Lemoncello

Homemade by Rose.
Cool label.

Gas Stove - Finally

OMG this has been such an ordeal.

I thought in America you went to the store, buy a stove, they delivered it in a couples days and everyone is happy.
I thought companies stood by there products and customers.
I thought someone out there had a clue!

Well I lived in the 3rd world for many years and had better service - no lie.

No, not some high end custom stove I tell you; no this is all over just a $600 everyday gas stove.

While we are fixing up the house, and having to change out the broke ass old electric stove, we though we would convert to a gas stove, as they are so much nicer. We cook 3 meals a day 7 days a week for the most part, so a nice stove is important to us. That also meant having to have a gas line installed, which turned out to be a pain and huge expense on its own.

Well, 3 months and 6 days, 3 stove deliveries, 2 stove returns, 2 damage stoves, 3 companies (Sears that did such a shitty job, and didn't care, I will never ever buy anything from them again), 20 feet of new gas line, county inspections, 1 credit card charge back. I would continue, but it is depressing me all over again....

We have been cooking for over 3 months on the broken electric stove that came with the house - only one broke ass small burner.
I'm trying to cook dinner switching puts around one one broke ass heating element.

Finally, the Samsung Gas stove that we ended buying from Home Depot arrived. Oh wait, ya this one was also delayed 10 days, as the truck got into an accident. But it finally arrived, it was not damaged, I didn' t get lip from the delivery guys like the Sears guys, and the installation guys were great and did such a good job I tipped them well.

Umbrella Contest & Tree Lighting

We enjoyed the mile walk into town for the Umbrella Parade & Tree Lighting.
It was raining a bit, but that is the NW in December, and we all had umbrellas anyway.

Milwaukie, OR is really turning out to be a nice town. Really reminds us of Safety Harbour - on the water, small town, lots of community events, farmers market, neighborly, nice shops, local hardware store.

This event was the anal Umbrella Parade and Christmas Tree Lighting. Lots of turnout, great umbrellas, and the business decorated for the season (the was a contest for that, too).

Continuing in my tradition of writing the longest sentences in the world, not that I know what the record is - not that it matters anyway; and my liberal use of punctuation, followed by my well know inability to spell due to my sever dyslexia (card carrying member of DNA the National Dyslexia Association,) I will continue my story.

So many people had made cool Umbrellas I want to do one next year - already have the idea.
Great prices to the umbrella winners, and the winners of the businesses holiday season decorations. In fact a whole street got a honorable mention, because they all got together to decorate in a theme - now that is small town.

The mayor, which Rose thought was rather handsome, did a great job as host.

Snow Day - First Snow of the Season

We don't get a lot of snow in Portland, so it is fun.
The city takes it all in stride, as they do everything here, with fun and beer.
The ski resorts will be loving this.

Cutting Baseboard Trim

I'm getting around to cutting, painting, and installing the new floor trim.
I'm cutting the trim outside to cut down on dust in the garage. However, it is 40deg out there, so makes for a chilly day.

Painting is in the garage. Unheated, but better than outside.
I have to keep the paint in the house to keep it warm enough to flow and level out.
In fact, I have had to put a small can of paint in a water bath of warm water to get it to flow.

The new trim is looking good and worth the effort.

Thanksgiving 2016

David and I usually spend Thanksgiving on our own but this year we were so happy to be invited to an amazing dinner at Christopher and Bradley's house in Hollywood, Portland. I felt like I was charmed, and Mrs Bean was my chariot, David my frog coach driver, and I was dressed in finery.

David makes a lovely frog..........

Their house, which they bought almost the same time as we bought ours, looked lovely already. They have a lot more boxes to unpack, and there's still furniture to come. We know what that feels like!

The dinner table was set in harvest colours with a beautiful flower centerpiece.

Such good food - we couldn't have done better in a restaurant.

Being a Brit I rather love having an extra family holiday in the year.

Christmas Cactus

Must be getting close to Christmas - my cactus are going into full bloom. I keep sneaking into the kitchen to look at them. Such spectacular flowers. As these pots have been here since the day they arrived I'm keeping them on the sill - it suits them.

What are the pickup truck guys staring at?

As a home owner, again, I'm missing my old Jeep Cherokee Sport with the roof racks.
Ms. Bean and created a bit of a stir at Lowe's carrying home 12 foot long sections of floor trim.
She is a little tyke and we got our goods home just fine. Way to get the job done old girl!

Potato hand

This is why I love Farmer's Markets. Weird shaped veggies. That taste good.

This is a fingerling potato which had to be recorded for posterity.

Moving Day

Here's the truck.

David and I have a knee jerk reaction every time we see a UHaul truck. Too many times we've sat in the front of one of these!

Here's Bradley organising things.....

David and Bradley organising truck - with a faint impression of Christopher IN the truck.

Somebody must have made a joke! Of course, this is early in the proceedings so everyone is still full of energy and bonhomie.

Rose's office in the stages of emptying out.

The living room and kitchen in chaos....

