Snow and Heating the Crawl Space

Snow in Seatlle! It is fun when we get snow here. The whole city shuts down. Earlier this month we got 4 inches. Cooler weather prompted an investigation of the efficiency in which our house was being heated. I noticed a lack of airflow in the bathroom and master bedroom. Upon bundling up, brandishing Maglite and "Spider Defense Tool" (a long stick) I ventured into the unknown (the crawl space underneath our house). While I was down there I noticed how hot it was; it was warmer than it was in the house. I crawled around looking at the duct work to see if I could find a hole. During my trek I collected a plethora of cobwebs on my "Spider Defense Tool." I then found the problem--there was a four foot section of the duct work that had fallen down. I proceeded to re-attach and patch up the ducts. Afterwards, our radiant floor heating wasn't as nice but the house heated up more efficiently. Note: This document was written and edited by Kim, because I have been remiss in my blogging duties.

Kim's Birthday

Kim's Birthday was on December 5th and we had a wonderful weekend together hanging out and catching a movie. We went to eat at Salty's at Redondo (a nice seafood restuarant). We also went to see the latest Jane Austen book made into a movie, Pride and Predjudice and did some Christmas shopping. It was a lot of fun. On Sunday, we went downtown with Kim's family to celebrate with them too. We ate at another seafood restaurant on Lake Union called Rock Salt. Then we all walked around downtown looking at the Christmas decorations and doing some window shopping. All in all it was a wonderful weekend.

Thanksgiving and other fun stuff

Thanksgiving was really nice. Kim and I spent it with her Dad's side of the family. Grandma made too much wonderful food as is always the case. Yesterday, we did the crazy "Day After Thanksgiving Shopping Thing." It was insane. We got up at 4:30am and got to the Fred Meyer by the 5am opening. There were hundreds of people there already. I was driving the cart and Kim was leading. Unfortunately, we got separated because it was so hard to navigate the shopping cart with all of the people. I thought she went through the "Sock" isle when she actually was going to the Christmas decoration area. They had 1/2 price socks and needless to say I didn't make it out of that area in a short amount of time, nor unscathed. Finally, we made it back together and checked out. By that time it was almost 6am, the time when Target opens. So that is where we headed next and got our tree and some decorations. Following that I dropped Kim off at Jo-Ann Craft Store, while I went to Best Buy. She met me afterwards and we waited in the checkout line at Best Buy for 45 minutes as it wove through the store. Woo Hoo! Although, how often do you get to REALLY check out the vaccuum cleaners, refrigerators, washers, dryers and other large appliances there.

The remainder of the morning and afternoon was spent at home decorating for Christmas listening to Christmas music. It was really quite a lot of fun. This was the first year we have had a tree so it was kind of exciting putting it up and decorating. When we got it we didn't realize that it was pre-lit. That was a nice surprise. We also did some finishing touches on the house as well. The front closet didn't have flooring yet so I cut some linoleum to fit and installed some molding in there and in the bathroom that had gotten "put off."

This morning we met Kim's family at Yuen Lui (pronounced Yen Loo E) for a family portriate. While the pictures were getting ready to view on the computers, we went to Starbucks for a snack, Yum! When Kim and I were comming home she said that I should update my blog. So I am.

Oh, and one more thing, Sons of Dust is playing for church this Sunday and for special music we are playing "In the Light" by DC Talk. It is a great song and I really enjoy playing it.

One Down - 1 year 11 months to go

I did it! I finished my first class, and if I am not mistaken, I think I did quite well. I will find out my grade is this comming Tuesday. Class is really quite fun. It is much more time consuming than I though it was going to be. I have a hard time doing anything in my free time that isn't homework or else I end up feeling guilty. (including blogging) I have a break here between Thanksgiving and Newyears in which I only have 1 evening class. I am switching from Tuesdays to Thursday nights so I am actually getting off with a nice break that I won't get in the future.

Fireplace Insert, Furnace, Cabinet Doors, Back to School - Who could ask for better excuses to forget to blog

Okay, okay, so I shouldn't have to make up excuses as to why I haven't updated my blog in a long time but I feel so bad about not keeping people up-to-date. October has flown by extremely fast. Kim and I made the decision to have a gas fireplace insert installed when we had the new furnace installed. I know I don't have a picture of the furnace but look how much warmer the house appears. The old one had cracks in the heat exchanger and was about to start leaking carbon monoxide which I have heard is not good for your health. The insert is amazing! It is so nice to be able to turn a switch and have a warm inviting fire to relax around. Plus it really finishes out the living room. We also finally have cupboard doors. Which looks really fancy but it is harder for me to find things now. I really liked being able to see where everything was located. Oh, and an update on the ivy growing on our trees. Good news for the tree bad news for the ivy. After cutting out the "trunks" of ivy the leaves stayed green for a long time but finally they are starting to fall off and look very frail. I am really amazed by how long they have survived without a trunk.

