You Lumen Up My Life!
Posted on September 27, 2013 by
Across the construction worksite I could hear the story of Paul (from the Bible) playing on a CD telling about Saul’s blindness. That’s what the siding crew was listening to one day. This great crew was often heard asking questions about creation, politics, pondering on people from the Bible, and discussing morals. They were fun and polite and did everything we asked and more. This week they finished siding the house and made gutters on site.
From sheet metal to a gutter, this crimping machine was cool!
This is the roadside of the house.
ProSiding Crew who put up the HardiePlank
It was this ProSiding crew that Jack turned to for help in helping him overcome his fear of heights. One of the (many) things that Jack has been dreading was hanging the 2 ceiling fans and the chandelier in the Great room, 34 feet up. Yes, this is my pilot husband, who has the fear of heights. So Monday, when the crew was nearly through with the siding and guttering Charlie’s siding crew agreed to put scaffolding in the great room to mount our ceiling fans and chandelier. Jack who has been wiring, wiring, and wiring built special wooden boxes to mount the ceiling fans and the chandelier on the timbers.
Ferguson Electric scrambled to get all of the parts we need it so this group could do the work while they were still on site. Kudos to Sarah Burns at Fergusons along with John, Deborah, Darryl and Tim. Their kindness and customer service are superb. However, we still were left with the wrong bulbs and fan blades and could not accomplish this awesome task on Wednesday. So, Thursday we skipped choir practice in favor of assembling our second choice of fans and trying the new bulbs. Nope- bulbs didn’t’ work. We drove off to Lowes in a huff (I might add!)
That brings me to the title of this blog. Have you shopped for lighting lately? For goodness sakes, since when did the alternatives in light bulb shopping become so complex? You can no longer purchase a 100-watt incandescent bulb. And energy saving policies require so much labeling in a different measurement scale…not watts and amps. Instead, there are so many new types of bulbs that it takes an Associate’s degree to understand the choices. For example, 13 lumens= 60 watts and 23 lumens = 100 watts. Kindly refer to this easy reference chart!
I needed 4 GU24 LED or CFL dimmable bulbs that to fit eache ceiling fan. Since the room is large, we wanted at least the strength of a 100-watt bulb. Each fan takes 2 bulbs. So how fast was the train traveling? Just kidding, keep reading!
The section in the home improvement store is huge now! Once I purchased these bulbs and got them home for the fan assembly, they were still wrong and late Thursday we had to make another Lowes run. Hopefully we have the correct ones for this work starts first thing Friday morning. Oops, this just in, Charlie says let’s wait until Monday. I agreed in favor of double checking those bulbs tomorrow.
So whether it is Saul or Paul, seeing the light, or my chandelier bringing a warm glow to Bedford Landings, I hope to sing the song soon…You Lumen up my Life! And you know, it may be the bulbs, it may be daylight or it may be heaven sent when this all comes together!
This has been a productive week starting with last weekend. We had 12 friends and family assisting on the three decks and front porch flooring. Thanks to Jim & Sandy, Skip, Bill & Carolyn, Debbie, Mike and Lisa, David and Kathleen, Lynn and Eric we were able to get everything 80% completed. We had a great time working together (and playing together) as we went! Thanks to you all !
The photos show the porches and decks. We have selected honorary names for them (See captions).
The bridge deck bridges the private master deck with the main public deck. We didn’t work on it at all.
The Family and Friends Front Porch was mainly constructed by just that-family members and their friends!
This Master BR, private deck we are calling the Koontz deck. Watching our good friends (plus Debbie!) who are both engineers disagree about dimensions was sorta fun! Sorta.
Now this is the Skipper deck. The largest of all, Skip designed it as he went! The part nearest the house will become the screened porch.
The front deck connected to the Skipper Deck. This faces the road.
By Monday, however, Jack was whipped and took it slower, but still did more wiring. On Wednesday, Southside Electric came and connected the POWER! We now have power to the main house but the connections are still being made.
Southside Electric at work.
Jack is more than half way through with wiring. And I must say, the electrician is a much happier camper than the plumber was!
Pro-Siding loves my selection of siding colors and I do too! I wanted to add color contrast to the Navajo Beige Hardie plank. Around the fixed windows, I selected a maple color Hardie plank. Charlie from ProSiding says he has never seen another house done I this way and that’s a good thing!
Maple siding accenting the stacked stone chimney.
I have drafted a final schedule of everything that needs to be completed before we can move in. Check it out! Note how many items have Jack’s name next to it.
If you are around and want to come over to have fun at Bedford Landings, let us know if any of these tasks fits your skill set! We always will feed ya lunch! It’s a tight timeframe but I am hopeful that Jack and the contractors will all miraculously be able to meet the deadlines and by turkey day, we can set the table indoors!
