Moving on – and moving in!

It was good to have Vince help to build the deck; he and Jim worked together well! We opted to go with pressure treated lumber rather than using a composite product and we will paint the deck with a Home Depot product called Deckover.

Linda drove out to Ashland City on May 13 to pay off the balance on the building permit and to find out if we could get a temporary Certificate of Occupancy (CO) – with the deck nearly done, we just lacked the front steps with railing and seed & straw to start the lawn in order to get the final CO. It has been raining so much in April and May that we couldn’t get concrete poured for the footings for the deck stairs, front steps and an apron around the front of the garage. 

So, while she was in Ashland City, Linda looked at hog panels for the deck railing at Tractor Supply.

When she stood up after bending down for a closer look at the panels, she nearly fainted. She had been having some dizzy spells and was not feeling quite right – and a visit to the doctor revealed that she was anemic! After a blood transfusion 2 weeks later and 5 iron infusions over the following 3 weeks, her numbers went up, but were still quite low. She sees the hematologist again in August. On May 20, we finally got the concrete poured!

The kitchen is looking good!

We went shopping for furniture and ordered counter height barstools that matched the cabinets! We also ordered a bedframe and nightstands for the master bedroom.

A few days later, we were able to locate the panels that we wanted for the deck at the Co-op in Fairview; the “goat panels” have 4” square openings.

Here’s Vince putting in the goat panels.

The deck was finished by May 25; we still need to do some sanding and paint it.

We had several loads of fill and topsoil delivered and spread.

The front steps were put up on June 3.

Chris came over on the 9^th and took some drone photos.

We got the temporary CO and were able to close on the mortgage on June 10. Jim ordered railings for the front steps – from Amazon! It would be several weeks for us to get a local firm to put railings in, and we had to have them installed in order to get our final CO… The movers came on June 12^th — 4 men with 2 trucks moved everything out of our storage units! 

We slept in the house for the first time on June 16^th. Jim got the seed and straw down so we will eventually have grass; the wild turkeys visit daily to check out the seed and hopefully they are leaving enough that we will have a lawn!

We also had some furry visitors!

With missing parts, much frustration and engineering, Jim put up the front railings.

We got our final CO on June 24^th and the porta potty was picked up on the 26^th – no more need for it!

After sitting for nearly 4 months, we took Acey out for a spin on June 27 and then parked her in the detached garage where she will stay until we take off again for more adventures!

Linda’s mother and her sister Laura were both artists – and a lot of their artwork is being hung in the new house. The dining area has Laura’s silk screen “Taming the Wild Beast”, a collage/quilt and a painting Linda’s mom did.

Over the kitchen sink is a couple of Mom’s work and Laura’s tomatoes. Betty Gilpin painted the “kitchen angel”.

For the first time, Linda has all 15 of her Mom’s “Christmas All Year ‘Round” collection hanging together!

In the front hall is the original of “He Will Feed His Flock Like a Shepherd”. Our family donated 4 originals to our church. We enjoy seeing them in their new home!

Mom’s “The Boy and the Spider” hangs in our great room.

Laura loved to use flowers as a subject. These 2 Calla Lily prints/collage are in our front hall.

Laura had made 2 silk screen versions of Spider Lillies.

This is a pastel piece that Laura did.

This is one of at least 2 posters Laura did for the Orlando Opera!

A “Laura” gallery – a selfie and small originals and photos of larger works.

“The Yellow Chair” – one of Linda’s favorites that her Mom painted.

On June 30, when we went to mount the stained-glass window inserts, we discovered that the trapezoid windows measured just a bit too big for the stained-glass butterfly windows to fit snugly!

What could have been a 2-hour job ended up taking many hours over 5 days! Jim had to do some fancy woodwork to adjust the molding around the windows to frame the stained glass inserts. The 3 windows on the right side have the “fix”, and the left ones are the way they windows came.

Now the inserts fit!

These butterfly windows have a bit of history! Laura had drawn a design for stained glass windows that were to go in a nursing home that her parents’ church in Boca Raton was planning to build, but it never got off the ground. So, her parents had the windows made and they hung in 2 of the homes they built in North Carolina. Here is a photo of the first home that housed the stained glass windows.

When we built our last house in 1999, we planned to be able have the four center panels; Linda’s parents had promised to give the inserts to us when they sold the house they were living in. Here are some photos of Jim and Chuck taking the windows down in 2003.

Special crates had been made to store and transport the windows; here’s Linda’s folks crating the windows.

 We enjoyed having the windows in our previous home for many years.

and now all six panels are gracing our new home!

We hung vertical shades in the bedrooms.

Chris has been a big help to us in our building and moving in process. He helped Jim install the permanent front door at last! (we had a temporary door in place while we were under construction and until we moved in.)

We had not seen or heard from Chuck for quite a while, so we took a quick trip to Baton Rouge – it was really good to see him and catch up!

Our home is shaping up and we are glad to be settling in 😊