We had snow flurries today, but nothing stayed, thankfully! Unlike Edmonton where these it looks freezing cold (according to tonight's news).
This panorama was created by "autostitch" from seven photos that I took in February last year, when Freda and I took a walk around and over the lake. You can tell it is a composite photo because there are two Tawnys and one of then is sorta hazy/fuzzy.
This photo shows the deck from a bit of a distance to show how nice the deck looks with the lattice and boxed in stairs. (I need to do the same thing to the barbecue deck also.) I placed some flat stones at the bottom of the steps to give a nice solid footing when stepping off the stairs. I used stone as it gives a more natural look here in the back yard.
Freda found the whiteness of the floor registers too bright and attention getting. So we went and purchased taupe vents to replace the white ones.
The builder had subbed out the job of caulking to the company that did the roofing and the soffit and fascia installation.
An all too common sight, unfortunately, dead wildlife beside the road.
We didn't get our Certificate of Completion for our septic, as it failed the final inspection because "Mantle must be extended to 15m, 0.25m thick at 15m". Personally I do not understand how we could have failed the final for this reason when we got a temporary use permit almost a year ago. Anyway, enough whinging...
Today, Jason came and fixed up the grading on the north side of the house. The inspector didn't like the grading on that side, by the window wells and a few hollows by the side of the garage and beside the air conditioner.
Our goal this weekend was to complete the big deck. The only outstanding item was the stairs since we put the wire mesh (hardware cloth) and lattice on last weekend.
This photo shows the final finishing details of the skirting at the end of the stairs. This was a bit of finicky work, but it makes it look "Pro-Fesh-un-ul".
Tawny is looking cool.
There were two primary areas that the inspector was concerned about re: grading around the house. One was the north side of the house -- we are still waiting for the Bobcat to come back to fix that up -- and the other was the window wells. However, I needed some clear stone in order to complete the window wells. On Saturday when we were walking Tawny, we saw the landscaper's truck drive down our road, but he was gone by the time we got back to our house. Yesterday Freda discovered that he had dropped off the clear stone we had been waiting for, so I was able to finish the window wells today. I placed landscape fabric and scattered a few shovels of stone to hold the fabric in place, and then dumped the load of stone, levelling it out and stomping it down a bit.
The other area I needed the stone for was by the back deck. I need some stone to level out the area for the steps. I dumped two wheel barrow loads when I took this picture, and will need a few more. The pile of stone is about half gone so the amount should be just about perfect.
This photo is of the antenna for our new wireless high speed internet service. The blue blobs in the sky tell me that the camera lens is dirty and needs cleaning! :)
The day started out wonderfully. First, Fernando Alonso won the Japanese Grand Prix thanks to an engine failure in Michael's Schumacher's Ferrari - his penultimate race. (These links are all high-bandwidth sites.)
Today, we had several long walks with Tawny. As well, Freda took her for a swim and a play while I was mowing the lawn. We got home from our afternoon walk around 5:30 and Tawny just crashed after she ate her supper. Tawny normally sleeps on the floor somewhere near us, but tonight we were making too much noise so she went to the bedroom to get her beauty sleep!
When friends ask if we see deer, they are often surprised when we say that we see them every day. I took this photo of deer on our front lawn this morning, just so you can see the evidence for this statement.
The deer appear not to have touched the lilacs again since they chowed down on them. I got some advice from friends who live in the country, and so far it seems to be working.
The fall colours are at their peak right now!
Here is Freda standing by the completed line of fence posts. The fencing crew came on Friday and completed the fence post installation by drilling holes in the bedrock some places. They didn't say when they are coming back to install the chain-link - we hope it is on Tuesday! :)
Today we put the lattice on the bottom of the deck. On the other side, steps will run the full length of the deck. Before we put the lattice up, we put up some hardware cloth, to keep the critters out, in case they decided they wanted to chew through the lattice. :)
This is the deck with the completed lattice. It sure looks a whole letter better, and cleaned up!
The fencing crew arrived today. They started digging and encountered rock right away. They charge an extra $15 per hole for "hard digging". We will be charged $15 extra for every hole because of all of the rock. At least they are digging the holes deep enough so they will be below the frost line.
In fact, there is so much rock, that they need to rent a big drill to cut through the rock. This truck is delivering the trailer mounted air compressor that will drive the rock drill. It works sort of like a well drill, it has a hammer action and rotates a bit with every blow. Lots of air flow is needed as that is what blows the rock chips out of the hole.
This is after some of the crew left for the day. They left before the compressor was delivered, otherwise they likely would have had all the posts planted. Unfortunately this means that they won't be able to stretch the fencing tomorrow as they need to install all the poles and have the concrete cure first.
This is Michael installing our antenna for the fixed high speed wireless internet connection. Unfortunately his drill bit was neither large enough nor long enough to drill the hole through the wall. Michael did manage to get the antenna mounted on the roof though, so that part is completed.