Its been a very unusual year. Actually it started in Nov of 08. Our cabinet shop had a major fire that totaled the building. Fortunately the building, being of stout timber frame construction withstood the forces of the fire and remained structurally sound.
We decided it would be best to convert the shop into a 6-plex apartment building. At the same time we planned to build a new cabinet shop just north of the original. It has been over a year now and we are still not done. I did not think it would take this long! It has been a year of many challenges, for everyone involved. Brenda has been an unfailing source of support. My crew has stepped up to meet many new challenges and learned to do many new things.
I had to learn a lot myself too. I have a good background in construction so a lot of stuff was not completely new, but I was continually amazed at the unending decisions and problems that needed to be solved. It was very stressful. Not all bad stress though. It was very fulfilling to solve problems, to learn new things, to see a plan come together.
We bought a skid loader in the spring to do dirt work on the job and to use for snow removal for the apartments later. I dug a LOT of dirt with it. My brother Ross hauled approximately 50 side dump loads of dirt away. I have cleaned snow now several times with it too. So far I have learned that it takes about 2 1/2 hours to clean 6" of snow. Today is Christmas ......the 3 day storm system we are in has been called the storm of the 1/4 century.
It was a relief to have the skid today!
I was scooping snow around 6:30 this morning and a 3 car convoy of Mexicans got stuck on the road just east of us. I went and scooped them out and then they got stuck just west of us.
I had to get a chain and pull the lead car out of a drift. Feliz Navidad!
The new shop is very nearly completed. We need a spray room filter, some electrical hookups, a freight elevator and some creative storage spaces. The layout is pretty nice but with only 2/3 the SF of the old shop some things are tight. Things will need to be lean and mean in this shop!
Sometime ago we acquired the old bleachers from the old SC high school (see earlier post)
One of the first things we are doing in the new shop is cutting and milling that wood into millwork for the basement apartments. Also way back when...only several days before the shop fire we had purchased 3000 BF of quartersawn sycamore; we are now cutting that up for millwork. Since the day of the fire all that wood has been stored in our garage. It seems like that half of the garage is always being used for something other than a car. Now the plan is to park the skid loader there and keep my work truck in stall seven of the new garages.
That way when it snows I can just hop in and push snow!
This year we became grandparents! It seems babies don't let their arrivals be determined by fires or any other business in peoples lives...good thing they don't! Tobias is super cute and can really shriek. We went to visit Nate and Hannah at Tobias' baptism and had a nice time there.
Heather got engaged early this year to Jon. They plan to be married May 15 2010. Heather graduated from Dordt in the spring and started school in the fall at Creighton university in Omaha. She is studying physical therapy.
Holly has been very busy studying nursing at Dordt and St Lukes in Sioux City. She comes home with friends for dinner quite often and it is nice that she is around.
Both girls helped out when they could on the apt. work this summer and other times when the could. Heathers' Jon worked for me full time this summer and part time this fall and winter.
We did make it to SD a couple times this year. One time we shot clay pigeons. We had planned to go for Christmas but the weather was too bad.
Earlier this year I sang in the Sioux County Oratorio. We performed some selections from the Messiah. I really enjoyed that. I had wanted to do it for some years. I also sing in the church choir and really enjoy that.
I have been too busy to really spend a lot of time playing guitar. I look forward to the time I can return to a more normal routine.
