The view from here...

For the past 7 days, this has been what Iowa skies have looked like, more or less. Some days there were brief periods of sunshine. Others, no sunshine at all. With another 2 inches of rain last night, our total is now over ten for the week. That's almost a third of what we usually get in a year. On the radio this morning, there was a list of school cancellations due to flooding. I've never heard that before. Due to snow, yes, flooding, no.

In the midst of all this, all the growing things are bright green--like it should be April (spring showers and all). Normally, August is hot, dry, brown. I think we can safely put away all the talk about a drought for this year.
Our magnolia tree even thinks it is spring and has three blossoms opening right now! (Or maybe it is just making up for not blooming this spring because of the late frost).

School's begun

Yesterday was the first day of school--Time for the traditional picture.

Elizabeth (Elly) is a true 8th grader--spending quite a bit of time getting her hair just so (but by the time she got to school, the humidity had changed it a bit). Alice is heading into 5th grade. Weather update: We've had over 8 inches of rain in the past few days, but we missed the storms last night. The night before, lightning played across the sky almost constantly.

The rain caused a change of plans for our Young Women. We had planned on doing wading-pool-kickball last night at our house (this was planned a month ago, when we thought August would be hot and dry--why did we ever think that?). Instead, we played "Thimble", but mostly, the girls just wanted to talk about their first day of school--"Did you get Mr. ---?" "Oh, I didn't like him." Etc. It was still fun.

Now, I just have to find a time when the lawn can be mowed. If it is too soggy, the lawn mower leaves muddy tracks. If I wait until it dries more, we could (and are supposed to) get more rain. And if I wait too long, we could bale it and sell it for hay. But I'm not complaining. Our house isn't flooded (and there are plenty around our state and others who are flooded), and our lives haven't been disrupted too much. And everything sure if GREEN!

The Fence is Done

We wondered if we shouldn't have built our own picket fence from wood, and then had to paint it every couple of years. Nah! Although the vinyl fence doesn't seem as sturdy, it will look nicer a lot longer. Once the posts were in (and Kevin very wisely put the caps on them--since they were hollow--before the major rains), the fencing sections went in quite quickly.And a view from the backyard of the finished fence...
When we drew up the plans for the gardens, I had forgotten about the slope. So I'll probably do the flower beds in segments, to correspond with the level of the fence section. And, we'll probably just do bushes on the inside of the fence to increase the privacy of the backyard.

About those weekend plans...

Despite the rain Saturday morning, the work commenced! I wish I could say that "we" got a lot done, but it was 99.9% Kevin doing the work. I took pictures.After "measuring twice" the hard work began. Although we'd had a lot of rain, after one foot of depth, the hard clay was dry, and HARD! It took Kevin several hours to dig the first four holes.It took every ounce of his power to grind away at that clay with a post-hole digger.Talking to him at that point, I thought he was about to finish for the day as his shoulders were sore, and we'd rent a movie or something for the evening. Then, he thought he would just "mark" the spots for the last 5 holes. Before long, he had them dug--the hard clay was either absent or was wet all the way down and it didn't take him long. (These were also closest to the house, so perhaps the dirst was still loosened up from the construction of the home.)

Then, once he had all the holes dug, he couldn't leave them like that--that would be dangerous if someone walked through our yard. So he trucked over the concrete bags and the pea gravel,
assembled the arbor, and by dark, all the posts were set. All that remains is to put on the fence sections (which are currently stored in the window well). Kevin just doesn't stop until the job is finished. Of course, on Sunday, Tylenol was his favorite friend, and he even slept in a bit on Sunday morning--till 7:30 a.m.!

The flower beds will take shape slowly. Of course, with this rain, the sod would be "easy" to take up! We'll see...

Not a lot of sleep last night...

That's right. Five inches of rainfall last night. That's on top of the 1.5 inches on Saturday morning. You would think we were in a typhoon or something! The sump pump ran all night, and before bedtime, the emergency sump pump kicked on as well. It too ran most of the night. But... no basement flood!

And why did that bother our sleep? Well, the emergency pump has a high-pitched wail to signal that it was needed, and it continues the whole time it is running. After awhile, you kind of forget it about it and it fades into the white noise of the house, but on one level you remain aware that the basement could be on the verge of flooding. So several times during the night, either Kevin or I got up to go check on things.

Weather forecast? More heavy rain tonight, tomorrow, and Wednesday. It's too bad we can't send some of these clouds out West where they NEED the rain!

Weekend Plans

Sorry, there are no pictures with this post, as the plans for this weekend are still just in my head, and it's hard to get a picture of that!

