We moved

Things have been busy, so I've had little time to write. I had a big paint job in Knoxville to finish, and we moved our household. The house we moved into was quite thrashed; but I've learned something in the process. With a large family, if we moved into a pristine house, it would be inevitable that we bring it down a notch or two. The children make paths in the yard where they play, things like that.
But if we move into a really beat up house, then do repairs, it brings the look of the place up 5 or 6 notches, at least. That's how it appears to be working out here. The landlord is happy, the wife is happy, probably the neighbors too, and it's fun for me to do the repairs.
This house was built in 1900. It looks like it had wood siding, which was later covered with those 12 inch tall by 24 inch wide tiles. Some of the tiles have broken, which makes the place look bad. A hodge podge paint job doesn't help either. I don't want to be working with that old tile material, but as it turns out, I don't have to. The rent here is pretty cheap, which suits me fine, 'cause I'm the king of cheap. His majesty was quite pleased to realize that all these scraps of “Polymetal”, which is a knockoff of “Diebond”, work well as replacement tile pieces. I had a number of 12 inch by 8 foot long pieces, imagine that. This material is a layer of black PVC plastic, about 1/8 inch thick in the middle, with a thin sheet of aluminum of both sides. It's light, rigid, resists weathering well, and comes with a nice painted finish. The pieces I have are white. I'll try to insert a couple of before and after pictures below

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Not only are we able to do some renovations, but I like other things about this place as well. We get along with the new landlord better than the old one; I'll skip the details. This one lets the kids go into the hay field, he lets me use part of the barn for working and storing paint. The barn! Man, what a neat old structure. It's a two crib, hand hewn cantaliever design. It's had extra parts and newer roofing put on, so you can't see it's history from the road, but it's all obvious from within.
A little looking around has revealed that this Boyds Creek area is rich in history, and historic structures. I once had hopes of renovating bad looking structures and walls in Knoxville, but decided that it would be better to work closer to home, in the Seymour area. I have what seems like some neat ideas, but that's another topic, I'll probably handle it through my other website, Donahuesignarts.com
Years ago, I spent a lot more time in the woods, I taught my children to labor by using a crosscut saw with them, to get all our firewood. There are something like 60 different kinds of trees here in East Tn. If you like hardwood trees, this is a real joy. So now I'm back to going in the woods with antique tools and the younger children. I make things out of dead trees; mauls from Hickory, gluts (wooden wedges) from Dogwood, fence posts from Locust and Cedar.