Hendersonville, NC

 Back up a day since we were too busy yesterday for me to put up a post!  The Craigslist ad for free firewood worked like a charm.  A couple answered and hauled 2 pickup loads away.  They use wood as their sole heat source so we were happy that they answered.

Then we packed up all of Granny's stuff and got ready to head back to the moutains.  Power/water/internet/cell service is all restored at her house in Hendersonville now.

On I-40 heading west.  A good bit of traffic but this part of I-40 was not harmed.  We did, of course, see lots of trees down and muddy washout areas beside the interstate highway.

Lots of road signs warning of Limited Resources....

 

She's all settled back in at home now.  Beautiful Carolina sky.

Pittsboro, NC

 Started the day early - it was "free mulch day" at the Chatham county recycle center.  Duane borrowed the nice dump-bed trailer from our neighbor.

 

First of four loads.

That project took up most of the morning as the pickup point is about 15 minutes away.

Spreading out the mulch will be a project for a different day.  I heard the chainsaw going at the front of the house.  There is a beautiful pin-oak there that is part of the "sidewalk issue".  The root from the oak is pushing up part of the sidewalk....even though it's a beautiful tree that was just a sapling when we moved in 30 yrs ago....if you look close you can see Duane in the blue shirt cutting the notches to make sure it doesn't fall towards the house.

Here's a zoomed-in view.

Lots of brush to drag away....

A couple of hours later....

We'll offer this wood up free on Craigslist for someone to come pick up...Busy day!

Pittsboro, NC

 It's time to do some house cleaning!  Like, the entire outside of the house.  Various areas are more prone to mold - mostly the north facing surfaces.  But the entire house had a coating of dust/dirt on the siding and needed to be washed.  I can't remember, but I don't think we washed it last year....

 

Much better after some soap and bleach!  I won't bore you with details but it was just rinse & repeat.  Really brightened things up.

 

Next was the decking....it had gotten a thin layer of black mold and looked forlorn.

I tried a bit of bleach but it really didn't touch it.  So Duane brought up the handy/dandy floor polisher with a stiff brush attachment.

That really did the trick!!  Nice to have lots of time to address some of these house issues.  (photo looks a little odd because of the shadow later in the day, but you get the idea).

Pittsboro, NC

 Miranda stopped by to pick up her Tracker!  I was not prepared for a photo op....I was at the house applying bleach and washing the siding, hence, the ragged clothes....

 

We had stored the Tracker in the hangar all last year while she got settled in her new apartment.  She now has a garage at her apartment so she finally got it tagged and ready to drive.  A little sad to see it go!!!  But nice to have a short visit and an added plus, she got to visit with Granny a bit too.

Pittsboro, NC

 Just hanging out!  Granny staying busy.

 

 

Pittsboro, NC

 Forgot to post about this the other day....we had ordered some heavy acrylic sheeting (3/8" thick plexiglass) to replace all the salon windows on the boats.  Both boats have issues and it's best just to get them all replaced.

The supplier is Piedmont Plastics near the RDU airport.  The sheets are 4'x8' and very heavy.  Since we needed them in smaller pieces, we had them cut them up into 4 pieces each.

Loading into the van.  Duane will take these and rig them to bend since the windows are not completely flat installed on the boat.

Cutting out the patterns we made the other day at the boat.  That's as far as we've gotten....

Pittsboro, NC

 I did my first-of-the-month Sojourn over to the airport to do the montly/quarterly taxes and billing.  I was surprised that there were a lot of pilots in the terminal building waiting for some low clouds to lift.  Their planes are packed with relief supplies going to the mountains.

They'll make several trips to staging airports to the west.  Not terribly efficient but a good effort!

Pittsboro, NC

With all the activity we had sewing the salon cushions, I forgot to post about the new roof on our house!

The origianl contract for the roof replacement was for Friday - but that's the day that Hurricane Helene roared thru....rescheduled for Saturday.  

Here are the "before"  photos.  We got 30 years out of this roof - I think we got our money's worth!  We had a few leaks and some rotten areas on the underlayment.  No structural damage though.

The crew arrived just as scheduled and got right to work.  Noisy process!!!  We were in the basement doing the last of the cushion work.

Funny seeing the roof bare...

 

 They did replace several pieces of underlayment so they had a pristine surface to lay the new shingles.

They put new "thru hulls" on all the vent pipes.  Once they started laying down the shingles, it was quick.

 

All done!  Nice new architectural style shingles make it look a bit more upscale.

 

The sun was setting so this side looks a little washed out....hopefully we'll get another 30 years out of this roof!  Glad we just paid for this replacement and didn't think twice about "doing it ourselves"....

 

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Pittsboro, NC

 

I am pleased that this project is mostly done!!!  I won't bore you with repeat photos of each cushion as they are similar.  Will have to wait until we get it back to the boat to announce a complete success but right now it measures exactly as we'd planned.  Yay!  So glad this is done!! The Ultrafabrics faux leather feels wonderful to the touch.  Soft and breathable.  

The only other big sewing project I have left for now is to make a new jib cover for Sojourn.  Not a rush because the existing one is intact and doing it's job protecting from sunlight.  It's just thin and will tear eventually.  Will tackle that project in the next few months.

Pittsboro, NC

Next up was a seat back.....the originals:

Front

 

 

And the back:

 Assembling the pieces for the new cover.

 

One done! 

The back view:

 

How it will look in the boat.

After a rest, we tackled another bottom cushion.  3 done, 3 to go!

Pittsboro, NC

 I never really showed you the "before" cushions....This is the real leather cushion - in very good condition when we bought the boat over 7 years ago.

But daily wear and tear rubbed the surface and there were a few tears. Plus I never really loved the color anyway!

 Back to the basement....sewing the internal zipper panel on.

 

 

For those of you interested, we sewed in a layer of 1/4" Sewfoam to the main seat area to help it maintain it's shape and not get "wrinkly". (the black surface).

Eased in boxing all the way around.  Ready for final assembly.

All done - cushion 1 of 6....

Backside of the cushion.

And side view.  Pretty pleased so far!!

Not really looking forward to several more days of sewing.....but beats the alternative of paying megabucks to an upholsterer.

P.S. for those of you interested, we're using UltraFabrics Brisa brand material.  Expensive but supposedly very durable.  Love, the soft feel of it.  I had ordered several different samples of the UltraLeather and Brisa fabrics.   I chose the Brisa because I just loved the Cambridge Blue pattern.  I could instantly see that it just looks absolutely natural with our countertop color that is the main "theme" in the salon.  

It is a bit stretchy - we made sure the stretch is the same direction on all the seats as we laid them out for cutting.  And I have quite a bit of fabric left over so if the bottom cushions show wear in a few years I can easily make new covers for them.  

Pittsboro, NC

 The shingles and various "thru the roof" gaskets were delivered early this morning.  The original schedule for the new roof was tomorrow.....but Hurricane Helene will dump copious amounts of rain on us tomorrow.  So the work is now tentatively scheduled for Saturday.   I guess the crews work when they can!

We worked an 8 hour shift yesterday on the salon seats....I know it doesn't look like much progress but we now have all of the components cut out and are starting to assemble.  I think there are 12 zippers!  These long runs of stitching requires lots of thread.  Lots of bobbin changes.   Did I mention that I HATE making up bobbins for some reason, haha?  Hope everyone is safe from the hurricane.  Looks like it will mostly miss most of the folks we know but appears to be a dangerous one for those in it's initial path!

P.S. - thanks for the words of encouragement....I know several of you have already tackled the upholstery we are now doing.