Well, Catherine will be happy about this as she has helped plan it and continues to encourage the building of a fence in our yard. Not just any fence--a white, picket fence (vinyl) with an arbor. It will stretch from the chimney on the south side of the house, to the neighbor's fence--a length of about 40 feet. When it is finished, it should add to the cottage feeling of our house. I've already purchased a couple of hardy roses to go on each side of the arbor and I look forward to putting other flowers there--like an English cottage.

We've been researching, and have decided on Lowe's as our supplier. We'll go purchase everything either tonight or tomorrow morning.

Now, if you thought this is a simple project, well, that's what I thought too. Then I realized you have to call all the utilities to come and mark their underground lines so we don't hit a gas line or cut off our phone.

Then, the pricing of the fence says, $xx per 8 foot section. So, naive me, I thought you would just multiply that for the length you need and you would have the price of your fence (not counting the arbor, or course). Wrong. You also have to order posts (aren't those included??), hardware, and some kind of system for anchoring to the ground. So this means digging post holes, and putting concrete in. Suddenly the cost has increased a lot!

Then we have to either dig up the sod, or else kill it to make the flower bed along the front and back of the fence. I did know that part, though I'm not looking forward all that back-breaking labor. (I think we'll spray the grass with Round-up, then after it dies, turn it over. If we were to dig up the sod, then we have to dispose of it somehow, and the city won't allow it to be put in the yard waste containers.)

Everyone is welcome to come help dig post holes, or dig the flower beds!

(Pictures will be posted during the process.)

http://www.bhg.com/bhg/story.jsp?storyid=/templatedata/bhg/story/data/1178659764627.xml&catref=cat10004

for a picture of what it might look like when it is finished.

A lot of money for a straw poll...

Heat, humidity, sweat. All that must add up to being in Iowa in August!

On Saturday, Kevin and I went to Ames, Iowa, to participate in the Republican party's "Straw Poll". Years ago this began as a fundraising event for the GOP--charge $35 and get to meet the candidates and take part in a popularity vote. It has come to be a benchmark for the presidential campaign--the first hurdle. Already since Saturday's poll, at least one candidate who didn't do as well as he'd hoped, has dropped out of the race. There were 8 candidates there, although Rudy Guiliani and John McCain skipped the contest--candidates like Ron Paul (the libertarian), Mike Huckabee, Sam Brownback, Tommy Thompson, and others that I can't remember their names. All are either senators, former governors, or congressmen. What is a straw poll? Part carnival, part BBQ, part campaign speeches.
The last time I was in the Hilton Coliseum was when Deborah was in All-State Orchestra. The air-conditioning was a nice reprieve from the heat. As we listened to the promises from different candidates, I found myself being a bit skeptical-- "That's nice, but how exactly are you going to accomplish it, especially if Congress doesn't want to go along?"
Mitt Romney, in the blue shirt in the center, came in first in the poll, but he also had paid LOTS of money for buses, t-shirts, food, music, etc. A radio report this morning said that if all he spent were divided by the number of votes he received, it came to over $4000 per person!
We kept wondering, wow! How much money is being spent here today??? It's too bad that politicking takes money these days.

I have ambivalent feelings about living in Iowa during the presidential campaign, which actually began this past January. On one hand we get to personally meet the candidates and put in our two-cents' worth. On the other hand, we have been getting political phone calls since January, sometimes as many as four a day. That is VERY tiresome! We really enjoyed late November and December when all that had stopped after the last election. I was sorry it started so early for the next one.

You wanted a close-up?

Now Kevin knows how it feels to be pursued by the paparazzi. (And can you see the red glow off his shoulders and chest???)

Mother Nature

A week or so ago we had a lovely storm come over and drop some much-needed rain. Nice!--until the hail started falling. The sound of rain hitting the roof changed to crash! bangs! and we ran to look out on the deck to see what was happening. (Obviously, the water shoes were no longer drying out).

Most of the hail was about the size of large marbles, but every so often a much-larger piece would fall. When they hit the concrete sidewalk they exploded. The piece I'm holding in my hand had been on the deck for a short time before I dared poke my head out and pick it up. Kevin said someone at work put on a motorcycle helmet to go out and retrieve a softball-sized hailstone. Now, hail like that can cause some damage. A friend has about 25 holes in their siding. Others are having roofs replaced. We don't have any visible damage, but have begun the process of having roof estimates to make sure all is well. And we certainly were glad our cars were in the garage! The dimpled hoods betray all those that were out in the storm. Some cars had shattered windshields.

Yes, Mother Nature can be a bit unruly.