On Presidents and Plumbing

With Barack Obama’s inauguration today comes the intersection of 1928 and 2008 at Foxcroft. I have mentioned Obama here several times as he came into the sphere of our daily living, notably the first time I heard him speak. That was before he officially announced his candidacy, here:
Take A Look at This!

A slightly tongue in cheek rant about the pre-caucus attention Iowans were getting here:
I like Hillary Well Enough...

Our precinct caucus here:
Caucus Report

Perhaps the only political group I’ve been really excited about for quite some time (Banjos for Barack?) here:
And Now a Word From Ralph Stanley

Now for the 1928 part. That was the year Foxcroft was built. Undoubtedly Bess voted in that election, presumably for Herbert Hoover, a native Iowan and generally recognized hero at the time. If you’re not familiar with his legacy prior to the White House, he was regarded as the man who nearly single handedly saved our allies Belgium, France, and Russia, and later our enemy, Germany, from starving to death during and after World War I. Hoover’s life is really interesting.

The girls and I visited the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library and Museum in West Branch, ten miles away, last Friday. We went to see the “Rooster Flour Sack” an amazingly embroidered 100 lb. food relief sack that was part of the thank you gifts sent to Hoover from grateful, but still extremely poor, Belgians.



This sack has not been on exhibit for over 15 years. The photo does not even begin to do it justice.

The visit to the museum was my first in quite a while. I was NOT familiar with his time as secretary of commerce in the Harding/Coolidge administration. Hoover was the person who created the system of radio band frequency rights, was the subject of the first television broadcast in the U.S. and was tireless in his drive to improve the lives of common Americans, including the standardization of all industrial machinery parts.

Here’s where the plumbing comes in. On Saturday morning our kitchen hot water faucet gave out. This is in our original wall mount sink. I took out the stem and figured it was probably a washer. I completely stripped the set screw trying to remove it from the bottom of the stem to take the washer out. I bundled up and went to 3 hardware stores and our local plumbing supply store only to find that not only did none of them have a stem that would be a suitable replacement, no one even carried washers any more. I drove home dreaming of Hoover’s goal of standardized, interchangeable parts.

To add insult to injury when I looked up the online plumbing place I’d gotten the faucet from, they didn’t even carry that model any more.

Here's to greater regulation in the future! Mr. President, once the banking thing is straightened out, let's go for plumbing!

Central Calling

A small thing accomplished over break was to hang a new phone in the upstairs sitting room. We've had an old princess style phone up there. Does anyone under 45 even know what a princess phone is? Boy that makes me feel old. This one had been Lisa's that she brought when we were married. I'd never seen a BROWN princess phone, but I digress.

While cleaning in the basement I found an old phone that had been in my childhood home. My parents had bought it in the early '70's or so and had a digital keypad added to it.

The phone's original bells still ring when the crank (not visible on the right side of the picture) is turned, but for incoming calls a second set of bells installed inside the box are what you actually hear.

When my folks moved in 1988 they took the phone with them, but never found a good place to install it. When they moved into their apartment in 2005 the phone came to Foxcroft, and since that was right when we were moving in, it went into a pile in the basement.

Wiring it back up wasn't too hard, but a little more complex than I had originally thought it would be, since apparently my father CUT the line out of the phone, so I had to splice it together. Perhaps I need to do a little more work on it, as it won't dial out, but will take incoming calls.

Here is a shot of it in the sitting room, next to my great-great grandfather's cupboard:


I really like sitting in the chair below the phone and talking. The heft of the receiver surprises the girls, but feels very comfortable to me.

My next great plan is to put a candlestick back into the phone niche in the dining room, then we'd really be set!

A Few Other Local Bloggers

There are LOTS of blogs in Iowa City, most are started by students, and fizzle out pretty quickly. I don't search a great deal for other local bloggers, but here are three local blogs that I really do like. One has barely started, one is VERY prolific, and one falls in between.


Barely started is "The Old Mellicker Place", I happen to know the author, as is evidenced by the link to me, but I hadn't known he'd started bloggging. I really hope Mike continues with the project, His writing and insights will be excellent, and he's a nice guy to boot.


