a slippery slope

Apparently there is a massive storm blowing into the area tomorrow which will bring with it several more inches of snow and then a full day of ice on top of that.
This will be very heavy. A big concern here has been snow loads on roofs.
So far most of the collapses have been flat roofed buildings and sheds. But with a storm like this coming - this could change.

We were watching the news this morning and there were reports of people falling off their roofs and ending up in the hospital all over the area.
Perhaps these people have slightly underestimated their own capabilities or maybe they have forgotten that snow and ice can be slippery.

Our old colonial farm house has a pretty steep pitch to it. This not only helps keep the snow totals lower -but carries the load better.

The problem here is our much flatter lower roof which wraps around half the house.


There is some drifting, and parts of this roof never see the sun - this has us a little concerned. Concerned enough in fact to want to do something about it.
But -with the storm on the way early tomorrow morning, it leaves us no time to hire this job out.

I am working from home today - so my arthritic wife has forbid me to do anything about this until she gets home this evening.
(tee hee)
What makes a dangerous job more fun? That's right, do it in the dark. Might even be better if we were drunk - but I have enough trouble with ladders sober, so we may pass on that.

Unfortunately I don't think we'll be able to get pictures of the project in progress... unless of course the news crews get here in time.

The House on Elm - don't sweat the small stuff

Very shortly after we moved in we needed to do some quick, nothing fancy fixes.

For one - we foolishly assumed the hideous blue tile looking stuff around the shower was in fact actual tile. Ah.. rookie mistake.
So that had to all come out.
Ok. new bathroom ..check.

When we bought our three bedroom home we asked our oldest child, then 8, to pick out her room - she chose the attic. The unfinished attic.
Slightly too short to be legal living space - but perfect for a child, we forged ahead with sheetrock and skylights. We didn't do any creative, atticy stuff like you see now in all the remodeling magazines. We just finished the room added a blue carpet (of her choice) and moved her in.
She loved that room at the top of the house. Too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter. But a child's paradise none-the-less.
In the beginning - the only access to the attic was through our room... the so called master bedroom. Which was perfect for an 8 year old. Years later we would reconfigure the hallway to allow our teen a private entrance to her space at the top of the house.


We planted a vegetable garden and a some trees in the vast backyard... but those piddly projects never made us work hard, sweat, bandage up, or cry... and certainly did not involve a sledgehammer.

The House on Elm - moving in

Moving day went swimmingly.
Well - as best as it could for doing the entire move using a pick up truck.
That and we weren't quite, exactly, completely packed yet.

Yes, its true. I may be overly organized now - but back in the 80's I was a bit more - let's just say spontaneous and relaxed.
(thanks again Bets, I owe you still)

Almost needless to say it was a very long day.
And my increasingly-round-wife could really do nothing more than watch.
Well...watch ... and tell us that the rugs needed to come up and the entire house needed to be painted.
NOW.
Seriously.
NOW.

Have you ever tried to reason with a woman who is 8 months pregnant?

You see, we bought our house from an old woman with one leg. Peg.
Actually - her name was Mary. But we called her Peg.
Yes, we were that immature.

Peg loved green.
We made this assumption because the entire first floor was not only painted green, but had green wall to wall carpets as well. And really ...who paints their basement green - unless you really, really like it.

Granted upstairs there was a blue room and a pink room, as well as a green one - but Peg didn't go upstairs... with the one leg and all.
In fact - Peg creatively turned the the dining room into her bedroom.
It was, of course, green, and matched her green bedspread.

All of this green needed to go. And there was clearly no time to waste with all this nesting going on.

And so - we rose early the next morning, opened all the windows to the cool March winds and started tossing carpet out of the house.

That week we painted the entire house off white. If memory serves, I believe the color was Navajo White. This was a stop gap till we could make more decorative decisions later.
For now - since the baby was coming ANY SECOND - we needed wood floors and clean walls.

The House on Elm - circa 1987

It was 1987, we had just gotten past our big hair phase.

We lived in a comfortable apartment, the first floor of a small house, which had ample space for us, our 7 year old daughter and two cats. We had a fireplace, full basement, a nice porch to sit on, and upstairs neighbors with healthy libidos. We were in our mid 20's. Life was good.
Then, we got pregnant.

At first, we didn't think much of our living arrangements. My young-wife and I were both growing larger day by day -- this of course was because she would send me out to Burger King or Carvel or the grocery store in the middle of the night and be sound asleep by the time I got back with whatever her latest craving was.

We were young, stupid spontaneous and literally taking each day as it came.

Then came the nesting.

Are you familiar with the nesting?

wow.

And so - in her third trimester - my round-wife proclaimed

"We need a house."

Um. Ok.

This was the late eighties people. Interest rates were through the roof, houses were selling like wildfires and were totally overpriced.

We went to see houses everyday - and the ones we bid on were already sold by the time we picked up the phone.

One afternoon our realtor called and told us she had a house for us to see.
We went immediately. It was getting dark.
We walked through - we noticed the house seemed to have a kitchen and bathroom and we saw no obvious holes or missing walls. We put a downpayment on it right then.
Did we see potential?

No.

My ready-to-burst wife needed a house NOW.

This would have to do.

We went back later in the week to see just what the hell we actually bought.
It was at this time we noticed the house was somewhat ugly (notice the aluminum awnings), needed a bit of work (also the aluminum siding),
and had a back yard big enough for horses.

egad.

We're gonna need a bigger lawn mower.

moving... an iterative process

We decided we wanted to move a couple years ago.

We've been here almost 23 years. That's a long time.

So I've decided to blog the 'story' of this place and the time we've been here.
I will do it in chapters - because I am lazy, and because no one really wants to read more than a paragraph or two at a time. We all have lives here.

Note this for starters...
We have not yet found a house - tho we know where we want to look.
We are actively in the process of getting ready to go on the market - thus the dumpster.
We are hoping to be ready by spring - but would like to sell mom's house first.