When I first met Jack nearly 10 years ago, he told how he built his own home. It reminded me of the nursery rhyme, “The House that Jack Built.” I am again reminded or how many of these verses are coming true with our new home. Let me illustrate with the last verse of the rhyme.
This is the farmer sowing his corn,
That kept the cock that crowed in the morn,
That waked the priest all shaven and shorn,
That married the man all tattered and torn (I don’t get that verse),
That kissed the maiden all forlorn (that would be me!),
That milked the cow with the crumpled horn,
That tossed the dog (poor Kramer!),
That worried the cat,
That killed the rat (well we haven’t actually trapped it yet!),
That ate the malt (we drink ours!)
That lay in the house that Jack built.
And if we can keep it lively, fun, and productive, we will indeed make it! Thanks to all the wonderful deckers!
We passed the plumbing inspection! Yeah! Small celebration!
This weekend, we have 13 friends descending on Bedford Landings to help put the decking floor around the exterior of the house. The siding is nearly complete and the siding crew will be installing gutters next week. This has been a busy week so photos to follow later!
By the way, we are hopeful that we can open for business sometime in December. Not until I see the drywall go in can we schedule everything else so stay tuned!
This week, I assembled a time capsule to put into the wall. I am not sure which wall put it in, and it’s not like there is going to be millions of dollars hidden in the walls; just this and that. Photo (minus my cell phone) shows that I included business cards, information about Bedford Landings, family photos, food labels, a record player stylus, a pedometer, etc.
I just hope that the RAT doesn’t carry off the time capsule! I set a mouse trap since I saw mouse droppings in a corner of the stairwell by the garage. Granted, the house is open and being such a fine house, if I were a rat, I would move in too, but there is not food in the house. Maybe it likes the glue in the trusses. But I loaded peanut butter on a trap and this monster ate the bait, but didn’t spring the trap. Then defiantly, left more droppings by the trap. I’ll get you “my pretty!”
Jack left Wednesday for Wisconsin to retrieve the plane which he abandoned after the Brown Recluse attacked him in July. That little plane will take 17 hours to get him back. He is watching the weather anticipating getting home this weekend.
This was taken in July by a friend who flew in his plane with Jack to Wisconsin.
Before he left, he had a surge of wiring work and framing. He and Steve framed out the ceilings in the Master bedroom and sunroom including the Tray Ceiling.
Pro-Siding (and Charlie English and happy crew) are working steadily along on the exterior this week. They are from Rocky Mount, VA and we sure like their work and attitude!
The color is Navajo Beige.
We have had a few calls wanting to make reservations and we appreciate your calling, but I hesitate to make any reservations in 2013. Once we start moving in, and get settled, though, we will be ready to open Bedford Landings! The we can all celebrate! Until next week, enjoy the lovely Fall weather!
Shout-outs to long-time friend, Susan and her sister’s family- Jennifer & Brice and daughters, Carter (age 11 or 12) and Clara (about age 3) who visited SML this week! They came over Monday night for burgers on the grill. Susan texted me to ask what they could contribute for dinner. Being the ever-vigilant “child-involvement mama,” I recalled Carter would be capable of making a simple dessert to bring. I texted Susan to suggest Carter make a dessert. Carter brought a lovely berry cobbler but Mama Jenn indicated that Clara did help with it! Then the lovely EIGHT-Year old, Clara asked why I just wanted Carter to bring the dessert; to which I responded, “because I thought you were still three years old!”
My point? Kids are great #1– but also they grow and change. We all do and so does our building project! Often the results are not as visible from the outside, but, inside, Jack has moved on to wiring! Yea! I will comment on plumbing once it is inspected.
Here are a few examples of this week’s changes:
Example 1.
This space someday will be the kitchen counter instead of a 2×4 catch-all shelf for tools.
Kitchen countertop to be.
This next photo was taken just a few months ago of the kitchen area…
and here it is today, a wiring masterpiece in progress!
Wiring completed for center island, laundry room and appliances.
All of the wiring has to travel down to the circuit breaker boxes.
Starting to fill up two boxes!
Indeed the siders (not spiders!) started today. They have gotten almost a whole end wall done and have started trimming the exterior of the windows. Maybe next week, there will be more to show. This is the basic color. But there will be a surprise accent color!
We have had our share of visitors again this week. We met neighbor, Joy and neighbors WC and DeeDee. But Clif lent a hand pulling wire! Thanks so much to our singing buddy!
Wiring in the study.
Last Sunday, I spent the whole day weeding the little median between ours and our neighbor’s house and planted a little garden. It’s a lovely view from the hangar porch of the Lil Garden! That’s mom’s Little Boy Blue watering the redbud!
And speaking of changes, I saw Mom this week. She continues to change! She was cold, so I took the opportunity to cuddle with her.
There may not be many more times to cuddle! So grab the moments while you can.
So…Clara’s not three anymore, Mom’s not brilliant and efficient any more, the house is ever changing, and life goes on!
Ciao, bella amici!