Contractors, Roofers, and Yardmen!

Hi, Ya'll!



As we begin to write this (hopefully) short blog, there are five men on Sharon's roof, three yardmen out back, and the tile man along with his son and brother in the bathroom. Sharon feels like screaming!!!!! It has taken the tile man much longer than he thought to finish in the bathroom. He got to the point of installing the shower door, and found out that the one we bought was the wrong size! Arghh!! Back to Lowe's we went to retrieve the right size, and they didn't have one. They did have one at the other store on the northeast side of town. The tile man lives on that side of town, so Sharon gave him the funds to purchase a new one.



Meanwhile back to the beginning of this day--Sharon was on her way to Home Depot at 7:00 this morning to get a piece of corner moulding, and a new toilet seat! We can't wait to get out of town!



And now, to change the subject-- here are a couple of pictures of Ellen's new bathroom floor.

She likes the tile in the bathroom, so she wants to get more to have her bathroom floor done, and also, the upstairs bath. It is time to get rid of the carpet. She is going to use the same color in the other two baths.

We can barely keep up with our own comings and goings, so we don't expect you to do that either. We can't wait to get out of town! (Did we already say that??) Tomorrow is Wednesday. We are at 36 hours and counting until Thursday morning.

Until next time. . . . . . . .

Today's View!

Hi, Ya'll!

Hope your weekend is going well. These two pictures were taken this morning. We just knew that Willie would be finished by yesterday. Now it is looking like he may not be finished today. There are so many tiles that need to be cut into small pieces to fit the step and the seats, etc. It is a very tedious job.


He is doing a beautiful job, but we are running out of time here! The roofers are coming on Tuesday. Thank goodness they don't need access to the inside of the house.
We are out of here on Thursday! (After an early morning appointment at the beauty shop, of course!)

As a sort of postscript, Willie didn't get finished today. That means that he will be back on Monday. Surely, he will be finished by then.

By the way, we forgot to mention that Sharon fell off of a ladder this week. She has bruises showing up all over her right side. Ellen had gone to run a few errands, and Sharon was cleaning out the cabinet over the washer. Somehow she forgot that she was up higher, and she missed the last step! She is lucky not to have broken her hip. That would have ruined our vacation plans--big time. She is bruised, but not broken. That is good, isn't it?

Until next time. . . . . . . . .

Poco A Poco !

Hi, Ya'll!

Just in case you are not bored with our blog, here are a couple of pictures that Sharon took last night. You can see that it is finally taking shape. It is going to be pretty. We are excited to see the finished product -- maybe tomorrow.


This is just another view. The tile actually has more of a sage tone than what it looks like in the pictures. We have this "vision" of what we want it to look like....sure hopes it comes true!
More to come... Can you believe that the new roof is supposed to begin Tuesday?
Until next time. . . . . . . . .

The Joys of Remodeling??

Hi, Ya'll !

We decided that we would change our salutation! (You can guess that a teacher wrote that!) So much has happened to us this past week that each day is greeted with, "We wonder what will happen today!" You already know about Ellen's water woes. After the water heater was put in and the air conditioner leak was fixed, Willie and his son, Oscar, came to begin to put tile down in Ellen's guest bathroom. It looks really nice. We took pictures, and will post them soon.

In the meantime, Sharon discovered a leak coming from the toilet in this bathroom. Somehow or other, the tile man must have knocked something, and the toilet was leaking from the tank bolt. (Are you still with us ?) Oh, joy!

The really nice neighbor across the street came over and fixed it. (Of course, it took two days; but, at least, it is fixed.)

And now to Sharon's latest remodeling adventure.
This is the shower/Roman tub in the Master Bath. It is in desperate need of a make over!
Another look...

It took a day and a half to get all the old tile out. The poor man's arm must have ached by the end of the day.

We picked out some beautiful fixtures to replace the old standard silver ones. We can't wait to see how they will look!

Yesterday afternoon we decided we really have not done anything "fun" since Ellen has been on vacation. Neither of us felt like cooking, and we both were getting a manicure in the late afternoon. We picked up dinner at Jaxon's and Ellen had rented a movie earlier in the day. After we ate, we put on our night gowns, put our feet up and watched "27 Dresses" with Katherine Heigl. We laughed, sipped on Chardonnay, and relaxed. What a great way to end a busy day!