Prolific is "The Prairie Urbanist". Donald is a fellow University Heights resident, and writes his blog through our local Iowa City paper, The Iowa City Press Citizen Donald writes on politics, biking, and numerous local and national issues. His recent post, Does University Heights Have a Future echoes what I've been thinking about ever since the University of Iowa announced they would acquire our largest commerical property in town, thereby taking off our tax roles. If his predicition of our eventual annexation by Iowa City comes true, perhaps he can be an ally in the creation of local historic districts within town. If you run across this, Donald, you'd probably like to read my post on University Height history, and our original town slogan: The Coral Gables Subdivision of Iowa City.


In between is the blog I've been aware of the longest. Flossie was the first local person to contact me via Foxcroft. Here is her blog: "Flossie At Home" She and her husband also live in a wonderful older home, not far from the Mellecker place. A self described "graduate student, editor, and homebody" Her blog is a great reason why Iowa City was declared a City of Literature by UNESCO.

So here's a little waves a greeting to some special neighbors.

Weather Geek

As an avid weather geek I was not surprised to read that the state climatologist reported 2008 was the fourth wettest year on record in Iowa.

I read the almanac section of the daily paper religiously. That section gives highs and lows for the previous day, notes record highs and lows for the current date, and gives total precipitation for the current month and current year compared to averages totals. There is also a listing of the inflow of the Iowa River to Coralville Resevoir, outflow from the dam spillway and river gauges at the stages of Iowa City, Lone Tree, Marengo, and Wapello. I love all that stuff.

For the Iowa City region we were just short of 20 inches over normal precipitation in 2008. Average mean is 37.90" we totaled 56.49".

With the recent warm weather melting all the snow river flow has been way up too. Inflow is 4,050 cubic feet per second, outflow is 4,375 cfs. Normally this time of year that runs somewhere around 1200 cfs. During the flood last summer flow in Iowa City reached 42,000 cfs. At that point we had a record flood gage height in Iowa City of 31.5 feet (flood stage is 22 ft)

Here's to a normal 2009

Christmas 2008

It's time to catch up on our Christmas activities this year. I hadn't posted the tree yet, so here it is:



Christmas day broke our 5 day string of snow shoeing in the ravine behind our house. Here are some pics of Rowan and I from Christmas Eve:


In our backyard before we set out. The ravine is about 12 acres of woods between us and the University golf course. Four separate gulllies all come together back there. Winter is about the only time you can really get in, its too wet otherwise. We have seen deer and turkey there this winter.


At the bottom


Walking in the creek bed.


Christmas morning was just us. Laurel got a wren house. Here we are putting it together.


Lisa has quite a collection of pottery, and especially loves pitchers. Here is a small one I gave her this year.


Lisa's family from Rock Island, Illinois, came for dinner. Since my family had come already last Sunday and we had turkey then, we decided to do a roast. We had never cooked a roast, so thankfully my 1950 Betty Crocker cookbook explains everything. We got an 8 pound top round roast. There were 11 of us for dinner, slightly smaller than the 15 we had with my family, but both below our crowd of 22 we had at Thanksgiving 2005.

The butternut squash in the picture above (bright orange squares) was from our garden as were the potatoes. While we were getting dinner ready I read to Lisa "A Christmas Dinner Without a Maid" a reprint from The Ladies Home Journal, 1905, which I had found at the Arts and Crafts Society website. We were both laughing over things we remember our grandparents doing for holiday dinners that seemed to come right from this article! Lisa said her grandmother always wrapping up the celery to make it keep longer, I told her my grandmother always served nuts and mints with coffee after dessert.

It was a wonderful holiday of good memories.

SL eet + ICE =

a SLICE of winter!

We went to bed listening to the sleet that had been hitting the house since 7 PM last night. I got up at 4:45 with it still falling. Not surprisingly school was cancelled, so our winter break begins a day early.

We had nearly an inch of ice on the ground this morning. We all worked at shovelling for nearly two hours and got all the sidewalks and steps cleared. I took the car in for an oil change and walked home.

This afternoon I took the cup of walnuts I have from our trees (I picked up a small percentage of our walnuts this fall, husked and dried them and then hung them in burlap bags in the basement.) So far I've cracked and gotten a grand total of three cups of nuts. I used two cups in Apple walnut cake and banana bread. The last cup went into Black Walnut divinity. Here is the recipe:

Ingredients:
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup white syrup
1/2 cup hot water
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 egg whites
1 teaspoon real vanilla extract
1 cup chopped black walnuts

Directions:
Cook and stir sugar, syrup, water and salt in sauce pan until boiling. Cook without stirring until hard ball stage on candy thermometer. Remove from heat.