Finally, school. School? Yes, School. I decided that for my future plans it would be a good idea for me to get my "Bachelor's of Science in Management" (you must say that with a big booming voice with lots of echo like in an empty gymnasium or the Grand Canyon, which ever is closer). I want to be able to provide for my family and going this direction will provide me with a larger set of tools and options to go within Boeing as time goes on. I really don't see myself working shift work as a technician for the rest of my life. So my first class was this last Tuesday and will continue weekly from 6pm-10pm for 5 weeks. Then it will switch to Thursday nights for the remainder of the two years.

Also, great news! I got a promotion. I am now a "Senior Simulator Technician" So now when ever you talk to me you must speak with a Spanish accent, "Yes, Senior." If you are wondering, I am still doing the same work. As a technician it is just a constant learning experience so as you get more experience you get promoted. I don't have any more responsibilities as such.

Airport Towing!

My Aunt and Uncle own a tow truck company here in the Seattle area and they just got their internet site up and running. It is really nice. My favorite pictures are the ones of the antique tow trucks. They have put so much time and effort into them.

http://www.airporttow.com/

On another note Sons of Dust played last Saturday at Jammin at the Seattle Center. It was so much fun. There were a couple hundred people at the 3 on 3 basketball tournament so we had a pretty large listening audience. On this coming Saturday the 24th we are going over to Yakima WA to play two concerts for a prison. A ministry that puts on small Bible studies has invited us to play. I am really looking forward to being able to minister in music to this group of people.

Also my Father has joined the ranks of Bloggers with his own blog. Be sure to check out all of the pictures he has posted of his Mount Rainier climb that I spoke briefly of back in July. He is really cool. I respect him so much and I am proud to be his son.

http://www.robindawn.blogspot.com/

Original vs New Fireplace

In response to Luke's comment on the previous post: I realized that I didn't explain about the two fireplace pictures. Back in May, I took pictures of the entire house before I started working on it. The picture of the wood burning stove with the magenta bookshelves on the side is what the fireplace looked like before we started remodeling. If you look at {The Livingroom "Before"} post near the beginning of my blog you can see another vantage point of the living room with the wood burning stove. So below, from top to botom you can see:
1. Before remodel
2. After removing shelves and painting
3. After removing stove
4. After installing tile

The Holly and the Ivy (minus the Holly)

Here it is, after much anticipation the completed fireplace. Actually it is almost completed. But you hardly notice the couple of trim pieces that still need to be installed.
I also include a picture of Kim Painting that could be duplicated and posted on each of the days I have talked about working on the house. Kim has helped so much by painting molding and touching it up once installed. She is a great worker and for that I am very grateful.

I spent yesterday afternoon trying to catch up with Kimberlee. You see, she went to a 4 year University and at the end they had this very special time called the “Ivy Cutting.” Every student was invited to hold up one section of this huge ring of ivy and then the President of the school came around with a scissors and snipped off a piece for each student graduating. This was to symbolize exiting from school and the entry into the real world.

Well, I obviously didn’t want to be left out. So I had my own “Ivy Cutting.” This ivy was growing up three of the very large trees in our yard. It was getting to the point where I was concerned that it may kill the trees. I didn’t want to lose the shade from the trees or have the trees fall on our house. So I cut the ivy at the base of the tree. The item in my right hand is one of the larger sections of the vine. WOW! It was huge. There were more than ten of these large vines growing up the side of the tree. Above the cleared section around the tree you can see how huge the ivy was. It extends 40 feet into the air. Behind the house you can see the tree in the front yard with the ivy on it as well. That turned out to be quite the project. But now I feel that I am even with Kim. I have had my “Ivy Cutting” as well.

WWW.TROYSTORER.BLOGSPOT.COM

My brother Troy just started a blog too. Be sure to check it out. It has some great pictures of him, his wife and my new niece.

http://www.troystorer.blogspot.com

Joy Electric Pics

I know these pictures are really sad quality but they are taken with my pocket pc and it doesn't fair well in poorly lit locations. However, I did want to share the picture of the people setting up because I thought it turned out really cool with the circular light in the ceiling. The other shot is of Ronnie Martin on left playing the keyboard slung over his shoulder and his live drummer on the right.

