Incognito

I've been busy blending. All the new electrical and plumbing conduit on the sides of the house were bothering me (as well as a few old pieces), so I used our leftover house paint to disguise them. I still need to borrow an extension ladder to paint the top part where it overlays the clapboard siding, but I'm out of that paint at the moment. Sherwin Williams is having one of their huge 40% seasonal sales next week, so I'm going to pick up a gallon of exterior paint for that. It's never a bad idea to have extra on hand for touch-ups.

The utility company won't allow painting the meter face (for good reason!), but the rest of the box is open territory. I haven't decided whether to paint the cable box or just have Charter come remove their equipment, since we don't have cable, dish, etc.

While I had the paintbrush wet, I decided to do a little faux finishing on the front, too. The lattice-work brick on the porch had collapsed some time in the past, and the repair job was less than professional. Gobs of cement were smeared on the face of the brick and the mortar lines were thick, clumsy, and unattractive. I used matching paint to clean up the facade as best I could. Not perfect, but better.

Before:

After:

Baby, it's cold outside

But it's warm and toasty inside! I'm so thankful God arranged for us to have the dual fuel heat system. We are slowly using up our propane tank (as we would have forfeited several hundred dollars by switching to natural gas immediately), so we haven't connected the gas furnace yet. But it got down to the mid 30's last night, and the house had a chill all day. I had completely forgotten that we had the heat pump feature until reminded. So I went to the fancy control interface and programmed us some warmth! It was so lovely and quiet and unscented and all-pervasive.

Awww...

That was my first thought on seeing the little rabbit. My second (spoken out loud) was, "He's going to eat my garden"! And he's actually not so little. But it certainly was cute seeing him pose outside our dining room window and look around, wash his face, and continue his exploration through our backyard. It's the first rabbit I've seen, although with all the tall grass, shrubs, and underbrush, I knew there had to be some around. DaVinci was soon hot on his trail, so perhaps that will dissuade him from too much interest in my much tended vegetation.

All Our Ducts in a Row

All this thinking and planning and debating and praying about the HVAC situation, and I guess God already had our unit picked out for us. And it turns out He thought we should upgrade to the dual fuel system for downstairs, because that's what we got!

It's hard to explain how I didn't know what we were buying, but with all the confusing model number changes, rebate offers, different components you can mix and match, and other befuddling details, I was pretty sure I had communicated we had settled for the gas furnace. And the price on the final quote sheet definitely reflected that fact (gas-only is a good bit cheaper than the dual fuel heat pump plus furnace).

So imagine my surprise when the installer handed me the manual for the downstairs unit and it was for a dual fuel! And the unit was already sitting on the pad hooked up, so they said it was ours and not to worry about it when I asked. The owner admitted it was his mistake and to consider it a bonus! So we got a top of the line, highly efficient unit without meaning to and without paying any more than we were planning to for the gas-only one. One more blessing in the long line of fabulous happenings here on the farm!

Here's to being cool in the summer and warm in the winter. The process took twice as long as expected (but was still completed in only two weeks, which I find amazing). I had the opportunity to interact with a very reputable family business, a nice crew of guys, and learn more than I ever thought I would want to know about heating, ventilation, and air conditioning. It took a very big chunk of our renovation budget, but we think it's worth it.

Next step: Learning how to control our fancy-schmancy "environmental control" (nothing as simple as a thermostat, of course) with Jeff's iPhone!

Clearly Calisto

Our new foundation plantings of Indian Hawthorne "Calisto" are in bloom, and we are thrilled. This was one of my clearance purchases last fall, and what a deal it was! Such pretty pink, long-lasting blooms, and fascinating blue-green curly leaves . I can't wait until the shrubs fill in and become a mass planting in future years. Now, if I could just do something about all the weeds in the lawn...

Delving into History

Another mystery solved here on the farm.

(Ignore the shiny duct in the background)

We have been asking anyone and everyone who ventures into the basement if they know what this contraption is or was used for. It appears to be a large, slightly trapezoidal concrete foundation for something that bolted to the top. We've asked electricians, plumbers, miscellaneous contractors, older men of "that" generation, etc. Many people have had suggestions, but no one could identify it.

Until this morning, when the elderly gentleman who was born and grew up here stopped by for a visit. I asked him, fearing he may not even know what I was talking about and certainly wouldn't be able to navigate the basement stairs to investigate. But he certainly did know. It's a remnant of the Delco-Light Plant!