Mind your back Christopher.....!

Okay - so you are minding......... still smiling.

David is concentrating hard - if he can levitate the cupboard everything would be so much easier for Christopher and Bradley.....

The living room being filled with furniture. Suddenly the empty space is becoming a home. Christopher, we told you.... mind your back.

And it's gone......

Never mind, a drink will help with the pain.

Finally, an empty truck. And Portland waited 'til the very last minute to rain.

At last - the moment we've been waiting for - celebrating our new home.

It's taken us 8 years to get here and with the help of family and friends we did it.

THANK YOU for all your help and support. We could not have done it without you.

Put Your Best Foot Forward

Must be my left one.

The Trim ...

We have reached the trim painting stage. Lots of blue tape, primer and paint. David has finished the studio - 3 door frames, 1 window frame and a door. Took 3 coats.

Here is is working on the bathroom door having already primed the bedroom and his office.

Long way to go.

David has done everything himself (except the floor laying). I don't even want to think how much money we've saved because of his abilities. A LOT.

The big truck move is this Friday. Oh boy........

More Hanging Baskets

Having taken a picture of our hanging baskets outside the Hillsdale apartment I thought I would have one of them hanging off the patio roof at our new place in Milwaukie - continuity you see.

Probably won't keep them there as David will bang his head on them.....

Day 3 - floors laid

3 days - that's all it took to lay luxury vinyl tiles (ha! - whoever heard of luxury vinyl, vinyl is vinyl) throughout the house. All except the bathrooms which will be ceramic tiles - a long way down the road.

The above is David's office - he chose the right hand back bedroom. That way he can look out onto the street and watch what's going on. Probably not much as it's a VERY quiet neighbourhood.

This is my studio floor done. Finally all the threads and beads which bounce onto the floor can be rescued instead of disappearing forever into the carpet and then into the guts of Robbie the Roomba.

Next up - painting the trim......

Shadow Hills in Autumn

I was sitting on my daybed in the living room of our apartment and suddenly realised there is such a beautiful fall view outside our patio. This year my hanging baskets worked a treat (might have something to do with paying attention to how much light there is???).

Behind the baskets is "our tree" which the children love to climb and swing on. It's gone into full autumn mode with orange and yellow leaves. On the ground is a carpet of colourful fallen leaves and in the background the carefully mowed green lawns.

A good memory to take with us when we move to our new home.

Day 2 of the floor installation

Not the best light to see the colours of the floor tiles but you get the idea. It's something called Tuscan Slate and has a mixture of greys, creams and browns. Very neutral. And tough.

The installer got the living room, hallway and big sections of the 3 bedrooms done. Fast worker. I think there will only be one more day and he'll be finished.

We love it. It makes the whole house open up.

Plus, now all the floors have been disinfected and sealed the horrible cat odour is gone. All we can smell now is fresh paint.

Next - painting all the door, closet and window frames. David is so excited - not!

The laying of the flooring tiles

Pantry, utility room, and kitchen already done. There was an odd section which didn't look right to me which I had redone. The boxes of tiles come in packs of 7 random colours and somehow several dark sections had lined up with light sections. The contrast was too stark so our nice floor installer redid the layout. After that it looked just fine.

You can see the contrast here with the darker section of the floor to the left of the picture. But it's all good now.

Our installer is very methodical - he's done this a few times! Each room had all the boxes of tiles laid out neatly in rows, ready to be clicked together.

Flooring Arrived

This week our new flooring is going in. I think the floor color will be a good offset to the bright white ceiling and walls. Our neighbor has almost the same flooring and it looks great.

Walls now White

Finally the Magnolia color is going. I hate Magnolia paint, just looks dirty to me.
Anyway, the ceiling and walls are now Bright White. We'll have artwork on the walls for color.

KILZ on the floors

To seal the floors and kill the smell I am painting all the sub-floors with KILZ. This will also help any water spills in the future from rotting out the sub-flooring. The new laminate flooring will be installed next.

Painting the ceilings

Finally - David starts on painting the ceilings. This is just another phase in the long haul updating.

You can see how dark the original paint had become. The white makes it look sooooooo much better.

Another ceiling being painted.

Flowers

Autumn crocus popping up in the front garden. It will take a full year before we know what we have lurking.....

Roses and japonese anenomes, picked from the garden and making use of a plastic Phillies cup!

The tree you can see through the kitchen window is some kind of magnolia - I think. It has magenta flowers which doesn't seem like a magnolia to me but the leaves and shape of the tree say it is. More research needed. And definitely a pruning.

Washing walls with TSP

Cleaning the bathroom with TSP. Gets the grime off the walls and creates a good surface for painting.

Studio ceiling getting a good dose of TSP. After all this work David needs some TLC.

Sanding trim

Sanding the living room window trim.

Sanding the trim around the walking wardrobe. Always be walking, not walk in - an previous landlord had advertised his rental as having a WALKING wardrobe and ever since then we've had special clothes closets.

More trim sanding - note the rolling eyeballs.