Mutant Slugs from Outer Space

I went outside this morning to water plants and found aliens in the backyard. Between the giant bee-eating spider, millions of june bug shells, cicadas, and mutant slugs, we have the market cornered on creepy crawlies.

Getting Closer

Another Nera picture. She really likes all of the openings in the house and uses them to elude Portland. Now that I am in KC and the daily grind has started we get some things accomplished during the week. Here is the update.

The last pieces got installed to finish out the glass panels.
I pushed the panels as far toward the living room as possible but that left a space on the top open. A birch piece nicely finished it off. You can see by the birch wall that I started installing trim this weekend too.
Instead of buying luan to template the vanity for the concrete sink/countertop, I used some leftover birch pieces. I spent all saturday afternoon putting together the mold for the countertop/sink. The sink bottom and inset are installed but I ran out of material for the rest of the sink portion. Making the countertop mold is different. Everything has to be designed in inverse and assembled backwards so it can be take apart once the concrete has cured.
Molds for the backsplashes.

We grilled out some pork tenderloin. I really like out outdoor grill.

Tomorrow will be a big day. We have to be up at 4:30 because Sam has a race and I am flying to Chicago tomorrow night. Time for bed I guess.

Little of this, little of that

We didn't really have much of a plan this weekend, just to get some things done around the house. The weather was absolutely perfect. As you can see Nera has pretty much settled in. Saturday we ran errands and John got the new stereo wired up. Now that we have real live cable and internet it is pretty nice.
Hey, it is starting to look live a living room. Sam managed to get lots of things put away.
After a week of getting woken up to cat fights we decided to move into the bedroom. Wow, not sleeping in the kitchen anymore what a novel concept. Portland had to make sure the bed still worked right.
Ok, ok, some real work did get done on the house too. We finished the closet door and got that mounted. And we got the vanity installed. Now John can template for the sink/countertop and start getting the concrete forms ready. To maximize space the drawers won't get installed until after all of the plumbing is hooked up.
Nothing fancy but it is suspended from the wall. We had to use some big lag bolts since it will have to hold 4 inches of concrete. Sam also started staining the bathroom door so soon we can actually use it. Tomorrow is John's first day of school, summer is officially over.

De Soto, KS is a terrible place to raise children

Because it's illegal to ride your bike!

Last night, I was riding my bike on a 2-lane country road where the speed limit typically ranges between 35 and 45 mph. I was about 15 miles into a 25 mile ride when I heard a siren behind me. I turned around and saw lights flashing, but kept going. Sirens again. WTH? So I pulled over. Yup, I got pulled over last night on my bike.

Apparently it is illegal to ride a bike on 83rd street in De Soto. They ran my license, wrote me up, and literally hauled my butt out of town. If you look, you'll see the ticket says I was unlawfully operating an '08 Trek bicycle.


The cops were nice even though I was being a little bit of a smart ass, not beligerent, just trying to make light of the situation. In my defense, from the east there are no signed posted until you're in town but it's illegal to ride 6 miles east of town as well. Ironically enough, where they dropped me off at the adjacent town's border there is a bright yellow sign "Share the Road" with a bicycle on it. Same road, just a few miles down. FYI, the town of Lenexa IS bicycle friendly.

And before you start to lecture, I get it. Road safety, line of sight, blah, blah, blah. We're not talking about a 4-lane road where the speed limit is 65. The bottom line is residents complained about having to slow down to pass cyclists so the city passed an ordinance. Just post more damn signs and an alternate route for us non-motorized vehicles.

The ticket cost me $100. I haven't decided if I'm going to go to the court date or not.

Remember this day

Sunday was a pretty productive day. We worked on the bathroom doors and started putting things in the closet.

It sure would be nice to have a toilet up here. The toilet went in a little too easily. We got it connected and bolted down, tested it, and it started leaking. After some readjustments it is in and is working. Now we need a bathroom door.
Went spent sunday afternoon putting some things away. The flamingo now stands guard out front.
We had an impromptu "toilets in" party sunday night and grilled out brats. This is the current state of the back patio. Those grasses are just a little too big and will get moved next year.

Psycho Night Race Report and Saturday Progress

Friday night we both ran the Psycho night 10k trail race at Wyco park. It started just as the sun went down and was lots of fun. The weather was cool and relatively bug free. Running the wyco triangle in the dark was great, you never knew which direction was next. 78 people raced and Sam took 4th for the women.

There was only a little mud out there.

It was a little raining on saturday. While I worked on the bathroom the other three made sure the bed didn't get away.

I got the toilet valve installed and managed to get the floor tile grouted. I am such a concrete nerd. The grout is latex polymer and epoxy-modified.
I also got all of the bathroom closet shelves painted. The bathroom closet is 2 ft by 2 ft and has lots of storage. Sam worked on the closet door and continued refinishing the sliding door for the bathroom.
I got the bath vanity stained too.
Since we had a productive day I did some cooking in the new kitchen. I made sweet curry rice with red peppers and tandoori talapia. It is so nice to have a kitchen again.

Tomorrow, install the toilet? We can only hope.

The Terra Cotta Warrior

Sunday was even hotter than saturday. We started the day by doing a 6 mile run out at Wyco park. A few bruises and a little poison ivy later we started working on the house. Sam did some yard work but called it a day early. Here is the bathroom floor before. John spent the day tiling the bathroom floor.

It made a mess and my back is very tired but the tile is finished. It looks like bamboo and picks up all of the other wood colors and the brick wall. The grout is going to be some shade of brown.
I set up the tile saw in the second bedroom. The terra cotta tile slop and water went everywhere. My pants are red.

Still too hot

Well, John is in KC for good now. Friday morning most of the glass panels got installed. The glass panels were recycled pieces from 3-form. One side is frosted and the other clear with recycled crushed clear glass pieces inside.

The top trim piece didn't fit just right so I am making a new one. At least you can't see the shower from the front door. Once we get the door on it will be like a real room.
Sam started working on refinishing the other side of the salvaged door. It was over 90 in the garage and even hotter outside so not much work got done this afternoon. We did a little weeding in the yard and I saw a HUGE snake, at least five feet long. Since we've chase a chipmunk out of the garage a couple times lately, the snake gets to stay.
The birch wall also got sanded and stained. The color really warmed up the bathroom.
We didn't work on tile today but here are a couple sitting on the floor. Tomorrow we are going to try and get the bathroom floor tiled.