projects – Page 8 – The Hermits' Rest

We Have a Pool, Soon to Include Water

I feel a bit weird writing a cheerful post today, but maybe it’s a good example to f the ability to hold two emotions at once. Right now, talking about the swimming pool is a good distraction.

As I type, the hot tub is filling up. I can even see water reflecting on the tiles. It will take a long time to fill the pool, and then we will get instructions!

It was another interesting day for the Pool of Dreams, and I hope one of the last pre-swimming fun days. Two really nice guys came to do the acid washing, a nephew-uncle duo (who truly loved Goldie and now want a Great Dane). I decided it was a lot more fun to watch them than to try to re-learn the piece of software I was messing with, so I spent a lot of time observing the process. First, there was sanding. The nephew sanded all the potential rough spots quite carefully.

I was happy to see all the protective equipment he used.

While that was going on, the uncle took apart “Mandi’s swimming pool,” slowly and methodically. I was surprised to see he just let all the water out, until I realized all the excess concrete particles had settled to the bottom. I sort of wanted to keep it and make it into a little patio or something.

After the sanding came lots and lots of rinsing with a hose. That got rid of any grit that was hanging around.

He already had on his mask while he rinsed.

Then came the smelly part, which involved a lot of muriatic acid. He had a circulating pump that re-used the water/HCL mix. It was stinky, but sure left the pool surface shiny and clean. Of course they did it to the hot tub, too.

Between the power washer, the acid, and the hose, that was one clean pool.

It was impressive to watch, but probably my favorite part was when he pumped the diluted acid mixture out and it made smoke when it hit the dirt. We figured nothing would harm that Bermuda grass, so it was fine to send it that way.

I did stay upwind of the acid. Once that was all done and everything cleaned up, they installed all the covers, light bulbs and such, which made the entire hole in the ground suddenly look like an actual swimming pool. To say I was pleased would be an understatement! My pool of dreams is becoming real.

Oh, look, the hot tub is full. You can see all the drains down there.

The nephew was very impressed with the glow-in-the-dark tiles on the steps and seats and took pictures of those. I guess they are a new feature for the pool company. When everything was done, they were kind enough to power wash the patio, which had some staining from the plastering process. Now my whole setup is fantastic.

What’s left is to get the chemicals in the pool (it’s a salt-water system), get the cleaning system set up, and learn how to use the pool. That will happen on Thursday, we are told. I can’t wait to see it all full and with the lights going. I guess that’s my Christmas present.

Dogs like it, too. I’m glad I got a photo of how their shadows looked on the empty pool!

This made my solstice good. Like with everything in life, there are sad things to balance out the happy, but at least most of the time, I’m fine with that. Sigh. Okay, for whoever among you it is who goes through every picture in the galleries, here are a few more photos from today.

I tried to get a photo of the surface of the pool. It’s so natural!

Pool of Dreams! So Pretty

Finally and at last the plasterers showed up to put the finished surface on our pool of dreams. Doesn’t it look great?

It’s so lovely. Why is Penney running away?

I love the shiny surface, too. Isn’t it inviting?

And the red trim matches the trim on the house.

I’m such a kidder. That’s some sort of sludge pool of water sucked out of the plaster. The process was pretty complicated and took a lot of guys to accomplish. They also went through many bags of white cement and shiny stuff.

Guys fill a hopper with dry material and mix it with water. Then it goes through a hose to the pool.

It was fun to watch. They sprayed the goop out in globs. It sounded like gargling and was quite goopy looking.

As soon as they got it sprayed, someone would start smoothing. They did two coats of rough smoothing. The second coat had shiny stuff in it, which looked really cool.

The guys wore interesting shoe attachments that didn’t mess up the plaster much, as they skillfully smoothed the quick-drying glop.

On the final pass-through, they really smoothed and sprayed a textured coating (for safety). It’s quite subtle. They also cleared off the lights and the glow-in-the-dark tiles.

There are still some pipes sticking up, which I assume are the drains, but the did a bit of finishing.

Looking toward the deep end. Hey, no water!

Tomorrow more guys will come in and do an acid wash. I assume they’ll do final touches as well. Then, I do believe water will go in! I have no idea how long it will take. Lee says 2-3 days.

Looking the other way. From these photos it looks like there will be some shade all day. Maybe.

