I’ve become a fan of our native ninebark, Physocarpus capitatus. It’s a big, glorious shrub. As the common name implies, the shredding bark provides year-around interest whether it really has nine layers or not. In June it is covered with ball-like clusters of small white flowers, held just above the dark green foliage. Birds eat the mature seeds in late summer and in autumn the leaves turn golden. Continue reading
Studio exterior view with some windows in place and framing for front porch.
Thursday, May 29
There’s been a lot of progress on the studio in the last couple of weeks. We’re scheduled for inspections of the framing, wiring, and plumbing tomorrow.
French doors in east wall lead to the camera room.
The experienced foundation repair crew finished cutting holes for the new windows and doors, closed up the old barn door opening on the front of the building, and took down both barn doors. They installed the French doors leading from the camera room to the garden and most of the windows. The double window for the sales room came from the factory the wrong size and had to be re-ordered. The original supplier for the front door couldn’t get it built in time, so we switched doors and hope it will be here next week.
Sunday, May 18
There was more slow and tedious work in the new studio last week, followed by a quick flurry of activity that looks a lot more like progress.
The tedious work was doubling all the joists that hold up my office on the second floor, immediately above the camera room. When the building was originally built in 1928 they used 2×6 lumber to span more than 12 feet. The rule of thumb for that distance calls for 2×12 lumber. As a result the joists had sagged a lot over the years and the floor bounced when we walked on it. It took a couple of days, but now all the joists are reinforced, with new 2x6s on both sides of the original ones. Continue reading
Monday, May 12
Remodeling includes a lot of tedious work, which meant that visible progress last week was a little slower than the first couple of weeks. But by the time the A-1 Builders crew went home on Friday afternoon the subfloor was complete and the big glulam beam that supports my second-floor office was in place. Continue reading
Thursday, May 8
We got a new hen last weekend and she’s adopted the construction crew from Aspen Diversified Construction, Inc. Rather than hang out in the yard searching for bugs and worms, Chester likes to hang out in the studio and supervise the construction activity. She doesn’t seem to be afraid of anything, even standing calmly on a piece of framing timber while Dennis cuts it to length with his Skilsaw. Where do we find chicken-size safety glasses for her? And that name, Chester? That’s what Mike started calling her.
Most of the floor joists and some of the sub-floor in the new camera room
Monday, May 5
The crew from A-1 Builders made good progress last week, getting nearly all the new floor joists in place and laying most of the sub-floor. They deliberately left a few joists out where the plumber will install a new sewage grinder pump. It will be a whole lot easier to dig the hole under the crawl space for that without the joists and floor in place. Since the studio is lower than our septic tank and drain field we have to pump our sewage uphill and the old pump was buried outside and not in good shape. Continue reading
Exposure mode and ISO dials on the Canon G12 compact camera
Most digital cameras, except for the very simplest, offer several exposure modes . How do you choose which one to use? It depends on what’s most important in the photo you’re making. This month I’ll explain the difference between the primary modes: Program Automatic, Aperture priority, Shutter priority, and Manual. Your camera may also have a variety of Scene modes. Continue reading
The thimbleberries (Rubus parviflorus) are getting ready to burst into bloom throughout the Whatcom County lowlands in the next week or so. The first flowers opened on the plants in our garden last weekend. This robust shrub will soon be covered with large white blossoms, highlighting roadsides and woodland edges.
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Wednesday, April 30
It was a quiet weekend at the studio construction site as the crew from A-1 Builders works four 10-hour days Tuesday through Friday. The weather was good, which allowed the saturated soil to dry out a bit. The excavators dug trenches along the foundation walls to lay perforated drainage pipe. They’ve also painted a waterproofing compound on the foundation walls. This is an extra step to keep the underpinnings of the studio dry when the building is sealed up tight. For now, we’ve got piles of dirt everywhere and quite a mess. But our chickens have been having a great time picking through the dirt for fresh worms and grubs. Continue reading
The painters and the painted came down to Fairhaven on Sunday morning, April 26 to have their portrait made with the Fairhaven Village Green Mural.
Lanny Little originally painted the mural some 13 years ago, then refreshed and updated it in the summer of 2013. In the process he added eleven people who have played a role in modern Fairhaven over the last four decades or so.
Longtime “Mr. Fairhaven” and proprietor of the Fairhaven.com website, aka John Servais, invited all the people who had been painted into the mural, as well as those who helped Lanny with the painting in 2013, to come to the Village Green for a dedication and group portrait during Dirty Dan Day on April 27. This photo is the result. Continue reading
