Thank Heaven For Rebecca

Rebecca came over today and put more of her excellent touch on my bedroom, living room and kitchen.

We went shopping. Good thing I have her help because I have very little natural aptitude or interest in shopping.

We are getting me organized and cutsied up.

Now to get myself habituated to keeping it organized and cutsied. Yah, you are right, there is no such word as "cutsied".

Can You Believe It -- No Good Wife Tonight

I have some blue birds in my yard. I have one that will fly into the garage and watch Carl work.

Since I can't watch my favorite TV show I'll sent off some pictures of my favorite birds. Now this guy doesn't live in my yard. I really like to hear loons sing.

This Grackle lives in my yard when it feels like it.

Here is another of my yard guests, a California Quail, apparently lost.

Here is the Kitchen

I have been doing a bit of remodeling in the last few months, knocking down walls, putting in new windows, the whole deal. As we had worked our way from the bedrooms to the living room to the kitchen everything we didn't want in a room we either threw away or moved it to the kitchen. On Monday we started in earnest on the kitchen.

Rebecca came down today and we tore into cleaning and organizing the kitchen. Well, I just did what I was told. Check us out. Rebecca, girl you walk on water.

We moved the computer from the living room to the new space several weeks ago. If you look to the window you can see it is before we put in the new window.

Change of plans, we moved the computer to the bedroom and moved this low boy chest into the new space. As you can see, the new window is in and the walls are painted.

Don't you love the change here. We moved that tall shelf that was on the left of these two out of there today. Centered the two. Looks much better don't you think. My heart and my house is full of thanks to Rebecca. She works so hard and gives her excellent creative skills to sweet little house. Mother would love this.

CHACO CULTURE -- CHACO CANYON, NEW MEXICO

When I was teaching on the Navajo Rez I loved visiting the ruined places. They were all over. We would find these when we were hiking and exploring around. It is really amazing to come upon a place where people lived so long ago.

This place is about 75 miles from my home. It's on the Navajo Rez. It is designated as a national historic site. It certainly is but isn't treated very much like one.

These are ruins of an ancient people. We call the place Chaco but nobody knows what these people called themselves. They were here over 2000 years ago and as you can see they built some amazing things. Some archeologists think Chaco may have been a big meeting place maybe for trading and visiting. Maybe like General Conference. lol. There are a zillion rooms but no halls. The rooms just go from one to another, all connected.

You get to take these close up pictures because access is open. You can walk around anywhere in the ruin.

The round structures are kivas. They were covered when they were in use. There are benches, drainage, and circulation ducts in the bottom. The kivas were used for ceremonial stuff, maybe like elder's quorum. Who knows?

The building was 3 stories high. Some of the other structures are thought to have been as much as 5 stories high.

The original inhabitants are what many people call the Anasazi. They deserted the place about 2000 years ago. No one is really sure why the people left. Maybe weather. Maybe enemies.

Straight south from Chaco is Sky City, New Mexico, also called the Acoma Pueblo. It is almost the same age as the Chaco ruin but it has continued to be occupied for the past 2000 years. The city is up on a mesa on the south side of the interstate highway. You can see the Pueblo sitting on the mesa there in the middle of the picture. The people living here are not very welcoming.

The Acoma Tribe has a casino and a huge truck stop right across the interstate from the pueblo.This is between Gallup and Albuquerque on I-40.

I Like Living In My Living Room

Nothing new here. Something less. Moved the computer out. Then just stirred. Then Rebecca arrived. She told me to just let her do her thing and say nothing, which I did.

Stephen F Austin and Sam Houston

Karen called. Rebecca told Karen she was arranging and that I would soon start hating her but after the stress and mess of the moving was done I'd be over hating her.

She started moving my treasures off the shelves. Oohhh! Putting my little Zuni fetishes in my big plastic garbage box. All my old Life magazines had to go. No cigar boxes. See the paint cans in the doorway? I'm doing it one room at a time now.

See that top shelf, it has about 4 or 5 of my 40 or 50 ducks.

So, what do you think? Me? I love it. Never got mad, never hated her.

Its all good. What do you think?

The kitchen is next. It has been gathering all the stuff that can't be in the other rooms plus is has all the paint and cleaning stuff. Its really awful.

