Progress at the Singing Woods

August 12, 2011 by Rachel

Dear Friends,

We have decided to put our Hawaii plans on hold for a while (maybe a few years?) because the pull to be with family is strong :).

The Singing Woods (where we live now) is a pretty cool place. Mark’s Grandmother bought the property in the 50’s, when Mark’s dad was in his 20’s. After his parents married, the couple lived on the property until they had their own log cabin built. Currently, Mark’s mom still lives in the same house, Andy and his family live in Mark and Andy’s grandparent’s house, and Mark and I are living in the Burrow, Greenhouse (to be built), and the Altier. Altier means workshop/studio and its intended purpose is just that. Right now, it is filled with stuff and is used as storage, but we all hope that it can be cleaned out and used for work and play purposes.

We are settling into life at the Singing Woods. The Burrow is a cement room that Mark built several years back. It is attached to the Altier on the South side. The plan is to build a greenhouse in front of and on top of the Burrow. The greenhouse would reach up to the Altier’s roof, so it will be a 4 story greenhouse spanning the whole South side of the Altier. Andy, (Mark’s brother), Sam (Andy’s wife), and the girls (our nieces) are giving full support.

I help Evelyn (Mark & Andy’s Mother) with the dishes daily and laundry often and Mark and I have driven Evelyn to every concert of hers this summer (Sunday and Wednesday evenings). She is in the Peoria Municipal Band. They play a lot of marches and each concert has a theme. Very fun! The last concert will be Sunday evening, August 14, at 7:30 pm.

We have been to two water parks with the girls and at the last one, we got free passes so we went back last Tuesday.

It is hot here and very humid most days. (It was when I wrote this 3 weeks ago.) Sleeping in the Burrow is great though. It is typically in the low 70s without any AC. The room is a cement box and has earth burmed against the East and West sides and a little on the north wall underneath the Altier basement. Mark was worked hard to empty and clean out the burrow. Mark and Andy installed two more plywood boards on the North wall. The room also has a thick layer of insulation throughout. This week, we have been working on getting the room ready to paint. Today, we hope, we will apply a few coats of primer.

As soon as the room is painted, we’ll move furniture back in and be able to have our clothes in the Burrow instead of in the Altier.

In addition to finishing the Burrow and building the greenhouse, there is the work of sorting and deciding what to do with/keep/sell Mark’s belongings. Before we got to IL, he had two storage units that are 12×40. We put our CA belongings into a third one, along with the stuff that was in the Burrow. This third unit is also a staging ground to help us have room to sort the stuff in the first two. We hope to use, sort, sell, or give away everything in storage by the end of January. That is our goal.

So you can see, we are working hard!

Much love,

Rachel and Mark

Posted in Life in Central IL | Tagged Altier, Earth Burmed, greenhouse, Singing Woods, sort belongings |

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