Before I get to the events of the last six months or so since I last posted, I wanted to take a moment and recognize a big milestone in our lives.  Looking back through this blog, I realized our first post about our Colorado adventure went up two years ago yesterday.  It’s certainly been an interesting journey, and now that we’ve got a couple of mountain winters behind us and we’re starting our third summer up here, I think we have a much better understanding of the challenges that we could only imagine when we first began.

The last six months:  We felt like the house was far enough along to move into it back in August.  Even though the flooring still needed to be put down and the finish work had to be done, the essentials; like the kitchen, bathrooms, and utilities were all useable, so it seemed silly to remain in the cramped (albeit cozy) fifth-wheel.  While we were certainly more comfortable down here, the move might have dampened our sense of urgency toward overall project completion.  In fact, we both sort of took a break from it all.  Days became weeks, and then a couple of months passed with not much actual progress.  Granted, winter had set in, and much of our focus turned towards little things like keeping warm and making sure our driveway was passable.  We also figured it might be a good time to get some surgeries out of the way and use the down-time for recovery.  Sandi had back surgery and I had both hands and wrists operated on.  We’re both doing better now, and we’re hoping winter is finally over, so it’s back to work on a list of projects that lately has been getting a little shorter each week.

Winter:  This one was a challenge for sure, especially after how easy we had it last year.  We had snow on the ground on Halloween, and had about three inches fall a week ago last Wednesday.  For those keeping track, that was snow from October to the end of May; eight months running.  Our driveway was impassable several times, so we have a new contact in our phone list…..  the Plow Guy.  When I couldn’t handle things with the quad and it’s snow plow, we called him to come up with his pickup and blade.  When it was too much for that set-up, he brought the front end loader to literally dig us out!

After the blizzard in March, that meant seven hours of digging to clear the road. Sandi spent those five days in town and I had spent them stranded up here at the house.

We had bought an older pickup and a plow of our own, though it wasn’t doing us much good when we needed it the most since we hadn’t been able to find the correct mounting hardware at that point.

Fortunately, we managed to get our hands on the proper brackets and with some help from our son-in-law, everything should be ready to go for next year!

I’ll try to post about some of the individual projects we worked on, like the tiled entryway, the tiled mudroom, refacing the fireplace with stone, building a hearth, etc., but probably the biggest change was the addition of a fireplace insert.

What a tremendous difference it made in keeping the house warm.  I have no idea what the science is behind it, but burning wood just makes the whole house feel so much warmer than the gas furnace does by itself.  Of course, someone has to find, cut, split, and stack all that firewood, but that’s probably a subject for another post.

For those still following us, thank you and sorry for the delay.

 

Last year was, by all accounts, a pretty mild winter according to those who’ve been around here awhile.  At least, it was as mild as winter ever gets up at this altitude.  Readers may recall that we had a fair number of challenges, especially since we were still living in the 5th wheel; an experience I’m glad we had, but not one that I feel we need to repeat.

In an effort to stay warm, we went through an average of two tanks of propane every six days or so, and we ran out (always in the middle of the night, of course) several times.  Our daytime temperatures rarely rose above the freezing mark and many nights saw the mercury dip below zero.  Our fresh water tank froze a couple of times, which made life a little uncomfortable, and the trips out to the porta-potty in the snow and wind were downright unpleasant (trudging through the snow, not the porta-potty….  it was cleaned quite regularly).  The wind blew hard enough to flip over the previous occupant’s pickup camper, and we spent many nights sleeping with the slides pulled in so the 50 and 60mph gusts wouldn’t rip off the awnings.  It snowed several times, but it never really accumulated and it never stuck around more than a few days.  In short, it was a pretty mild winter.

Like I said, it snowed, and it was often windy, but the wind never blew the snow around.  If that doesn’t make any sense, please don’t worry, I sometimes confuse me, too.  Some readers may remember our friend, Fred.  The first time we met him, he warned us about our driveway and how the deep snow could make it impassable, but we just didn’t experience it last year.  Winter is still technically a week off, and we now understand what he was trying to describe to us.  Our first snowfall was on Halloween, though I doubt the 8 inches we got during the day had much to do with the lack of trick-or-treaters that evening.  Since then, it’s snowed six more times, for a total of almost 20 inches so far.  This year, though, it’s not melting off down in the valley, and each time the wind blows, it drifts up the hill and across the lower portion of our driveway.

