Pittsboro, NC

I didn't really have anything I wanted to do today, so I went out to Siler City and did some hedge trimming.  Man, it was hot!!

The bushes had gotten a little "large" again.....

I got a nice powerful hedge-trimmer from the City and went to town on trimming!  

I understand boxwoods recover from even fierce trimming.....so I assume these will be green again eventually!

Pittsboro, NC

Got a text from our neighbor in Oriental.  He said the boat looked fine but there is a tree across our driveway.   Glad that's all the damage.  Duane will make quick work of clearing the tree next time we're there.   Thanks for the photo Jerry!!

Pittsboro, NC

We're back in Pittsboro - and the storm has passed.   We only got a bunch of rain, no wind to speak of.

Should be a beautiful day today though.   Don't know how the boat fared last night....hopefully we can contact a neighbor and get a looksie. 

Oriental, NC

We got all the lawn furniture stacked and ready for the storm.  If the surge floods the lot, it should just wash right over the pile.  It will be a mess but shouldn't move or wash away much.

Then we spent a good amount of time this morning centering the boat in the slip with double lines.  Since the storm seems to be trending west of Oriental, we're thinking the boat will be fine (knock wood). 

And we're off, driving back to Pittsboro. 

Oriental, NC

Finishing up our storm prep....boat is tied up with double lines.

And we wrapped the mailsail to make sure it doesn't get damaged.   I removed all the canvas enclosure as well. 

But now the storm looks like it's going to track inland a good bit - so we probably won't even see tropical storm force winds.   Oh well, this often occurs as storms make their way northward. 

Oriental, NC

It was raining buckets....nothing to do with the tropical storm headed our way tomorrow night. 

But by evening it had stopped raining and all was calm.

Made it back to the boat....and it was a steaming evening!! 

No worries - opened the hatches for a while to let out some of the worst of the heat, then cranked up the a/c units.  All was cozy in no time.   Still looking at the hurricane forecast.  Seems to be wobbling around but staying close to us at landfall. 

Pittsboro, NC

With Hurricane Isaias bearing down on Oriental, we're going to head down for a few days and secure the boat (and maybe do a little to secure What If as well). 

I'd brought the 4 pillows from the guest berth home and bleached/washed them since they'd had no attention in 3 years!  But they're kinda in the way most of the time. 

Got another one of those extra large vacuum bags - and sucked all the air out.  Amazing transformation!

This will stow and take up much less space.  Open it up with fresh laundered pillows the next time guests are on board.

Pittsboro, NC

I went to Asheboro to help out Richard.  He had a jet coming at the same time that he needed to be on a Zoom meeting of the Airport Authority.

So I got to use the new fuel truck for the first time to fuel this Falcon 900.  Easy peasy.

Pittsboro, NC

Not a lot going on!  Just hot and muggy.... I did a few errands and the only other thing of note was "outdoor book club".   Fun getting together and we're careful to not breathe on each other!

Pittsboro, NC

I have a couple of old shirts that have lost almost all of their tie-dye coloring over the years.  I had some left-over dye in the basement and decided it was time to give them a bit of color back.

The usual process.  Twist them up into a ring.

And squeeze on the dye in random patterns.

After sitting in the sun for a few hours to set the dye, I un-furled them and left them to bake dry.   They're always so brilliant at this point in the process.

They do get much more "muddled" after the first washing....but still much nicer than the faded color before.

Pittsboro, NC

Pat had asked if I could do a small alteration to an awning he had purchased, so I got to work on it in the basement.  It just needed shortened 4" to fit his structure.  Easy peasy, just bulky.  The story of my sewing life.....

The guys got it installed in no time with just a small amount of help from the girls.

Was a beautiful day to be outside!  Hot, hot, hot but the pool made it nice.

Pat testing the new awning out.

Looking good!

And poor A.D....she has a new-fangled "cone of shame" around her neck but doesn't seem to mind.  It's there to keep her from bothering boo-boo on her foot.

Spent the rest of the evening at the pool, visiting and a quick little spur-of-the-moment cook-out.

Pittsboro, NC

Back home after a month away.  We had left the a/c set at 85 in the house just to keep everything fresh.  It worked - no musty smell.  Our lawn had just been mowed and all was just as we left it. 

Pretty early, hazy early morning photo from the deck.

Oriental, NC

Pretty sunrise this morning!!  We're packing up to head to Pittsboro for a while, no nothing much of interest today.

Oriental, NC

Ed and Cathy got an identical motor for their dinghy a few weeks ago.  Ed mentioned that he noticed that we had covered up the air intake at the rear of the motor with our Sunbrella cover....so that went on the list of things to rectify. 

This is the concerned area.  The motor seemed fine all winter....but more air available has got to be good for an engine.

So we marked the cover and took it inside for alteration.

Simple construction with a leftover piece of Phiphertex leaves that area breathing room.  

And for those of you interested,  Duane's been doing all sorts of sketches of the new charging system.....glad it's him and not me!!  (Not my cup of tea!)

Oriental, NC

Our side sunshades were in need of some TLC.  They were on the boat when we bought it and I haven't done anything to repair them.  This year in the Bahamas, we used them quite a bit and it shows.  The material is a tough open fiber - but the areas where it contacted the stainless lifeline stanchions eventually wore thru.

Also, almost all of the  attaching hardware had ripped somewhat.

So I just set about making patches out of some thick rip-stop nylon.  Then we reinstalled all the hardware in the same places.  (The blue marker is water soluble disappearing ink.)

More patches.  Hopefully these won't pull out for some number of years!

And 4 layers of patch for the rubbed-thru whole.

It may not look like much, but I counted 22 patches (the shade is about 14 feet long) and took most of the day.  Luckily, most of it inside in the a/c!!  (It was 96 degrees and sunny).

In the evening I noticed that wonderful warm pink glow outside.

Always relaxing to see that view for that few minutes at the end of the day!

Oriental, NC

Two of our four boxes of lithium batteries have arrived......the other two boxes are lost in FedEx-land in California.  We think.

This is one of the 8 cells that Duane will tie together to make a wonderful new lightweight, efficient charging system.

Lots to do to accomplish that. 

We had a quiet evening of leftovers and with no card game! 

Oriental, NC

Pretty and calm this morning.

Today is a bit of a sad day - the What If crew are heading south for some time in their RV.  They've stripped the boat of canvas and it's now settled in the middle of the slip in case (knock wood against) a storm comes up.    Will be strange to have evening meals alone for a couple of months!  Wish them safe travels.

Just an rear view of the boats!  Hot and steamy down here!

Oriental, NC

Beautiful sunrise - and we have a better view of it now that What If is moved to our side.

Things are winding down a bit here because Ed and Cathy are driving south tomorrow for a month or two in the RV. 

We'll get some more chores done before heading back to Pittsboro ourselves for a while.

I had gotten a few of these huge Zip-Loc vacuum bags and wanted to try them out.  I've got a lot of linens and winter clothes that are seldom used and take up a lot of space.   The package says that it reduces the space 4X.....

I didn't do a good job with the before photo as I piled in a lot of linens in this bag.  It really did reduce the volume by a huge amount!  (Not sure it was 4X, but I'm pleased with the result.)


Amazing how heavy that bag is!

I did a big bag of winter clothes as well.  Now I have a large empty space in the cabinet for extra storage.