After many, many days of rainy, grey weather, we are enjoying a few sunny days! You know you’re in the PNW when it hits 55 degrees and you see people out on the streets in shorts and tube tops. We took Fen to the dog park and she had a fun time running around through the mud puddles.
Last weekend, Aaron and I went out to the farm to trim all the brush and brambles from around the electrical cables. We are working to get electricity back on, and the company said they would be happy to come do the yard work for us – for $2500 extra dollars! We said no thanks – we can do it ourselves. 🙂 So we spent most of Sunday trying out our new buzzsaw on the end of a big stick (I’m sure there’s a more technical name for this tool). It worked great! Aaron worked hard cutting down limbs and branches, and I was the “hauler-away” person. He was impressed by my brute strength and said I am like Paul Bunyan. He is my Babe the Big Blue Ox. 🙂 Fen was “helping” by playing tug-of-war on the branches as I was trying to haul them to the pile. She LOVES life on the farm. I can’t wait to have her there full time.
Connie and Dave came up to visit us several weeks ago, and were helpful with things at our house (next steps in repairing the bathroom ceiling that fell through during the winter storms) and at the farm (trimming back branches around electrical cables). Connie took these beautiful macro photos around the property and I thought we had to share them!
We drove out to the farm this morning to check on things, and knew something was wrong as soon as we saw the gate to the driveway open. Someone cut the chain and lock with boltcutters, and kicked open the tool shed and the barn. Luckily, they didn’t seem to get into the house, and we didn’t actually see anything missing (there is so much junk there right now – nothing much of value to take!). It was strange that they likely drove in (why else break the gate – you can slip around it on the sides) but didn’t take anything that could’ve had SOME value – like the Crane sink, or the barbecue, or the riding lawnmower. We are grateful for that! We spent some time walking around to make sure everything was ok, and picked some spring flowers to take home before locking everything up again. We’ll be driving out more often to check on things – looking forward to having more happening there soon, so that it isn’t so empty!
One of the things I’m learning about Aaron is that once his interest in something is piqued, he goes 110% into research mode! In our efforts to get things going with the farm, he ordered about 40 used books on all aspects of home renovation and “green” living. He dreams of living completely off the land, wearing home-sewn clothes, canning, dehydrating pickling, and having as close to a zero impact footprint as possible! He now has a host of Excel documents detailing things like “planning out raised beds for gardening and researching companion planting techniques to maximize yield and repel pests and disease as naturally as possible.” (I just asked him to summarize this for me). 🙂
He surprised me with some books he picked out just for me as well – most on farmhouse style. He knows me well! One of my favorites is a book called “A Touch of Farmhouse Charm” by Liz Fourez – author of the blog Love Grows Wild. With all of the decor books out there, this one stands out to me because of the fun DIY projects inside! She has a whole list of things to make – from farmhouse signs, to pillow covers, to cake stands. Most of the projects are fairly simple, which I like – they can be done in a few hours! And the instructions are clear and easy to follow. Between work, farm, and wedding planning, there isn’t much time for additional things, so I’m looking forward to summer when life will be lighter and we can do some fun projects together.
Happy Sabbath! We are enjoying a quiet, rainy day here in Tacoma.
Progress on the farm seems to be slow… there are so many questions that are constantly popping up, and they all seem to depend on answers we don’t yet have. The farmhouse is originally a two bed, one bath home – so, tiny! We’ve been working on drawing up plans for several months now (many, many versions of plans) that add several more bedrooms and bathrooms to make it more of a family home. We are fine with the rooms being small – that’s part of what we like about the original home. But the additions we want need approval from an engineer because they would significantly change the layout and weight of the home.
Aaron scheduled a meeting with an engineer in Lakewood for yesterday morning. We asked Aaron’s dad, Dave, and my mom to come up to be at the meeting with us, as both of them have a lot of experience in different areas of home building and design. We couldn’t believe it when Dave called us on Thursday night and said there was a huge landslide on I-5 and he would be delayed by several hours. He waited, and waited, and waited in traffic to get off of the freeway and try to find another way around… and after many hours finally decided to turn back home. We were disappointed that he couldn’t make it up, but understood that it didn’t make sense for him to keep pushing north when there were so many delays. Then we got another phone call about an hour later – Dave was in a car accident that totaled his car! We felt so badly that this happened, especially as he was making such an effort to come help us at the appointment. Thankfully, Dave is ok and doesn’t have any physical injuries from the crash, even though it shattered his windshield and deployed his airbag!