A few weeks ago, we had about an inch here at the house, but as we rounded the corner to head down the hill, we found that much of the way down was under close to two feet of the white stuff.  Four wheel drive got us down and back, but a couple of hours with the plow on my quad cleared things up nicely.  I doubt that Santa will bring me a new plow with an enclosed, heated cab, so I’m hoping he at least drops of a new hat with ear flaps and a warmer pair of gloves.  The driveway is clear for now, so he shouldn’t have any trouble getting up here.

I called a guy who runs a snow clearing ‘business’ to see if we could get him on retainer in case things get really bad.  It turns out, he was hired to clear the road once before when the realtor was trying to sell this place.  His advice was to buy snowmobiles; saying it would be the cheaper option since he once spent 40 hours (at $250 an hour) getting the driveway open.  Basically, he just wasn’t interested, though he did suggest I take a look at the album on his website entitled ‘Driveways from Hell‘.  I did.  These before and after pictures are the only two photos he had posted there.

Frankly, I think he may have gone a little overboard since the real estate broker had pretty much given him a blank check, but we’re hoping that if I can just keep up with it, we won’t have too much of a problem. Otherwise, I guess we just try to hold out until spring when the snow melts and the road opens up on it’s own.  How hard can that be? It’s only a few months away!

Our new home has given us plenty of challenges, and winter is certainly one of the big ones.  The house is a far more comfortable place to spend it than the trailer, and we’re about as ready as we can be.  The 1000 gallon propane tank got topped off the other day, so the furnace and hot water heater should be able to run until Spring.  Our new fireplace insert is far more efficient at helping the furnace keep the house warm, and I have enough firewood stacked under the porch to last us a few months.  There’s food in the freezer and pantry and I made sure the internet and satellite tv bills are paid, so we still have our phones and I can watch Hogan’s Heroes every night.  I guess life isn’t THAT tough after all.

 

 

 

It’s been about five weeks since my hand surgery, so I’m finally able to get back to a few small, light projects.  Sandi had her back surgery about a week and a half ago, so she’s still moving a little slow and hasn’t been able to help as much lately, but it’s okay…  it gives us a chance to take a bit of a break.  I promised awhile back that I’d get caught up here, so here’s that update:

Upstairs

We began putting down the wood flooring and decided to get our carpet ordered about the same time.  The upstairs was ready first, primarily due to a couple of issues with the fireplace, so we talked to the installer about breaking it into two separate trips.  Since he’s fairly local, mileage isn’t an issue, so they brought all the carpet on the first trip a couple of months ago and got to work on the bedroom and stairs.  The living room carpet is still rolled up, waiting for the second visit.  He laid out a big tarp on the driveway and got to work cutting everything.  I felt bad and offered to help, but he insisted on carrying several heavy rolls by himself.

As you may recall from an earlier post, we decided to remove all of the railings and reconfigure the upstairs a bit.  The biggest changes were the addition of a closet and a wall on the stairwell side.

 

The carpet installation took most of the day, but we really like the way it came out.  More importantly, it meant we could finally get our new bedroom set out of storage and finally sleep in a king sized bed again.

 

Fireplace

Like I said, there was a bit of an issue getting the carpet laid in the living room.  We knew the fireplace needed work, but honestly, we’ve been putting it off this whole time because, frankly, we just didn’t know what to do about it.  The front was covered in large, white(ish) tiles, but several of them were loose and a few were cracked and chipped.  The mantel was a bit too large for our taste, and the hearth needed to be wider to meet code.  Our biggest dilemma was what to do with the dark plywood extending all the way up to the ceiling.  We knew it needed to be changed, but I certainly wasn’t looking forward to being back on the ladder or setting up the scaffolding again.

The first step was stripping everything off.  Taking the wooden mantel apart wasn’t too difficult, though I sort of felt bad.  We didn’t care for it, but somebody went to a lot of trouble too build it.  Oh well.  The tile had to be chiseled off with an air hammer, which made a terrible, dusty mess, but it got everything down to the cinderblocks, so we had a clean slate to work from.

