New Years' Day and Golden Friends

Our friends, who hosted our gathering, and Hubby, aka "The Dread-Pirate Sparsebeard"

A Golden Chain

Friendship is a Golden Chain,
The links are friends so dear,
And like a rare and precious jewel
It's treasured more each year...

It's clasped together firmly
With a love that's deep and true,
And it's rich with happy memories
And fond recollections, too...

Time can't destroy its beauty
For, as long as memory lives,
Years can't erase the pleasure
That the joy of friendship gives...

For friendship is a priceless gift
That can't be bought or sold,
But to have an understanding friend
Is worth far more than gold...

And the Golden Chain of Friendship
Is a strong and blessed tie
Binding kindred hearts together
As the years go passing by.

~Helen Steiner Rice

Talking to her Honey who called her from Iraq to say Happy New Year

Fixing up the Booksncoffeehaus Cottage

What we did on our Thanksgiving vacation week ~ (and now that we have strings of colder and windier days, we are so thankful that it is 95% complete).

It began the Wednesday before break. The trees in the yard had not even really started to change colors at this point.

Part one of fall painting project: I sanded, primed and repainted all the front porch railings. This began ten days before Thanksgiving. We already had everything we needed for this step.





Sparsebeard repainting porch soffits


and priming and painting bad spots on the gables. In this shot, you can see that we got to the sanding, priming and repainting of the green trim atop the porch. It looks so good.

Moss on The Cottage




Post sanding and priming stage

Looking better already, with both of us getting the siding primed up ~


and painted (the only color that we had to buy. We still had plenty of green and peach from several years back, the last time we painted).

Bottom piece of siding is rotten and needs replacing, so...

Nailing in new siding pieces. We ended up needing to replace the bottom two (b/c of large nail holes)

New siding pieces primed up, and then primed.

Now, back to the front porch. I needed to sand the flaking, front-porch swing. We replaced the seat a couple of years ago with mahogany slats (hand-cut by hubby), but never painted them. So, this project needed to be done for several reasons.

Back slats all nicely sanded and ready for primer

Working on the back, west-facing gable

repainting front porch soffits. By this time, almost ten days later, those trees were finally changing those gorgeous colors of Autumn.



Front porch railings all primed up, plus some lovely fall color, just for fun. It was a gorgeous, 80 degree day, that week of Thanksgiving.

North wall, door, windows completed, repainted...even the green trim below repaired gutters!

It feels great to have this done, and the house ready for winter. We even re-sealed some areas around the windows before priming/painting the trim to ensure a better finish. Next Spring/Summer: New roof!!

Now, on to Christmas projects. This time: Indoor craft projects and tasks.


Javamom

Reflections

Just a little brag. We miss our older two, grown kids and their spouses a wee little bit, but are very happy for them in their married lives out of state. They are making their own way, learning new things, cooking up new recipes, continuing educations, commuting by bicycle, racing bicycles, building bicycles, practicing their art(s), and then some.


Here are just a couple of handfuls of fun shots:


Our Daughter-in-love and daughter both ride with the organized ladies' rides from time to time.

Our oldest son, at CX racing practice

shots (above and below) during a race or two

Our daughter and her husband, enjoying a day with friends. The kids are doing great on this pedal car, since they both have been commuting to work via bicycle all summer (and some combination of cycling and the bus during inclement weather). That has changed as winter arrives, however. They just bought their first car together :-).

J and his wife will still be riding in the snow, though: They are all ready for it, having had their first snow of the season last week!

The youngest of our kids (behind me in the photo below) and I took a little road trip to see the marrieds this summer!

We had a very good time.

There was a concert in the park that we enjoyed

and visits to the bicycle shop where oldes ds works,

playing of games, eating of food, visiting Starbucks, and even a tiny bit of shopping.

We are all looking forward to being together again for the holidays!

Javamom