ran downstairs to find Travis and Wayne from Bresara Window Cleaning here to clean the eavestroughs…
they were getting an early start on this beautiful day… they had cancelled a few weeks ago when the weather turned and everything was frozen, so they were going all out to get their appointments caught up…
they did a great job and now the loose eavestrough is connected so I won’t have to worry that it will fall into the hot tub when I’m in it;-)…
apparently, in the spring, we will have to replace a downspout which has cracked…
maybe there won’t be so many icicles over the hot tub this winter…
and while they were working on my eavestroughs, my neighbour had his ladders up and was installing his Christmas lights on his eavestroughs…
last night my grandson came over just after dark to bring me a few items and do some jobs around the garden… here he is arriving, thanks to my new camera…
and the goodies he brought… I’m excited to try the purple popcorn…
he took the pump out of the pond, moved the heavy furniture onto the back deck, and then we spent time trying to catch fish…
two cellphone flashlights lit up the pond as he searched for the fish… amazingly he caught one of the shubunkins… quite a feat as they look mainly black in the pond and by then it was very dark out, lol…
I’ve been masking up now whenever he is over because of where he works… last night I ended up taking off my glasses as they kept fogging up, so I was trying not to fall into the pond… which was a feat as there are a bunch of rocks that have been pulled out of the water and are all over the deck, lol…
because I knew he was coming I had made our favourite red curry lentils and packaged up some for him to take home, along with a couple of items for the others… he was sad to hear he had to share the lentils;-)…
while I was working in the garage yesterday – a job I’ve been putting off for eight years – I realized that it was doable and wasn’t as difficult as I had imagined…
my system is to take the garbage bin into the garage on Thursday’s and fill it up with various bits and pieces…
today I also brought a table in to lay things out in piles of things I need, things I don’t really know what their purpose is, and things my son-in-law may want to use or for scrap, things to give away and garbage..
I also found some useful items which were put away in the new spots I’ve decided on…
seems like I spend a little over an hour at a time working but I am seeing improvement and actually found some counter space on the workbench;-)…
dragged the ladder onto the deck, hoping I could reach the eavestrough to clean it out…
had my pail ready and my gloves on, but the height was more than I could manage… was not prepared to take that last step…
moved the ladder over to the garage, set it up and it worked perfectly… was able to clean about four feet of the eavestrough… clearly it needs to be cleaned out more than once every eight years, lol…
will need helpers to clean the rest of it, but it already looks better after I cut down some of the Virginia creeper…
I have the nicest neighbours… they are basically all new(ish)… when we first moved here we became good friends with a number of neighbours, but they are all gone…
since then there have been a few inhabitants of various houses who we didn’t chat with very much…
today, the neighbour across the street came over and fixed a piece of siding at the peak of the house that had come loose during the big wind storm a while back… we had a lovely chat as he tried to get it hooked back in… he had volunteered to fix it for me, via his wife, who I had chatted with the other day when the fire trucks raced down the street… he helped me last winter when Indi got stuck at the bottom of the driveway and I couldn’t get her up the slope…
the tomatoes I’ve been eating came from the next door neighbours on my right… they have been in the house for a few years now and remind me of our friends who used to live there… he spends a lot of time tinkering in the yard and garage, lol… they spend time at the lake and moved here to help with their grandchildren and have them over on a regular basis… they got a dog a few months ago… not sure what type he is, but he is small and learning not to bark when he sees me in my garden…
the neighbours behind have been there for ten or so years so knew my beloved and they would chat over the fence all the time and share tools… the other day he offered to help with the garage cleanup…
the neighbours on the left are the newest addition… they are a young couple who also have a new puppy, which is going to be fairly large… they have both offered to pick up anything I might need when they are out and about…
I think back to the gatherings we used to have on the deck… weekend breakfasts, dinners and visits… those days are long gone…
and of course, nowadays the only visiting we do is at a distance…
still, it is lovely to know that if I need urgent help I could call on any of them…
on Saturday my neighbours gave me a bagful of tomatoes;-)…
since then I’ve used them sliced and in a tomato, cucumber, bocconcini, cilantro and balsamic salad…
then there was a delicious toasted tomato sandwich which reminded me of the wonderful ones that my beloved made… it took me the longest time to figure out one of the reasons they were so delicious was the huge amount of miracle whip he put on them;-)…
today I finished them up with a day-long tomato sauce with spaghetti and a chicken leg and thigh…
yesterday and today I spent a good portion of the afternoon in the garage…
I haven’t done anything with it since my beloved died… and that was eight years ago, sigh…
I still don’t know where stuff is or even what stuff is in there…
last month I had the roof reshingled and now I’ve decided to make cleaning and sorting it out my fall project…
it is going to take a lot of time, but for now my plan is to fill the garbage can each week with junk and set aside things I want and things I can give away…
this picture might look like a before, but it is actually the after of yesterday’s effort…
three shelving units were cleared off, the garbage can was filled, the next door neighbour took some firewood and the neighbour behind took the fancy woodworking wood that I discovered…
boxes were set up and put on the shelves for gardening, pumps, plants, bubble makers and fish supplies… and I found a couple of things I can use… brought one item in for another little project, and gathered scrap metal for my son-in-law…
today my middle grandson finished emptying the final few shelves, loaded up boxes with bits of wood to take home for their fire pit, washed down all the shelves, put the items back on the shelves and mowed the grass…
the oldest moved the ladders, picked up items at various stores, trimmed the Virginia creeper and loaded the wood into the car…
it is kind of exciting to really know where some stuff is…
herbiggirlpants 