Several of the mortar joints needed to be filled and we added a few concrete blocks to extend the hearth.  We dug into our supply of pine shiplap that had been salvaged from various walls throughout the house and, after cutting, sanding, and staining them, put them up to cover that dark plywood.  It certainly lightens the room up, and we hope it ties in okay.  The best part is it didn’t cost anything, and it went up pretty easily.

We had ordered some stone veneer from Lowe’s, but things didn’t quite work out.  It would be nice if there was a way to accurately track orders that go through third party vendors, but there isn’t.  We were told the order was in, though it turns out it hadn’t even shipped yet.  The upside is we were able to cancel the order and instead, went to a local shop that has a huge selection of materials on site.  We got what we needed and got started putting it up the very next day.  It cuts easily with an angle grinder and goes up quickly with mortar.  We’re really pleased with how it came out.

We have a wood burning stove insert on order and it should be delivered and installed just after Thanksgiving.  We decided to put down tile in front of the main door so we won’t be coming into the house onto carpet with wet / snowy / muddy boots.  It looked logical to extend that tile across in front of the hearth to meet code for the non-combustible material in front of he fireplace.   Then, we just continued it straight across under the window so it didn’t look odd.  Plus, we can stack firewood there and cleaning up the bark, dirt, and wood splinters will be easier, without trashing the carpet.

Just in time, I suppose.  They’re calling for snow and colder temperatures this week.

 

For that matter, I just realized that there isn’t much left of September, either.  While the afternoons have been sunny and warm lately, the signs of a quickly approaching Autumn are unmistakable.  The leaves are changing fast, with vibrant new colors appearing every day and the chill in the air each morning leaves little doubt that summer is now behind us.  I stepped out onto the front porch just a few minutes ago to snap this photo and noticed that it’s a mere 27 degrees outside.

If last year is any indication, we’ll soon be experiencing some incredible winds, some below zero temperatures, and probably a bit of snow…..  often, all at the same time.

For now, though, I’ll try to get everyone caught up on the past couple of months.

Travel and Visitors:  My mom decided that she wanted to move to Cripple Creek, too.  Part of it was a desire to be closer to us, and part of it, believe it or not, was to escape the harsh winters of Central Montana.  She found a really cute, brick house that was built in 1900, just up from the main street through town.  My son-in-law managed to find a few days between training excercises to make quick trip north, so we headed up to Montana,  loaded her apartment into a truck, put her car on the flatbed, and turned around and headed back.  She’s pretty well settled in now, and enjoys being close enough to walk to the casinos and restaurants in town.

My oldest daughter got tired of living in Southern California, so she and her family decided to move back to Washington (the state).  We were excited to have them stop by on their way north from Texas and spent a day showing them around the area.  The grandkids really seemed to enjoy going for rides on the quad and playing outside.  Hopefully, they’ll be able to come back soon and explore even more.  My youngest drove up this far with them, spent an extra night with us, and then flew home to Houston.  For those who might be wondering; yes….  Texas is on the way from California to Washington.  Sort of.  The image of a Second Lieutenant with a map and compass comes to mind, but we were glad to see them anyway.

I may have mentioned the local wildfires back in late June.  Cripple Creek had planned quite a fireworks show for the 4th, but they cancelled it due to the hazardous conditions in the area.  To our delight, they decided to put the show on a few weeks ago.  A little later than expected, but well worth the wait.  Casey and the grandkids came up for the night and we found a great spot on the top of our hill from which to watch.  It was perfect.  No crowds, perfect weather, and a great view.

Sandi took some time to go visit family in mid-August, and her sister and brother-in-law are here visiting us now.

  I’ve taken a few breaks from work, but with a steady flow of visitors, one of the jobs I’ve had to spend time on is the installation of doors.  For some reason, guests like the idea of having doors on bedrooms and bathrooms.  Mind you, the trim is still a work in progress, and they need to be painted yet, but they open and close just like they’re supposed to.  Some hosts put out fancy soaps and towels, we give them a door they can close.  Hey, we can be fancy, too!

Weather:  This years monsoon season brought quite a bit of rain, but nothing at all like the downpours we saw last summer.  It did, however, bring something new to us…..  hail!  We’ve seen the little stuff, but considered ourselves extremely lucky that the majority of the damage was over the hill from us, down in Colorado Springs.  The kids had damage to both of their vehicles from the first storm in June, but the storm that hit in August was even worse. 