We will keep you posted on the next step of the remodeling! (By the way, Sharon's husband is dog sitting in Nevada! We are glad that he isn't here. He would be a mess by now!)

Until next time. . . . .

NO NAP, YET!!!

Hi, Everybody!
We just thought we would post a short blog about our latest saga! Ellen's bathroom looks absolutely wonderful. Somehow, the man knocked something loose at the point where the intake water goes into the toilet!!! You guessed it--more water troubles!! We actually went to Lowe's twice today. Anyway, to make a long story short. The man across the street is an angel. He saw us trying to turn off the water out front so we could figure out what was wrong. He came to our rescue once again. He sent us to Lowe's for the right parts, and he fixed it so we didn't have to spend lots more of our time and fading energy on this new water problem. (Ellen seems to have everything go wrong with water at once--the water heater, the air conditioner, and now the toilet.)

Sharon had her cabinets refinished, and they look wonderful. We will post a picture of them. In the meantime, she is planning to have new counter tops installed in the kitchen, AND an Extreme Bathroom Make-over in the master bath.

Because of all of this, NO NAPS have been taken lately. Ellen has been off nine days, and Sharon has had NO NAPS!!!!! Ellen doesn't even seem to be sorry! Oh, by the way, did we mention that Sharon had a man come to work on the landscaping in the front yard??? It took the poor fellow and his grandson more than five hours to finish it all.

Until next time.. . . . . . . .

And Then Came Tuesday Evening!

Hello, Everybody!

"Water, water, everywhere, and not a drop to drink." The following are just a few of the pictures we took at Sharon's home on Tuesday evening. It really was quite a sight to see because, after all, this is a desert!

We watched helplessly while a neighbor's recycling bin went down "Rio Pino Real."

The shot below is looking up the street toward the mountain (which we can't see).

The water level is on the rise.

This is all underwater.

This one is a little blurry, but look at the flower pot!

We were beginning to think that we should have invested in a boat!

Yes, it says, "69 degrees."

Fortunately, none of the water came in either of our homes. When this downpour subsided, we went to Ellen's to check on the state of affairs at her home. Ellen has become somewhat paranoid about WATER! All was well on Sierra Valle.

We have since had another day of rain. It is just almost unheard of in this area. This time the rain has been widespread. The paper this morning said that we have had almost three inches of rain in two days! That may not sound like much, but it came within a very short span of time. Our side of the city received 2.5 inches in one hour!! The streets are full of rocks and mud that have washed out of the medians and also peoples' homes. It is such a joy to drive! We are certain that this monsoon season is far from over. We hope that you are high and dry wherever you are!

Until next time ... . . . . . . . . .

Tuesday's Project!

Hello, again!

Remember the air-conditioner condensation pipe?? Here it is, in all of its loveliness! You can tell how the jagged end of the piece of pipe looked.
Sharon used her trusty hack saw to even up the end of the pipe. After talking to Willie, our new best friend, we went to Lowe's to get an elbow piece of PVC and
a longer piece of PVC. Below you can see Sharon working her magic. She is sealing the joints. Ellen fixed her up with a pillow for her knees.

If you are still reading this boring post, you can see below how she put another elbow on the PVC. Then, you can see how she is draining the water into a plastic container. She dug the hole to put the container into. After putting some holes in the bottom of the container, she filled it with rocks.

Voila! Here is the finished product! Afer this picture was taken, we bought a single brick to fill in empty space. (Sharon wants you to know that the spade you see in this picture was her daddy's.)

The concrete is almost dry; however, this picture was taken before the monsoon hit!!!!!!

Stay tuned for our next post! Guess what it is going to be about? WATER!!!

Until next time.... . . . . . . .

Thank God For Real Plumbers!

Hello, Everybody!

Monday came, and along with it, our new best friend! Willie, the plumber, came with the water heater! In the crawl space below the platform which supports the hot water heater and furnace, we found these lovely rocks that were holding down the insulation! If the rocks had not been there, the insulation would have been sucked up into the blower.
This is also the area where the condensation line was dripping because the line to the outside was plugged with dirt and rocks!

