DEJA VU

Well, this past week, we decided that we needed to make one last trip to the cabin before the snow set in.

We made it through all the Thanksgiving festivities, and Temple Square, and on Saturday morning, we loaded up the truck and the trailer and headed to Panguitch.

We decided to take another load of insulation in the trailer and various odds and ends and put them in the conex - waiting for spring.

The drive down to Panguitch was reasonably eventless...There was major head winds, but nothing that would stop us.  I have a flu kind of thing going on, but I figured as long as I was in the truck and it was warm, all would be good.

We got into Panguitch about 5 and decided to head directly to the property because the weather forecast was calling for snow showers on Saturday.

We made it to the property about 5:15, just as the sun was setting and it was getting majorly dark.  The roads up to the subdivision was reasonably clear, but as soon as we hit the outskirts of the foot of the mountains, there was snow... lots of snow...  We decided to just drop off the trailer with the insulation and go back and unload this morning.

Well, about midnight last night, the wind picked up more, and it started to snow.. and I mean, really snow.  We slept in, and were greeted with a hearty good morning from.. snow... Not good.

We needed to meet with our contractor, and we did so at about 1:00 in the afternoon at Tod's, which is a little gas station/cafe just up the road.  Travis got there, and it was decided that Jim and Travis were going to drive up the mountain in his DuraMax truck, and I would wait in the cafe.  That was fine by me.

They were gone about 45 minutes.  Jim says there was about 6 inches of snow around the concrete work, it was bitterly cold, and the road was covered in snow.  Travis, our contractor, is supposed to finish the concrete walls this week, and we'll be done for the year - planning on starting up in the spring when we have a thaw.

On the way back home, we got about as far as Scipio, and the traffic came to a complete stop.. we hardly moved in about 3 hours.  We tried to call to find out what was happening, but had no cell service.  I texted Brianne and Brad and asked for them to find out what was going on... Apparently, the road was at a stand-still due to snow and ice, and there was a major problem with snow removal trucks... So, we sat, and sat, and sat.  When we finally started moving, it wasn't any faster than about 5 miles an hour.  After about 2 hours, a highway patrol officer pulled up behind us, and parked his car sideways across the highway - stopping all traffic behind us.

The road was incredibly icy.  Cars were slid into the ditches, or just parked on the side of the road - people refusing to go forward.  After about 2 hours, we saw 3 snow plows running tandem on the southbound lanes - we, were in the northbound lanes.

Incredibly scary.  Incredibly tense. I told Jim that it reminded me of when we went to New Mexico and got caught in a snow storm and spent the night on the side of the road.

After sitting on the road, for hours on end, let's just say, nature was calling, and nobody could answer the call.  And, wasn't just us, but every man, woman and child and dog on the highway.  It really was quite comical.  The conversation was, "What the heck are they doing... they pulled over... oh... never mind"...  The part that made us giggle was, Jim and I are both wearing fluorescent yellow jackets with reflective tape on them... absolutely not the right clothing to be on the side of the road with and trying to be inconspicuous with....

We saw one car that had run off the road - the front left wheel was hanging over the side of the ravine, and the other three were still on ground.  Scary!

After 9 hours, of a 3.5 hour trip, we made it back to Provo - safe and sound.  Terrifying drive, and thank goodness, the last one this year!

The amazing adventure continues... but, now is on hold for spring to make an appearance.

Jim and Cheri

SCRATCH, SCRATCH, SCRATCH...pause... SCRATCH, SCRATCH

I know the title sounds a little weird, but, if you read the blog, you'll understand.... giggle.

Jim and I planned one final trip to Manzanita this year...we planned on leaving Saturday morning, early, and take a load of building supplies down and store them in the Conex.

Well, after we got up at 10:00 am, and puttered around the house for a while (Cheri puttered, Jim worked. . . .), we got into the truck, drove over to storage and loaded the trailer and the back of the pick up...We decided to take sheets of insulation, a set of metal shelves, electrical boxes, Tyvex, a sonotube and some nails, and just miscellaneous stuff..

Jim dug through the largest storage building that we have, and started pulling out the insulation and loading it on to the trailer.  I straightened out the insulation on the trailer and loaded stuff into the nooks and crannies...

On our way to to Panguitch, Jim says that the first thing that he's going to do when he gets to the hotel is take a shower, because the itching from the insulation is just about driving him crazy... I figure that it's a good idea.  I didn't have this problem because I didn't have too much contact.

We get into Panguitch and decide that we are going to have dinner at the Gem theater - our usual weekend haunt.. We pull up to the cafe, and the windows are papered over and there's a sign on the window... it closed.  Sad face... So, we drove over to what we call "C-Span" (it's actually a pizza place called C-Stop) and have pizza and salad and it really was terrific.