They had additional damage to their cars, along with enough damage to their trailer (on the left, formerly our guest cottage) to have the insurance company total it.  Theirs was just one roof that had to be replaced, and driving around their neighborhood, it’s hard to find a skylight that isn’t covered with a tarp of some kind.  There were several animals killed at the zoo and a number of people went to local hospitals for injuries.

Both of our vehicles are in the shop now for dent repairs, and the shattered vents on our 5th wheel were easily replaced, so we still came out of it better than many, for which we’re grateful.

Surgery :  For 20+ years, I’ve lived with carpal tunnel in both hands.  It’s annoying, and at times, painful, but I never really bothered to look into having it fixed until recently.  Turns out, things were a bit worse than I first thought.  Sort of like this house….  seemingly small issues somehow turn into major repair projects.

Last Friday, I went in to have the left side done.  As a result, I’m sitting here with a finger-to-shoulder splint that limits my typing to just one hand.  Okay, so the truth is it’s just two fingers, but I do use my thumb for the space bar.  A skilled typist I’m not.

They did relieve the carpal tunnel by cutting in to my wrist, but they also cut in to my elbow to relieve some carpal tunnel there, too.  While they had me out, a quick incision in my palm should get rid of the annoying trigger finger that causes my middle finger to occasionally lock down.  Probably better than locking my middle finger up, though that’s a gesture I’m only vaguely familiar with and would almost never use.

As if that all wasn’t enough, the big project was fixing the arthritis in my thumb.  The doctor actually removed the small bone at the base of the thumb and replaced it with a prosthetic, then pulled some tendons from my wrist to secure it into place.

I’ve managed to wean myself off the pain meds already, and I should get the splint off and sutures out next week.  Then, I wait six to eight weeks for it to heal sufficiently that we can schedule a similar procedure (without the elbow) for the right side.  I’m hoping that once we’re all done, the constant ache will go away and I won’t drop things so much.

In the meantime, progress on our remodel is going slow down a bit.  A little rest is nice, but I’m already incredibly bored.

Progress on the House:  To keep this post a reasonable length, and since I’m on a forced hiatus, I’ll save some of the work updates for another post.  We have carpet in the bedroom, blinds up on some of the windows, and our fireplace got a pretty substantial makeover.  Photos to follow.

Okay, so technically, this headline is just about a week and a half late, but I wanted to share the kitchen post before making the big announcement.  Before I get to that, though, I hope you’ll indulge me for just a minute for some sad news.

I took an unexpected break a couple of weeks ago to attend a funeral back in Washington.  Jack was a co-worker, former room mate, and my best friend for the last 25 years.  He had been battling numerous heart and lung issues for quite some time, and ended up in the hospital for several weeks. 

Throughout his hospital stay, we kept in touch with him and his wife, Jayne on an almost daily basis.  With the various treatments, care and medications, it seemed like he was beginning to see some relief.  The last time I talked to him he had just undergone heart valve replacement surgery and said he was feeling better and was hoping to come see us soon and take a look at what we’ve been up to. 

Sadly, things took a sudden turn for the worse and he passed away just a few days later.  It won’t be the same without him, but we’re still hoping Jayne will be able to make it down soon.  Rest easy, Jack.

I got back here on Sunday and had one of those “sometime between noon and 4:00 pm” appointments with the DirecTV installer for Monday afternoon.  He arrived about 12:15 and by about 12:17, I had told him to get out.  Suffice to say that considering how much we pay each month for television, I was not fond of his smirk, didn’t care for his condescending tone, and just wasn’t in the mood for his arguing.  Strangely enough, he was somehow able to sense that I was displeased and managed to very quickly change his attitude.

Once he finished, I realized that we had a working kitchen, a working television, and a working, fully functional bathroom (including a shower).  We’re beyond the worst of the dust, and most of the flooring is down.  That got me thinking that continuing to live in the fifth wheel seemed sort of silly.