Beat egg whites with mixer until stiff. Slowly pour hot mixture over egg whites while beating continuously.

Continue beating, scraping sides often until mixture begins to lose gloss. Add vanilla and beat until candy can be dropped by heaping teaspoonfuls on aluminum foil. Add chopped nuts.


I've never made divinity before, I'll get pics when it's done.

Helen's Diary Dec. 4, 1933

Dec 4, 1933
Monday

Worked only 6 1/2 hrs. Just like Spring, skated with Hilly + Jimmy after work. Lots of baby snails. Listened to Alexander Wolcott on Helen Hayes' new play "Mary Stuart."


(Helen Hayes as Mary Stuart)

My comments:

• I believe Helen was doing work study in the French department.
• Even though I use this picture to show Kinnick football stadium, actually the two figures are Helen and Hilly roller skating here:

• Baby snails would have been part of the aquarium set up that Bess and Helen ordered. Their plan was to raise fish etc. in the aquarium over the winter and transfer them to their new pond in the spring.
• "The Man Who Came to Dinner" was based on Alexander Woolcott. I greatly enjoyed playing Dr. Bradley in that show in high school.
• The name of play was "Mary of Scotland" Helen Hayes played Mary Stuart. The show ran at the Alvin Theater, on Broadway from Nov 27, 1933 - Jul 1934. The playwright was Maxwell Anderson.

Hello Noel, Good to See You Again!

Our old buddy Noel showed up last night, like he does every year about this time. Noel's been around long before we came to Foxcroft, easily 20 years. Here he is:


Noel came in a box of other goodies I bought at an auction. I referred to some of them (the plastic stars) last Christmas in a post here:
Ghosts of Christmas Past Part 2

Noel is made of felt with sequins. I think he was a home project, my guess is maybe from the 1940's? To me has has that era's look. We are lucky to have a front door so similar to the one at our old place, so he fits as well here as he did there:


Merry Christmas

Goodbye Pepto Bismal Hall

We inched yet another step closer to "completion" over Thanksgiving weekend. I painted the hallway that leads from the dining room to the back two rooms, stairway, and bathroom. The shade of pink this very dark and dingy hallway sported prior to painting is the title for today's entry. I also painted the walls leading up the stairs to second floor. I used "Inviting Ivory," the same color as the second floor hallway, for both places, and since they are all adjacent, it ties together nicely.

Here is an original picture of the archway leading to the hall from the dining room:

Here is roughly the same shot today:

Looking down the hall from the dining room:

The hall is a dogleg, here is a view from the back family room, which was originally Bess' bedroom:

And looking up the stairway. I still need to cut the base shoe that will cap the stairs to length and install the new railing:

This now brings to two the number of spaces that we still need to restore. The next to be completed will be the "office" which was the daughter's bedroom when the house was built, it was our bedroom when we first moved in, and is now "the dog's room."

Here is an original picture:

And the same corner today:

The last will be the kitchen.

City of Literature!

It was announced this week that Iowa City has been named by the United Nations' Education Science and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) a "City of Literature." They are the third city so designated, joining Edinburgh, Scotland, and Melbourne, Australia, in receiving this title. Certainly Foxcroft seems to have had a small part to play in Iowa City's literary story, and if you believe the legends, it had a major role!

The FACTS:

The major impetus behind Iowa City being such a writer's haven is the University of Iowa's Writer's Workshop. The initial director of the workshop was Wilbur Schramm, who built his home across the street from Foxcroft in 1934, which was 5 years before the the official beginning of the workshop. He was an English professor, with an emphasis in writing. (Read the link on his name above to see what else he is famous for)

Schramm's wife, Betty, had been a sorority sister of Helen's. Helen's mother, Bess, had a degree in English from Upper Iowa University in the early 1900's and did graduate work in English at the University of Iowa while her husband Walter completed medical school and taught anatomy at UI roughly from 1905-1909. She was a highly educated woman, especially for the times, and a voracious reader. Given their mutual interests and the fact that they were living on the edge of town with few other neighbors it is no surprise that the Schramm's and Fox's all became close friends. This is evidenced by journal entries and letters I have read. It is not too much to surmise that most of Schramm's visitors and houseguests (Carl Sandburg, Wallace Stegner, William Carlos Williams, etc)also visited Foxcroft.