Labor Day Weekend Synopsis

We Are Finally Moved In!

I apologize for not updating my blog in a while. I do have a good excuse though. Kim and I are moved in to our new house and we have been really busy unpacking and doing all of the small projects that are still left. The tile looks great and we are just waiting on the mantle and legs to be made by our cabinet maker. I will be putting in the grout this weekend. Speaking of cabinets, we now have drawers and shelves so the whole kitchen is almost unpacked. The cabinet doors are still to come but I look at that as a good thing because it make things easier to find in the kitchen while I am learning a new layout. Our bedroom is all put together and everything is in its place there too.

We moved in last Saturday the 27th. Moving our new furniture from the garage into the house proved to be more of a challenge than I expected. I think next time we will move it out of the kitchen sliding door. The corner at the entry gave us much trouble with the couch. The first picture of Al and I with the couch on end doesn’t show Caroline who was trapped in the entry closet because of how we had to maneuver the couch. It was quite comical at the time. After getting them in the room we were happy to sit and relax. Kim was extra tired from supervising the project. The new furniture is extremely exciting to have. It is a special treat we got as a result of living with Al and Caroline the whole summer. You see, we didn’t have a house payment the whole summer so we could save that money and get something special. And that is what we chose.

God is Faithful in Fireplaces and Finances

Yesterday was a great day! I am just overwhelmed with how faithful God is with me. He has helped me through some challenging things as of lately. First of all, tiling the fireplace, I was really worried about how I was going to do it. So Kim and I have been praying, asking God to give me wisdom and the ability to do the job. Well, I am done setting the tile and it is looking really good. It was quite a process though.

It all started when I lined up the tile and a whole tile (13 inches square) wouldn’t fit up and around the fireplace. (See fig. 1) So I thought, “No big deal, I will just build up the side of the fireplace to be bigger.” That ended up being quite a feat. I had to cut the 2x4’s to the right size and then add a shim to square them up with the front of the fireplace. Then I had to figure out how to attach them to the fireplace with masonry screws. Add mortar, add backer board, add more mortar, add another layer of backer board and finally finish with a final coat of mortar to make the front surface flush. And PRESTO! I have a 13 inch wide fireplace.

Compared to that mess, cutting and laying the tile on the wall was easy. Kim helped too! I used tape to hold the tile from shifting once I had them in position. I put a wood brace up under the middle tile too. Now I just pray that as they were curing none of them slipped.

To top it all off, my day at work yesterday was great as well. I can’t go into the details as of yet but I had some tough decisions to make. Kim and I prayed about the situation and God came through again. Everything worked out better than I could have imagined. I not only have saved money doing the tile myself, I am still employed and everything is going smoothly. Could I be more thankful right now? I don’t think so.

Fig. 1

Laying Tile or SOD?

After experiencing laying tile I would have to say that I prefer SOD (of course the Sons of Dust type of SOD, not the grass covered dirt.) Yesterday I laid down the mortar for the tile in the entryway. It was kind of stressful. You are always under the pressure of time which I don’t like. I would rather take my time and do a meticulous job. With laying mortar you are under constant pressure not to lay too much of it down at a time or it will dry on the floor. But if you don’t get enough of it down you won’t finish the job before it dries in the bucket. Enough to make a man go crazy. But I did get through it.
The entry is curing as I speak and the next step is the grout. I mixed up a little too much mortar so I used it to start to fill the cracks between the bricks on the fireplace. Unfortunately, it started to ooze out of the spaces between the fake bricks. I guess I mixed it a little too thin.

After tiling I had practice with Sons of Dust. We had to take a new group photo because our last one didn’t have Wayne. It turned out looking like us so that was good. Then we played through some songs preparing for our next concert in Yakima, WA. All in all I came to the conclusion that I prefer SOD over Tile.

Tile

Well, I am about to learn how to install tile. Due to circumstances beyond my control I will no longer be paying someone to lay tile in our entry way and around our fireplace. Today we started preparing these areas for the tile. We started by spreading the concrete to fix the fireplace. Now it is level and ready for the tile to be put there but we still have to put backer board onto the brick for laying the tile there. We also cut the backer board for the entry, put mortar down and screwed the backer board to the sub-floor with the mortar under it. Now all of that needs to set. So we wait. The "We" I speak of is my Father-in-Law and my neighbor Doug. They were a tremendous help today. Kim spent part of the day at the house with us painting more molding. All in all it was a very long day of work and after finished it really seems like we didn't get that much done. Oh well.