Now, if that doesn't mean anything to you (as it didn't to me in that moment), let me "enlighten" you! (Ha ha, that pun is really funny, as you'll see in a minute.) Back in the '20's and '30's, less than 10% of rural Americans had electricity. So DELCO (Dayton Engineering Laboratories Company) created a gas powered engine and belt-driven generator that charged a set of batteries to power a house on 32 volts DC.

See the little concrete pad it's perched on? Just like ours!

As I sit here with my 200 amp electrical service and multiple breaker boxes and subpanels, it's amazing to remember how new electricity really is. Next time I complain about only having two or three outlets in the bedroom, I'll be thankful I'm at least not sleeping over a gas engine in the basement with a shelf full of batteries I have to charge and change!

Dated

Look what we found carved on the basement wall!

It would have never been found had we not needed to knock down some old built-in shelves in order to hang the air handler/furnace.

We've known the tax records show that the bungalow was built in 1925, but this was so fun to discover! We now have a tiny discrepancy on the date, but I would say that if the basement was poured in Oct '24, there's a very good chance the house wasn't completed until 1925, which is probably the only thing the tax records would care about.

We've know this family had a penchant for scrawling a date on things. I thought it was primarily the unmarried elderly aunt (whose handwriting can be found with the day, calendar month and year, and endless details printed neatly on window blinds, storm screens, ceiling fans and light fixtures, hat boxes, etc.). But this shows she inherited an affinity for the task. We may just have to follow suit and write a date on the studs or subfloor or something upstairs when we start the master bedroom/bathroom addition.

Everything's Coming Up Cannas!

It's definitely Spring around here. My tiny seedlings are popping up with their little green leaves, and the cannas are coming out of the ground. Most of them are the standard orange cannas with dark bronze leaves, but one is a Cleopatra with variegated foliage and flower. I'm looking forward to mine appearing like this exotic beauty!

Hot and Bothered (no more!)

I'll admit, it doesn't look like much to get excited over, but you should have seen the smiles on our faces yesterday evening when we went upstairs and felt a cooling gradient with each step up. What a difference a few days makes (and some awesome mechanical systems and human ingenuity). We have never, ever climbed the stairs and felt anything other than hotter by the time we reached the top.

The upstairs heat pump is installed and now they are diligently working on the downstairs system. There were a few hiccups initially, but everything has been resolved to our satisfaction. One item was placement of the outdoor condenser unit, which ended up almost two feet in the wrong direction. But I think it's a blessing in the end because we decided to move the downstairs condenser over to compensate, which will hide the sight and sound of both units better anyhow.

We pray for the wisdom and skill to communicate our needs and desires clearly and handle any problems if (when!) they arise. So far, so good! Of course, they haven't started cutting holes in my antique, irreplaceable quartersawn heartpine floors yet, either, so I'm still holding my breath just a little!

Next up, landscaping around the units with a lattice screen and some plantings, as well as painting all the conduit to match the brick and siding.

Frazzled Friday

It's been a crazy, hectic day. It started out raining (not good when you have contractors tracking in and out all day). Then it cleared up and got sunny. But by then we had discovered our phone wasn't working. A call to AT&T resulted in a technician coming out and checking our wires (more tracking in and out). There was a short in the line and it knocked out several of our jacks. He at first thought it couldn't be fixed, but ended up repairing one line and running another new one. So it all worked out, but you should have seen the footprints on my floors! Between the HVAC guys coming from the back porch up the hall and to the attic, and the phone tech going in and out of all the rooms to check lines and down to the basement, it looked like an old Arthur Murray dance pattern gone wrong!

But since it was nice out, I just let them run rampant in the house and went out to enjoy the pleasant weather. No use vacuuming and mopping until the end of the day! So I photographed our recent roses that Jeff planted for me in my new beds beside the house, and took a few pictures of the blooming baskets.

It doesn't look like much yet, but you should have seen this area before we started! It was overrun by weeds, a scrubby tree (way to close to the house!), and some overgrown yucca that were rooting under the driveway.

I planned an alternating pattern of Sunny KnockOut Roses (the only scented variety) and a small Red Drift rose, a groundcover version.

I'm very happy with the baskets. I was a bit concerned Jeff would think they were a little too "old lady", but he's told me several times (unprompted!) how much he likes them. I'm already planning ahead to what plantings I'll do for the summer when the pansies fade!

The Goldilocks temperature

Our months in the house have been like a Goldilocks fairy tale. It's too hot! It's too cold! Rarely is it just right. There are a few pleasant hours in the early morning now that it's spring, and sometimes on a sunny afternoon back in the late winter, when the ambient temperature was just right. But with different sun exposure, differing activity levels, various drafts, etc., it didn't last long. Oh, to have control at just the touch of a button...

