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View From the Trail to Mount Colvin

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Monday, October 31, 2011

We Were Lucky

IMG_1025Well, we think that we made it through this little episode without any major damage. We aren’t 100% sure yet because Harry has not been back up on the roof yet. It was about 50 degrees here yesterday and the snow was melting. But the roof was too wet and slippery for Harry to be up there traipsing around. IMG_1027He did set up his huge step ladder on the side and went up to take a look while I held it steady. The tree made what almost looks like claw marks on the side, but no punctures that we can see.

We have a call in to the insurance company, but we don’t know that anything is actually going to be done – we just wanted it reported in case. The guy who does RV claims doesn’t work on Sunday, so Harry will probably be hearing back from him this morning. Harry ordered some Eternabond last night, so if nothing else, he will be putting that over the affected areas.

This storm was a killer for some of the trees in our little development, which is a little weird, because we really only got maybe 6 or 7 inches. It’s not the first wet snow we’ve had in the past few years, but it did the most tree damage I can remember.

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This is our neighbor’s oak tree, right across from our driveway. It’s a beautiful tree. I took this picture first thing in the morning when it was still weighted down with the snow. Later on we could see that there were some major breaks.

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And elsewhere in the development…

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We sent a message to the company that takes care of our lawn. They are going to take the maple tree down. It is too badly damaged to leave it up. So we won’t have to deal with any more leaves or tree branches on our fiver from that tree. But it’s too bad – it was a pretty tree.

It is supposed to be warm all week, that is, in the fifties. Smile So our snow will be gone very soon. I hope we don’t have any more for quite a while. Yeah, I know…but a girl can hope, right!??

Sunday, October 30, 2011

Uh OH!!!

Well, we didn’t lose power, but as we feared, the heavy, wet snow brought down branches. And when we got up this morning, it was to discover this…

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A branch from this tree fell right on the fiver. Crying face

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Our first priority was getting it off the roof, so Harry went up and cut the branches on top of it.

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IMG_1020After Harry got most of the branches clipped, he tied a rope around the tree branch, and we PULLED!

 

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IMG_1011The good news is…nothing went THROUGH the roof.

But it looks like there could be some damage to the rubber of the roof. We will know more when more of the snow melts. We haven’t opened the slide yet, but it appears that nothing was damaged there. But we will be calling the insurance company about the roof, if nothing else.

It could have been SO much worse, so we are thankful for that, but still wasn’t a great way to start a day. <sigh>

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Fun on a Dreary Day

IMG_0984Being Saturday, I headed off to work bright and early this morning. Although there was nothing bright about it. What a dreary day! The clouds were low and heavy with the impending storm.

 

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I only had to work for a few hours, as I traded shifts with a co-worker and opened for a change, as well as getting out a little earlier than usual. So that was a nice start to the day.

I took the above pictures as we were traveling to Lake George. You can see that the majority of our bright foliage is long gone.

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We were glad that the snow didn’t come in early so that we had a chance to get our little trip in first. The place where we went for lunch, The Docksider, turned out to be a cute little restaurant situated right on Glen Lake.

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It is open year round and was decorated for Halloween/fall.

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Greg and Beth, and Mike and Carol, are the first Heartland owners that we have met in person. We enjoyed telling them about some of our newbie adventures!

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From L to R…Harry and me, Mike, Carol, Beth and Greg

It was great to meet them and we are already looking forward to our first Heartland Owners Rally next June!

 

After a great lunch, we headed for home, and happily we landed just as the flakes were starting to stick!

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It is definitely the heavy wet variety of snowstorm, and we are keeping our fingers and toes crossed that we don’t lose power.

Ughh!

My sister and I were saying yesterday that we both can remember “green” Christmases not that long ago when we both used to like white ones. But now that we’ve decided we’ve had enough of the white stuff, it just keeps coming and coming. That’s right, another storm coming up the pike today.

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The blue arrow is pointing to our approximate location. We are pretty much smack in the middle of the range, but I’m sure hoping that we’re closer to seven inches than we are to ten. If that 4 – 7 area would just dip a little lower, that would be fine with me!! However, no matter how much we end up with - YUCK!    And it’s going to be that heavy wet stuff, so on top of it, they’re warning about the potential of losing power. I am so over winter already, and it’s only the end of October…<sigh>….