Because of the little "mouse" in the room the week before, we decide to make a stop at the Dollar Store in Panguitch and get cookies and snacks.. Jim is wandering around and he found these cookies that neither one of us had seen for like 50 years.. They're that vanilla cookie with the little dot of mystery sticky, thick, strawberry/raspberry jelly in the center.  Had to buy them... yep.. they taste the same as they did back then.. giggle.  Jim said they might have been from the same batch!

We get to the hotel room, unhook the trailer, and the first thing Jim does is shower.... we then get on a "Lisa Ling" marathon - I think I watched about 6 episodes, and it ended with me texting Brad, our son/drug councilor asking, "What's Molly?"  He didn't text back, but I got a telephone call immediately after from Brad warning us not to touch the stuff, it was a really bad drug..... Giggle...  Nice to get the kids all concerned every once in a while..  Lisa Ling was reporting about it.

We got up this morning, and just couldn't get moving...  We slept in, and it really felt nice.  I got up and got dressed and got breakfast from the lobby and ate it in the hotel room... We're sitting on the side of the beds and I look down, and see that Jim's cheese omelette sandwich had somehow dripped onto his foot and it looked like a little happy face... giggle..

We got down to the property a little late, but started to unload the insulation. Now, I don't have a whole lot of experience with insulation, but I sure got a lesson today.  There were at least a thousand sheets (actually 23) in the trailer, two inches thick. My job was to get them out of the trailer and take them over to the edge of the conex where Jim would take each sheet from me, and stack it back in the corner of the conex...  I swear, each of those sheets weigh 500 pounds...It took us about an hour to unload the trailer, both of us sweating profusely, and yep... itching... I was carrying each piece under my left arm so my arm and the left side of my body was in full contact through my hoodie and blouse... strange sensation - like itch and scratch and little needles all together...Not my favorite job.

There was quite a lot done on the basement this week.. The cement floor was poured.

That's our on-site plans in the black tube, in the dirt at the bottom of the picture.

The forms for the walls are going up.  We were thinking the contractor had said that they were going to pour the walls on Saturday, but that didn't happen.  I expect it will happen this week, if it doesn't snow any more.

Jim had to be the first one to park in the garage.

On the way home, with all the sweating and work that we had done, my makeup is burning my eyes.  We didn't have papertowels or kleenex or anything in the car, so what do I do... pull my shirt and wipe my eyes with the front of my tshirt... you know, the t-shirt with the fiberglass insulation on the front... yep... about a second later, my face and eyes start to burn, and I've got nothing to wipe it off with... not a good idea... it was one of those "dur" moments..

In the meantime, our amazing adventure ends with... scratch, scratch... giggle, I need a shower. . . .

Cheri

Beautiful!

So, I'm looking at Facebook the other night, and I see a post on one of the vintage/antique sites selling antique tin panels.  It looked interesting, so I forwarded it to Jim.

The store that had them was in Salt Lake City, which was closer to Jim's work than my work, so I asked him to check out these panels before he came home.

He got to the store and found that these tin panels are over 100 years old and came out of three houses in Phillipsburg, Kansas about 40 years ago.  The person who took them out of the building was doing remodeling of homes in Park City.  He didn't use all the panels and they have sat in storage for 40 years.

I thought they were absolutely beautiful.

Jim saw them, and bought me 10 for my kitchen to be used for the back-splash!  They are each 18 inches by four feet.

Love, love, love them... Jim sure knows how to spoil me..

The adventure continues...

WOO-HOO!!!

Well, last week we failed the rebar test and they had to come back out and reinspect... Jim worked like a crazy man on Sunday evening and Monday morning, to get the plans red lined WITHOUT a fireplace, and sent them to Kane County Building inspectors to approval.  I called the inspectors office early Monday morning and told them it was coming and explained what we were doing, and I hoped the message got passed along.

Well, it did!  The rebar inspection was approved and guess what.....  footings, foundation and basement floor in a mono-block was poured today!  So freakin' exciting!!!

The concrete has to cure/harden for three days before the walls can be poured.  During that three days, it has to stay reasonably warm when it dries, and we have a cold front coming in on Thursday, so we're a little on the nervous side of life...Saturday, if all dries and cures properly, the walls will be poured.  It's supposed to warm up a little on Saturday through the next Wednesday, so we are hoping for the best.

Another amazing adventure.  And we didn't even get to put our names in it!  Hope the deer don't come along to inspect.

Cheri

BIG THINGS ACCOMPLISHED THIS WEEK!!!

