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August 15, 2008
IT'S FRIDAY, MY FAVORITE DAY!!
What a weekend last weekend! All the kids came down and we had a great work party. We started cleaning out the church and you wouldn't believe all the stuff we dragged out of there! There were two old water heaters, an old stove and lots of garbage that we hauled out. After filling a dumpster and the back of Jay's pickup, we still only cleaned out about two-thirds of the church. But it is a good start and now so if the church decides to fall down, there won't be anything inside! I didn't get a picture before we started cleaning, but I have one from a few years ago, and it hadn't changed very much!
We were too tired to haul everything away on Saturday and decided to wait until the next day to take a load to the dump in Tillamook. Like I said, Jason's pickup was full and the equally full trailer was hooked to the back of it. It would barely move out of the driveway. Guess what? As "Murphy's Law" will prevail, Jay the detective got a call in the middle of the night from the police department because of a bunch of gang-related stabbings in Mt. Angel. Since his pickup was still loaded with stuff, he left in our Jeep at 6:00 AM for home and work. Later in the day, after Greg and Dave hauled the stuff to the dump in Tillamook, we took Leslie and the girls back to Silverton to pick up our car and then we had to drive back to the coast after that (about a 6 hour round trip).
The next day, Dave and I sorted through all the steel that was found inside the church and hauled it over to the local recycle place. We donated about $250 worth of steel that we will use as a write-off on our taxes. We sorted the aluminum, stainless steel, brass and copper the next day and will take that over some time in the future.
I also was pleased that Greg got a couple of trees cut down and branches removed from the large cedar tree. The little sugar maple tree had grown up under the cedar tree and didn't have anyplace to go because the cedar branches were holding it down. Now there is room for the maple to grow, plus we have more light for the other plants around it.
The weather has been fantastic all week (it was misty over the weekend) and we are sure enjoying the sunshine. We have been watching the fishermen catch fish in the bay in front of our place and that is always fun to watch. The only problem is that the fish are usually caught on the wrong side of the boat and it is hard to see how big the actual fish is that they catch.
We had to run into town on Wednesday afternoon. We had an appointment with the financial councilor to make some adjustments to our declining investments, and we wanted to drive to Silverton and deliver an antique door that we found in the church. Leslie was sooo excited about this old door with a window in it. She wants to hang the door on her pantry. So we delivered the door and had dinner with them. Afterwards we watched the girls race each other in the swimming pool. Later we drove up to Lara's in West Linn and spent the night as Dave had a doctor's appointment and I had an appointment at the dentist to get my teeth cleaned.
Thursday, after we got home, we had a visit from my nephew Mark and his new bride Brenda. You may remember I wrote about attending their wedding reception last month. They spent the night last night and are planning to spend at least part of the day today before they head back to the valley. It was nice to be able to have some time with them, because usually when we see them, we have to share them with other people and don't get a chance to talk.
So, what's up next week? Not a lot. The weather looks like it's going to be nice, so I'm hoping we can finish cleaning the church and get some more outdoor work done. We have civic duties too - I have an Emergency Preparation Committee meeting and Dave has City Council. Other than that, just work around the place and maybe a chance to get the boat out and enjoy. I'll let you know.
