All junk

We are scheduled to close on a house this week. We were asked to make an offer on the house because it has some issues. The owner had health problems which were caused by a stroke if I remember correctly. Family just wants rid of the house and the state gets the proceeds to pay for medical costs.

The house is being sold as is where is and all the junk in it goes with the house. There is about 2 foot of stuff piled across the floor. Kinda curious what is in the unopened packages that came in the mail.

Matthew told me if there was still free pizza with the tear off proof of purchase on the boxes we could get a lot of free pizza.

Makes one wonder how anyone could live in the house. How do you walk on top of 2 foot of trash. When we met the family member to look at the house, she wanted us to make an offer without going inside. She was embarassed with the condition of the inside. Our answer was no unlocked door and we walk away. We don't do blind purchases.

There was not even a path through the junk. Had to climb up at the front door and walk over the top.

We encouraged the family to look for another buyer who might give them a higher price. I told the attourney who contacted us to look for another buyer. We know we do not have the highest bids in Oskaloosa right now for this kind of houses. I even gave them some ideas of where to look for another buyer. They took our offer.

 This is going to take us a while to haul empty when we get around to cleaning it out.

Question is did the community fail this man. Did he need help and no one was there to provide it. I know family members cleaned out the house once. When they requested guardianship they were denied. We do have people who are failing. How do we help them if they don't think they need help?

 

A time to think

Sharon and I went away for a few days

It was a time to slow down just a bit and think about things.

Sharon loves to walk trails.

We were walking along the top of a bluff.

I have a bad habit of wandering off the trails. I called back to Sharon "be careful the ground isn't stable here." Yea, it wasn't. I tried to catch hold of a tree as I fell. Sharon says she just remembers me spinning like a top. 

No broken bones just a couple of gashes.

I did learn to hang onto trees when the footing was iffy after that.

When looking at sharon's photos, I see I was on my phone dealing with issues too much of the time. Here I had just got back up the bluff and into the parking lot and have to answer someone. Still a bit shaky and honestly feeling some shock.

On the beach the next day dealing with another issue.

Oh, look, once again answering someone.

I spent some time this trying to figure out how to righteously deal with some situations. Cain asked God "Am I my brother's keeper?" That is a question I ask myself. Cain was asking because he had killed his brother and did not want to confess. 

I am asking myself that question because we have tenants who are not paying. There is always a reason why they have no money. The dog food was purchased. The dumpster is full of garbage every week but they have no money for rent. My response has been, "I am not your daddy. I can't support you." But I have been supporting them by supplying unpaid for housing.

Sharon took a picture of this waterfall. It is fake. The city pumps the water up to a high point and there you have it, a waterfall, but it is fake. I don't want to be a fake servant of Jesus and not live like he commanded. I don't want to be walking on ground that is not stable and end up falling off the cliff morally. 

This stone formation is called the devils door. I want to walk with God and not walk through the devil's door of selfishness, but I would be wrong to enable tenants to buy many "things" and not pay the rent because they think "he is too nice to make us pay".

So I needed some time to walk and think. I may have a responsibility to care for the poor, but first off they need to be poor. I have been told by tenants they can not work because they got hurt. They are talking to the wrong guy there. I have nerve and muscle damage in my arms from an accident when I was a teenager. My father was deaf, my maternal grandfather was blind. My paternal greatgrandfather had a wooden leg. All of us worked and paid our bills. 

So how do I treat those who owe us with love. Sometimes what is required is a hard lesson, there are priorities in life. If you have 3 bags of dog food in the house and haven't paid me, you are moving on out because the dog is more important than me. The dog may be important to them but someone else can support it, not me.

Yea I think that is justice. 

If they could pay the rent when they earned $15 per hour but now can't when they earn $18 per hour (inflation is 8% and the pay raise was 20%), They are going to be moving out. 

Yes, I think that is justice.

And what does God rquire of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God. Micah 6:8

I need to walk that fine line with both mercy and justice. The hebrew word for mercy is hesed, but it means mercy with justice

 

Windows are in and painting begun

We are finally working on a house we purchased last Fall. We kept shoving it back on our list of things to get done but the time has come to get it remodeled. The electrician has gotten the fuse box replaced with a breaker panel and the HVAC guys have put in central air. Now it is up to us to get all the cosmetic stuff done.

 I think the house was a landmark in Oskaloosa. You knew where you were because the green house really stuck out as you were driving down A Ave.