When we left off last week, we had purchased a 45 foot Conex container and it was to be delivered on Tuesday... Well, that didn't quite happen.  Our contractor wasn't quite ready for the delivery on Tuesday and it was moved to Thursday... Well, that didn't quite go off as planned either...

On  Thursday morning, Jim was contacted by the company we bought the conex from and was told that the driver was on his way.  Jim had already contacted our contractor who was supposed to be on site to help the driver place the box where we wanted it.  Well, Jim gets a call from the contractor on Thursday morning, and is told that the guy who was supposed to be there, called in sick and wouldn't be there.. BUT, the contractor was on his way, and it would only take him about 30 minutes to get there..The conex is coming from Cedar City, which is one hour away, so .... so, we're hopeful at this point...  This is at 9 in the morning...

At 11:00 am, the conex truck driver leaves because the contractor hasn't showed up yet...  um... (I thought it was a 30 minutes drive, dude...)  Because nobody was there, the conex driver dropped the conex on the road in front of our property... um.. really?  This is a 45' steel box, in a development where we aren't supposed to have a conex box...  well, we're freaking...  Our plan is to hide it where no one will see it from the road. . . .

About 30 minutes after the box was dropped off, the contractor shows up and is ticked because the box was dropped off, and the driver left... Well, um, there's a time issue going on here, dude...

Jim contacts the Conex seller, and he says first of all that he will come down on Saturday morning, and help move the box.. So, we are hoping that the owners of the development, don't make a little tour while this huge box is in the road... we're on pins and needles...

We thought the concrete was going to be poured on Friday, but... noooo... not that much luck.  The inspector who came to give his OK for the rebar, said that the plans call for this huge concrete block in the middle of the basement to support the fireplace... fireplace? We don't have a fireplace in the cabin..  They're "inefficient" and we have a wood burning stove planned instead...  But, where did this fireplace come from.. We look at the plans and sure enough, the architect (you know the one that we grew to hate and wouldn't listen to us... ya, that one...) drew the plans with a fireplace...  groan...  So, the plans have to be red-lined and sent back to Kane County building inspectors, and they need to come back out this next week, and reinspect with the red-lined plans, so hopefully, we'll pour on Tuesday or Wednesday...

Well, we leave for Panguitch on Friday night and get there in reasonable time.. We got a little bit of a late start and we showed up in Panguitch at about 9:50pm..  We go to the Gem restaurant to get some food, and as we walk up to the doors, the "OPEN" sign goes off... We then go to the gas station on the corner of the main drag, and the doors are locked.. We then go to the gas station which is a little further down, and finally got a little something to eat.. Jim had a little microwaveable bowl of ravioli, and I had a cup of Ramen...  wow...  I don't know what to say at this point...  Giggle.

Saturday morning, we get up and have breakfast.. can I say, I was starving?  We were supposed to meet our contractor at 9:00 and then the time got changed to 12:00 noon.. We head up the mountain and get a text from the contractor saying that there is a big wreck in Alton, and he was delayed... groan...  We pull up to the property, and sure enough, there's this big conex box in the road in front of our property... BUT, there was no letter or note on it telling us to get it moved, so we're in good shape...

Jim had called the seller of the box in Cedar City, and told him that we were on site and could he come and get the box moved, and he says that one part of his truck had broken and he wouldn't be able to have it fixed and out to our property until Tuesday...  really?  I would like to say that it was getting funny, but it wasn't.. This thing weighs 10,000 lbs.

The contractor finally showed up a little after 1:00, and Jim and the contractor said that they though that with the two backhoes, they could get the box moved out of the road and into the space we wanted...

I was skeptical...  But, they actually did it..  one backhoe pushed, and one backhoe pulled, and they got it exactly where we wanted, and nobody was injured...I was on Facetime with people the whole time just in case someone needed to call 911...

All that took about 3 hours and we were exhausted afterwards, so we decided to head back to the hotel..  We made a quick detour to the Panguitch Craft Fair (bought the cutest little outfit for Ben) and then got some dinner at the Gem, and then back to the hotel.... It was about 6:30 at that point, and both of us fell asleep...

When we walked into the hotel room, it was the funniest thing ever.. We were staying there for two nights, and we kinda like it when the room is made up when we come back from working...  Let's just say, the person who was making up our room, must have been in a hurry...  giggle.  This is what the bed looked like when we walked in.

We napped for a couple of hours, and then when it came time for us to actually get a good night's sleep, we're both awake...  I fell asleep but woke up about 2 in the morning to noise of a "little mouse" eating the cookies from the nightstand...  I told Jim that perhaps we should set some traps, and that little mouse just kept crunching away... giggle... he still makes me smile.