Soon we will! The HVAC installers are coming today. It should take about a week for the downstairs system, upstairs system, and all metal ductwork. We settled on the Carrier line with a high efficiency gas furnace for downstairs and a standard heat pump for upstairs. We will be switching to natural gas as soon as our propane tank is empty, which will tidy up the backyard and equalize our monthly utility bills, too. Since we won't need any heating for a good six months or more, we have plenty of time to get that taken care of.

We are taking advantage of rebates from Carrier and some energy efficiency incentives (because of the 16 SEER rating, duct sealing, etc.) the government is offering right now. So the extra upgrades paid for themselves! Might as well get a few of our tax dollars back, right? Now we just have a few more decisions to make, like register placement and such. I'm excited, but I'm also just ready for it all to be over!

Potting Pleasures

They aren't really pots, per se, more like container baskets. But it was a pleasure digging in the dirt, none the less! I told Jeff it was almost like being a kid again getting to form mud pies. A handful of soil, a flower or two, more dirt, a pinch of this plant and a stem of that one, all patted neatly down into my coir liners.

I used pansies, violas, liriope, creeping jenny, begonias, angelina sedum, and lambs ear to create six hanging baskets for the front porch. Here they are temporarily on the back porch near my potting station (the old fish cleaning station!) just after watering. The early spring annuals probably don't have long in this heat, but they were free, so I squeezed them in for a full look while they last.

Busy, busy

If it's been a little quiet on the Evans' blog page, it's not for lack of activity around the farm! We have been dealing with a hectic pace of life lately, as I'm sure many of you have this spring.

In addition to all the usual tasks of the season, I have had a companion the last week. A young friend of ours from church was out of school on spring break and we invited her to come stay with us. She was a great help, and it certainly shook up the normal routine. Jeff was at a professional conference most of the week, so she and I dove into some pretty intense projects. Stripping wallpaper, painting, hanging blinds, assembling IKEA items, gardening, etc. I'm here to tell you twelve years old is a perfect age to learn how to handle a wallpaper steamer and power tools! We also made some time for fun at the botanical garden, dinner out, movies, horseback riding, tennis, and a few other age appropriate entertainments.

Stripping a room full of wallpaper

Hurray for power tools!

Rainbow of tulips at the Botanical Garden

Red Eared Sliders

In addition to all the good times, she was here to share one of our tragedies (I have to admit, my life is pretty good if the following can be called a tragedy, but it was sad none-the-less). Attila the Hen died. I'm thankful I found Attila's little body in the coop in the middle of the day or we might never have known what happened to her (since the girls free-range all around the farm during the day).

She was just dead, no signs or symptoms. I called my vet and was eventually referred to a regional poultry diagnostic lab. We drove her down for a necropsy (chicken autopsy), since we were concerned cause of death might affect Atomic Cluck or any future chicks we introduce. We only have the preliminary report so far, but she had liver damage and died of a hemorrhage, so we're waiting to find out why. The lab deals primarily with commercial birds, so I'm sure the microbiologist was a little taken aback by my teary goodbye to a chicken, but she was very gentle and understanding (she even got a chuckle out of Attila's name).

Attila was my favorite, but Jeff reminded me that perhaps chickens are a bit too fragile and short-lived to be good pets. I can't help but be attached, so I'll just have to steel myself for the losses when they come. I'm busy researching fun and interesting breeds like Silkies and Frizzles. And maybe we'll add a few ducks and geese, too, since the ponds look so full and inviting with all the spring rains! Lots to keep us busy in the next few weeks and months.

Friday Flowers

A neighbor brought me some daffodils, so I was inspired to cut a few spring blossoms and make a tiny table arrangement. The salmon flowering quince smells so delightful; I catch a whiff of it just walking down the hall!

Bloom Where You're Planted

...or maybe I should revise it to say when. One of the things I was most looking forward to this season was seeing all our bushes and trees and bulbs blooming. It's our first spring in the farmhouse, and I had identified forsythia, spirea, flowering quince, all kinds of narcissus, and a tulip magnolia, among other early bloomers. We've had a rather mild winter overall, and by early February had already experienced 70+ degree sunny weather. It was just beautiful. Every bud was peeping through and just ripe to burst forth. And then they did! And then it froze!

All of the plants are well established so there was no concern over survival. But the tender petals of the tulip magnolia fell victim to the cold snap. We enjoyed about two days of opening flowers, and then they were limp, blackened remnants. But I'm happy to report that a few reluctant buds must have been hiding out and managed to weather the storm. So we may not have a full glorious tree to admire, but we take great pleasure in the strength and beauty of the few solitary blossoms.