Sunday, September 2, 2012

Forever House #12

...our journey to rent free living, all the entertainment minus the headaches.

Years ago (ok, 2) when we had our doors made we chose a metal shop based upon the fact that they advertised that they specialized in installing garage door openers. Well it was complete false advertising because they had no idea what to even do with one. Jimmy got his "installation money" back and decided he would do it himself. 
He had to hire a welder to make a couple of adjustments, but Jimmy had it working within a day! And it cost less than half the installation price that those other guys charged us. So yay for them not knowing how!

Jimmy was so happy when he finished that he sent me this video. You can sense his satisfaction with his work!
Jimmy asked Lico to build a little roof for the motor... I think he missed the "little" part. Lico is always thorough. This is one sturdy motor cover!
This thing is massive in real life. I laughed when I saw it. I think I might try to camouflage it with some vines. From the front it looks like we have a pet giraffe. 
 I'm really thankful to have a garage door opener. I'm uncomfortable leaving the car running with the kids inside and jumping out to open our gate, especially at night. This makes me feel a little safer. We had one when we lived in Santa Elena and I got spoiled. I asked Jimmy for one for our forever house and he made it happen! 

We haven't done much of anything else on our house over the past 2 months. We kind of took a break to save up money for the pipes, floors, and windows. We fixed some oops, like the part of my porch overhang that hung over into the view out our bedroom window. It is fixed in the photo below. 
I kind of went crazy with the size of my windows. This is taken from our back porch looking in. Eden's room is on the right and our main living space is on the left. We have some extra blocks, so I'm thinking about raising the bottom of the windows so that we can have some bench seating on the back porch. I think we might eat our suppers out there like we used to do in Santa Elena when we had a nice patio. I can't decide! 
Thank you to my mom and Rob Hall for both hunting down some pumpkin seeds for us last minute. Our masons are fascinated by the strange things Jimmy grows in his garden. It's just not the normal things people grow here. They like to weed it on the days Jimmy isn't there. Jimmy nicely asked them not to, but they weeded the pumpkin patch anyway which pulled up the vines and killed all of our pumpkins. They were just trying to help. Our new seeds have already sprouted. We might have some big pumpkins in time for Thanksgiving after all!
{I took this right before Jimmy mowed the grass. Rainy season makes everything green and tall!}

7 comments:

  1. I laughed at that roof too! (And the pet giraffe! lol.) What if the wind blows rain in from the side? Maybe Lico could lower it about 2 feet by reattaching it to the wall lower down. :) It's so wonderful how you're designing the house as you need it. The yard looks beautiful. I hope your pumpkins grow fast. Can you tell me, what are the criss-cross branches over them for? For them to climb on? I haven't seen that sort of structure here and it looks like such a great idea.

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    1. I know, I didn't see how the roof really does anything either. It has to be above the rod though. Some adjustments are going to have to be made. It is very rare that someone gets to choose everything about their house and doesn't have to work with any builders plans, but it can make you crazy too. I'd take the crazy to get the specific to our needs and family part any day!

      I don't know anything about pumpkins, but my husband said that if you start them out on a trellis they will adjust to where the vines are thick enough to sustain the weight of the pumpkins. You can grow more in a smaller space and it helps with air flow. You can't move them to a trellis after they are more mature because the vine will break.

      Thanks for your comments, I always enough reading them=)

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    2. My dad did the contracting for their house in Mexico, and because of his experience he's been helping some charitable projects (incl. orphanage) by doing the same for them, because it's such a different experience/ knowledge set. Bet he and you could sure share some stories!

      I didn't know that about pumpkins. I just think that trellis looks nice, however useful it is. :)

      And I always love your posts too. I often have comments I want to say but occasionally had trouble posting them. Should more often. (((( ))))

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  2. Any photos of your PEX tubing? lololol

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  3. Love the video!! LOL

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    1. Hey... I didn't know you had a blog! I will have to catch up!

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