Tomorrow Is The Day!

Two Men and A Truck arrive between 8 & 8:30 AM! More to follow tomorrow ....

Two weeks later ........

We are getting closer - Two Men and A Truck's rep will be here next Tuesday night to set up a date for the furniture move. We spent last Saturday night at the house because we got our new mattress! The dogs did just fine - a little nervous, but that was to be expected. The dog door - definitely a learning experience. Marcus was fine from the start, but, unfortunately, when he went out the door, the flap hit Rosie's face. End of lesson. Ed, on the other hand, tries to jump thru the door so he hits his back on the rim. End of lesson. Update:::: a few days later - with treats - all are going thru, albeit warily.  

Oh, the fence story - we installed this lovely, sturdy fence. When we were debating the width of the bars, Jeff made a template, 3 3/4" wide, to see if the dogs could fit through the space. Neither of them even tried to go through. Well, the fence is installed so we take the dogs to check out their new lawn. They were in the yard for 10 minutes when Rosie just casually walked through the bars. Duh. We now have 18" of netting from the ground up. We could have bought a 'puppy' fence that has intermediate bars up to 18".  Oh, well, you don't notice the netting unless you look closely, so please don't look closely.

Here are the escape artists before the break-out. Needless to say,  we didn't expect it, and I didn't have my camera.

 Marcus

Fewer and fewer boxes in the dining room. The spring is what you get when you buy a cheap tension rod.

 We put the living room rug upside down to avoid stains. Apparently it did not get along with the carpet pad and started to buckle. This is Jeff's plan to straighten it out. The vacuum is not part of his plan.

The front door with the supposedly puppy proof fence.

 The third bathroom sconces - maybe the third is a "charm".

 The drapes are Bren's 'hand-me-downs". They are lovely.

The brown 'curtains' are Big Lots shower curtains on the cheap rods. But, hey, they work for the moment.

 The puppy's room is shaping up. The TV is installed and their new couch is in place. All it needs are a few photos and a rug.

Thier room with lighting

and their doors that Jeff fabricated.

 My spice rack is back!

Photos in "the museum" - Jeff's words!

 The pantry is looking a bit more organized!

 and we have a mattress - and a sleepy guy with friends.

The kitchen is all lit up.

iTV is hooked up. The photo on the screen is from my YouTube movie of the float plane taking off behind the pick-up truck in Valdez, Alaska. Here's the link to the video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSmFC9caE8I

PS. don't look at the messy desk!

 We went to "Thrill of the Hunt" antique store and found this cabinet. It is what we needed for placemats, napkins, etc.

and fits perfectly on the wall. Note the dog toys! Life is back to normal.

Our other find at "Ivy Cottage" was this bench. The inlays are silver and look great with the entryway tile. Actually it was a table, but Jeff made it bench size. I like the shadows from the entryway light.

Father and dogs relaxing after a hard day's work. If you look closely, you can see the fence modifications.

Meanwhile, back at The Forest, we had a great oyster roast with our adopted daughter, friend, drinking buddy, and great friend, Stephanie. This is the firepit that Jeff helped her build.

On Monday, we made pizzas on the firepit with her three boys - soooo much fun. They are such great neighbors. 

Bennett

Stephie and Charles

 Liam

Our friends, Anne and Joe, are "expecting" - how many puppies can you see?

The answer is 6! (Both Jeff and I saw 5 - oops!) 

Three boys and three girls!

This "car?" was in front of me last week. Apparently street legal.

Our weather is so changeable this time of the year, Last week it was 80 one day, and then on Wednesday we had serious hail and rain. We were, hopefully, going to Hilton Head to meet friends, Betsy & Ray, but we had a 500' ceiling on Wednesday and grey, chilly weather thru today.

That's the end of the story for a bit. Tomorrow the rest of the bathroom towel bars, etc. should be installed as well as the last of the kitchen cabinet fixes. Do you believe we are almost at the end of this story??????

It doesn't seem like much has happened in the last ten days, but .....

We have TV's in the kitchen and the bedroom - we watched "Best In Show" as our inaugural DVD, of course. You all know we had 'those people' as clients - you know who you are! There will be one more TV in the study - it's the big one we have here, and it will be up to the movers to get it in place.

Remember our POD? Remember how it took the delivery person about 15 minutes to install it? Not so with the removal. They sent a young man, on his first removal, alone, into the forest. So not fair to send him down a little dirt lane, expect him to turn the POD 180, and put it up a small, sandy embankment. He was doomed.  He arrived at 11:15. He departed at 1:15 with the POD turned the wrong way for its placement at the new house. I knew we were in trouble when it took him 5 tries to back his truck under the POD. It was with a huge leap of faith we let him leave with the POD and all of our "stuff". BTW, the new house is 8 miles away. Somewhere, somehow, painfully to watch,  shortly before 4 PM, he left, leaving the POD about 40' from where we hoped it would be. The photos do not show the 1/2 hour when the operator unloaded the POD so he could turn it in the opposite direction, but proceeded to put his truck back into the same position as he started. Also, we will not mention how he put his truck hubcap deep into the sand. Also, we will not explain how he explained to his boss - who showed up after many, many, many phone calls - that the truck was stuck in the sand, the POD was blocking the road, and he had absolutely no idea what to do. Sadly we do not have photos of the contents or our POD, aka our 'worldly goods', when they shifted forward and fell into the door, nor do we have photos of Jeff trying to get the POD door open. It finally did.

Thus endeth the sermon for today.

Jeff trying to explain how to drive the truck up the embankment- to no avail.

 Oops.

Big oops.

(the boss) 

Totally blocking the road. Another oops.

A different driver took it away - took him 20 minutes tops - including getting it out of the sand pit.

With the Pod unloaded, we began putting boxes somewhere in the general vicinity of where they will end up.

Never fear, the guys are here!

We took a break and flew to Southport/Oak Island for a fantastic dinner with our friends Nikki, Gus, Kyle, Noah and assorted friends. Gus's wings were The Best.

Jeffrey, Dear is doing his usual, fantastic job organizing the pictures, etc in the study. We're not done yet, and some things will be rearranged eventually, but, for now, it's beginning to really look like home.

 Note the Barbie collection on top!

The fence was installed yesterday. Carmen (on the left) and his helper (I don't know his name), were just fantastic. Carmen has chickens, pigs, dogs, goats, etc., so he knows how important a fence can be. It's sunny in the photo, but they started when it was cold, then in rained, and finally it was warm and sunny. The fence is terrific - we only wish our yard was twice as big!

  

Here's your panoramic view.

Today I took Edgar Alan to test the fence. He happily baptized all of the bushes, so they are now His.

While Ed was baptizing, I was working on the pantry. It's getting into shape, but I need ideas for shelf organization. I'm using the plastic bins, but it seems there should be a better idea.

Outside, everything is in bloom, including our Japanese Maple.

The new photo (?) over the mantel looks great.

Today they replaced the office fan that never worked. We thought they were going to install the 3rd set of bathroom wall sconces (third time's a charm? of three strikes you're out? We still don't know), but that didn't happen. We do have Bluetooth music all thru the house, but we're still waiting for cable, phone, internet, etc. We need to meet the fireplace people and the alarm people, plus some people we don't even know we need to meet. However, we are really getting closer. Our goal is to be totally in by May 1. We'll all see if that happens!