The three of us – Aaron, my mom, and I – met with the engineer yesterday morning to talk about the options for the house. It was a helpful appointment, but like the ones before, left us with more questions than answers! There are all sorts of things we have to consider now – if you change more than 50% of a house in WA, you have to update the whole house to current standards/codes. Of course we want the house to be safe – but that means a lot of things, like changing the staircase to be a bit wider on each step and less steep… something that could cost several thousand dollars with moving walls, etc. to accommodate the new  set-up. As Aaron says, “it’s one of those spiraling things…” Each change leads to more changes we have to make!
So our next steps mean that we need to assess for several things before deciding what changes to make on the house. Even though the original foundation to the house is in solid condition, we would have to supplement it to do the additions we hope for. This means having a crew come in and lift the house, pour additional concrete foundation around the post and pier, and then set the house back down. This is an expensive process, and can run between $10,000 – $20,000! So we need a quote on exactly what that would cost. We also need to have someone come out to assess the septic to see if we need to replace that with the new bedroom additions, and we need someone to check our spring water to see if it’s usable as is or if we’ll need to dig a well.
In the meantime, we are enjoying driving out each weekend to check on things… a few weeks ago, we planted several hundred daffodil bulbs that my dad gave us. It will be fun to see those spring up sometime soon. One of my students who knows we are working on the farm suggested we visit a store in Seattle called “Second Use Building Supplies” – we went last weekend and had so much fun! We will have. definitely be checking back regularly to see what they have. Some of the things that caught our eye were:
- Fir flooring that would match the original fir floors in the farm
- An old Crane sink – similar to the original one at the farm – for a hefty price! Makes us sure we want to clean ours up and use it!
- An old, 42-inch front door salvaged from a 1906 Capitol Hill house in Seattle
- Several multi-faucet trough sinks
- A clawfoot tub
- A gorgeous Viking range – it had already sold when we saw it, and had three “waitlist” tags on it!
The best news is that they just put a Second Use store in Tacoma – just a few miles away! So we’ll be checking in there regularly as well. I’m realizing that I’m kind of a “bargain bragger…” If someone likes something I paid full price for, I usually respond with a quiet “thank you.” But if someone compliments something I got a great deal on, it’s like “THANKS!!! You’ll never guess how much I paid for this?! It was such an amazing deal!!! Let me tell you about it!!!” I’m looking forward to what will be the most fun of this whole process for me – finding great deals on home things that I love! 🙂
As I sit looking out at the gentle rolling waves of the Pacific Ocean preparing to have Christmas with Lindsey’s family, I still have trouble wrapping my mind around the magical and life altering events of the past year and a half. When friends introduced me to Lindsey, I was hopeful that we would have a fun date and maybe it would blossom into a relationship, but I never could have imagined that a year and a half later I would be asking her to marry me. Every date, every moment, seemed to draw us closer together and it just fit. I knew she was the one. While we did talk about marriage prior to November and started working on our Fettig Farm together, there was still one step remaining… the proposal.
Earlier in the year, my family was kind enough to give me a break from the B&B and unbeknownst to Lindsey, I snuck down to Seal Rock, Oregon to have a chat with her parents. We discussed our relationship and our dreams for the future. It was simultaneously one of the most nerve racking and exciting moments of my life. I am so thankful for my future in-laws and their continuing love and support. In addition to our little talk, there was another element to my visit. Lindsey has always wanted to wear her great grandma’s wedding ring, a beautiful vintage platinum ring from 1895. With the help of Lindsey’s mom, I had the ring cleaned, repaired, and resized.
And then one magical November day I proposed. My original plan changed a few times but I finally settled on proposing at Pittock Mansion in Portland, a Renaissance-style château built in 1909. I liked the vintage sitting which matched the ring as well as Lindsey’s style and likes. I was beyond nervous and was shaking like crazy, but got down on one knee in front of the grand staircase, Christmas piano music softly playing in the background, and asked the love of my life to marry me. And after a second that felt like an eternity, Lindsey said yes. The remainder of the day was a blur. We had a quick lunch with my parents before heading down to Lindsey’s parents for Thanksgiving. And along the way we called friends and family and chatted about wedding ideas.