Here is the brand new water heater, with a nine year warranty. That should take care of things for awhile! We are not ready for any more water inside the house!

For a touch of beauty and color, we decided to add a picture of a hibiscus that was blooming in Ellen's yard. These plants just seem to bring an aura of peace to our souls!

Until next time. . . . . .

The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly!!!

Hello, Everybody!

We know, we know that today is July 4th! We do not have much to celebrate. Wait until you hear what happened at Ellen's house today! The day began with joy, until Ellen walked down the hallway by the hot water heater. The carpet went, "Squish, squish!" Well, we went on to the parade that we had planned to watch. It is always fun to see people we know, plus we love to see the former students that we know. The Sun Bowl Queen used to sit in Sharon's third grade class.

The parade was nice, but in the back of our minds was the hot water heater. When the parade was over, we headed back to Ellen's. We quickly made lunch. Sharon began the task of soaking up the water and trying to find the source of the water. We determined that it was indeed the hot water heater, and headed to Lowe's. To make a long story short--Ellen had to buy a new hot water heater. The bottom line is more than $700. Do you know that it costs three hundred dollars to install????? Oh, if only we had young muscles again!

"What happened next," you ask? Well, the water was still dripping, and not just a little, but A LOT! Ellen has been hit with a double whammy! There was water dripping from the back of the air conditioner. She has refrigerated air and the furnace/blower, sit in the same closet area as the hot water heater. It was not a pretty sight, especially after having just paid for the hot water heater and installation----which isn't going to be until Monday because of the 4th of July weekend!!

We soaked up more water and Sharon began her investigative work. She really should have been a plumber/electrician/carpenter! Ellen loves to see her figure things out, but she takes on a whole different personage when she is looking for the source of trouble. SHE WON'T STOP UNTIL SHE GETS TO THE BOTTOM OF A PROBLEM!! Well, we put pans in the crawl space under the unit to catch the water. But when Sharon took the vents off to look underneath, some genius had laid installation and secured it with ROCKS!! Actually, seven or eight of them. Can you believe that???? Grrrrrr.....

Well, Ellen is afraid of what the bill will be for the air conditioner. She promised not to cry all night and Sharon promised to continue thinking about the problem. The puzzling thing is, the air conditioner is working just fine.

Now, this morning (Saturday) Sharon came up to Ellen's and got a long handled brush to put up into the PVC condensation pipe outside the house. You would not believe how much mud and junk, and rocks began to trickle out! We think that the condenser unit could not drain anywhere but Ellen's carpet. After numerous times of trying to clean out the drain, we went to Sharon's house to get the snake like the plumbers use. Sure enough, she was able to get the snake to go in as far as possible. When she pulled it out, all kinds of stuff came out. Actually, it continues to come out along with the clear condensation!!!!! Hooray!! We have checked under the unit all day long, and there have been no more drips. The carpet is dry, and the wood is dry as a bone. Yea!!

We will let you know what happens on Monday when the real plumbers show up to remove and install the new water heater. We have our fingers crossed because we were really afraid that there was something terribly wrong with the air conditioner. Maybe not.......

Until next time. . . . . .

The Plight of the Hummingbird!

Hello Everybody!


Monday afternoon, when Ellen got home from school, she went out front to plant a caladium she had bought the day before. She heard this loud buzzing sound coming from right above her. When she looked up, there was a little hummingbird in the skylight, and he couldn't get out.


Ellen called for Sharon to come and look. Being the ingenious person that she is, Sharon got a broom to see if he would light on it and she would bring him down. When he finally got on the broom, as she began bringing it down, he flew back into the skylight!! (Ellen went inside because she is afraid of birds! She watched out the window!) Sharon was finally able to get him to stay on the broom and she got him down.........and then he flew into the OTHER skylight!



Ellen finally came back outside to give encouragement. John, the man who lives across the street, called over to find out what we were doing. He is the one who helped us rescue the little dog several months ago. Anyway, John got his gloves and a ladder and came over and caught the little baby. He took him out front, and said, "There you go, little fellow." The hummingbird flew away! We felt like we had done something for the world. We saved a little guy!

We hope he got to his nest and got some rest. The poor thing was traumatized!

Until next time. . . . . . . .