Holy Crap!

Wow, I had my first encounter with a timber rattlesnake today. My friend Randall came down with me this week to work and while driving up the road I noticed something slithering in the grass. My neighbor James said that he has lived here for over two years and only saw one. I've only been working down here for two months and already saw one! How did I get so lucky? It was actually pretty cool. I was a bit mesmerized by this snake since it was about three feet long and over two inches in diameter. In Michigan I've only seen garter snakes and maybe 18" long at the most. The closest I've come to a venomous snake was at the zoo and there was a piece of half inch glass between us. I was reluctant to write about this in the blog or even mention this to my wife who is not real keen on anything that flies or crawls let alone snakes. I know this may make her a little uneasy but after doing some research on them they seem to be a very mild tempered species of rattlesnake, which would explain why it didn't seem to mind us watching him move across the road.

Well that's about the most exciting thing that's happened so far. We are going to be here a couple of weeks clearing trees and making a road through the property. The weather has been perfect. Sunny and in the 80's.





Sunrise from the camper



Randall cutting trees

Easter/Spring Break

Cody, Carrie, & Becca before Church on Easter



We spent our Easter week down in Alabama. We went down on Monday and came back on the following Sunday. My cousin Mike and his wife Sandee came down on Tuesday and stayed a night. They helped us clear and burn brush and stack firewood. We had strong storms and twisters come through northeast Alabama a couple of days before we got here. There were a lot of trees down, power lines down, and homes damaged. Fortunately, we had two trees fall but nowhere near our camper. Over all it was a good week. We made good progress on the road through the property and cleaned up the entire area around the campsite. The kids helped a little, but they were usually nowhere to be found the first couple of days. They loved playing in the woods. They made trails through the woods and Cody built a log fort.

Saturday we drove around some of the damaged neighborhoods and passed out business cards. I already got two calls for roof estimates the next day. I will be going back down with my tools to look for work on Thursday. I need all of you to pray God provides me with some leads for work. Money is getting tight and work here in Michigan is scarce. I have faith that this is God's plan for us and that the will provide us with of daily needs. With all of the lows we have gone through over the last two years, we have never been without the things we really need and more importantly without each other.


Sandra working hard



Firewood!





Sandra and Sandee resting hard!









Cody's Log Fort



We have a million of these inch worms and caterpillars on these trees. Rebecca's official job was checking me for free loading bugs and insects. She's good at spotting these things crawling all over me.

Husband, Father, Builder, and Lumberjack????

Who could ask for a more wonderful husband and father? How hard can one man work to build a place for his family to make their new home? MY MAN, that's who!

Over the last week Bob has gone through many ups and downs while working on our property. I wish I could be there with him to help. I can't imagine doing the things he has, all alone this time. Everyday I talk to him, he would tell me about new ways that he had come up with to "get the job done" or "how he will just make do". He has probably cut more than 30 trees (and cleaned them up), dealt with severe storms, mud and little to no electricity.

The strength and perseverance he shows to us everyday is a quality that I hope our children will follow in their own lives. Our kids did a little project while their daddy was gone, here's what they did:

WHY I HAVE THE BEST DAD

Cody said: He takes me to work with him. He loves me. He buys me toys. He takes me places. He takes me dirt bike riding. He takes me to get ice cream. Me and My Dad!

Carrie said: He plays with me and tickles me. He loves me. He takes us out for ice cream. He works hard. He prays for us.

Rebecca said: He helps us learn our verses. He takes care of us. He loves us. He protects us. He watches over us. He helps us learn. He's the best dad.

The last two nights have been a little rough for him. The generator is now only working sporadically. It won't run the fridge and the heat at the same time. Last night the generator gave out around 3:00 a.m. so no heat, and temps were down in the low 30's. He is so much tougher then me. I don't think I could have made it through the night without heat. (YOU AMAZE ME DEAR!)

I pray everyday that the Lord will watch over and protect him while he is gone. I also pray that the Lord will provide him with work so that we can continue to build on our dream of living on "our mountain".

YOUR DOING A GREAT JOB HONEY! I know you won't quit until we're altogether on our mountain. I couldn't ask for a better husband and leader for our family. Can't wait til you get back to Michigan.

Moving along, slowly!

Well, my week has been going in the right direction, but not without much perseverance. My trip down took an extra 2 hour due to a fatal accident on I75 in Kentucky. I still had to pick up my camper from storage and I wanted to get to Lake Guntersville State Park before dark, but this didn't happen. I hate pulling into a campground at night, especially one I've never been to before and without the help of somebody to keep me from hitting anything while trying to back into a campsite.