Also I got a new toy today from Home Depot. Al and Caroline gave me a gift certificate for my birthday and I chose to get a Dremel Tool. I have wanted one for a very long time and today we needed a tool to cut the backer board because it is like concrete. So I used my new Dremel Tool with a diamond blade to cut the board to fit into the entry way. It cut the board like a knife through warm butter. Or is it a warm knife through butter. Or maybe the butter or knife don't need to be warm. You get the idea. It cut it beautifully. Well, more of the saga later. I must go eat dinner.

27 isn't old when comparing yourself to a rock

Today is my birthday. Well, actually it isn't (it is actually Aug. 8th) but thanks to the wonderful technology of the blog I can just set my date and time back to the 3rd and "Ta Da" it appears as if I wasn't really busy and remiss in my blogging duties. My birthday wasn't really that exciting this year. I got to work on my house a little bit, but as you may be able to tell by my previous entries that wasn't something out of the ordinary.

I am now 27 years old. Writing it down makes it even scarier than telling people. Do you realize that 27 is only 3 years from being 30 and that 30 is only 30 years from being 60. And I am just not ready to be 60. Okay so I may be blowing this a little out of proportion. But just last year at 26 I could still tell myself that I was in my mid 20's. But now...

On to a brighter note. I just found this neat link on the internet. It goes to Ancestry.com and they want you to buy something or other. I don't advise buying anything from them. Not because I have anything against them but I just think it is better to save your money for important things like pocket pc phones or chocolate. But for free you put your name in and you can find out it's origin. It is a neat tool. The first link is the blank form, the second is my name.

The Origin of Your Name

The origin of the name Micah Storer

I visited the Historychannel.com and checked out some of my birthday happenings on August 3rd and this is what I found out.

1492 Columbus sets sail from the Spanish port of Palos to begin his journey

1861 Last installment of Great Expectations by Charles Dickens is published

1926 Tony Bennett is born (His real name is Antonio Dominick Benedetto)

1940 Martin Sheen is born

1941 Martha Stewart is born

1941 Gasoline Rationing Begins in the Eastern US soon spreading to the rest of the country prior to the US entering World War II

Well, Call Me Uncle!

I would like to introduce to you my first and only Niece, Eden Marie Storer. She was born on Sunday July 24th daughter of my brother Troy and his wife LaRae. I am an extremely proud Uncle.

Last Softball Game of the Season

Last night the church softball team had its last game of the season. It has been a fun season and we played better than we did the previous year. Of the two games in the double-header last night we lost the first game but won the second game after coming from 2 points behind in the last inning. It was quite exciting.
The picture of Kim and I was taken just as Michael Martin was running home during a hit. Needless to say I was a bit distracted. But we finally got it right. We took two pictures as a team. One was supposed to be serious the other silly. Well, the silly picture came around and only two people were being silly so I had to take matters into my own hands. I gave the two people next to me a nice shove and it created a nice tumbling effect. You must notice however, that Bob (far right) was able to keep his composure throughout.I am kind of glad that the season is over because it has been so busy lately and we need to get work done on the house. But, it was great to end with a great win. It will make it exciting to come back to play next year.

Oops! Badge+Fan=No access to Building!

Just a note to remind you. If you happen to wear a badge hanging from a lanyard, you may want to beware when you are leaning over a computer that is being cooled by an external fan. If the badge happens to get sucked into the back of the fan it could be rendered useless in a matter of seconds. It also may startle you because of the loud noise. Not that I have an exorbitant amount of experience in this realm of activity or anything.

I was reaching over this fan to get some measurements for a power supply that I was supposed to order. Now I have to go to the Badge Office to get a replacement before I leave today so I will be able to get into the building tomorrow. Something interesting I noticed when I fished out the tangled wreckage from the fan was that there were small wires hanging out of the broken spots in the badge. I didn't know my badge had wires in it. That was cool to find out.

Anyway, I advise against doing what I did. Unless you are curious if your badge has wires in it too. Sorry I couldn't get the picture to show the wires. My pocket pc camera leaves many pixels to the imagination.

Who are they?

Thanks to my Mom, I realized that the family picture wasn't very detailed in it's uploaded state. So from Grandma's 80th party picture, listed from left to right is:

Micah, Kim, Robin, Brian, Jared, Christy, Lynette, Mark, Connie, Ron, Jack, Denise, Grant, Tory, Jennifer, Christina, Dan, Laura, Michael, John, and Julie.

