It's Camp Time Again....

As the month of June draws to a close, we are off to John & Di's
daughter's Stag & Doe celebration in St Thomas. We arrived a little early and visited with John & Di before we all went over to the party. The hall was decorated all weddingly and all, the games were on one side of the room and the dance floor down the middle - you are correct, Barb & I didn't see much of the dance floor! We played the games and entered a couple of silent auctions - of course I entered the one that was offering a JD gift pack so you know that one was popular! Every time I would up the bid, the same guy would also up his, needless to say, I didn't win. We did come away with a few gift baskets and had a fun time doing it.

I know, now get back to work and
work we did. Now we have the trench into the weeping tile that connects to the sump pump, we can continue working on the driveway. Time to smash more concrete, dig more trenches, shovel more gravel and get more pipe laid! So far, the little we have done is lessening the amount of water we get on the floor of the garage after a heavy rain so if we extend the drain pipe down the driveway and remove the asphalt and get back to a eco-friendly surface like gravel, we should be able to stop it altogether. In these pictures, we have taken out some of the asphalt and extended the trench, shoveled the gravel and placed the weeping tile - and not all in a days work! With all this activity, sleep comes easy for us...

We take a day to celebrate Canada Day. We walk down to the water front, just a few blocks away and find a good spot along the stone break wall and await the explosions of fireworks hosted by the town. We think they were fantastic and even better than past year, it was a great show. Then a nice evening walk back with my sweetie!





As I stated in a previous entry, we are trying to get out to as many area events as we can. Our next adventure was to the Ridgeway Summer Fest. It was like a mini Fairhope Art and Craft show back in Alabama. It was a nice walk about and we even bought some stuff! We were able to get up close and personal to some raptors that we all recognize. All in all, it was a nice day and we'll go back again next year.

Now we ready for our grandsons visit for 5 days! Barb likes to plan some activities, crafts and outings. So all of this gets a name and this year it is called CAMP RUNINMUK. It's always fun to bring in his favorite foods (sweets) and drinks that help to make his stay with a couple of old fogies enjoyable! We find that it's not difficult to keep the young guy entertained as long as he has his ipod with him! He was our first guest that stayed in the spare room and he thought it was great - but he hasn't known us in anything but the trailer so is that a fair judgement? We walked to the water, did some arts and crafts, baked cookies and had a picnic. We tried convincing him that pulling up asphalt was fun too but he wouldn't bite. What do 10 year old's know anyway....

 

 Well, his week has past and we're having a picnic lunch on the break water wall before we meet up with his mom. Time to get back and get to work!

Hope all is well wherever you are and take time to stop and enjoy the life around you....

Finishing the Deck

The deck surface is done but we have planned for a fence just to give us that sense of privacy - not that we do anything that is private but we don't want passersby to be busy watching
us and veer off the road and crash! So, that is our next task in finishing the deck.

We planned our layout so we don't have to cut the boards much and once the fence frame is up, the boards can be nailed up quickly. Some cutting was required so I manned the saw while Barb 'manned'

the nail gun! What a team! But, we (me) calculated in error and we had to run into Niagara Falls for a single 2x4 to finish the job so that put us back another day. Now that we are all done, we moved the outdoor rug up to the deck and then the dining table.



We are also replacing the patio

stone walkway with a wooden one that better matches the deck materials. I built the separate units in the garage and then we put them in place, level and squared them up to the deck except

they are a step down from the deck. The overall look is great. During the laying of this wooden walkway, we uncovered an old cement sidewalk that had been buried under the patio stones. We had hoped that we could leave
it to act as a solid footing for the wood units but after we leveled the second one, we realized the old sidewalk was badly broken

up and slowly rising toward the driveway and we would not be able to level the remainder of the walkway with the first units we laid. So, it had to come out! With sledge in hand and the sweat pouring out, we managed to get it all broken up and loaded into the truck so we could dispose of it at the dump.

On the way back from the dump, we stopped off at our local nursery to get a 1/2 yard of gravel for the base of the remainder of the walkway. It doesn't take us too long to get the truck unloaded and the gravel leveled off. Once we got the 4th walkway piece in place, we decided now was the best time to dig a trench from across the front of the garage to the weeping tile that runs the perimeter of the house. Usually after a heavy rain, we have water on the floor in the garage so this should help fix that problem.

We had a break on Father's Day. Terri & Mark invited us in for dinner, along with Corrie & Dean and family. It was perfect timing for us after all the slogging and digging and deck building. We sat in the covered area catching up on everyone's doin's and enjoying being together. Dinner and cocktails capped off a perfect day.





Back to the project on Monday but it was a shopping day

for a new dining table for the deck.  Yes, Larry Finn, we bought it at IKEA. Tuesday, we were back at it and, once again, we proved that nothing is simple! After lifting the asphalt where we wanted to trench, we find more concrete that is cracked and uneven so it has to be uncovered, broken up and removed so we can trench and lay the weeping tile to take away the water. Whew. That sledge hammer got heavier as the day wore on!

We take another break to attend our gand-daughter Ali's high school graduation in Toronto. Congratulations to our two grandchildren who successfully graduated this year from high school, Mack & Ali.

After the ceremony, we were back to Terri & Mark's for dinner. The ceremony was late so by the time
we got back home, it was the early the next day so we dragged a little on Friday. But with hard work by the two of us, we managed to break up the concrete in front of the garage and got the trench dug and ready for gravel and the perforated drain tile

but enough for now. we are off to London later to attend John & Di's daughter's Stag & Doe bash for their upcoming nuptials. More about that and our adventures next time..... hoping all is good wherever you are....