We are now in the process of planing our dream wedding for May 28th, 2017 and are so excited to share this next step of our life with our friends, family, and loved ones.
Things are quiet at the farm right now. Aaron and I have been driving out every weekend to feed the several feral cats that live there to keep the mouse population under control. We bought a big auto-feed container that dispenses food as it gets eaten – it’s always gone when we check in, so either the cats are eating it or something else is! Hopefully the cats. When we were there yesterday, we saw one of them… a pretty, small, black cat who was very skittish and ran off as soon as she saw Fen. Fen was so funny… barking and growling with her hackles up. She thinks she’s Queen of the Farm.
Aaron is working away today on a foam board model of the farmhouse. We appreciate my mom who’s spent many hours creating multiple versions of drawings and layouts for us to consider! The 3D model should also help us figure out exactly what we want so that we can get plans nailed down. Aaron is working with an architect and engineer who will be coming out to see the farm soon to help us draw up the formal plans that will be approved by the city. We’re hoping to get moving on that sooner than later, as we’re sure that things will pick up for contractors in the spring.
During our visit yesterday, we spent about an hour walking around and thinking of ideas for things… we are looking at perhaps doing solar tiles for the roof (Aaron found out that Elon Musk is putting out new, less expensive tiles this spring – Aaron loves what they do, and I like how they look compared to solar panels, even though I find myself pulled back to the idea of a corrugated tin roof), painting two of the currently red outbuildings a pretty charcoal grey, maybe doing a circular driveway, and putting together some big planter boxes for vegetable gardening.
We continue to be daunted by the amount of junk around the farm… yesterday, we noticed a set of lawn chairs and a grill almost completely covered by grape vines in the front yard! Both Aaron and I have some time off in January and we may try to devote a good chunk of that to hauling things to recycling and the dump. We mentioned again yesterday how thankful we are for good family who came to help us do a very successful demo day a month or two ago.
It is stormy here in Washington! We’ve had several long, full days of heavy rain and winds that are expected to be 50+ miles per hour tonight and tomorrow morning. Yesterday as I was leaving for work, I heard water running in the bathroom (at home in Tacoma – not at the farm). When I went upstairs to check on it, I saw a huge portion of the ceiling was caving in! The latex paint had basically turned into a big water balloon holding gallons of rainwater that was leaking in from a hole in the roof where some of the shingles had blown off and the plastic panel underneath had either worn away or wasn’t put on properly. Luckily someone was able to come out right away to help us do a temporary seal so that it’s watertight for the rest of the weekend until a roofer can come out on Tuesday.
We drove out to the farm this afternoon to make sure that everything was ok and that no trees had fallen onto the house. We did see several downed trees and lots with broken branches, including one of the pear trees lining the driveway, but the buildings all seem to be intact.
Aaron just made a batch of homemade crockpot hot chocolate – yum. The recipe says it’s supposed to simmer for three hours… I’m thinking that could be a flexible estimate. 🙂 I’m grateful for Aaron, who’s helped me with so much over the last few days, cozy living rooms, candles, and a dry house! We hope everyone else is staying safe and warm in the storm.
Lindsey here! We don’t have too many new pictures to put up, as we are deep in the process of paperwork – many visits to county offices and phone calls to insurance companies and city services. My mom and dad came up to visit for a few days this week and spent hours working at the farm while I was at work at school! We appreciate them.
Some of the ongoing projects while we get all of the permits we need include sorting through the piles and piles of old things on the property. We are quickly learning that the family who lived there kept EVERYTHING! We’re up to a count of about 18 broken-down lawnmowers now, and in every cupboard and corner, we find new “treasures.” There is a landfill about three miles from the farm that takes most materials and doesn’t charge for recycling, so we are trying to sort old and unusable things into piles of metal, plastic, rubber, etc. We have a new (to us) trailer to haul things back and forth, which is helpful.
While walking around the property a few days ago, we came across five different LARGE piles of bear scat! We are obviously not in downtown Tacoma anymore! The fruit trees are dropping loads of dead-ripe summer/fall fruit, so I’m sure the bears are gorging themselves at night. We’ll be keeping a close eye on Fen as she roams around the property! One of the best parts of being at the farm is watching her barrel race around, full-speed, going as fast as her chubby puppy-body can take her. She loves it there.