In summary, here are some photos showing what we accomplished on Miss Janie's house during the week:
On the outside of the house, we removed the old siding from around the bow window, wrapped and trimmed that whole wall and fixed the window, painted the new siding on the
porch, painted lots of siding pieces and put them up on two sides of the house, painted all the railings and trim on 3 porches, and painted the back side of the house, including the lattice-work. TL decided to stay a 2nd week, so he could finish overseeing the remainder of the siding installation!
Hm, you can't really see the difference in these photos, but it really looked much better.
In a bedroom, we finished painting the trim, and painted the walls & closet.
In the master bathroom, we fixed lots of drywall, mudded, and primed.
In the living room, we fixed all the problems with the drywall and previous mudding – you can't really tell by the picture, but it looks a lot better. We primed and painted, and it's ready for the flooring.
In the entry foyer, we put up all the drywall, and mudded it. It's ready to prime.
We had an unventful bus trip back – I just mostly dozed and took medicine, and I felt a good bit better by the time we got back to Pittsburgh. I think we only made one real meal stop, at Cracker Barrel in Bristol VA for breakfast (I only had a bowl of grits, and they seated us with a couple we hadn't met yet, so I did try to be sociable). Oh, and then a quick stop at the Beckley Travel Plaza to get something to take with, so the driver wouldn't have to stop again (I had my first coffee in several days, and Al & I bought a ham & Swiss sandwich to share later). Movies were watched, but I can't recollect which ones.
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SO, overall, I think we got a lot accomplished for Miss Janie in a week. It was different from last year, when we worked on a couple different houses doing different projects. While it was good last year to see different neighborhoods and meet different people, in this case we were able to get to know Miss Janie and Mister Bob pretty well throughout the week we spent with them. So that was good in a different way. By the end of the week, she knew most of us by name, and was telling us all sorts of family anecdotes, etc. She told us that she really appreciated all the hard work we were doing for her and in general on the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
And just as we did last year, we really enjoyed meeting and working with a group of excellent human beings.
We're already looking forward to next year's trip…
Where have the days gone? 