I can’t wait to see how they do the chemicals and lights and stuff. We will have to have “Pool School” soon! It sure has been a relief to see progress. It also turns out that if we had started later, those supply chain issues would have caused even more delays. Eek.

Enjoy a few more pictures! They are in chronological order.

Two Truths: We Need to Learn This

Last weekend, as I was driving home from my Drew lesson, I listened to an episode of Hidden Brain, by Shankar Vedantam. I’m so glad I did, because the story he shared, gently and neutrally, made the point that I’ve been slowly and painfully trying to articulate for the past few years:

More than one viewpoint about people and situations can be true at the same time.
Me

I’ve always been deeply aware that circumstances are rarely black and white. No one’s all good or all evil. No form of government is all bad or all good. No religion is perfect or all bad. You get my drift and may even agree.

But what this episode, “Both Things Can Be True,” clarified for me is that while it is much easier to see people only one way, it is entirely possible to hold two completely conflicting views of someone. The woman in the story comes to see an important person in her life as both someone who saved her life and betrayed her. She could be both grateful and angry. And that allowed her to reach peace.

I can understand that professional football is highly flawed and can lead to head injuries with lifelong consequences. I can also enjoy watching it and be a fan. Integrative complexity?

The ability to do this is called integrative complexity, which is not a new concept, but was new to me. That’s what has let me cope a little better with the complexities in my own life (sparing you the details).

Good news: studies have shown that people who grasp integrative complexity are more likely to succeed in life. That makes sense to me. You’re more open to connections and possibilities.

From what I observe, though, not many people are into the complexity thing. It’s easier to over generalize.

I see it so often where someone fucks up and the people around them switch from seeing them as good and label them as evil. It’s happened in my family, both to me and to someone I care deeply about. I see it, too, when people declare all Republicans or Democrats are evil, all Christians or Muslims are extremists, all police officers are corrupt…etc.

No wonder there’s so much divisiveness. Black and white thinking is just easier.

I am so tired of that bullshit.

It’s not easy to let go of ingrained patterns of belief. Don’t I know it! But integrative complexity is, I think, exactly what is needed to create a world where people can work together to solve the real problems of the world…once we accept that solutions, too, are not all black and white.

These are my opinions. Your mileage may vary.

Grateful for So Much

It was a really hard day in f so one ways. My friend’s memorial service wasn’t one of those uplifting ones that celebrated someone, but more of a sermon. I really hope it comforted her family and friends.

To console myself after we were dismissed by the preacher, I went and ate some toast and fried chicken at Dairy Queen. Then I checked on the progress at Anita’s house in Cameron. I’m grateful she’s coming here. And her house looks great with its new insulation, plumbing, and air conditioning. It’s like a new house.

I had a few minutes, so I got a cheerful red velvet shirt to wear over my funeral dress. at least the Bling Box cheered me up, since friends were there and we had fun joking around. And Jennifer, who happened to be there, helped me pick perky earrings.

Next, I headed over to the Master Naturalist holiday party, which the incoming President and VP did a fine job with. I feel good about organization going forward.

We gave the 2020 class their prizes, and that’s when I realized my festive red top, when combined with the dress I was wearing, made me look as if I were about to give birth. Hmm. Not my best look.

I drank wine to help me deal with the previous event, and did my best to enjoy seeing all our chapter members after so long. Our county has low COVID rates right now. I hope it keeps up.

Two good things made me more grateful. First, more than one person came by and told me I’d done a good job as President for the past two years. I was really grateful. It was a hard job and I was often overwhelmed with things. But, I got them through a slump after the previous leader died, and I handled the COVID changes. Whew.

The other thing I’m grateful for is that Catherine, who comments here often, told me she had a gift for me that was really from a blog reader who follows my stuff. Apparently, I’m inheriting this item from someone who passed away, and when the dreaded saw it, she insisted it was for me.

It was the biggest Dallas Cowboys flag I ever saw! Now I need to hang it up. What a kind gift! I was really touched and grateful to receive this well-loved flag. Thanks, blog reader! I’ll get a picture of it flying up soon.

Since I didn’t get a picture of the flag, here’s our chilly sunset.