Don’t get me wrong; it hasn’t been nearly as bad as one might expect.  Sure, this past winter was a bit challenging at times, and filling the water tank, emptying the holding tanks, and having our own, private, porta-potty just steps away has been a definite adjustment from pour last house.  Still, maybe it was time to say goodbye to the trailer as ‘home’, and put it back in the category of ‘hey, want to hook up and go camping this weekend?’.  Besides, we can tell the world with a certain amount of pride that we survived a Colorado winter in a trailer.  I have no need to do it twice.

Our bedroom floor is still just plywood sub-floor, and I really didn’t relish the idea of setting up the king-sized bed upstairs, along with the headboard, dressers and nightstands, only to have to move them for the carpet installation.  But, the ‘sewing room’ downstairs has a finished floor now and is big enough for a queen-sized bed.

By the time Sandi got home, I had managed to move the bed frame, headboard, and mattress / box spring down from the barn and had them set up downstairs.  It’s not fancy, and it’s certainly not going to be long-term, but it’s working for now.

Another trip down from the barn and we had a dining room table and chairs, along with a couple of area rugs.  No, those aren’t our cows…  they just come and go as they please, leaving little souvenirs along the way.

A couple of days later, I had scrounged up enough phone wire to splice a few pieces together and run it down over the hill from the barn to the house so we now have Internet, too.

The carpet has been ordered and should be installed in the bedroom and on the stairs on the 17th.  I finished laying the floor in the office, and only have the tile in the mudroom left to install.

As always, I have a disclaimer…..  we are far from being done, and I still have quite a long list of things I need to get to, but the vast majority of those are relatively small projects like molding, hand rails, and window sills, and can be done over time.

But, it’s sure nice watching TV on our big-screen.  It’s a terrific treat to take a real shower where we don’t have to go through the turn on the water to get wet – shut off the water – get soapy – turn on the water to rinse off – shut off the water – wash your hair – turn off the water to rinse off again – process and hope you didn’t just run out of hot water along the way.  The pressure is good, we can leave the water on, and there’s more than enough hot water.  Sleeping in a real bed where we don’t bump our heads on the ceiling of the slide out when we get up is a nice change, too.

Sadly, it also means we no longer have need for this guy:

They picked it up this morning, so no more bundling up, trudging through the snow, and enduring below freezing temperatures with the wind blowing through the cracks around the door.  Ahh….  good times and great memories.

Location and vista views aside, one of the things that really drew us to this house was the layout of the floor plan.  As I’ve described before, the living room is large, with a 20-plus foot high, vaulted ceiling, and the second floor is completely occupied by the master bedroom and master bath.  But, the kitchen was also a huge bonus.  I first shared this photo a little over a year ago in one of my first posts.  It shows the L-shaped counter with the 8′ long island.  Also visible, just to the right of the island, was the very small, practically useless, pantry.

As much as we were drawn to the possibilities for this space, we were less than thrilled with several things:

The floor:  The chipped and peeling, self-adhesive tiles were filthy and outdated.

The window(s):  One was obviously broken and needed to be replaced, and they were the wrong size, with the sills actually lower than (and behind) the top of the counter.

The island:  This thing was 8 feet long with a butcher block top.  We didn’t need the extra prep sink, and that disgusting range was beyond salvageable.  The ship lap siding looked bad and it was just really too big.

The cabinets:  These were actually a pretty good quality and made out of maple.  Unfortunately, there were doors and drawers missing and the kitchen had no upper cabinets at all.

The counter top:  This white, Formica counter top was, like the rest of the kitchen, nasty.  It wasn’t installed properly, wasn’t level, and the joint where the two pieces met in the corner was misaligned.

The overhead light:  I’m not even sure how to describe this mess.  Someone either removed a large piece of sheet rock directly over the island, or it was simply never put up.  They framed the opening with basic, construction-grade lumber, and then hung a couple of fluorescent lights like you’d find in your garage in the gaps between the ceiling joists.

The first step, obviously, was to gut the whole space.

We tore up the flooring, removed the unneeded plumbing from the center of the room, borrowed two feet from the right side of the kitchen to enlarge the pantry, and then began putting things back together.

We replaced the three old windows with one larger window, finished hanging the cabinets, built a new island, had the new granite installed, and added two pantry units beside the refrigerator.  We closed up the ceiling and added some new pendant lights over the island and some new fixtures in the dining room.

