What a whirlwind of a weekend! We took a drive up country to the Amish store – mostly for piping for our wood stove, but also with a “lets buy awesome stuff” attitude. It was a kinda murky late fall morning, but the colors were beautiful and the ride was peaceful- especially with a passed out Izzy in the back seat.
We made it, first to Brookside, a little restaurant next to a hotel off the highway before you hit Canada. I had a waffle covered in strawberries and fresh whipped cream and MrGillis had an omelet breakfast… Izzy charmed other patrons with her coloring abilities and general good attitude.
After breakfast, it was off to the Amish country store, the Pioneer Place in Smyrna.
I cannot say enough how much I love this place. Where else can you buy a gallon of Bragg’s apple cider vinegar for 20 bucks? Or a dozen whole nutmegs for under 5? I bought my first bottle of essential oil there (teatree was my gateway oil) and I got all the metal serving ware we used at our wedding. Their bulk flours and other baking goods are insanely low priced, and I get my pastry flour, wheat gluten, and a bunch of other stuff there as often as possible.
They have a little bit of everything from boots, to plumbing, to kitchen and health and even some toys. We’ve gotten many a good deal there – including all the pipe for our wood stove. Izzy and I had a lot of fun wandering around while MrGillis talked to the nice Amish man about what pipe we’d need. We also managed to grab some chocolate covered raisins and trail mix that was a gift for my parents.
After heading out of Amish Land we headed into Houlton to do the rest of our shopping before heading home.
Our GPS took us thru some real back woods traveling on the way home- the weather was still pretty murky. We dropped the Bug off with her grandma and headed over to the old homestead to get some work done before supper while MrGillis mused aloud about how nice it would be if the groundwork was just miraculously taken care of…
YEA GROUND WORK! Are you friggen kidding me?! My psychic hubby totally called it! My husband’s uncle came by and helped us out! When we pulled into the driveway and saw that going on, it was seriously the best feeling all day, even after our awesome trip.
Yea for almost having the windows and doors almost covered! MrGillis has really been busting buns to get this place as tight as possible before the cold really hits. We’ve been lucky so far that we haven’t had any major freezing nights.
Yea for one floor done, another floor ready to go AND OHMYGOD I ALMOST FORGOT TO TELL THE BEST STORY OF THE WEEKEND-
So we went to another one of our big fav stores this weekend, MARDENS, to scope out the flooring situation, because we need flooring for 4 more rooms. Well, we walked up to the flooring area and could only find ONE PIECE of flooring the size we needed, and that was in our ever tightening budget. BUT it had a big HOLD sticker on it. Well I convinced MRGillis that HOLD does not mean SOLD and he should ask about it. TURNS out that the hold sticker should have been taken off the day before AND WE GOT TO BUY IT! A roll of 12×14 vinyl sheet flooring for 132 bucks! The best/worst part is, as we were signing the info sheet, THE GUYS THAT PUT IT ON HOLD CAME TO GET IT. The store employees were very professional, and mrgillis and I weren’t carrying it out with us, so no words were exchanged, but the floor, was ours!
yes. the truth is right there. ANY DIFFERENT collusion of events, AND WE WOULD HAVE NEVER GOTTEN THIS FLOORING.
day MADE. AGAIN.
But the downside of getting all this awesome stuff and putting it down here in this shed, and then telling the entire internet about it, is we feel the need to up security. So my job for the afternoon, other then helping mrgillis, was to beef up our lock situation.
Yea for padlock installation success! I must say, I’m pretty happy with my first lock installation, along with the doorknob I fandangled in there weeks back as well.
And a big woohoo for the pieces of our next big project – wood stove installation! Our furnace has been cleaned recently and is working well, but we have 20+ acres of woods out behind the house, with two cords already sectioned out and stacked, drying for next springs cutting, splitting and stacking again. we also were given two different wood stoves over the past 6 years that we’ve just been holding on to waiting for a time to come. Well that time is now. And next spring- We’re throwing the other one into our first permanent greenhouse. But that is another blog, sometime in the future.
So today, Wednesday the 2nd of November, we got the phone call we’ve been waiting for. Coastline Homes is delivering our new home TOMORROW MORNING! By 8 am they’ll be pulling in with it is the word.
We have a lot going on for the next two weeks, so I don’t know if I’ll get a bunch of blogs posted, but I’ll try.
Until next time, have a wicked good night!
Gillis Gardens, LLC 