So sure, even with floods, deaths, illnesses among my friends, and all that, there is still stuff to be grateful for. By the way, I’m also an honorary grandmother, as baby Ruby arrived yesterday. Life goes on.

Blue Screen Day

No day is great when the first thing you see is a bright blue screen on the new laptop you’ve only had two months. And yes, that’s what greeted me this morning, when I came down thinking I had 2.5 hours to work on training stuff.

Instead, I spent 2.4 hours on a tech support call, repeatedly rebooting and having to enter a giant, endless passcode. I became cranky. When the young man informed me I had to reinstall the operating system and could do it only if I had a USB drive of a certain size, I became vexed. Of course I threw out all my old Planview drives and only have the giant one where I brilliantly store all my backup files. It was too big.

Look who felt well enough to come out with the other dogs.

Now, I know how hard that job is and that they are reading from a decision tree and actually have no clue how computers work. I know the guy was trying while he repeatedly had to consult various things. But I also had to work.

Of course my colleague on an Asian subcontinent had pinged me long before I came downstairs, so I had to help her while on the phone with the other guy. One big happy family, since we work for them same company. I got her going. Then the OTHER fellow I’m working with on that project needed help.

We think Carlton cleaned his shoulder up last night. It looks less gross.

I was really patient, for me. But in the end, someone has to come work on the laptop in person. So glad I spent extra for that. This means all blogging will be done on the phone for a few days.

I will stop with the whining and summarize that today was very long. The woman who pinged me before I came down to work was still asking questions when I was trying to work with the horses.

Not All Bad

The day had good points, though! The Pool of Dreams finally saw some more action today! An electrician came to get all the power for the equipment set up. He couldn’t get the wiring to the part of the garage where the fuse box is, so he will have to come back.

Lee and dogs supervising the control panels.

I was relieved to get this done. The plaster is supposed to be Friday. We’ll see.

I have more to share that’s somewhat cheerful but I’m tired of typing on the phone. I’ll be back soon.

Wiring the fire pit. Harvey is trying to hide.

Remember That Pool of Dreams?

Hey there, readers! Do you remember that back in September we started building a swimming pool over here at the Hermits’ Rest Ranch? You haven’t been hearing much about it lately, have you?

Lee inspects his plastic palm trees. They will help keep people from falling off the steps, which has already happened.

That’s because, just as Lee feared, the workers disappeared for about a month. Naturally, the only day all this week that I was gone was when people showed up, at last. They came to put the plants in the flower beds. Hooray.

They also put in Lee’s fake palm trees, which I have to say look pretty good right now. We will see how they hold up after a few rains. I was glad to see that the real plants are hardy items like palmettoes and those yuccas with the red blooms. They will at least lend some color.

The dogs seem to approve of the plants or whatever peed on the rocks before they were delivered, perhaps.

Lee and the gang were glad to see that they did put landscape fabric down and they put tan rocks in, not glaring white (which pretty much cooks plants in the summer sun here).

They didn’t have enough rocks. Oops. My job is to remind the owner to order more rocks.

The frog pond is now dry, as well. There is a lot of silt and such in the bottom of the pool that they will need to get rid of before the plastering can occur. I have been told that the plastering will commence tomorrow or Monday. We’ll see.

I think the plants look nice, but I do hope they remember to make the electricity work and make the pool actually work after the plastering. I want that hot tub.

In Other News

I enjoyed a book club at a nice restaurant last night with Anita and the women from the old neighborhood. Finding the restaurant was challenging, because it is in a dimly lit (but lovely) shopping area and its sign is not lit up at night. You are just supposed to know where it is, sorta like Bob’s Steak House in Cameron. It was really nice to see everyone and get caught up, at least a little bit, on what’s going on with them.

It’s not quite everyone, but is most of the neighbors!

They gave Anita a lovely poster with lots of photos of them as a going away gift. Wasn’t that sweet? No wonder we’ll miss them once Anita is no longer cat sitting on the next street over!

You will also be happy to know I got a replacement helmet for riding the horses. I actually ordered two, in the vain hope that Anita or someone else concerned with the safety of their noggin will want to go riding with me some day, once I have two horses. I guess, though, if one’s my son, I’ll have to get an XL helmet.

I figure if my horse is named after a Native American group, I can have a matching helmet design. The other one I ordered is plain white and has more air vents, like for summer.

