morning.  One of the things I’ve had on my to-do list is ordering Touch of Oranges Wood Cleaner and Touch of Beeswax Wood Preservative.  I finally got those ordered today directly from the company with free ground shipping.  I checked Amazon but the prices were no better and the products were not eligible for Amazon Prime.  I also found what I think is an exact replacement for my iPad2 flip cover and put it in our Amazon shopping cart.

Our son (Brendan) and grand-daughter (Madeline) arrived around 10 AM.  Madeline knows her way around the main floor of our house at this point and headed directly for the pantry to see what snacks we might have.  We tend to have dried fruit on hand, especially raisins and cranberries, as a tasty but healthy choice.  She is very fond of dried cranberries.  We spent the morning playing and talking and having a drawn out snacky lunch.  Somewhere in there Brendan setup the Pack-n-Play.

Pat Davidson from Apex Roofing showed up around noon to look at our roof and give us a quote.  Apex has done two roofs for us on the previous house and did excellent work at a fair price both times.  The quote was about what I expected and I gave Pat the verbal go ahead to put us in the schedule.  They are scheduling out about six weeks, so mid -June looks like the timeframe.  That potentially runs into the SKP Tri-Chapter Rally or the ARRL Field Day, as well as bus and bus barn projects, so we will have to see exactly where things fall.  We like to be around while this sort of work is going on.  This time, however, I also need to build a dormer on the back side of the roof to provide better access to the attic, generally, and the air-conditioner evaporator/air-handler, specifically.

The quote is for a new roof, with new underpayment and ice shield, so it is a “tear off” where they first remove all of the old roofing and repair any damaged/missing roof decking or boards.  They always look for at least a three day window with a dry weather forecast.  Pat said they would work with me relative to the dormer.  Specifically, they would start the tear off in the area where I want to build the former and then move to a different part of the roof so I can do the carpentry.  Linda and I need to visit ABC Supply Co. in new Hudson to pick out the specific shingle we want, and we plan to do that sooner rather than later.

The dormer is simple in concept but a bit trickier in execution.  I would build two tapered walls on the ground that look like right triangles.  The hypotenuse would attach to the roof with the long leg on top and horizontal and the shirt leg facing out and vertical.  Joists would be installed across the two walls, tying the together.  The front wall would be framed for an access door between the two short legs.  Two rafters would be installed at the end wall.  The ridge board would be set in place and cut to tie into the roof.  Two backer boards would be installed on the roof running at an angle from the ends of the side walls up to the ridge board.  The rest of the rafters would then be installed.  The walls and roof would then get plywood sheeting and decking.  The final carpentry would be fascia boards and siding.  Fortunately we have a pile of Hardy Board left over from when the house was sided.  Hopefully there is enough to side the dormer and it is in good enough shape to use.  I would then install the door, which I might have to build.  Apex would then roof the dormer, including continuous ridge venting.  The final steps would be painting the door and door trim and installing fascia and vented soffit material to match what is already on the house if I can find a supplier.  We would like the dormer to blend in and look like it belongs there.

Brendan got Madeline down for her nap at 1 PM and then spent a little time looking at what we plan to do with the floor in the bus before heading back to Ann Arbor.  I gathered up the Armstrong vinyl floor tile samples and drove to Lynch Carpet in Howell to return them and see what else they might have.  Clint let me keep the one we like for a couple more days and gave me a grout color chart.  I then headed to Best Buy in Brighton to pick up a Sony Blue-Ray/DVD player and a couple of flash drives, all of which were on sale.  I stopped for gas and got back to the house just as Madeline was waking up from her nap.

I was able to spend a little time researching a potential new vehicle.  As much as we are enamored with the Jeep Wrangler Unlimited the Consumer Reports data on them is very discouraging, especially the reliability data.  Viable alternatives may be the Nissan Frontier Pickup Truck or the Nissan Xterra SUV, both of which are available in 4×4 configurations.  Even the Ford F-150 might be a possibility as it is available in a 4-door, short-bed, 4×4 version.  They all have much better CR reliability data that the Jeeps.  The problem is, they are not Jeeps.  If we can wait a year, Ford is releasing an F-150 Raptor in fall 2016 that will feature a 10-speed transmission with six selectable driving modes including rock, mud & sand, and Baja (high speed desert racing).  It will probably also feature a ridiculously high price, but then none of these vehicles are inexpensive.

We got a phone call from XPO around 4:20 PM to let us know they would be delivering our box spring mattress foundation around 5 PM.  They showed up right on time and carried it to our bedroom.  Linda signed the delivery slip and they were gone as quick as they arrived.  We will wait until Brendan retrieves Madeline tomorrow to disassemble and reassemble the bed.

I entertained Madeline while Linda prepared dinner, but Madeline was very interested in what her Grandma Linda was doing, so we kept going to the kitchen to check on the work.  Linda served some “mock” chicken tenders, but she also fixed fresh green beans and homemade mashed potatoes, reheated some frozen edamame, and set out fresh black grapes and pineapple chunks.  Madeline is a good eater and we all enjoyed our meal.

Madeline is “potty trained” and very proud of the fact that she is no longer wearing a diaper.  She had a very successful day letting us know she needed to use the toilet.  We have a booster ring for the hall bathroom and put a stool in there for her.  She uses the stool to get up in the toilet seat and then uses it to stand up at the sink and wash her hands.  The hall bathroom sink/counter is lower than normal and turns out to be a great height for Madeline with the use of the stool.