I found a great deal of Schramm memorabelia in the house while emptying it. Items included a copy of his biography of Francis Parkman with the inscription "For Mother Fox with the sincere hope that she reads no further in this volume." I found a brochure that describes the "Arts at Iowa" including the first use of the phrase "Writer's Workshop" from the summer of 1939, and numerous poems that were sent as Christmas Cards, the latest being from 1979.

The best find, however was from a photo scrapbook. It is a portrait of Wilbur and Betty Schramm. The picture below was taken in 1938, eight years after "American Gothic" became an immediate sensation by placing third in an art contest sponsored by the Chicago Art Institute:


This picture was taken, presumably by either Helen or Bess, on the front yard of Foxcroft. Schramm was Grant Wood's best friend while Wood was on the faculty of UI!

The LEGEND:

I have heard from several sources that the idea of a writer's workshop was born in the library at Foxcroft over conversations between Schramm and Bess about how to create a place that would encourage the creation of great literature. I have absolutely no proof that corroborates this in the slightest. But there are still quite a few boxes of things to look through!

We Interrupt this Political Blog...

...to bring you a post about home restoration.

BACK PORCH
I was able to come to some completion on the back porch. Steps are installed, but I still need to finish the railings. Here is a close up of the steps:


And a long shot of the porch:


GARDEN
I cleaned up the garden last weekend. I dug up my potatoes (two meals total, tops), harvested acorn and butternut squash, and picked green tomatoes. Here's some of the last haul:


Fish Pond
I don't have a photo right now but we took the plants out and put them in a livestock tank in the basement along with our one surviving fish. I used the wet vacuum to take out the last 150 gallons of water. I excavated the hole that was punched into the bottom and after two days of drying, filled it with lime base and cemented it up. That was Wednesday morning. Of course it rained in yesterday. I vacuumed out water again and now have three 4x8 sheets of plywood covering it up.

LAST POLITICAL COMMENT (for a while)
Wednesday also marked the two year anniversary of my neighbors Mike, Pete and I going to downtown Iowa City the Sunday night before the 2006 mid term elections and listen to an electrifying (but widely unknown) young senator from Illinois stump for the democratic candidate for Iowa governor, Chet Culver. Of course the speaker was Barack Obama, and we were astonished at the idea of 2,000 people showing up for someone who wasn't Hillary Clinton.

Vote GARNER: For Verne...

..For YOU



If anyone needs a good laugh before we start watching election returns, I suggest you go here:

http://www.votegarner.com/HOME.html

3 term Verne Mayor, Garner St. John is in the re-election battle of his life!

Be sure to watch each week's campaign video starting with week one. Then check out Garner's recipes and his work prior to politics when he was the host of "Travellin' Man." Read his blog too:

Garner's Musings

Some would claim that in an alternative universe, Garner St. John is an old high school friend of mine, and that Verne is merely his Los Angeles based comedy troupe's latest endeavor. Some would claim that that he was mentioned this Foxcroft blog post: Holiday Plumbing. Some would go so far as to say that I appear briefly in the crowd scene in the "Opponent Chooses Running Mate" episode on votegarner.com. But I wouldn't know about that. All I know is that the town's bar is called "Haverkamp's..."

All I can say is that this is the proud bumper sticker on my car:

And Now A Word From Ralph Stanley!

As a banjo player I can't express how absolutely delighted I was by this:



I think it's great that "Rank Strangers," a song about coming home to find everything changed, is playing in the background. I think that pretty well sums up the realization of what the Republican Party has become for working class Americans. The "devoted husband" plug was a nice touch too.

Dr. Ralph Stanley is one of the great bluegrass legends. With a 60+ year performing career he is an American icon. Most of you not familiar with his story should recognize him as the person who sang "O Death" in the movie "Oh Brother Where Art Thou."

The very first and last promo shots has him holding a Gibson archtop banjo very similar to one I have.

Step By Step

I'm continuing to work on the back steps. Pete dropped off the yellow pine that he joined together to make the side "boxes" that will cover and hide the end stringers. I spent yesterday cutting and shaping the boxes.

With some luck I can get them painted this week and maybe installed next weekend. Then I would be ready to install the steps.

So Much Work...

...So little to show for it!