Or,

Me, my Wife (Kim), my Dad (Robin), my Dad's brother Mark's son (Brian), my Dad's brother Mark's son (Jared), my Dad's brother Mark's son Brian's Fiance (Christy), my Dad's brother Mark's wife (Lynette), my Dad's brother (Mark), my Dad's Mom (Connie), my Dad's brother (Ron), my Dad's father (Jack), my Dad's brother Ron's wife (Denise), my Dad's brother Ron's son (Grant), my Dad's brother Ron's son (Tory), my Dad's brother John's daughter's best friend (Jennifer), my Dad's brother John's daughter's daughter (Christina), my Dad's brother John's daughter's best friend's Boyfriend (Dan), my Dad's brother John's daughter (Laura), my Dad's brother John's son (Michael), my Dad's brother (John), and my Dad's brother John's wife (Julie).

I you made through that paragraph still sane, I commend you.

Mom - Thanks so much for your comments. I am glad you helped me realize that the picture was a guessing game and that not everyone would know the people pictured. I will try to get a more detailed one to post as well.

Doors, Floors and Cabinets

Today was another day of working at our house. Greg (the Cabinet Guy) brought the cabinet boxes to the house so I have to show a picture of them. Mike and Lyndsay, Al and Caroline, and Kim and I worked for about half of the day. Greg hung doors, Lydsay, Caroline and Kim painted the doors and closets, Al replaced the electrical hardware, Michael installed lighting and I cut holes in the floor for the vent covers. We got quite a bit done and things are starting to look finished.
In the pictures you can see Al in the kitchen with some of the cabinets. The "office" with part of a new door, the new flooring, and a finished vent hole. The green room is the master bedroom with a new light fixture and a floor that is not cleaned up yet. And the last picture is of me starting to cut a vent hole in the dining room.

Grandma's 80th Birthday

Thursday the 14th was Grandma Connie's 80th Birthday. Boy was it fun. We were able to have a good majority of the family together and I got to be "in" on one of the best surprises ever. It all started last week when my Dad called and said, "Micah, you know Grandma will be turning 80 on the 14th? How about I come out there and surprise her and the whole family." "Wow!," I said, "that would be fun." Then he said, "Oh, and while I'm out there I think I will climb Mt. Rainier." Wow! Wow! My dad has wanted to climb Rainier for as long as I can remember (which isn't very impressive because of my not so impressive memory). But, he did live out here when he was a kid and my uncle Ron (his brother) climbed it over 15 years ago. I think I remember him saying that he wanted to climb it then. So I think that is enough proof. But more about that later. Back to surprising the family and Grandma.

My dad flew in from Missouri in the afternoon on the 14th. We immediately started surprising his brothers. Mark was at work at the tow truck company and so we headed over there first. We park across the street and I see Mark driving around the corner. My dad hides in the trunk and I get a phone call. It was my Cousin Jared. He was in the office watching the whole thing. "What is your dad doing here, and what is he doing getting in the trunk of your car?" he asked. I told him to "shush" and wait a second. So I tell Mark I have a present for Grandma in the trunk of my car and I need help with it. So he comes around the car I open up the trunk and there is my dad. Of course, Uncle Mark acts nonchalant and says, "Oh, Man, that makes my present look boring." So we continue to the other brothers houses and enjoy surprising each in a different way. John, that smarty pants, guessed that my Dad was in town before we got there but it was still good to visit with him. Ron, wasn't home so my Cousin Tory helped get my Dad into their basement. Then when he got home we told him that the surprise was in the basement. He was very surprised as well.

However, none of these compared with the surprise for Grandma. After everyone arrived Dad called the house on his cell phone and asked to speak to Grandma. She got on the phone and because there were so many people in the room she plugged her ear. So Dad was in the kitchen and slowly walking into the living room. As he came closer he was saying, "I called to wish you a happy birthday.... Can you hear me? I am on my cell phone. Can you hear me?" So everyone started to hear him as well. Only Grandma was concentrating so hard on trying to hear and plugging her ear that she didn't notice him walk into the room. All of a sudden, she finally saw him, screamed with surprise and straightened up in her chair. It was quite a sight to behold. The evening was filled with good food and lots of visiting. My Uncle Ron took lots of pictures and he sent me a few to post. He is a great photographer. He was the one who took pictures at Kim's and my wedding.

So my Dad is preparing to climb Mt. Rainier right now. He has one day of training, then Sunday he will climb to Camp Muir then Monday early morning he will climb to the peak and back down in the afternoon. A small part of me wishes I could go with him but with everything else going on it is probably good I am not.