(slave) Labor Day

Yesterday Rus and I celebrated Labor day by actually working. Crazy, I know. There is a lot of work to do at Gram's house (the house we will be moving into when our house sells and Rus's parents move to Lordsburg...), but most of it we will have to save until Rus's parents move out - we don't think they'd appreciate us tearing out walls or carpet, plus we kind of like having them around. The work we could do yesterday included electrical work in the garage (very important, you know), and cleaning up some termite damage. Hmm, have I mentioned the termites before? Nasty little guys, but at least this species has a preference for paper and not for wood. That means they enjoyed dining on the paper part of the drywall, not the studs. The whole house has been treated for them, and all that was left to do was to clean up their mess - tracks and droppings in the drywall in one bedroom and a closet. Yum. So while Rus ran wires and conduit with his dad, the kids and I took turns with some joint compound and a trowel. Jacob was great at filling holes with his finger full of paste, and Bekah learned how to smooth the joint compound on. (It was her room, after all.) In the garage we hung two eight foot florescent lights and a half dozen outlets...on one wall. Serious garagers need outlets every four feet, you know. I'll have to post pictures later...
The first part of the weekend we were blessed to be able to hang out with my friend Taffy and her family in Ruidoso. (Roo-ee-dough-so...or Ree-uh-dough-so...or Ree-uh-dough-suh...I haven't learned which is right). We hiked, rode bikes, ate lots of good food, enjoyed the beautiful weather, attended church (tripling the primary), and relaxed. It was really, really fun!
We stopped in Carrizozo to dream and drool at this awesome door/gate/warehouse where almost everything is built in Mexico. The couple lives in Mexico in the winter and then brings back goods to be sold in the spring and summer. Here are some of our favorite things - hopefully we can incorporate some of these ideas into our new home. I love the metal straps on this door.These corbels are 200 years old. Rus and I want them and the two ancient columns that go with them.Rus and I are contemplating making our own front door, similar to the one above (which is out of solid mesquite). It would be a really big door and we liked the idea of making windows in the top of it like this:
And now from Ruidoso:
Here is a sign from the South Fork Trail that we hiked. I thought it was very thorough. (Although they could have added parachuters, repellers, SWAT teams, monkeys, screaming children...)The trail was absolutely beautiful - green and lush with water. The kids played in the water, hiking upstream on the rocks, and not a one of them went home dry.Rus helped Jakey down from a wall he had climbed. Well all of the kids climbed it and needed help. I noticed it worked better for this:And not so much for this: (Taffy's brother)You can check out some more great pics on our adventure blog. Rus took some amazing shots of the water.
Our trip even ended with a beautiful sunset. How perfect was that?!