April

We got the key to the house in the late afternoon and with our cars loaded, we met each other in the driveway before unlocking the door to our first home. After showing our friend Melissa around the property and the house, we immediately went to work, and by 11pm that night we had all the cabinet doors off of the kitchen cabinets and a pile of old rusty hinges and plastic knobs. The next day, Allan went right to work doing what he does best: demolition. We tore down the drop ceiling in the kitchen and began a long process of cleaning. The hosue was very dirty, and we are going to paint, replace carpet and even may refinish the hardwood floors.

We were also excited about the yard. With just over a half acre, and plenty of mature pants and fruit trees, there is (and will be) a lot of work to do. But, we were very excited to see what will bloom this spring and summer. Some of the highlights of the yard are many apples trees, three pear trees, two plum trees, some cherry trees, blueberry bushes, raspberries, two small ponds, a beautiful Japanese maple tree, and lots of surprise flowers. Melissa and Juan spent part of the day with us our second weekend here and we did a lot of yard work. Melissa and Shana did some serious removal of dead branches with the help of the saw Cheva (Chad and Eva) gave us as a house-warming gift. Juan and I built bee houses for mason bees. Yeah, yeah. You may think bee houses are not that important, but mason bees are super pollinators and we have fruit trees about to flower! We also learned that mowing a hlaf acre with a push mower is an exhausting task.