 

We installed nearly 900 square feet of new, wood flooring.  Much of that was in the kitchen and dining room.  Once that was down, we began the appliance installation.  Fortunately, we had a little help over the Fourth, though from the photo, my son-in-law seemed to be doing more resting than helping.  (I’m kidding, he’s been a great help through this whole project.)

We still have a few finish projects that we’ll need to get to, like installing a tile back splash, tacking up the molding at the top of the cabinets and around the base, and installing the pantry shelves and door.  But, everything works and doing dishes in the dishwasher is far, far, far more convenient that trying to do them in the little sink in the trailer.

 

 

I realize this is a couple of days late, but Happy 4th of July!!!  We hope everyone had a great day celebrating our nation’s birthday.  You know, I just had one of those odd, random thoughts….  who else remembers the huge celebrations in 1976 as we celebrated America’s Bicentennial?  Hard to believe that it was 42 years ago.

Time sure flies!

I suppose that’s as good a segue as any…  After a full year (and then some), we’re getting very, very close to moving in.  Sandi stopped by the carpet place the other day to talk to the owner about coming out to measure the living room, stairs, and master bedroom for carpet.   We’re still a couple of weeks out for installation, but in the meantime, I’ve been working some pretty exhausting days trying to get us ready.

Living Room Lights and Fans: I’m not sure if I’ve adequately conveyed how much I dislike heights in general, or how much I detest being up on a ladder, perched atop a shaky scaffold in particular.  What I can tell you is that I was thrilled, overjoyed, excited, relieved, ecstatic, happy, (you get the gist….) to finally climb down for the last time and take the damned thing apart!

The first level is 6 feet, the second is at 12 feet, and the ladder gives me about four feet more, in addition to my 6’2″ and whatever my reach works out to.  For those who might be wondering, no…  the safety gate at the top level wouldn’t do much good if I had fallen from the ladder, but it did provide a little added stability.  If you look very closely, you can see that the ladder was strapped down to the top deck, and I used four tie-down straps to provide a little bit of cross bracing.  Still, not my favorite.

Unfortunately, the large, gold track lights and the gold fans with white blades seemed too dated and obnoxious to leave up.  I polled my entire crew and not one of them volunteered to switch them out for me and paint the ceiling, so I ended up having to suck it up and do it myself.  For clarification, my “crew” consisted of me, Sandi and our grandson.  Sandi was at work and our grandson is only 8 and just doesn’t have much height to him yet.

To replace the gold, we went with brushed nickel to match the rest of our electrical and plumbing fixtures.  The track lights are half the size, but just as bright, with LED lights that should last a good, long time.  I would dread the notion of having to change light bulbs up there.  The fans are suspended from 4 foot rods now, instead of being installed up against the ceiling, to sort of add some depth and interest.  These blades match the flooring we’re putting in, too.  The pine strip along the peak was added to tie in the ship lap and give us a little stronger base from which to suspend the fans.

Stairwell Chandelier:  As long as I still had the scaffold in the house, we decided to swap out the old chandelier hanging in the stairwell, too.  Again, the old one was large,  heavy, obnoxious, and gold.  With so many little light bulbs, those would have had to be changed periodically, as well.

 

Flooring:  A couple of years ago, we decided to finally have the floors done in our Chehalis house.  The carpet was pretty worn, and we wanted something a little nicer for the house we planned to live out our days in.  We picked a really nice carpet and hardwood laminate and had it all installed at a pretty hefty pricetag.  As the installer was packing to leave, he mentioned that he was going to take the 12, leftover cases of flooring to the dump.  Since we had already paid for it, I told the guy to just leave it, figuring I could find something to do with it.  As it turned out, that wasn’t our forever house, after all, and we ended up moving those boxes here to Colorado with us.

We found a place locally where we could get more of the same style and color flooring.  Due to my consistent inability to accurately plan and schedule these various projects, we’ve had 60 cases of it stacked in the living room since October.  Then, this past weekend, we finally dug into it and started putting it down where it belongs….  on the floor!