After working on steps all last weekend I was able to install TEMPORARY STEPS on Sunday night. While appreciative of the fact that, for the first time since June, they could walk up something resembling acutal stairs, the rest of the family was a little underwhelmed by what I had to show for all my work:

In my defense, since we made the concrete pad high enough to ensure drainage AWAY from the bottom of the stairs (a huge problem before I started this project, water used to pool at the bottom of the stairs , often to a depth of two inches) The distance from the top of the porch deck to the pad was a shade over 19.25 inches. Standard stairs have a 7 inch rise making the perfect height for two steps onto the porch 21 inches. I bought precut stringers and then proceeded to shave off the top and bottom of them to get an approximate 6.25 rise. Since the stringers are pitched slightly forward to ensure water drains off the steps I couldn't just set the fence on the table saw a rip away.

Another issue was how to attach the stringers to the porch. I know that over time the concrete pad will shift and heave. the porch sits on footings so it shouldn't move. I ended up running 2x6 boards from the stringers back under the porch and then drilling through the porch joists and attaching a carriage bolt assembly to tie them together. I only made the bolt finger tight so that over time if there is movement the steps *should* be able to float a bit??? We'll see how that works.

Anyway I got the two middle stringers set up and was able to use salvaged steps from the old basement stairs to serve temporarily. I did get the two outside stingers cut to correct rise and bought a bunch of really nice yellow pine to cover the rise, and to box in the sides of the outside stringers. When I have everything installed the stairs will be 6 feet wide. That means they will extend from one tall pillar to the other.

75 Years Ago at Foxcroft

Helen's Diary

Oct 11, 1933
Wed.

Up late M and I put down wood. She put on N + W storm windows. I excavated pool about 6-9 inches + scraped sides, concrete fine.

Comments:

The photo above is labeled "Oct. 1993" but it must have been near the end of the month since Helen is more than "6-9 inches" down. She and Bess dug a trench for the sides of the pool and used the ground as a form when they poured cement for the side walls. After it dried Helen then excavated the middle.

Whenever Helen writes "M" she is referring to her mother, Bess, who was the original builder of Foxcroft.

I can only guess what "put down wood" means: The blueprint for the basement shows a "kindling room" maybe they were putting wood down there to burn in the fireplace that winter? Maybe they laid planks on the gravel driveway for traction in the mud?

I had wooden storms made for the west side of the house, but since it has been so nice I still have the screens on.

Concrete Shoes?

When I got home from work yesterday I discovered Pete had already been by and taken off the 2x6 forms from the concrete pad we poured at the bottom of the back porch on Saturday. Despite the steady drizzle I put paver bricks around the perimeter of the pad and backfilled the places that needed it. I took the broken sidewalk and temporarily filled in the the square of sidewalk in each direction leading from the pad to the garage and the south side of the house.

When digging out the garage side I found that there are more stepping stones under the cement sidewalk, like the ones we found three years ago running out into the back yard. Since the original photos of the house show only a gravel path from the porch to the garage, the stepping stones must have been added when the others were done in the 1950's. Here was our photo of the other stepping stones taken in 2005:

So now I know when I replace the rest of the sidewalk I can recover more stepping stones.

Helen's Diary: Oct. 7, 1933

Sat.

Worked 8-12 reading scores. M + I to Iowa (38) Bradley (0) game. Got much colder during the day. M canned 35 qts of wild grape juice from Grace Strubley.

Giants won World Series 4 games to 1 over Senators. Score 4-3 in 11 innings

Comments:

• Helen had a work study job and UI in foreign language department.
• Tickets to the Iowa-Bradley football game would have cost $1.00 each according to some quick research showing that UI cut prices in 1933 from $1.50 to $1.00 due to the depression. For the Florida International game this season I bought tickets at face value of $50.00 each.
• I can't imagine how many grapes it would take to squeeze 35 quarts of juice
• The New York Giants beat the Washington Senators at Griffith Stadium in Washington D.C. to clinch the series. According to Wikipedia:
  Washington, D.C. has not hosted another World Series since 1933. Game 5 was the final Series game played in the nation's capital as of 2008. This Washington Senators franchise became the Minnesota Twins during the 1960-1961 off season, and would not reach the World Series again until 1965. The second Senators team became the Texas Rangers. The transfer of the Montreal Expos to become the Washington Nationals opens the door to D.C. again potentially.

Iowa football player and Big Ten 1933 MVP Joe Laws. This photo was taken after the mayor of Iowa City offered Laws any honorary position in the city after winning the MVP award. He chose to be the fire chief (photo from Des Moines Register)

Washington Senator's Player/Manager Joe Cronin (photo from Wikipedia)

Progress: Porch, Puddles, Pond

I was gently reminded by my most faithful reader last week that it really had been a long time between posts. In spite of little reporting progress continues.

