This week at the Lakehouse

Yup, things are a happening!

Saturday, May 26th

Quite a blustery cold day. No sitting outside today. We had a locksmith guy come by to quote on rekeying the locks as I had mentioned earlier ... not one door opened with the same key as the front door. As it turns out we will be replacing all of the door hardware as what is there is pretty cheap and will not stand the test of time.

Sunday

Of course the weather today was much better than the rest of the past weekend. Notably the lake was much busier with boats, kayaks etc. Everyone enjoying the warm sunshine instead of the cold grey skys yesterday. Sunday was "Fish and Chips" special at Jake's Pub so Ray treated me to lunch. We both did "our thing" for the rest of the day, putting things away, cleaning etc. We certainly hit the sheets pretty tired at the end of our day.

Monday

We headed to Duncan to get some specific shopping done. Ray mostly stayed in the car as I powered shopped at various stores. We were back home by noon as he had a guy from Prices' Alarm coming at 1pm to quote on a system. We had the gardeners here moving plants and rocks to help widen the entrance of the driveway for our motorhome which is coming tomorrow from Kristi's in Nanaimo. On Saturday, the gardener's had already cut down the trees next to the driveway ... all of the spruce and pine that would continue to be too bushy and grow wide which would scratch the motorhome. We are redesigning these side gardens with small flowering shrubs that will stay compact. Will, one of our new gardeners, has a friend with a small excavator near our house, so he was hired to move a few huge rocks that could not be moved with brute force. Nice to know the right people. lol Cindy and Will (also do work for our strata and several of the other houses on our street) will dig out the bushes near the rock and replant them in the community garden area of our subdivision before planting other shrubs for us. The irrigation lines will all have to be repositioned and we have a line on someone through our new General Contractor, Mike.

I spent the rest of the day planting  a few tomato plants in my raised garden after Ray assembled if for me and laundry, cooking etc. you know, the stuff you have to do living in a house. :) After dinner I was tired and sore so it was "Tub Time" in my clawfoot tub.

Of course when you have a German Shepherd, you are never truly alone! lol :) Freya stays close enough to watch .... but far enough away to run if I try to make her come and have a bath!

Tuesday

Off to Nanaimo first thing for an appointment with our Financial Advisor, Costco, lunch at Nori's (our favorite Sushi restaurant) and then we will be bringing the motorhome back to Lake Cowichan. Another busy day. When we arrived back home at 4 pm. with Ray pretty sore.  At least the motor-home fits through the gate and into the driveway. Yeah, one problem solved.

This is the before picture taken last February.

 The after picture.

See how much driveway we reclaimed on this side.

Wednesday

The original building contractor Mike, came by. He did a ton of finishing work to the house that was completed this past January 2017 to December 2017 so the house could be put up for sale. As Louise's husband had died ... everything stopped and nothing had been completed in the finishing end, ie floors, counters, bathrooms, heating etc. Basically we have a brand new house. That he was interested in fitting us into his incredibly busy schedule is awesome. He will have his crew tackle the sundeck as soon as he can as it is unsafe with a few of the posts rotten at the base. Mike knows all of the subs that worked on the house and he employs them on his other three builds going on this summer. Most of the inside work won't get done until late fall or until January.... looks like travelling south may be out of the question this winter. Nothing will be fast with coming to the table so late in the year with everyone's summer already booked for months. The best part though, is that he will act as general so Ray and I only will have to deal with him instead of up to 15 separate contractors. :) So we will be patient. lol The rest of the morning I spent filling up planter pots to enhance the empty spaces with the trees cut out of the front gardens. Ray went into Duncan for his appointment with the Bank.

The cherry tree was removed as it really encroached over the driveway with it's branches.

A lot less "foilage" to contend with. We plan to replant with some flowering bushes that will be kept low.

Our front porch patio. The place to retreat to for sunshine when it is too windy on the lake side of the house. Hopefully with this area blocked by the motorhome, the deer in the area will not eat my tomatoes!

This afternoon the wind calmed down so I had myself a campfire to burn up all of the driftwood pulled from the gardens and on the beach. What a mess. It sure looked much better once it was all burnt up. We've installed an old woodstove the owners had left outside in the firepit area. Apparently Don and Louise packed this old stove around for 25 years. Definitely not certified so cannot be used inside the house. Garrett had repainted it with stove paint and it looks fabulous. Once all the large pieces of wood are all burnt up we will clean out this firepit, throw some more gravel down and start using the wood stove. Another busy day with the Shaw Cable guy here to finish wiring for TV in the basement this afternoon.

Burn up the junk and then we will clean up the area and begin using the wood stove.

I also managed to get our solar lights installed into the gardens. Costco has some beauties this year at a very reasonable price.

Thursday

Today, our realtor from Nanaimo came to the house and then took us out for a thank you breakfast. He also wanted to see the house with our stuff moved in.

Not much to choose from here in Lake Cowichan for breakfast restaurants, but we ended up at the Country Grocer and had a great breakfast that was also reasonably priced. With full bellies we headed back to our house to give Bryn the tour. In the afternoon we had Madman McKay's in to bring us a new receiver as ours was way too old (over twelve years) for the new technology. He hooked up our existing speakers as the quality of them is ageless. Ray bought well 12 years ago. :) Now we have great sound in our house again. With the timber frame design the acoustics are amazing.

Tomorrow the kids come for the weekend. Yeah.