Here's a pic of the backup



All set up. It's cheaper to stay at the park than in a hotel. These days I have to save where I can. Hotels offer some nice conveniences but they aren't cheap.



Dinner! Mmmmm, Venison! Signs says no feeding the deer, but nothing about eating them!




I got rained out a couple of days this weeek but I made good progress on the days I was able to work. I burned some brush and cut more trees down. I started to clear a drive into our property and an area to park our camper. The idea is to have some temporary residence for the summer while we work toward finishing the road and getting power to the property. After that we will work on building a more permanent structure. My family is used to camping, but this is going to be a little more rustic than we are used to. We do have a generator and the camper is self-sufficient but there still is the issues of disposing of waste and getting fresh water. I am going back to Michigan on Thursday and will be back here on Monday after Easter. Sandra and the kids are coming down with me. This will be a good chance for a trial run.

I had some trouble getting up the drive with the camper. The Big Dog F350 4x4 Powerstroke wasn't the problem, the Alabama red clay was. I have made several trips up before this one and had no problems. Of course, it was dry. We had rain on Thursday and I was hoping the clay would be dry by Saturday. It wasn't quite dry enough. I almost made it past the first crest before spinning all 4 tires in the mud. I hit the brakes and my truck and trailor slid back down the hill about 20 feet. I was a little nervous, as I was no longer in control of the direction I was going nor when I would stop. After letting the clay dry for a few hours I was able to make it all the way with no problems.





After I cleared some trees on the property




That's one good lookin' Hillbilly!



Home Sweet Home!



Pics of Lake Guntersville

Sexy, Sassy Sandra!

Sandra and her mom got their hair cut yesterday. She got about 8 inches cut off! She looks 10 years younger. Here are a few pics...

Here is her before picture...






Sandra's after picture...



Sandra's mom...




Well, I'm going back down to Alabama on Sunday. This time I will stay a little longer in hopes of finding some work and getting more work done on our driveway. Work here in Michigan has been scarce. The difficult part is getting the jobs to come back to back with less down time in between. It makes managing my time back and forth difficult. I never know exactly when or where the next job is. Every time I have gone down in the past, I have had to return within a couple of days for one reason or another, but this time my return date is open ended. I will be back here before Easter. I will try to post more often next week as I make progress on the property.

Work Bee Weekend!

Sweet Home Alabama! We had the best weather the past four days. We could not have picked a better weekend to work on our new property. It was 80 degrees and sunny today. We all got sunburned this weekend and Sandra was worried she might need her winter coat when we left Michigan! We got to meet more new neighbors this weekend. There is no lack of southern hospitality around these hills. Every one of them offered to help us cut and clear trees or help us in any way they can. We spent 4 hours Saturday night just talking with Mr. & Mrs. James King, our neighbor two doors down. We went to a new church in Cullman on Sunday and the kids really like it. It's a modern baptist church. The music was a little too contemporary for me, but we really liked everything the church has to offer. They made us feel very welcomed. We even went to Sunday school! It was pretty cool. They have so many areas for us to get involved in. We met a couple at Sunday school and the offered to come help us work cutting trees and invited us to their home already. I believe God has some great things in store for my family. We are all looking forward to making new friends and doing life together.

Here are my worker bees!




The funnest part of starting on any new job is finding new reasons to buy more TOOLS!



They call in the big dog when there's heavy lifting to do!




Clearing a tree that fell on our "driveway".



Sandra got a picture of the tree falling.

Time to Move!

Moving stinks! It's been a long and busy two weeks. Our time is up on the house and we decided it was time to make our move. We spent the first week packing everything in the house and selling off anything that we didn't need. My friend, Randall, went with me to Alabama last weekend to help with the loading and unloading of the truck. Sandra and the kids moved in with her parents for a couple of months until the kids are finished with school. I'm going to be working on setting up us a place to set our "temporary" residence on our property. I still have a lot of work to do. Hopefully by summer I can finish fixing the drive and get power up to the property. I'm going to be back and forth over the next couple months, I still have some work here which helps pay the bills. Pray God blesses me with work in Alabama. That is the one thing that will help further our progress more than anything. Sandra and the kids are going down with me this weekend. She hasn't been down since the beginning of November and she is starting to feel depressed. I think this trip will help to keep her spirit up and motivate her. I know I get motivated and excited every time I go down. We are going to check out a new church while we are there. The kids are excited.