Painting is not just painting.

That's right, painting is not just painting. It's also power washing and scraping and sanding and priming. Charlie the painter and his assistant, Randy, have been hard at work for 3 weeks now, and they’re almost ready to open the paint cans. Prepping this house for painting is a tedious, seemingly endless job ... I'm sure glad I'm not the one doing it! Charlie says he's beginning to see the light at the end of the tunnel, though ... just a few more non-rainy days should do it, then the actual painting will be a piece of cake.


Here’s Charlie on an awesome piece of equipment we call the "man-lift." It's pretty cool. Charlie can move it around and manipulate the position of the basket without leaving the basket. It moves at the heart-stopping speed of about 1 mile per hour, which somewhat lowers the danger of the operator getting thrown from the basket accidentally.


And here's the front of the house after power washing and sanding and scraping. Some of the trim has been primed already. Also, take a gander at the new half-round window in the attic. Notice the window guys forgot to take the label off the outside of the window. Never fear – Charlie can take it off when he goes up there in the man-lift to paint.


Our electrician, Stacey, is hard at work updating all the wiring on the second floor (my brother Alan did most of the work on the first floor already, enabling us to move in when we did last summer), and Charlie used a couple of rainy days a while back to paint the room that will be my studio/office, so it won't be too long before I'm able to move out of the breakfast nook where I've been working for a year and a bit. I can hardly wait! And even though the vista is beautiful from up there, I will miss this view whenever I look up from my work to gaze out the window here in the breakfast nook:

Holy Spirit, Peace divine!
Still this restless heart of mine;
Speak to calm this tossing sea,
Stayed in Thy tranquillity.

– Samuel Longfellow, (1819-1892)


Whenever we are outwardly excited we should cease to act; but whenever we have a message from the spirit within, we should execute it with calmness. A fine day may excite one to act, but it is much better that we act from the calm spirit in any day, be the outward what it may.

– J. P. Greaves