A long time has passed since I last posted anything here at Greg's List. The summer has been relentless with tons of things going on, weeks of crazy heat early in the season .. seems like there hasn't been a whole lot of time to put together a worthy post. On top of that there wasn't anything particularly note worthy to post about.
It is very likely that the following post is also not note worthy enough to post on, but I shall regardless.
Well, we are in the midst of a pretty large house project. It has come to our attention that water has been making it's way into our basement. This has been an issue since we've moved in, but recently there has been another breach and all sorts of silt and mud are collecting as the condition worsens. There really is no damage to speak of, but if the issue is not addressed damage will ensue.
I took a few videos to document my progress,. So far I've spent 6 hours digging with a total of 9 hours total.
One of the problem areas is here on the right side where at one time there existed a doorway into the basement. At sometime the door got bricked up and had concrete poured in and then dirt filled in over the top. Water at the base of this structure seeps in when it rains hard. The job now is to excavate until the bottom of the door is reached. At that point we will scrub the joints clean and apply ample amounts of hard setting tar.
The previous owners when they decided to seal up this door way had decided apparently that it would be a good idea to dump in as many spare bricks and rocks as fill for the hole. The biggest hassle of this job has been trying to pull these mini-boulders and bricks back out of the hole. The job is utterly back breaking.
The new water breach looked like it was created by erosion from roof water run off. That and possibly a burrowing animal. We decided to put in a french drain around the back of the house that leads toward the back deck where there is a water catch system in the making already beneath the deck. Eventually the plan is to have this water tiled down past the front of the house where it will be carried away toward the culvert on the edge of our property. The project is a lot of physical work, but it will be well worth it to not have the moisture in the house.
We took some time this season to and do some staining and rudimentary landscaping. I never did get around to finishing the staining, but we did manage to stain the kids' play set and back deck as well as a few of the wooden items in and around the back garden.
The garden took a beating during those very hot 100+ weeks, but there are still plenty of goodies. Here is some basil that is looking good.
Seems like the last few years our peppers have not been producing as well as I would like. There is still time, though, so I hope they all hurry it up and get some growth! This jalepeno plant is loaded with peppers! I can't wait to stuff them with cheese and bake them! Or throw them in with beans and rice or in a chile ..
The grapes in the green house have kicked butt this year. We have a bunch of them washed and frozen in the freezer and they are awesome! They are chewy, icy, intense grape explosions!
A panorama of our semi-cluttered yard ..
.. panorama of the inside of the green house ...
