what next?

Roofers.

Our garage roof has been leaking badly for years.  Now, with Rowan done her exams and Teagan arrived to spend a week with his sister AND three days of predicted sun, seemed the ideal time.  What did the two cherubs think?  SURE!  Before they could think better of it, Doco had gone to Coe Lumber for five bundles of grade-4 cedar shingles.  Then, yesterday, while Rowan was off at field hockey and I was at UBC too, Doco and Teagan set to.  When we returned, Teagan had the north side roofless.

Rowan joined in.  Why not do both sides at once?  It's not going to rain.  So the duo got well down the south side.  The three little boys next door - Issac, Orin and Theo - appeared with their dad, Kevin, and had a fine time helping "Mr. Harris" put old shingle bits in the bin.  Music and merriment from the roof.  Fine neighbourhood entertainment.

 Resuming this morning - one foot on the neighbour's roof - the pair finished baring the south side ...

… took an ice-cream-snack break ...

… then tackled replacing the rotted pieces of furring strips (strapping) along the bottoms and the top.  Doco wasn't actually on the roof, but directed from the yard or the ladder, and wrestled the stubborn furring strip off the north-side bottom.  An impressive crew!

Off for a sushi lunch and back for a lesson in how to put on shingles - starting at the bottom, shingles a bit apart, the first row two-layers thick, the second layer overlapping the spaces between shingles in the first.  The second row 5 inches up from the first row, with a furring strip, tacked down temporarily, used as a guide.  Doco did the first shingle, and the roofers were off.  The trick seems to be to make sure each shingle covers the gap between the two shingles in the row below.

I was dispatched for another five bundles.  By the time I returned, the roofers had done five rows - eight by suppertime, when they quit for today.  Tomorrow they think they will go hiking!

P.S.  I remember my delight, the summer I was eight, in "helping" my dad put a new shingle roof on my grandmother's little house in New Denver - actually up on the roof (a bit - I think my main job was to hand shingles up to my dad).  Some jobs are FUN (but there's still a fair chunk of roof left to cover!  and when does Teagan need to go home?)

end of first year

Rowan is done year one at UBC!  Here, with friend Gabby (and mother Janet off-stage), in her Totem room, just after her final exam (Physics) ...

… and celebrating, moments later at Wiltshire Street.

Teagan arrived in Vancouver in time to help Rowan move out of rez.  The "Wild Things" are the last to be removed from her well-decorated walls.  I'd say it's been a good home.

Brother and sister headed off to Wreck Beach for the sunset and the ritual burning of notes - Math, Chem, Physics, Bio.  Sounds as if no subject was spared.

Now, on to the next chapter ...

brother and sister

Rather  a fine photo of Doco and Aunt Susie, taken just now by Janet at Wiltshire Street.

Blossoms ... but bees?

The backyard fruit tree blossom has been magical, but there's not much buzzing.  Will there be fruit to follow?

Cherries.
Our "found"cherry, from Joanne via Candy, couldn't have had more bloom.  Last year it had about 4 cherries.  This year I think it had about 4 bees, but I guess we (or whoever is here in mid-late July?) will see.

Apples.
Lots for the bees to chose among.  Hopefully they snuck about when I wasn't looking.

"Red-free" espaliered apple from the 2002 UBC Apple Fair

"Belle de Boscoop" - for all-winter yummy apple desserts - from the 1991 UBC Apple Fair

As for the wood anemone splendour, the flowers do it all, bees not required.

And this from Diana's and my Kerrisdale walk … evidence of a flowering-cherry "snowstorm" outside Starbuck's … my camera couldn't catch the flying petals (even I can't see them).

Lesson.  We need to find and re-instate our Mason-bee houses.

Jericho Beach on a sunny April afternoon

No crab fishers on the pier today.  Fishing is closed after last-week's oil spill from an anchored tanker - one of these?  No sign of oil, though - not on the water and not on this shore.

The wind blew hard and the sail-surfers flew fast!

The mast cables jingled like wind chimes against the masts of the hundreds of grounded sail-boats.  Diana thought the boats sounded restless to get out to sea.

Vancouver City sat there beyond the waves like a painting.

English daisies filled the Jericho Park grass.  Same as in Jericho, Oxford?

A red-wing blackbird whistled behind us on the bridge - lots of yummy grain on the bridge deck.

Ducks in full mating display.  Mostly shiny-green-headed mallards ...

… but not all … one wood-duck and one something, bottoms up ...

… and the bunnies are back.  Or maybe they never left?

Sand is on the move.  The cherry tree seems content, but firefighters will have some digging to do ...

April on the Ranch

April 6th, greeted by the snow-shoveller's annual carving up of the lawn.  Doco decided this year to hire Ralph to put it back together as best he could, and then Rayan to add top-soil and grass seed.  We'll see what it does by our return in mid-May.

The restored "squirrel barn" looking glorious, rather like a bird … in spring you can see Chris's foundation rock-work … and Doco's windows (two done, one to come)!

A line from me to Doco to the corner fence-post (behind his head) is the approximate western boundary of lot #1799.

a sturdy tree fort, waiting for its inhabitants

Doco's rescue of 6 rejected (by our fruit tree workshop leader) "Romance" cherry-tree whips …  a new variety developed in Saskatchewan by a mad scientist … I'm doubtful that they will survive, but who knows?

Doco and Ralph planting Linda Edwards' orphan oak tree … we HOPE it's in the right spot!
... as Doco says, "it can always be cut down"!

April 13th and we're off, back to Vancouver.

April in New Denver

A few semi-random photos around New Denver in April 2015.

the Raven's Nest on Main Street

the emerging Valhalla Pure store, from Main Street ...

… and from the highway corner 

Kay and Echo in the lovely late-day light on the cliff-edge in front of her house
 at the top of New Denver

Practicuum for our organic Fruit Tree workshop - temporary plantings behind Knox Hall ...

… some are diggers ...

… and all learned a lot.  Now how will our trees fare?