We played after dinner until Madeline was tired.  She has always been comfortable staying with us but at 29 months of age is starting to have some anxiety about being away from her parents.  She wanted her daddy, and was briefly a little bit teary, but it wasn’t anything Grandma Linda couldn’t handle.  Linda followed the usual routine of looking at the rug (wall art) and all of the pictures in the hallway, the small bedroom, and finally the middle bedroom where Madeline’s Pack-n-Play is set up.  She selected the Construction Kitties book (again) for a bedtime story.  It was one of the books we got from the library yesterday and was her favorite choice all day today.  She fell asleep easily as she usually does.  We are active, busy people, but it’s a different kind of busy from having a 2-year old in the house.  We were tired, and turned in about an hour after our grand-daughter, but it was a good kind of tired.

We were so busy today that we failed to notice that it was Cinco de Mayo until it was almost over.

 

2014/07/04 (F) Independence Day

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Pictures from today are in a separate gallery post with today’s date.

In spite of a ridiculous series of very brief power failures late last night, Madeline’s first overnight stay at our house was a complete success.  She was busy and cheerful all day yesterday, took a nice nap, went for a walk around our yard, and enjoyed a hearty and substantial dinner.  After all that she was ready for her evening bottle and then went to bed without a fuss at 7:45 PM.

She slept for almost 12 hours, which meant we could get up before her at our usual time and get ready for her awakening.  It took her a few minutes to fully wake up, during which time she was a little groggy but not fussy.  By the time Linda got her dressed she was ready for breakfast.  Linda made oatmeal with raisins and cranberries and all three of us had some.  Madeline also had fresh strawberries and blueberries.  Blueberries are one of her current favorite foods, along with peas.

We played with toys, read books, and played (with) the organ until 9:30 AM and then got ready to go on a field trip.  At 9:45 AM we left for the Howell Conference and Nature Center (HCNC).  The HCNC is the largest wildlife rehabilitation and permanent care center in the State of Michigan, and is located about eight miles south and slightly west of the heart of downtown Howell.

We were there for just over two hours and spent most of that time looking at a lot of animals including the following:  Coyotes; a Sandhill Crane; Whitetail Deer; owls (Screech, Saw-whet, Barn, Barred, Snowy, and Great Horned); a Wild Turkey; Bobcats; a Porcupine; Opossums; Turkey Vultures; an American Kestrel; hawks (Broad-winged and Harrier); a Peregrine Falcon; and American Bald Eagles.  Although HCNC rehabilitates wildlife for release back into the wild whenever possible, all of the animals we saw today were permanent residents due to injuries and/or habituation to humans that have made it impossible for them to survive without human care and protection.

After we were done with the Nature Walk and Raptor Center we explored Alexandria’s Playscape for 20 minutes, by which time we needed to start for home in order to have time for some lunch and still get Madeline down for her nap on schedule.  Linda rode home in the back seat to keep Madeline engaged so she wouldn’t fall asleep and this proved to be a very successful strategy.  We all had lunch and Linda got Madeline ready for her nap without a fuss.  Once Madeline was asleep Linda also laid down to rest for a bit while I started a load of laundry, booted up all of my computers, and installed updates.

Madeline had a good, long nap and was ready to tackle the last third of the day when she finally woke up.  We played with her new set of Lego Duplo blocks for a long time.  She enjoys taking them apart but this afternoon she figured out how to assemble the square ones.  She has a very good attention span for an 18 month old, but her attention naturally shifts in response to a stimulating environment.  She is always busy, and often in motion, but takes a break occasionally to enjoy one of her books.  She is also very independent and usually knows what she wants at any given moment.  She is, however, also open to suggestions and interacts very well with us.  She verbalizes quite a bit and is developing vocabulary.  We know this because she has a few words that we are able to understand and she uses them correctly and consistently.  She has a lot of other sounds that are clearly an attempt to communicate using speech, but she can’t quite form the words well enough yet for us to really understand what she is trying to say.  Sometimes, however, we can figure it out from the context of what is going on and what she is looking and/or pointing at.  We also discovered that she knows the names of colors as she consistently picked out the correct color Lego block when we asked for it by color.

For dinner Linda made a dish with baked beans, rice, carrots, onions, and celery.  I doubt that she will make it again as none of us seemed to like it that much.  My opinion was that it simply contained too much cinnamon.  After dinner we went for a walk around our property and saw a deer in the neighbor’s yard across the street.  When we got back to the front of the house we let Madeline explore the inside of the bus for a few minutes.  By 7 PM she was ready for a clean diaper, pajamas, and her evening bottle.  She fussed for about 10 seconds and then let grandma carry her to her bedroom where she looked at the paintings before yielding to her porta-crib for the second night in a row.

We have been hearing fireworks occasionally for the last few days, but starting around 8 PM things got cranked up and between 9 and 11 PM I thought we had inadvertently attended a major fireworks display.  I have written before about how much we like living in the country, but I have also written that the country is not always a quiet place; it just has a different kind of noise.  Usually that noise is the sound of nature, and we love it.  But occasionally it is an all too human sound, such as a gun being fired, or a dog barking.  But tonight we had fireworks, and a lot of them.  At our previous house the police would have showed up, and maybe the fire department too, if someone tried to fire the size and quantity of explosives we heard tonight.  Not out here in the country; big bonfires (burn piles) and big fireworks are apparently perfectly OK.  So is shooting a gun whenever you feel like it.

The house is not overly insulated, but Madeline was sleeping in the middle bedroom with the door and windows closed and the windows covered to keep out light while she naps during the day, so the fireworks did not wake her.  I felt bad for the cats, who spent most of the day in the basement or hiding in our bedroom to avoid contact with Madeline.  She gets very excited when she sees them and runs after them because she wants to pet them, which just reinforces their desire to be somewhere else.  When they finally came upstairs after she went to bed they had to endure several hours of explosions, which they were not used to and did not like.  The celebrations were mostly concluded by 11 PM and finally settled down completely by midnight.