For our next post, we want to show you the kitchen, but here’s a sample of the process and how the flooring looks when it’s installed:

 

We’ve seen a number of DIY shows where people live in their homes during a remodel.  In fact, we seriously considered fixing up the basement of our own project house to live in temporarily while we worked upstairs.  But, despite how tough trailer life was during this past winter, the sheer amount of dust has been so overwhelming, I can’t imagine the discomfort we would have had to endure by trying to live and work in the same space.  We fought drywall dust for months, and continued the fight as we literally sanded every square inch of the ship lap that we kept on the walls.  We swallowed the dust, inhaled the dust, wore the dust, and had to constantly dig the dust out of our noses, ears, and eyes.  But…….  the battle is finally over!!!  We’re done painting.  The ship lap has all been freshly stained with a clear poly to bring out the natural beauty of the wood, and piles of dust have been bagged up and carted off to the dump.  The house is looking great, so I’d like to claim victory, but there are all the scars it left on us, so we may have to call it a draw.

Ready for Floors:  The first time we saw this house, we cringed at the nasty vinyl tiles in the dining room and chuckled at the paint on the floor in the living room.  It’s not as if someone simply painted over old, hardwood flooring; they painted the plywood sub-floor.

We realized later that the paint probably just served as an initial, temporary treatment until the maple flooring was installed.  Of course, we know now that somebody ripped out all of that hardwood, though maybe they did us a favor; we didn’t have to tear it out or haul it away, so it made our workload a tiny bit lighter.

We plan to install hardwood laminate flooring in the dining room, kitchen, and office.  If things go right today, I’ll get started on that project tomorrow!  The mudroom will be the same tile that we used in the downstairs bathroom, and the sewing room, stairs, master bedroom, and living room will be carpeted.

Master Bath:  I shared photos of the downstairs bathroom before.  We really liked how the tile came out, so we continued the process upstairs in the master bath.  We stepped outside our comfort zone a bit by moving away from the standard browns, tans, and wood tones and went with gray, instead.  It’s different for us, but we think we’re really going to like it.

One of our grandsons spent last week up here with us, so I was fortunate to have some help installing the toilet, cabinets, and towel rods.

Despite the more modern approach, there’s no denying that it’s a huge improvement over where we started.

A Milestone Reached:  I was looking back through some older posts, and realized I arrived here on June 15, 2017.  Yep, it’s been over a full year since we started!  Fingers crossed that we’re actually nearing the finish line.

Some Good News from and Unlikely Source:  The County Assessor came out last week to update their records.  Despite the fact that we aren’t yet finished, his opinion was that our value here is well over twice what we paid (including our upgrades and renovations).  That means our annual property taxes will go up somewhat, but if and when we decide to sell, we should be able to make that profit we were hoping for.

It was sort of humorous.  He was so taken by our view, he actually took photos to send to his wife.   A nice compliment from a guy who has seen most of the properties in the county.

Aside from the abundant sunshine and the great opportunity to remodel a really cool property, one of the things that drew us to this part of Colorado was the history of the region.  Unfortunately, we’ve been so focused on the house over these past several months that we really haven’t devoted much time to exploring the area.

But, we’ve had visitors for the past couple of weeks and their arrival coincided with the Memorial Day openings of several local attractions that are closed during the winter months.

The current town of Cripple Creek is far smaller than it was a little over 100 years ago, when something like 55,000 people lived and worked here.  Nearly every one of them was involved, somehow, in the search for gold.  Some were digging prospect holes, some were working in mines that were already active, and some were working in support; running boarding houses, brothels, saloons, or stores.  With only about 1,200 people here now, we were curious to take a step back and see what life here was like in the 1890’s, so we began at the Cripple Creek District Museum which is housed in the old railroad depot at the end of Bennett Ave., the main street of town.

When we finished browsing all of the displays, photos, and artifacts, we went next door and boarded a narrow gauge train for a ride through the area on a 116 year old, coal fired, steam locomotive to see some of the old mining operations and learn a little more about the area’s history.

The hillsides are dotted with the head-frames of many old, abandoned mines, but you really can’t get much of a sense of what lies below, so we decided to visit the Mollie Kathleen, only area mine that offers tours underground.    We crammed into very small cages to be lowered a thousand feet in pitch darkness, down to the tenth level of tunnels, where our tour began.    As we moved through the tunnels, our tour guide explained how mining has evolved over the years, beginning with those original, old-timers; drilling holes by candlelight with iron bits and sledge hammers to prep for the dynamite that loosened the rock and gave them access to the veins of gold ore.

