Ottumwa Ward Hay Ride

Susie Wright is one of the most hospitable, genuinely lovable people I have ever had the opportunity to know. She is an older sister in our ward that has a farm in the middle of nowhere Iowa. Her and her husband Sam time after time graciously offer their home for a million reasons. We have been there to have raspberry french toast for brunch every month for over a year, picked hundreds of ears of the sweetest corn ever known to bag and freeze, hauled off with loads of sheep manure for compost, helped bottle feed lambs and kittens, and spent hours enjoying our ward family at the annual ward hay ride. Sam is not a member of the church but is wonderful and open to the ward descending upon them time and time again. I hope I grow old like Susie. She is one of my life's heros.

Our sweet Susie.

Here is a little run down of the 2010 hayride. We were an hour late (can't stop a plumbing job mid-way) but still managed to spend over 3 hours playing at her place.

Andrew loved the "ho-sies!" He was climbing the fence to get in and pet them.

Adam and Sam Zimmerman made each other sick going round and round on the tire swing. Adam told Jonathan we have definitely got to hang up one of those at our place.

See what I mean. Susie's place is pure bliss.

I think Andrew may have found his first crush. Drew and him were buddies all night.

Ma and the boys aboard the wagon.

Mr. Matthew

The Wright's farm hundreds of acres of corn. We rode along through the fields. It was really pretty.

This is my enemy. Brother Duker has decided to claim the coveted Boy Scout marshmallow cross bow as his own. Although I saw it first and wanted it worse than him. He believes his contributions as popcorn sales rep. give him dibs to it. I however, as the Scout committee chairman believe it should me mine!

After we roast hot dogs and pot luck we take the hay ride. Sam pulls us around and Susie preps the home front with hot cocoa and smores upon our return.

Smore on one side of the fence, adventure waiting on the other...

No longer need goggles to run the garbage disposal

What to the untrained eye may appear as two white pipes running along a wall is actually a 4PM-7AM non-stop work session and the removal of goggles from my kitchen drawer. Okay, I didn't really have goggles in the drawer but I was tempted many times.

Bless the dear sweet skin on the fingers of my husband. I have gotten a very forceful back spray each time I use the garbage disposal since we moved into this house. I flip it on and wet treasures come flying out of the opposite sink. Apparently it had much to do with how the disposal was vented. Well, while plumbing the basement he installed an entire new vent line for the upstairs kitchen. He started this project at 4PM and finished as the boys and I were waking up the next morning. There wasn't much left of his hands from the PVC cement and many other fun things he did (I was asleep I didn't see much of it) but my kitchen sink runs like a Rolls Royce. He reinstalled all new pluming under the kitchen sink, re-plumbed the dishwasher and vented that sweet thing like nobody's business. It has never looked, ground, or sounded better AND I don't have to wipe off my face every time I use the garbage disposal. Oh that sweet man. The only unpleasant treasure was the abandoned putrid mouse nest he uncovered in the wall behind our dishwasher. That left much to be desired. By like a good man he took care of that along with the venting. Once again, just another project in the past few weeks by Mr. Jenson.

My Dad asks... "So is Jonathan a plumber or an electrician today."

Well in this very moment I would call him the cable guy. He just finished running and installing new phone lines and cable lines through the house. When we moved in we were the proud owners of one single solitary phone jack. Now we have phone, ethernet and cable running rampant through our home. Now we just need a TV and cable service to go along with those wires... not likely any time soon. This past weekend I would have called Jonathan more of a mason. He completed the plumbing in half of the basement and we poured cement over his handy work. While the cement has been curing he has re-wired the basement outlets and light switches and hard wired the fan in our bedroom. (The pull chain busted inside the fan. Due to our absence of A/C our only source of survival at night is ceiling fans. In order to keep the fans going and turn out the lights we were having to unscrew the 5 light bulbs. A little tricky for a short pregnant lady.) Following are a few pictures of his work in progress:

I would label this picture "Mr. Manual Labor." You see in order to completely redo the plumbing in the basement there was a lot of cement that had to be removed, old pipes taken out, old drains removed and filled and new lines put in. This is Mr. Jenson during one of MANY MANY MANY cement removal sessions. Notice the fine white coloring of his hair. This happens each time he puts in another "session." The fine cement ash spreads very quickly and thoroughly throughout the house. A few days ago I asked Adam to take something downstairs for me. He opened the basement door took a few steps down and said, "Mom, there's a cloud in the basement." Yep, that's a usual around our house. I used to dust. Until the cement removal ceases I think I shall start dating the blind slats each time I walk by and draw smily faces on the piano.

These are Jonathan's cave man tools that he retreats to his cave and makes lots of noise with. This particular session was the removal of cement in the closet under our stairs... yes there are pipes looming everywhere.

Through the fine haze you can see a patch of dirt that was once old plumbing covered in cement. After Mr. Manual Labor dug it all up and laid new drains and plumbing it will someday be the drain work for my new laundry room. I was really sad to discover that all of the plumbing work had been covered by dirt before I got a picture of it. Under this trench lies much blood sweat and tears. It was soon covered with cement.

This is a glimpse of the man cave.

This dazzling picture is just for kicks, and yet another project of a few weeks ago. Due to the removal of various walls and the design of our new bathroom we (I say we... Jonathan) had to relocate the clean out on our chimney stack. He cut a hole in the cinderblocks and moved the clean out door here. I missed how he did it, but he did a good job relocating the hole and filling in the old one. Just another day in the life of Mr. Jenson