Woke up, got dressed, had breakfast and decided to go check out the RV that was in storage...  At the end of the season, while the RV was still up at the property, we actually had a mouse... I had set a plethora of traps trying to catch the sucker, and I did make a kill... But, I was nervous that some of his friends had taken up residence in my RV, so as Jim says, "you set a mine-field"... I was expecting a mouse or two to be caught, but was thrilled that not a single mouse was caught down at the storage site...  It's either they don't like peanut butter, or there aren't any... I'm going with the "aren't any".

We went up to the property, and decided that we didn't know when we would be back, so we had to get the property all ready for winter.  We were planning on putting everything into our Conex!

On the way back to the property, a coyote ran in front of our vehicle.. he was fat and absolutely beautiful with a thick coat of fur and a beautiful thick tail.  I don't think I have ever seen a coyote before, although at the property, you hear them sometimes at night... howling at the moon.

We put the BBQ and the fire pit and plastic pipes and nails and all sorts of stuff in the Conex, including the Honda four wheeler.

We picked up all the garbage around the site area...  I think I need to get a big garbage can up there... cans and bottles and trash and everything else was all over the place from the sub-contractors... was driving me crazy...

Jim was going to put the backhoe into the conex for the winter, and as we tried to drive it into the container, we realized that the backhoe was about a foot too tall for the 9 1/2 foot tall Conex... so, the backhoe is going to be out in the weather this winter.  We're going to have to get a tarp or something and put it over it. Jim also winterized the drain pipes with anti-freeze that go under the house, just to make sure they didn't crack this winter.

On the way out, we picked up our little trailer that was left on site and filled it with all the garbage and dead tree limbs..We're supposed to have a cold snap later on this week, so I'm glad that we got everything cleaned up.

Was a busy, but very, very productive weekend....

As always, another amazing adventure.

Cheri

Can we say Con.Ex?

Well, Jim and I made it down to Manzanita this past weekend, after first making a trip to Cedar City, Utah to purchase a  Conex shipping container.  We have so much stuff in storage (4 storage buildings to be exact) that we thought it would be a good idea to buy one big container, and consolidate.

So, we find this guy in Cedar City, and make an appointment to go see shipping containers, on Saturday afternoon.  We make it down there in good time, pull into the lot, and there at 100's of shipping boxes, or all sizes.  We were looking for a 45' box 9 1/2 feet high, in good condition, that could be transported over the road, in about an hour to Manzanita.

We found the one that we wanted, paid for it, and then set up the delivery date.  It's supposed to be delivered on Tuesday or so.  Stoked.

We then drove on to the property.  I don't think it looks a whole lot different, but Jim says that it is.  I guess I really don't pay attention.  You can't see the plumbing pipes any longer, they're covered up, and there have been trenches dug around where the forms are going... apart from that, not much difference.

This is a shot of Conex Drive today.  The conex will sit on the railway ties once they are set down level.

We failed the compaction test last week, and the contractor had to soak down the one corner with water, let it dry and then use a jumping jack to pound it down.  I can see where the ground was wet, but I don't think it's been pounded down yet.

The big news for the weekend is that we moved Beluga (Jim's Dad's RV) into storage.  We revved her up, and drove her down to her winter home in Panguitch.

 This next weekend, we'll need to go down one more time, and make some repairs to her, so that she will be safe and dry for the winter, and that'll be the end of it for this year.  We found that one of the roof vents got cracked, and that needs to be replaced and some of the caulking on the top of the RV is leaking, so that needs to be fixed.... nothing major, just a few minor repairs.

A lot has happened in a short period of time.  We have decided that once the concrete goes in, which is supposed to be this week, we are going to wait until spring to do the framing.

More adventures....

Cheri

SIGH....

Well, the good news for the midweek post is... We passed the water pressure test!

The bad news, is... we failed the compaction test.... sigh...

But, the situation is fixable.  Our contractor has to go out to the one corner of where the building is supposed to be, pour down water, mix it in, and then compact the dirt so that it will support the foundation of the house.

The positioning of the cabin moved so that we had a nicer view and we didn't have to cut down trees... Because of this, it was moved to an area that had previously been dug up and it wasn't virgin ground... which made it unstable.

The contractor was going to try and pour concrete tomorrow, that is, if the rebar test passed tomorrow morning... (so many tests)... So, the compaction test is resheduled, the rebar test is on hold, and we hope to pour concrete on Monday now..

But, Conex Drive is in and we're going down to Cedar City on Saturday to purchase the conex container and have it delivered.

Another amazing adventure.

Cheri