We actually have/had a fun day planned today, assuming the snow doesn’t come early and put a crimp in our plans. We have signed up for a Heartland Owners rally in Lake George next June. It’s going to be at the same campground we stayed at in September. The couple organizing the rally are coming up today to check out a possible restaurant for the group to go to one evening, and we’re meeting them and another couple for lunch at the restaurant. Hopefully we will get to Lake George and home before the snow starts flying. Update tonight, and probably snow pictures… Thinking smile

Thursday, October 27, 2011

How Many More?

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This is what it looked like when Harry got home from work today…

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and this is what it looked like about ten minutes ago…

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And it is still coming down!

 

 

 

We HOPE this is our last full winter up in the snowy north!

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Had to Do It

Maybe if I hadn’t been off today, it wouldn’t have happened. IMG_0970But with a high of about 46 degrees today, there wasn’t too much sun outside to warm up the air in here, and by this afternoon, my nose was cold! So…had to break down and turn up the thermostat so the pellet stove would kick on and warm the place up. However, making it to the 26th of October sure wasn’t bad.

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This is the view of the front yard from our living room. This picture of the tree is from this past Sunday. There is nowhere near that number of leaves on the tree now. By the time, the rain and other assorted varieties of precipitation passes us by in the next few days, our trees probably will be mostly bare.

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It sure was nice while it lasted.

It was a slow news day. Harry had an appointment this morning and I tagged along. Afterwards we went for a nice late breakfast. By that time, the morning was pretty well over. Add in some grocery shopping and other odds and ends and there went another quick day off. A day off sure does speed by!

Tuesday, October 25, 2011

A Look Back at the Beginning

It won’t be long now until we have to turn on the heat. We have not turned it on yet, and I am still hoping for November 1st. Our house has cooled, of course. IMG_1824But it holds the heat really well, and has ever since we replaced all our windows with Pella windows in 2008. You can see here what the house looked like back then – notice the front door and the windows in the living room.

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That was the beginning of our house remodeling project, so you can see that we have been at this for quite a while now. 

The house was a mess for much of the summer of 2008, but we were definitely pleased with the results.

Notice the rust colored carpet – that was back before we started replacing everything with the wood flooring.

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We also added the garden window in the kitchen.

 

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So that was the beginning of it all. We certainly feel that we have made the house much more marketable. Although we may not financially recoup the monies that we put into the house improvements over the past three and a half years, if we are able to sell the house in a timely fashion, we will consider it all a success!

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<sigh> As I’ve been been writing this, I’ve been listening to the weather forecast. We have a chance of snow for this Thursday evening – maybe 4 inches or more.

NO, I’m not ready yet!!! Crying face Come back, beautiful fall weather!!

Sunday, October 23, 2011

A Wonderful Weekend!

This has been just an all-around nice weekend. It is absolutely gorgeous out, with a temp of 57 out there right now, and with the sun, it feels so pleasant! Right now we have our windows open, and the fresh air is wonderful. We may eke out one more week without heat. If the weatherman is to be believed (yes I know that’s a stretch), by next weekend our highs are going to be down in the 40s and our lows down in the 20s. So this might be our last hurrah before the cold weather moves in.

On top of the nice weather, we have had some time to relax and enjoy the weekend, and we also got a lot done. Just a perfect kind of weekend.

Yesterday Harry started working on the roof of the fiver, cleaning it up, and today he headed back up for awhile more to apply the treatment. Here are the final results…

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What a great job he did! The fiver is done now, and ready for the winter months.

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We also spent some time working on the guestroom. As you can see, the closet especially needed a coat of paint.

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It is pretty well set. I think the closet may need another coat, and there may be a few touch-up spots. But for the most part, we can knock the guestroom painting off the list.

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And, if that wasn’t enough for one weekend, we also replaced the kitchen light…

Here is before…

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and, only about 30 minutes later, we had a brand new look…

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I love it!!

We also drove over to Walmart this afternoon for a couple items, and not far from our development we noticed that the 4H club was having a chicken bbq fundraiser.

 

So when we got back, we fit in time for a walk to pick up a yummy dinner…

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Notice I haven’t given up on my flip flops just yet….

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See what I mean?! Does that sound like a wonderful weekend, or what?

Hope you all had a great weekend too!! Smile