High and Low

This has been a week's end and early week full of activity, and with each passing day Gladys changes for the better.

The lift bucket rests in the backyard while
the workers take a lunch break.

The lift truck was fun to watch as the tree trimmers
cleared the lines.

Last week we had Duke Energy send out their crews to trim the trees away from the power lines that run behind our house.  We were a little nervous because the lines run right above our fence, and we did not want the crews to drop branches onto our structure.  Three years ago, when the crews came through, they climbed the trees and let the branches fall wherever they wanted them to fall.  This year, thankfully, we had a different company who used a lift bucket to safely and efficiently remove the offensive branches.  They did a great job, and the fence remains intact.  As an added bonus, Rick and I got to sit in our lawn chairs and to watch them work for the greater part of the day.

Our small freezer will allow
us to shop the sales and store larger items
(like a ham or a turkey).

Today we had a long-awaited delivery of a new freezer.  We enjoy the convenience and the taste of Schwan's Foods, but we have never been able to buy too much at any one time because our refrigerator freezer is not exactly spacious.  After careful measuring and shopping, we purchased a 7 cubic foot GE freezer and had it delivered to our garage.  While we understand that a garage is not the greatest place to have a freezer, we really have no other place to put one in this small house.  Also, during the really, really hot months of the year, we will not be here so the freezer will not be in service.  We hope this works out well.

Forms outline where the new sidewalk will lie.

As I write this (6:45 p.m. on a rather chilly evening) Cory is still working outside framing in our sidewalk.  His family concrete business agreed to pour a front porch and sidewalk for us, and he has been busily working on framing it out for us.  He wants to get it finished by this evening so someone can come tomorrow to spray for termites.  Then an inspector will come to give the initial approval for Cory and his crew to come back this Saturday to finish the pour.

The new sidewalk will include an expanded porch.

We are excited to finally have the front walk done.  Cory is doing a great job of making sure the pitch is correct so that the water flows away from the house, and he is adding in a few decorative curves so that the porch and walkway do not look so linear.  We had a bit of a problem of what to do around the drainpipe, but we eventually decided that a gentle curve around that will work just fine.

Rick "supervises" while Cory sets the board
for the sidewalk.

Tomorrow we will wait for the termite spray and the inspection.  Then, we just hope that we do not receive any rain, and we will wait for the weekend to complete this job.