Chapter 87...Decorations and Green Gutters

Off Grid...Chapter 87 8-19 It's a rainy dreary day today. Mike and I are so so tired of this weather. Usually it is beautiful in the mountains but this year has been the worst we have ever seen it. I am very thankful we built the house last summer. We would never have finished if we tried to build this year. We decided to load up the jeep and go the dump. On our way we get a call from Mike's daughter. She wants to redo the floors in her house and she just picked up laminate samples. We told her we would stop by to check them out after the dump run. When we get to her house, since it is still dreary out, we help her work a little. The only way to see if it will good is to take up some carpet and put some of the self stick strips down. We help her put about 6 strips down and it looks good. Now she will have to order enough to do the entire house. She wants to get rid of all of the carpet because she hates it. She has gotten very picky since she started her Housecleaning business, lol. She also loves remodeling. Wonder where she gets that from?LOL, By the time we get home there is a package for us. Woo hoo, finally it must be our awnings. I really hope they got it right this time. Back up at the house we open up the package and it looks good. They sent us just the canvas and the brackets to match. Since we already have the bars we just have to add the canvas. After a month we now have 2 matching awnings, lol. Here is Mike hanging our 2nd awning. Next we hang up our new outside display. Now things are starting to come together. 8-20 The weather hasn't been the best but we really need to get the gutters back on the house. It seems like we took them off just in time for all of this rain. I help Mike get started and then I get the downspouts and prep them for painting. I am going to paint them the same green as the house. This way we don't stand out like a sore thumb. Some houses need the accent but this house we want to blend. First I lay them across 2 chairs and give them a quick fine sand so the paint will adhere better. Then I start painting. It looks like they will need 3 coats. Here is the first coat of paint. While that dries I go and help Mike with the gutters. As I start helping it starts to drizzle. Uh oh, I run back and grab the downspouts and put them inside the building to keep them dry. We have to go inside until the rain stops. Ok, we get another chance. Mike and I go up on the roof to hang the gutters. Here is Mike hanging the gutters. I pull the downspouts out of the building and give them another coat....and it starts to rain again so I bring them back into the building. We get another break and Mike and I finish putting the gutters up. Next we put the downspouts back on the house. Earlier when Mike was on the roof he unscrewed some of our metal panels. We have a small leak and we need find it. Mike and I lifted some of the panels to take a look. We found a small part of the plywood that is damp. We must have a small hole in one of the screws going into the roof. On a hot sunny day we will have to slide the panel over, let it dry, find the screw holes and repair it. Just another thing for the ongoing list, lol. The front of the house is really starting to shape up. Notice how yellow things are. Last year we were all green at this time. We have had too much rain. And of course, it poured again that night. 8-21 We are trying to make a decision about the roof. Since neither one of us likes the metal roof because it is just too noisy and it rusts, we are checking into shingles. We find out that we can't do shingles because our roof pitch is too low. So we have to come up with a new plan. Either way we still have to locate the hole/leak and repair it. Unfortunately we have to wait for better weather. 8-22 Today we had our first guests visit us at the house. The Geezers are in town and we invited them over. It rained in the morning but cleared up enough for a nice visit. 8-23 Today it rained the entire day. Yuk!! 8-24 Well at least it isn't raining today. We took a ride over to David's to see what our options are for the roof. Mike thinks maybe we can use a tinted roof sealer. We soon find out that roof sealer can't be tinted so we will have to stick with white. David doesn't have enough in stock for our whole roof so we are going to think about it and check on some more products. On our way home we take a ride across the holler. We finally met our neighbor who took his trees down last year. He wanted a better view and unfortunately we were in the way, lol. Anyway, his wife wasn't home but he seems very nice. He told us that his wife will say "their painting again" meaning Mike and I, lol. It is pretty funny how much we change things. But that's how you learn. Maybe next time we can meet his wife. Lisa