I think the last I wrote a blog post, I had just moved back into the Pace area. I will try to do my best to update on how things have been going since I moved back. I really like my new house. It is, in my opinion, bigger than I think it needed to be, but that’s okay. It seemed like I couldn’t really go wrong, so long as I could afford it. My day-to-day basically goes as, I wake up every morning around 6:00 (central), I put some clothes on, brush my teeth, brush my hair, and walk outside to my workshop in my back yard. At this time of the year, the sun is just rising or it is still dark. I open my window, so I can look out into my forest and watch the birds and the world wake up. I usually heat up some water for cappuccino. I turn on my ham radio and listen to everyone else getting ready to go to work, and I listen to the Internet radio shows I like, or I get ready for whatever work meetings or conferences I need to call into. I work in there until about 2:00 or later, depending on if I need to work over. From there on, the rest of the day is mine until my wife gets home from her work, around 5:30 or 6:00.
On the weekends, I have been trying to stay somewhat social; although things have been a little busy the last month or so. I try to go over to my parents house or have Heather and her family over when they aren’t too busy or whoever else I think of. I still know a few (but not many) people around town.
Julie and I have had a few projects we have wrapped up around the house. First was a few of the lights around we didn’t like. I say we, but really my brother-in-law Jeremy did most of the work for us. The lighting inside the garage was not good. We were basically given two hanging light bulbs for a two vehicle garage. My parents had some fluorescent tube lights that dad had planned to put into Nannie’s garage but never did. Jeremy helped me put them up in our garage, and now it is plenty bright in there.
The other lighting project was on the back porch. I had purchased an “outdoor fan” from Home Depot and had the contractor put it on our screen porch area. The rest of the covered porch only had standard fixtures. I found two of the same fan on eBay for less than half the price of Home Depot, so I purchased those. Again, thanks to Jeremy, now I have the fans put up.
Here’s a picture of the fans.
The only real problem with these fans is that, even though they were advertised as outdoor fans, the fan blades certainly were not designed for outdoor. Within a few days, the new fans’ blades began to droop. At some point, I will replace the fan blades with ABS blades, which I have on my Wish List.
Another problem we have with the house, which I hate to even point out on this blog, was that the bottoms of bricks are stained. If you followed any of the pictures from the Home Project album, you can see the problem I am talking about. The problem was basically a result of how much rain we had while the house was being built. As it was told to me, we had a lot of rain, and as a result, the contractor wasn’t able to put out sod soon enough. We had him clean the bricks, but it didn’t really help at all.
Back in February, my mother-in-law and stepfather-in-law stayed with us (in our guest room) for a few days. One of the projects my mother-in-law wanted to help out with was some landscaping. We planted gardenia and azalea bushes in front of our house that somewhat cover the brick stain issue. We also planted a flower bed and a kumquat tree. The kumquat tree was actually a gift from my mother-in-law to me. I was saying before that I would like some fruit bearing trees if we were going to plant any trees. Julie knew that I was fond of the Odom’s kumquat trees.
I posted some pictures over in the The Yard photo album.
Another problem we had with the house (and again, I am embarrassed to say) was mice. I guess it was all the trees that we cut for the house and the winter and all, but we had a major problem with mice in the attic. I never ever saw any inside the house, but the attic had some major problems. Since I am a brand new home owner, I had never had to deal with this issue before, and I don’t really remember it when I lived with my parents. I was surprised how loud they are. Anyway, I started out just putting a trap up there, but it didn’t catch anything. I had my pest control guy at Gold Web come out. He gave me tips on better ways to place my traps, and also pointed out several entry points on the outside of the house. I bought some copper mesh and stuffed up some of the weep holes in my house that were too wide, as well as a few other openings I found. Since sealing up my walls and trapping six mice, I haven’t caught any more of them. I am hoping this means that they are gone for good.
We still have a few pending projects. The fitness room still needs a little bit of work. My workshop’s concrete floor, which is painted a brown color, doesn’t stand up well against my wheeled office chair. I need to put a chair mat down after I have repainted the affected areas.