Since we expanded the back porch this summer I needed to make two small columns to place at the corners to attach the railings to. Using the same construction method as the original columns that support the porch roof, I created two boxes 30 inches tall. These will go over the 4x4 posts I attached at the corners of the frame. The railings that ran between the house and the tall columns will fit in there. I have also started to strip the paint off those railings and will get them ready to paint.

Last Sunday I broke up the concrete pad that was at the foot of the porch in order to pour new and be able to build steps back up to the porch. A major reason for all this porch work was that the pad had dipped in the middle and rain water collected into a giant puddle at the foot of the porch steps. With proper slope we should be able to get rid of that problem. Pete stopped by last night and our plan is to dig out and pour a new pad this weekend.

I was looking through Rowan's pictures from her digital camera and selected these to show the pond. These were taken when we had emptied the girls' swimming pool into it. The hole in the bottom still needs to be patched so water has slowly leaked out. I'll get that done this fall too.

Happy 80th Birthday, Foxcroft!

Bess and Helen moved in to Foxcroft on Sept. 1-2, 1928. As we were sitting on the porch last night we wondered what the original elevation of the land was back then. Either a lot of dirt was brought in to raise the house since there are seven steps up to yard from the street, or else the street was dug out. Old photos lead us to believe the area near the houses were raised.

Here's to hoping that the next 80 are just as good.

Mailbag! Part 2

Picking up where we left off yesterday:

Commenting on Runner Up!
Jennifer said, "Congratulations! I love berry pie."

So did everyone. I'll make more next year certainly.

Commenting on I'm Floored By How It Looks
Tech Handyman said, "looks amazing! I will now have to read the rest of your blog. Be sure to keep us updated on the progress!!"

Umm sure, I have included your comment because it at least linked back to a blogger profile, but this seems a little spammish to me...

Commenting on On the Cutting Edge
StuccoHouse said, "Wow, that looks great."

Donald & Christie said, "Nice job! I like the verticle grain flooring. May i ask where you found it! Enjoyed you blog and will be watching for more! :)"

Stucco: Thanks! For those that haven't read her blog let me tell you, this is a highly valued compliment. She is one of those people who really does everything right with her historic home.

Donald & Christie: The flooring was from Friends of Historic Preservation's Salvage Barn. I helped pull it from a farm house outside Belle Plaine several years ago. This floor was used as interior floor, many of the pieces we pulled were over 12 feet long. You cannot get that quality lumber today.

Commenting on A Cool Thing About Elevation
Jenni said, "And you will never forget this comment...
“I will never ever forget this night!”
how sweet."

Thank you, Jeni. Like StuccoHouse, I read Jenni's blog often without commenting...

Commenting on Amateur Archivist
Captain Zamo said, "I lived in the basement of that house on golv with mick and helen in 1979. a family of racoons lived on the roof because helen often fed them. The famous Iowa Writer's Workshop was planned in the living room. mick worked for vance bourjally on blue bird farm."

Captain- I think you're the person who called me too, I was stripping paint when I talked to you and really wasn't focusing very well. I thought you were someone local calling to chat. I appreciate your call and information.

I am aware of the legend of the idea creating the Iowa Writer's Workshop being formed here. There is plenty of evidence confirming the friendship between Wibur Schramm's family and the Fox's: Wilbur Schramm autographed books found in the house and Bess' war time letters to Helen asking if she had read Wil's latest story in the "Saturday Evening Post," for example. But I cannot get any outside confirmation of that story from other sources... But that doesn't mean I don't repeat it or pass it along myself!

Mail Bag! Part One

I'm not always good about getting back to people who comment on posts. I'm always a little surprised that anyone comments on my posts, especially since I read many blogs without commenting. But I wanted to answer recent questions so here goes:

Commenting on As If We Didn't Have Enough Water!
Christine said, "I hope you fare well with all the flooding. Good luck!"

We did OK, the river crested 18 inches lower than expected due to downstream levies and dikes failing. Their misfortune was our gain. The lower crest prevented my office from flooding. A fellow ICCD teacher and her family have moved into the rental house behind us, their acreage along the Cedar River completed washed out.

Commenting on Ride the River
Kathy from NJ said, "Thank you for all these pictures. I am very happy that your family is all safe.

I was looking at some of the original house plans and am curious about the storm cellar. Was it ever built? Is the storm cellar part of the basement?"