The screened in front porch had degraded since we purchased the house. This photo was taken the day we made an offer on it. After we purchased it one of the screens blew out and the screen door was sagging badly.

This afternoon all the windows have been replaced and we have started painting. (by we, I mean me as Matthew seems to never have time to paint. He made the statement last night that no one except him seems to go into attics and crawl spaces. My reply was no one except me seems to be able to pick up a paint brush or roller.) We enclosed the screened porch and made it a 3 seasons room.

This photo was also taken on the day we made an offer on the house. The windows were so bad, 1 of them actually blew out last winter. That was when we shut the heat off and let the house freeze up. There were 1/2 inch gaps around the windows. 

This is the same side with new windows and one much smaller window in the bathroom. A window at toilet level just seemed such a bad idea.

We are now to the place the house is almost sealed up. We have added insulation where there was none and the windows are tight in the frames and double pane. We can keep heat and cool in and the elements out.

I know commentators who like to talk about the Old testament Israelites building a wall and equating it with building a wall to keep out immigrants from this country. That Old testament story of building a wall around Jerusalem has nothing to do with the movements of people. It is about what you are letting into your life.

We put in windows and insulation to keep the house temperature stable and keep the wildlife and birds out. We all need tight walls in our lives. We need to be discerning about what we let into our lives. What do we read on the internet, what do we watch on TV, what books do we read and what shows do we attend? Make sure the windows of your life are keeping the world out. make sure the insulation of your life is keeping out all that will lead you away from the will of God.

I don't believe in banning books, but I do believe that everyone needs to be discerning. I read things I disagree with so I can hone what I believe. I have read the Koran and the Book of Morman, but I refuse to read books laced with profanity or explicit sex. 

I am willing to read what others believe so I can formulate my response but I have no desire to visit the gutter. 

Build walls around your life to be sanctified, not to shut out everything by putting on blinders.

 

It's my birthday and I'll cry if I want to.

Yesterday was my Birthday. It was definately not the best birthday I have had. Ok so I cried part of the day. Sharon is the light of my life. Yesterday we had verification that cancer is once again growing in her bone marrow.

That was quite a blow. I do not know what I would do without Sharon in my life. I have now had 24 hours to process the bad news and can realize that Sharon has beat this before and she can beat it again. God stepped in 11 years ago and life has been grand since then. There were a few other younger women who also had this rare cancer when she was diagnosed over 20 year ago. They all passed away within a few years. God gave Sharon life and continues to give her life. God answered prayers.

 

For the last few years every blood test didn't feel like it could be a disaster. Now that complacency and comfort are gone. We have a new reality. Once again we are crying out to God to give healing. 11 years ago a new drug was available out of East Germany with the fall of the Berlin Wall. It may not even have been the drug that killed the cancer back. There was a corelation to prayer and healing. 11 years is a long time but I wanted another 30 years.

Now we are looking at a future of sometimes fear and sometimes joy, but we know God has it all in his hand. I don't have much to write because I am still reeling between everything is going to be fine and the fear of what if it isn't. 

All I can say is ya'll better be praying for healing for Sharon, because she is the one that keeps me on an even keel. You really don't want her not influencing me every day.

Clutter

We finished remodeling a house today. That means everything needs to be moved out. All tools, 

supplies, cabinets

dry wall and plumbing supplies

windows and any appliances

paint, brushes and rollers

It all needed to go somewhere so we moved it to the next house on our list.

We are going to need several days just to get all the stuff we moved organized and sorted.

Our storage facilities are full, so we need to go though both of those and see if there is anything we can ship to the landfill. We have to much stuff in this house to even start working on this thing.

This is the house we just finished. 3 days ago you could not see the floor in the living room. Now it is cleaned out and looks great.

The rooms are empty, look inviting and usable.

Micah and matthew put the bathroom together and it is almost a work of art.

The kitchen was full of tools yesterday morning. This afternoon it is clean and ready for a family to move in. 

I know a lot of the "stuff" we carried out of the house the last few days has value. But it was cluttering up the house it was in and the house was not livable. I see people living in houses that look a lot like the one we now have full of stuff. We are going to sort it, hang the cupboards on the walls. Use the cans of paint. Install the trim. Put in the new windows. Lay the new floors. When we are finished the house will be empty because we will have used all the "stuff". The people I see living in houses that are filled with "stuff" are not using the "stuff". They just can't let it go. 

