GETTING THINGS DONE THE WARNOCK WAY

Hallie and Nick at the raised bed

On Thursday (June 25), daughter Hallie and family arrived before 4:00 p.m., and Hallie immediately set to work to replace the old raised bed with new boards. To press forward and get things done is the Warnock way, but the forecast of rain on Friday was also a motivating factor. It was a chilly, rainy weekend.

Silas on his tree swing

The next day (Friday), sons Murray and Clint arrived to participate in the workday, but Mike had already accomplished most of what they expected to do. Mike’s priority was his new “toy,” the wood splitter, and they helped him move it from the kitchen porch to the barn where they tried it out. Meanwhile, Hallie installed a new faucet in the downstairs bathroom – her gift, she said. They all finished the raised bed as much as possible, and Clint agreed to return on Sunday with more raised bed materials from town – and that happened.

Saturday, I enjoyed watching Silas run back and forth across the yard behind Grandpa Mike as he worked from shed to barn and back to shed. Silas often spoke of “the zone,” though he never revealed exactly what the zone was. Apparently there was more than one zone, and some places weren’t in a zone.

Yes, dust bunnies under keyboard

Hallie took on another project – Mother’s old piano.  My dad insisted that every piano needed to be tuned annually, but this old piano just isn’t worth hiring a professional tuner. It was my dad’s studio piano for years, and then Mother taught on it. What I’m saying is that it’s not only old but also worn out, so Hallie decided to take it apart and clean it, just for the experience. Turns out that it needed a good cleaning. Just look at that matted dust!

Uncle Clint with Silas

Nick, Hallie’s husband, enjoys picking berries and making jelly. He scouted around and found a currant bush on the property and then made a small batch of jelly. He seemed disappointed in it, but jelly-making is always an experiment. The berries, the pectin, the sugar – it comes together differently every year. Nothing wrong with having syrup for your ice cream.

On Monday, Hallie and family left for home, and Mike and I went back to town, stopping at the transfer station to get rid of the refuse on the pickup (paid $12.75) and then delivering a tailgate and bumper to the salvage place (received $5.10). While in town, a nagging pain in Mike’s jaw exploded into excruciating pain, and on Thursday (July 2), a wisdom tooth was extracted. He also had an MRI on his leg for diagnosis of an injury. KW