At least Sara and I won’t mix our helmets up anymore.

Ranch Work Never Ends

That declaration should come as no surprise. There is always something new that needs to be done, or more likely, something broken that needs to be fixed. It’s a good thing we get to enjoy such lovely sunrises and sunsets! Today, the sky was pink 360 degrees around the ranch. Ahh.

The good stuff is that the dog fencing is all done, and most of the gates are in. The big ones are wide enough for a tractor or truck, so that equipment can get into the yard to work on various projects.

Dogs get to stay in, people and equipment can move about as desired.

The gates are already handy, since some repairs needed to be done within the fenced area. For one, the pool guys discovered a leak in the pipe leading from the garage to the septic system. I guess it’s a good thing that water isn’t used too much. We would have guessed the earth shifted and broke it or something, that is until our intrepid team found the duct tape that had been holding the pipe together. There’s no way we would ever have known if the pool guys hadn’t dug that hole.

Perhaps you now see why we no longer use the general contractor for this house. But wait, there are more reasons for that, right near the problem pipe.

Whoever ran the water lines and air conditioning stuff to our garage building did not bother to seal the holes into the building. That was sort of okay at first, since in the tack room (former office, living quarters, and other things) the walls kept the room sealed. But, something broke at some point and a hole had to be put in the wall.

You could easily see daylight from that hole in the wall. Guess who else could see it? Rats and mice. They got in and ate a bunch of chicken food and made a huge mess. Worse, they ate the plastic cover on my expensive refill container of fly spray. Why on earth? I really didn’t like them in there, and neither did anyone else, since they also ate cattle cubes.

One hole blocked. And yes we need to get the mold off the north side of the building. Of course, the pressure washer is broken. Ranches also break a lot of things.

Today we got them sealed out or in. All holes have been covered up. Now we just have to kill off whatever rodents are still in there. Otherwise, they could live a long time, and reproduce just like rodents tend to do. I’m not sure what we are going to do, since I don’t like keeping rat poison anywhere around dogs.

Now wasn’t that an appetizing blog post? Let’s see if I can produce something less icky for tomorrow.

Projects? We Always Have Projects

There always seems to be some house or another than needs to be worked on in our little community. The focus right now is on Anita’s retirement house, Pickle’s Pink Palace. I’ve probably mentioned that a few things have come up, so she isn’t in there yet (she’s in my office, right where I am typing).

The crew (the nephew and his helper, Marcus) have already taken down some walls, made some openings, and come to the conclusion that the whole place needs rewiring and insulation on the outer walls (there is NO insulation).

On the other side of that tar paper is the brick. No insulation.

But the place actually looks a lot better already, thanks to painting the walls a neutral color and removing the old cabinets and scary appliances (the stove is not scary, just dusty, and the fridge holds beverages for the crew). The biggest eyesore, a heater that took up the best wall in the living room, is also gone. The hole it left is much more attractive.

The heater hole is exactly the size of a full-length mirror, and I tried to look at myself in it.

An electrician and a spray-foam technician have already been scheduled, so that will be taken care of soon and the walls can go back up.

The kitchen also had no insulation, but at least the cabinets are gone.

Then will come more painting, flooring, cabinets, and the all-important HVAC installation. And oh yes, new windows and roof.

The garage, which is on the other side of the wall that’s been removed, will be the main bedroom and bathroom.

Much landscape cleanup has been accomplished, but there are a lot of nandina plants and other nuisances to get rid of. I hope we can save some of this beautiful little “weed,” though.

There are a few very large, very old trees that were planted when the house was built in 1955. They are in their old age, but we hope to pamper them a few more years. The oak and pecans make Anita look even tinier!

We’re all extremely excited to get this house livable. We know it has a good vibe from back when we bought it. Anita is going to make it so true to its lineage, and so livable as well.

Want to see “before” pictures? This post from 2019 has some!

Hexagonal Rainbow Stripy Glory

Hooray! My mistaken “invention” is finished! It’s perky, trippy, stripy, and glorious. If I were a baby, I’d want it for my floor mat, and I’d want to gum those wormy fringes.

I had so much fun watching the stripes develop. And the fringe cracked me up. It makes the blanket a little feminine but won’t hurt babies.