I can easily keep the junk out of the house I live in, but can I keep the junk out of my mental, emotional, and spiritual life? Do I hang on to mental clutter I don't need? Do I get upset about something and let it clutter up my mind and life instead of just letting it go? 

We all need to step back sometimes to try to see the big picture and let the little stuff go. Clean out the clutter and set our eyes on God's kingdom. That is my goal. How about you?

 My grandson Caleb says goodbye

something saved, something replaced

When we purchased the house we are working on now, we put new flooring in the estimate.

There were holes in the flooring and it was baddly scarred in places. After some time looking at the floors and the problems with them, I decided to try to save the old fir floors.

Got out the "Rock Hard " wood putty and filled holes. Then got out the orbital sander to sand them smooth. That is when you find out why they call it "Rock Hard" wood putty. I went through a few sanding discs.

Stained the scratches and the wood putty. I have one room ready for a coat of polyurathane. Floors over 100 years old and still looking pretty good after some work.

The kitchen floor was roll linoleum. It had to be replaced. Bought 12 mil thick flooring at Modern Floor Covering. Matthew installed it and it is a beautiful floor. I do hope whoever the tenants turn out to be, they will treat it well.

We are still a long way from finished with this house and we have 4 more to remodel after we get this one done, but we have the bathrooms finished. Shower is tiled, vanities and toilets are in. Still need to caulk around tub and vanity tops but that is a quick job

 

We have been purchasing larger 2 bathroom houses which take longer to remodel, but they are in high demand.

We decided to save most of the floors even though it will trake some work, but we gutted the bathrooms and started over. That is the way most of life is, some things can be saved if you are willing to put in the work, and some things just need to be thrown out so you can start over.

I see a lot of relationships fail. Got a call this week from a young woman looking to rent a house. It saddened me becasue the only reason she would be looking for a house is she is leaving her "fiance". That means their little child will growing up with her parents in 2 different homes. I wonder could the relationship be saved if they put in some work, or was it doomed and needed to be thrown out. 

They had never made the committment of marriage. That does make it easier to throw out the relationship instead of putting in the work to make it shine like new. 

I know there are relationships that need to be ended but we live in a culture where the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence. Reality is, change and abondment is seldom better.

small changes count

We finished the last ceiling that needed to be fixed this week

The hot water radiators on the second floor had leaked and left cracked and stained ceilings on the first floor. I hate working over my head so it was a great relief to get the last one done. The truth is I had forgotten about this one until Sharon pointed it out last week. I think Matthew was ignoring it, maybe hoping it would fix itself.

This is the best picture I have of the kitchen when we purchased the house. There were no upper cabinets and that strange cut back into the wall to recess the fridge. They might have done that because the island was too close to the fridge. We are shortening the island, moving the stove out of the corner, and moving the fridge over as well.

We added a lot of cabinets. This is the best picture I had. The cabinets stretch another 5 feet to the right of this picture. I do love the new floor in the kitchen "work" area. The kitchen is huge. There will be seating by the island, room for a table on the tile floor and a table on the oak floor. I wish we had this kind of room in our kitchen.

One of our remaining big projects is the countertops.

The original shower upstairs needed a little help.

We have it tiled, grouted, and sealed. It was a double shower when we bought the house and the boys were adamant that we keep the double shower. We showed the house to a prospective buyer yesterday and they loved the shower.

Matthew built all the bathroom storage and vanities for both bathrooms.

Solid wood construction

We have been working on this old house for a long time. Micah asked on Friday if we had owned it for a year already. Nope we bought it in August and remodeled 2 other houses after we purchased this one.

It has been, and still is a big project. We are used to houses 1000 square feet or less, this one is 3300 square feet. More than 3 times larger than our normal projects.

We hope to wrap it up in the next month and move on to a couple of other houses we have purchased that need major work.

When I look at this house at the end of any week it feels like we have made no progress. Every week it looks like we have only made small improvements, but those small improvements are adding up over time. That's a lot like life. Small changes in attitude and behavior add up over time and make life a lot more enjoyable. Those small changes in my life might make life more enjoyable for those around me as well. Some think they want to relive their youth. I don't. I don't think I would approve of the person I was at 20 years old any more. I would tell that guy to be kinder and more thoughtful of the people around him. I do hope 10 years from now I don't look back and think the same thing about the person  am now.