“Down the hill” near Colorado Springs, are a couple of area attractions that we drive past every time go to the big city.   We’ve visited Garden of the Gods before, but it’s always fun to drive through and see the cool rock formations.  This is a photo of one of the more interesting rock features called ‘Balanced Rock’.  Given the immense weight of this huge rock, along with the often-extreme weather conditions in this area, it’s a pretty amazing feature.  There are several other cool features and a lot of marvelous scenery in the park, and they have a really nice visitor’s center that does a great job of explaining the development of the region’s geology.

Finally, we visited the Manitou Cliff Dwellings, an ancient home to the Anasazi people.  You can actually see the cliff dwellings from the highway, but we hadn’t stopped before.  I was amazed at how well the structure was built, given the absence of modern stone-cutting tools, levels, ladders, and mortar.  I did feel a little cramped, though.  It appears the Anasazi were a little smaller than most folks today.

We’ve gotten a lot done in the house, too.  I have our next post started and I’ll try to get it published in the next few days.

We’ve enjoyed seeing all the green lawns, new growth on the trees, and the plants in bloom down in Colorado Springs, but we’ve had to wait patiently to see any of that up here at our place.  This week has been pretty incredible as the Aspens have finally begun to leaf out.  It’s cool seeing a new patch of trees turning green, literally each day.

We feel like we can finally see the finish line.  It’s still off there in the distance a bit, and there are still a few more turns along the way, but we feel really confident that we’ll soon be able to sleep in our brand new king sized bed in our very own bedroom that doesn’t have wheels, just steps away from one of those fancy, flush toilet thingys.

We’re done building.  We finished the window project in the sewing room and the siding had been replaced on the outside wall.  We hauled off the last big trailer-load of materials to the dump, and the table saw and radial arm saw have been removed from the living room.  Most of the tools have been picked up and put away, and the dust is finally beginning to settle.  We have a little more sanding before the office, mudroom and sewing room will be ready for texture, but all of the time and effort we’ve been putting in on the rest of the house means the bedroom, upstairs, stairway, and living room have all been textured and are ready for paint.

I’m curious about something….  As we drive around, it appears that many auto makers are no longer installing turn signals in cars, because more often than not, they seem to make lane changes and turns with no visible warning, and one brand of automobile seems to have taken safety to a whole new level by limiting how fast they will go.

Without a doubt, the slowest vehicles we’ve encountered on our drives are Subaru’s and we can’t figure out why we almost always get behind one whenever we head out of town.  More curious is why they are soooo slow.  Do they not come equipped with a gas pedal?  Do they have a pre-set, top speed of just 25 mph?  Are they harder to drive than other cars?  Is there a Subaru club that takes turns sitting at the gas station waiting to pull out in front of us? Is it worth buying a heavy duty bumper for the truck to just gently nudge them into the ditch?

And finally, a bit of sad news.  In our very first post, we mentioned several people we had been working with as we began this journey.  Obviously, the realtor, the septic guy, and others were critical to the process, but one was probably more influential than any of the others, and he became our first new friend here.  I’ve mentioned before how we first visited the house on Saturday with the realtor, dismissed the idea as ridiculous, thought things over for a day, changed our flight, and came back up on Monday for a second look.  We stopped at the hardware store for a pad of paper and tape measure, where we met “Fred, the Ace Hardware guy”.  He was sitting outside smoking a cigarette and we chatted with him for quite some time.  He was friendly, engaging, and excited to share what he knew about the property and the area with us.  He told us how he had been wounded at the siege of Khe Sanh in 1968 as a 20 year old Marine Corps Gunnery Sergeant before returning home to Wisconsin, where he worked in a local plant for several years.  He came out to Colorado in the 80’s, when his son graduated from the Air Force Academy and he fell in love with the area. He went home, quit his job, sold his house, and he’d been here ever since.  We enjoyed visiting with him at the store and he was a wealth of information and help over the past year as we faced challenges ranging from electrical issues to broken pipes, and we were sad when we learned our friend was planning to retire at the end of April so he could move away to live with his girlfriend.  I stopped in on his last day to say goodbye and BS for a few minutes and on Saturday, we learned he had passed away.  Thanks for everything, Fred.  You’ll be missed.