Starting on the fence at Whittington's

We woke early by Oregon time. Although the time was 5 am, our bodies thought it was 8 am. We did morning Duolingo lessons and had tea while we waited for Mark and Cindy to wake. Since Robert has Sunday and Monday off work, he slept in until late morning.

After a breakfast of bacon and eggs, we walked the dogs along the canal for their morning exercise. When we returned to the house, Mary and Cindy did some cleaning, unpacking and organizing while Mark and I started preparing to erect the Fencer Wire metal fence from Home Depot. The materials that were shipped to the house included 14 fence panels that were each 8 feet long as well as posts and connecting materials. The fence is all steel with a system of clips and bolts to attach panels to posts. Self drilling screws secure the clips.

We drove to Jerry’s Home Improvement to get 8 bags of Sakrete, 4 bags of crushed stone, two treated 2X4s and some Tapcon screws. The stone would fill the bottom few inches of the holes then one bag of concrete would secure the posts. The boards and Tapcon screws would provide an attachment point to the house. Jerry’s is very much like Menards with a large selection of hardware and other items at competitive prices.

Back at the house, we used Tapcon screws to attach a 2X5 to the stone house foundation to attach a fence panel. We dug post holes for the other end of the first panels and the gate. The soil was not very hard or rocky so digging the 26” deep holes wasn’t very difficult. While digging the hole for the hinge side of the gate, I hit a PVC waterline about 12” down, however, it was a line for the irrigation system and shouldn’t be a difficult repair. We filled the holes around the steel fence posts with concrete and positioned the fence for the concrete to harden overnight,

We took the dogs on a walk along the EWEB Canal (Eugene Water and Electrical Board) where we saw markers and some equipment of possible construction soon. The path was a little damp from the overnight rain but was a pleasant walk.

When we finished, Robert was back from visiting some of his friends then Michael arrived around 5 pm. Mary had made meat loaves with the Schmidt’s Restaurant recipe and Cindy made a huge macaroni and cheese with several varieties of cheese. Mark made hard rolls and everything was delicious. We enjoyed visiting with the boys and catching up on their lives. We are hopeful that Robert can navigate through his divorce from Sheena and get shared custody of Zella and the baby that is expected.

After dinner, Mark and Michael watched a football game while Mary and Cindy worked on a 2,000 piece jigsaw puzzle of Las Vegas at night. Robert worked on some lessons and questions provided by his attorney that would help him in gaining custody of his children.

Since our bodies were still on Eastern Time, we turned in early and slept well.