Here Come The Closets

When I first started to remodel I was only going to move the pantry to somewhere else, move the laundry downstairs, and cut the walls down in these spaces leaving all that wonderful head room for me. Carl suggested we change the windows. You have seen that in progress.

The laundry never made it downstairs. I decided to put it in the closet in my bedroom. To make space for that I decided to cut the wall down between the two upstairs bedroom making one nice size bedroom with two 96 inch closets.

The old doors were bi-fold uglies. Really awkward. I wanted sliders because they don't take much room. We white washed them. They enclose my laundry closet. The new shelves are not in yet.

I put all my shirts in the other closet. You can see my t-shirts behind the plastic. We put that up to keep the sheetrock dust out. That dust is unbearable. It is still everywhere.

Carl put the new doors up today. They are fabulous don't you think.

Tonight I will sleep in a bedroom that is twice as big as before and everything as I dreamed it.

CARL PUCKETT

Journeyman Joe St. Giezel

Let There Be Light In The Kitchen

I have already shown you some of the pictures of the new kitchen window. We replaced the two windows that were in the stair well and in the hidden closet behind the pantry. Here are the pictures of that window replacement from start to finish.

My friend, Carl Puckett, is a really fine brick mason. He cut the wall, put in the new window, and rebuilt the brick facing outside. As you can see, it is way more beautiful from the outside than before. I am very lucky to have his help.

Actually, Carl is doing all of the carpentry too. Truthfully, Carl is doing everything. I'm just watching and reporting and doing a little cleanup.

The Wall Removed

Here is the bedroom wall we removed. Oops, immediate problem, we took out the wall and the ceiling immediately fell about 7 inches. The roof is not supported by trusses. It has rafters supporting the roof but only some very unstable cross pieces hold up the sheet rock. The are just two lengths of 2x4 meeting in the middle and very loosely nailed together. Ouch!!

We frantically propped it back up with 2x4s.

Here is our solution:

We put up a 4x8 beam where the wall had been, then we white washed it.

The two ends are supported with 4x4s and are enclosed in the sheet rock.

As you know I'm very keen on tiffany and craftsman glass.

How do you like this overhead light?

Bedroom Remodel

For some years now I have wanted to make the two bedroom on the east end of my house into one big bedroom. This would mean cutting out the wall between the two rooms. Well, we had to change the doors and re-route the electricity too. So here goes. This is the SE corner. Remember those skinny windows. I had all the windows replaced two or three years ago. Should have opened these up, cut the brick and made a bigger window. I didn't. Too late now.

New corner with a little furniture.

Rebeccca and I went to IKEA yesterday looking for a right size, right color, right comfort sofa for the 70 inch space we had on the East wall. Here it is--blue with some cute pillows.

As we were walking through the store we saw this cool little leather chair with a foot stool. We sat down in them, Rebecca in the chair and me on the foot stool. We talked for maybe an hour. We realized we had both been very comfortable in this chair and stool so we bought them too.

2011 NATIONAL PLAYER OF THE YEAR

OUR JIMMER HAS WON JUST ABOUT EVERYTHING

John Wooden Award

AP Player of the Year

First Team All-American

Nation's Leading Scorer

Oscar Robertson Trophy

Sporting News Player of the Year

Leading Scorer in BYU History

The Naismith Trophy

The Cousy Award

The Atlanta TipOff Club Award

Provo Tabernacle Yesterday

$15 Million Repair Estimate

Carelessness was one of the likely causes of the fire. We also know that a lighting guy with a performing group did some "modifying" of the electrical system just hours before the fire. He had installed an extra bank of lights so they could record the performance for TV.

THERE WERE BIG WARNINGS!

Seems there were alarms, fire smells, smoke smells, popping and cracking sounds, and even a circuit breaker kicked everything off during the evening rehearsal. They eventually turned that annoying alarm off.

I REALLY WANT A BRICK

See that big stack of brick on the left corner of the picture? I'd love to have just one or two of them.

THE CHURCH HASN'T SAID IF THEY WILL REPAIR THE BUILDING

So, if you have any political, personal, spiritual, or other influence with the church, beg them to save this wonderful building.