How to Make It

Intermediate and above knitters will want to know how to make one of these, so here we go, informally. Beginners, make the actual pattern! It’s easy.

Lion Brand Mandala in Gnome and Sprite with a little Honeycake.

The basic pattern is NOT by me. It is an adaptation of Meadowland Baby Blanket by Irina Poludnenko. (It’ a free download.) The pattern is supposed to create a square blanket, and if you follow the instructions correctly and pay attention to the diagram of how to make the triangles link up, you will, indeed, get a square blanket, just like the one on the pattern front page. Lots of people have made it, and it comes out quite cute.

However, I made a mistake after finishing the first triangle and picked up the stitches for the second triangle along the edge with the decreases, not the straight edge. If you look at the close-up above, you can see that I picked up the 96 stitches along the edge with a little jog in it (where the decreases that create the triangles are). So, you do this, too.

Other than that, follow the Meadowland pattern, but don’t stop after four triangular wedges (because it will NOT be a square). Keep going and make one more.

It really adds that pop of color to one’s bland timeshare condo.

For the sixth section of the blanket, you’ll attach the new triangular wedge to the first one as you go. To do this, end each right-side row with K2tog, knit next stitch together with the next cast-on bump from the first triangle. There will be 96 of them, and since there are 96 garter ridges in the triangle, you’ll end up having invisibly seamed the blanket. (In the close-up photo, the blue stripe was where I cast on, and the pink stripes are the last triangle.

You could also just knit the last wedge the same as the others and use mattress stitch to sew the edges together.

When you’re done, work the same edge as the Meadowland pattern calls for, or any other edging you’d like, such as single crochet.

Note that the two extra wedges meant I needed to start a third ball of yarn. If Sprite had been available, I’d have used it, but I used another color instead.

There you go, how to make a hexagonal blanket from a square pattern. If you read this and know a better way to describe the way I finished the last wedge of the blanket, let me know.

Knitting Report: Regrouping and Planning

I spent a lot of time knitting for the past couple of days, as well as talking about knitting while my friend Kathy was here. It’s really a rare treat to have someone around who is an expert knitter to bounce ideas off and get input from. For much of my life I was surrounded by knitters and up on all the latest cool patterns, etc., but for the past decade or more I’ve been more of a lone knitter, just watching what friends do but not interacting much.

I like my replenished fresh flowers, so I will make you look at them. The prices here for fresh flowers are not bad at all!

Having Kathy around to look at the “square” blanket I was knitting for baby Ruby was helpful. I felt a bit better about not understanding why it did not in any way, shape, or form make a square. I MUST have misread the diagram, picked up on the wrong sides of the triangles, or something, but I’m still not sure what I did.

Well, it looks kind of cool. it is not a square.

Kathy was a fan of ripping it out and starting again. I think if the baby wasn’t coming sooner and if I hadn’t really disliked knitting with that particular yarn, I might have done so. Her next suggestion was to just add another wedge to it, and see what that does. I think she had a good idea. I’m pretty sure I have enough yarn for another wedge, and if it curves around a little more, it could be a little baby wrapper, or maybe when she’s older a “hug” she can wrap around herself. That makes me feel better.

We also talked about what pattern to make with the new yarn I ordered to make another blanket. I think I’ll make it a diagonal stripe, alternating colors, as with the failed blanket.

Let’s hope this one works out in these two colors.

While the “square” blanket was in time-out, I worked on this other project, which is Saroyan, in a corn and cotton yarn. This is odd. Both pictures look upside down here, though they look the other way in the files list. Anyway, I got a bit more than halfway through it (knit all the straight parts) before running out of yarn. Oops. I should have brought along another skein. The cotton/corn blend is a little weird to knit with, but it’s sorta pretty, I think, and at least it’s coming out right.

While I was out shopping with Kathy, I also got a cute embroidery pattern that’s easy, but I like what it says, which is “Notice the small things.” I may work on it tomorrow while I watch football.

I do have other yarn waiting to be worked with, and we talked about a really pretty wrap that Kathy had made before. If I get the embroidery done before my other yarn arrives, I’ll give it a start. So, that’s my exciting knitting update, which took way longer than expected, thanks to realizing I needed to update my Ravelry page.

Patiently waiting yarn for the next project, along with the book queue.

Good thing the time changes tonight!