Friday, February 20, 2009

Do You See What I See?










I love sunsets, like most people. We all have different views of the sunset. Mine, is looking toward the ocean, which is about 40 miles from home, down a valley and the Columbia River. I never get tired of the view, and each one seems just a little different. This is the one I looked at just a couple nights ago. Yes, near us is that gorgeous little house, pretty isn't it? I've always loved it. I think the Northwest is so pretty, although I admit I haven't seen a lot of other areas.
I also thought I'd share some pictures, a couple of the house my husband just built, and another couple of the one he recently started. It's actually going pretty quickly, which in our economy, is making me just a little nervous. He was supposed to build a home from a Street of Dreams model over in Washington Sate right after this one is finished, but the people aren't sure now if they want to build. Getting all the paperwork, county permits, working with the engineers, etc, takes a lot of time, so we won't know until mid spring if this house will be getting up right now. Besides me bragging LOL, about his work, he actually has never advertised. He doesn't even has his name in the phone book, and hasn't had for 15 years! People just have seen his houses and have gotten in line for one of their own. So, needless-to-say, we are wondering what we'll be doing this summer. I really don't think it's going to be advertiing so much as "who can spend the money?" right now at least. We'll see how that all goes.
I've been trying really hard to save for a rainy day, or a bad economy, you think I should? Anyway, if you've ever heard of Dave Ramsey, that's what we're trying to work on. We have jokes around here when we aren't spending money on something, or getting by with what we have, that we are on the "Dave plan". Today we had a Dave plan moment. We were getting ready for homeschool to get going, but I was still finishing some kitchen stuff. My refrigerator isn't all that old, BUT for some reason the gasket/seal on fridge door had slipped, and it hasn't been shutting very well. That makes the fridge run harder, costs more money, etc. I was frustrated thinking I'd probably have to have the repairman come fix it. But guess what we did? I went on line, found a website that showed how to replace the gasket. I thought our gasket was still in pretty good condition and didn't really have to buy a new one. I got some soap water and made sure I had it really clean. Then, following the instructions I got from the internet, one of my 10 year old twins got his tool kit out, followed the directions, finally got his older sister involved, and do you know what? He got that gasket back the way it was supposed to be. I don't know how much he saved me, but thankfully, it's fixed.
So here we are working on Heritage Studies (history) in school, and he's watching his teacher (dvd), but his mind is wandering. He's wondering if he should be a carpenter, a mechanic, a pilot, or ??? It is obvious to us that his bent is in the fix-it department, that's for sure. Whatever he does, it will be good for him to know how to fix his own stuff.