As to the storm cellar, yes it was built. It is no longer part of the basement because at some point they walled it in. When I look I can see where the opening was. My guess is that the thing leaked water into the rest of the basement. 20 years after the house was built photos show a big cinder block cold frame for starting plants right above where the storm cellar would have extended beyond the house. I'm guessing that contributed to problems. After we had owned the house we discovered that the foundation wall on that side was cracked. 5 Deadmen in the Basement explains what we had to do about that.

Commenting on And Now For Something COMPLETELY Different
NV said, "Wow! How awesome to see that same closet a lifetime ago and to have unearthed such treasures inside. It's great that you have such a connection to the original owners. Also, glad you haven't floated away. Bad year for us Midwesterners."

Jimbo said, "Make dude man spring for a ticket to London too! Woo!"

Jennifer said, "Very cool! I say you send them with a personal escort... you of course!"

Sandy said, "Awesome! I agree with Jennifer."

My thoughts exactly! Lisa and the girls get to leave for California next week but since we are implementing a new student information system in the school district, I am extremely busy right now training people on it. Maybe I'll blow all my overtime pay on a ticket... or new wooden storms, sigh.


I'll comment on the rest of the recent comments tomorrow! I promise.

A Cool Thing About Elevation

With Lower City Park flooded this year we couldn’t get our usual shelter to cook out then watch fireworks. Iowa City decided to move the fireworks to Hubbard Park and to set them off after the last Jazzfest concert, with a scheduled start about 10:30. That would be too late for us. Lisa heard from one of the neighbors that you could see the Coralville fireworks from Finkbine golf course, near our house.

We packed up popcorn and drinks and rode the two tandem bikes to the driving range a little after 9:00 last night. No one else was there and we settled in on the bench above the range. Thirty seconds after we sat down the golf course sprinklers went on and doused us. We moved.

After half an hour of younger daughter asking if it was dark enough yet, we finally saw a tiny glow barely above the tree line off to the north. “IS that IT?” screamed the six year old.

“No, I think that’s the North Liberty fireworks.” I said. We watched them for a few minutes Then we saw tiny flares, barely above the tree line to the west.

“IS that IT?” screamed the six year old.

“No, I think that’s the Tiffin fireworks.” I said. We watched between the two for a few minutes. Then another set of fireworks started, barely above the tree line to the north, but east of North Liberty’s.

“Is THAT it?” screamed the six year old.

“No, I think that’s the Lake Macbride fireworks.” I said. We watched between the three places for a few minutes.

Suddenly a big firework explodeed MUCH higher in the sky. “Those are Coralville’s!” I said. We oohed and ahhed appropriately. Older daughter was very disappointed that being so far away we could barely hear the explosions.

After 20 minutes of watching there was suddenly a VERY LOUD explosion BEHIND us (to the east). We looked back and realized we could see the Iowa City fireworks too. Our heads were on swivels going between Coralville and Iowa City.

I told the girls, that’s the cool thing about being at the highest point in Johnson County, we could see 5 community’s fireworks all from the same place. Younger daughter commented on the way home that, “I will never ever forget this night!”

On the Cutting Edge

"Always take the short cut; and that is the rational one. Therefore say and do everything according to soundest reason."

-Marcus Aurelius, Meditations ix 33

On Saturday I finished nailing down the porch floor. I got out the trusty pneumatic floor nailer and had at it.

Since the threshold of the door extended over my ledgerboard i got to go "old school" and hammer in nails too:

I told Lisa I would have the whole thing done in an hour, but it really took me two and a half.

That was where I left everything on Saturday because we had guests coming in the afternoon to swim with the girls and stay for dinner.

On Sunday afternoon I snapped a line along the edge of the porch to even my boards up. I had let them "run wild" because I couldn't be sure how tightly each would butt against the house.

I put a new blade in the circle saw and with as steady a hand as I could muster I sawed the edges. Hence today's title:

I then sanded the the top of the cut edge to round it off a bit. Then I hit all the end grain with wood hardener. It looked so good, I did the entire porch with hardener for good measure. After waiting 4 hours I used wood filler to plug up gaps since the tongue never completely fills the groove. I didn't want little openings for water to migrate into.

After that was set up I hit the edge with 220 grit sandpaper and put a final coat of wood hardener over what I had just sanded.

This morning I got up early and put a second coat of stain over the whole porch. Tomorrow we should be able to walk on it.

Like Marcus Arurelius I have sound reasons for everything, but it certainly doesn't lead to the short cut!