Here is John

covered in _ _ _ _ !!!!

Yesterday I got 800lbs of manure

and spread it in my raised gardens!!!!

I hope you had a good day too!!!

Remember, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of another, peace, john

The saga of the awning!!!!! Well, here goes - about two weeks ago Sandy and I bought an awning for our deck... We purchased it by phone after seeing it on-line. It is coming from company called SunSetter Products in Malden, MA. It, the parts in 6 boxes arrived in the rain last Friday, March 16, 2007....................... It was dropped shipped by UPS Freight... a big 18 wheeler stopped in front of our house and the driver and I carried the parts to the house....

Oh, I forgot to tell you this is a 20 foot awning so the rollers it

came in were about 21 feet long - two of them, one with the roller and one with the fabric.... pictures are in order..

Well okay, it was raining all day Friday so I read the directions. Then Saturday came and for me it started around 4 AM........ couldn't sleep thinking about the awning and the soon to arrive EXCELLENT adventure, putting it up.... also, it was St. Patty's day we were going to Dennis and Marie for Irish for and stuff.... BRILLIANT!!! We had a great time there, but that time came at 5 PM and I still have 13 hours to go

Sooooo, I read the directions... Well as luck would have it, it started snowing (no pictures this time).... so, I watched the installation video, and read the directions again.... and I got out my tools.... You may have noticed the bag of pecans in the upper left hand corner, they are yummy, I buy them from a place in South Georgia.... oh yah, and there are the directions.....

A break in the snow came and I went outside and measured and marked so that when the time came, I, we would be prepared to get with it.......... By the way, the instructions are numbered, and number one is a list of "before starting you will need" and the first item is "an assistant." I had three assistants, Sandy, Dennis, and St. Patrick.... Sandy and St. Patrick helped on Saturday and Dennis helped on Sunday. It stopped snowing around noon and so Sandy and I started working.

We got out the roller and the fabric and laid them across three chairs...........

At this point, we have done several steps and have the fabric on the roller...

Wow, that looks big.......... It also looks a little like a giant mechanical Anaconda getting ready to suck the life source out of me?

Next we, Sandy and I, (St. Patrick was out to lunch) leaned all of this against the wall so that we could attach it to the house... I am making a long story short, believe me. In between ever activity, I went in the house to get warm and read the next direction....

Here is Sandy holding up her end.... which, she did all day long in the cold and wind. Very brave lady... my love!!!!

While you cannot see it here, I did not take a picture, we finished attaching it to the house in time to go to Dennis and Marie's at 5 PM for dinner.......

Sunday, Dennis came over after church and we made a couple of more attachments and fine tuned the awning...... as you can see, it was still cold.... and, St. Patrick had left for another year!!!

But did you notice, the awning is Green...Evergreen... and, Sandy picked the color!!!!

And there it is all rolled up and waiting for a nice day to be opened and used...... another excellent adventure................... thanks for reading...

Remember, take good care of yourself so you can take good care of someone else... God bless you all... john