Subtitle: Happy findings about Wilkins Family History in Seattle
Saturday, July 7. Got the blog out at 4:00 p.m. Phew. Spent the day as much as possible in the house because of the high temperatures. Supposedly, at the airport, 5 mi. south of us, it got to 100, but it never went above 93 on our front porch.
To compare locations, put the following coordinates [ 47.033, -120.53 ] into Google Earth and then zoom in (and out). The temperature sensor and other equipment is inside the circle (made of large concrete Jersey-barriers as seen on highways):
http://www.americanconcrete.com/commercial/barriers/Jersey-Barrier.jpg
http://www.wrh.noaa.gov/mtr/cpm/mmts.php
There are established standards about the location of these things but many are not properly sited. See here for an example:
http://www.norcalblogs.com/watts/2007/06/how_not_to_measure_temperature_12.html
Our small thermometer closely resembles this one:
http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00005NN9E.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg
. . . with the unit on the right located under the overhang near the front door. By late afternoon shade is all about but there is still lingering heat in the house and concrete from earlier in the day. So, we measure temperature at the house and the airport measures temperature very close to the runways. That makes sense to pilots. If we had a unit that would send a signal about 200 feet we could have one out under the big trees down by the creek. That would be interesting but we don’t live down there. Well, no one lives in that little circle at the airport either, but that’s what the National Weather Service uses to report our Ellensburg temperature:
So, back to our activities: We finished putting up the strawberries and then had some for dessert on ice cream. Tomorrow, it will be warm again.
Sunday, July 8 I expect John will be up early to get the chores done before it gets hot. He was, but it got hot anyway. The high for the day was 104 and lasted over 3 hours at the airport. We never saw the temperatures as high on our front porch; only got to 96 or so. It was a lot hotter in the direct sun. John watered the thirsty raspberry bushes, and they were quite happy ~~ not ours, but soon:
http://www.raspberries.us/three-raspberries-636.jpg
We stayed inside during the heat of the day; doing all sorts of things. I spent time writing music for our group. Today I finished Hi Li-li, Hi Li-li Hi Lo as well as I Want a Girl (Just like the girl that married dear old Dad.) Those scores were given to me by our banjo player Evelyn, who found them in a songbook she has. Now I’m ready to start I’ll Fly Away. I brought that sheet music back from GA.
Also today, John and I got on separate computers with Google Earth, and found the spot where my grandparents (from GA) raised 3 children while in Seattle, while my granddad worked on construction of the Smith Building (built from 1909 to 1914). Today it’s called the Smith Tower, and once it was the tallest in town. They built their house in southwest Seattle, south and up the hill from Fauntleroy Way (the end of the electric trolley line south from Seattle), on the NE corner of SW 44th Ave and SW 102nd St. My cousin Susan and her husband John (yes there are many Johns in the family) plan to fly to Seattle July 18th and wanted to see the old house. John and I had taken Granny there back when we were still living in Idaho. She flew up, and we drove to Seattle, picked her up at the airport, spent the night in a motel, and then came back to Idaho after showing her around Seattle, and the finding old house. I don’t remember the date, but someday we will turn up the old slides we took and they will have a date on them.
Still hot; but cooling off. There are thunderstorms south of us. The lights are occasionally blinking. Apparently, there were some serious (lightning-ignited) house fires south of us in Yakima. It was colorful and very windy and rainy here. I heard from a former student in Moxee that lightning struck some houses. Very sad. We didn’t have any strikes or even noise here; just lots of flashing lights. It beat the neighborhood fireworks on the 4th.
Monday, July 9 Wonderful progress on finding out about the house my grandfather built in Seattle. I’ll outline what I found out. Here’s the scoop– from what I wrote Susan and John who plan to visit the house next week. I’m sure they were only planning to drive by, but they are thrilled they will get to go inside and see the work of our grandfather, long ago. The house was built in 1913.
I found out the real address of the property is 10122 44TH AVE SW Seattle, WA 98146. You can look that up on Google Maps or Google Earth, and drag the little orange man to get street views. However, be careful, the photos are taken before the garage was built there in 2004 on the old foundation. I got access to the King County Assessor’s records on line, and found many details about the house as well as the owners. My former student Nizar (now working in Renton, WA) sent me the link and then a worker from King County Assessor’s Office called me (in response to an email I sent them). He didn’t know the address, which Nizar had found, so I gave him the information, and he walked me through the extra pictures in their database. I had only found one photo, which was of the garage. Then he gave me the name of the Archive where they put all information from before 1982. I have yet to contact those folks in Bellevue, WA. The Assessor’s office does not have that much room on line to store it. I found the owners’ names in the database records for the parcel, and then I looked them up on switchboard.com finding out where they live and their phone number. Their son is living in the house. I talked to the lady for almost a half hour. She was very happy and interested to hear about the history of the house. Her name is Sue W., and her husband is Roy. Their son is Matt. She is willing to give my cousin Susan and her husband John a tour of the house next week. Ironically, the son is a Carpentry Contractor. My granddad was a carpenter working in construction projects. I find that really ironic. The son added a garage on the old footprint (which had rooms in the back probably used for a chicken house), and he kept the architectural design of the main house. There have been some rooms added in place of the old sun porch out front, and the son uses that as his office space. He also refinished the “fir” floors in the kitchen and has not destroyed the bin-type (tip out) cabinets for potatoes and such off the kitchen, that were built into the space by my granddad. This couple bought it in 1986, for $58,000. [Likely within 2 years of our visit with Granny.] It only has one bedroom, but now has an appraised value (for taxes) of $266,000. I forgot to say that the stained glass windows are still in the front room of the house. Susan and John are going to visit the owners next Thursday afternoon/evening and get an inside tour of the house. How exciting! We have appointments we cannot change, which keeps us from driving over to join them for a few hours and for the tour of the house. Susan assured me she would take her camera and record the event.
Meanwhile, I also managed to call about my violin shoulder pad that didn’t fit my violin (too large), but it fits my viola. I called to see if I could figure out what I should have ordered, and I asked if they sold medical tubing I could use to recover mine that has deteriorated over the past 15 years. The sales rep I spoke with said she had the same need awhile ago, and she went and bought two feet for 50 cents. She is in Rhode Island. She was willing to share some with me, and took my name and address to send it. I hope that happens. I am anxiously awaiting it.
I was able to send out 9 jobs today from the jobslist. It now has 520 recipients.
John went outside for an hour with our farrier to put the wedges in shoes on Ebony’s front feet to relieve some of the stress on her bowed tendon. John is still doctoring her twice a day. I threw leftovers together for supper while John took care of the horses and cats. It didn’t start cooling down till right before 9:00 p.m. when it finally reached 81, from a high of 105. I haven’t looked to see what’s on tap for tomorrow. I do have to go to town for an appointment at 5:30. I had made it later in the day, to coordinate with music at 6:30 on Tuesday night, but that was cancelled for the month of July (and August). John and I will soon be enjoying raspberries on ice cream (from last year). He picked only five raspberries today, and within a day or so, he’ll be able to start adding to the freezer. Tomorrow may produce some more strawberries for him to pick as well. The strawberries really don’t do well in this much heat.
Tuesday, July 10 Nothing till 5:30, a shoulder/neck massage for Nancy. It was a rather rough session, but I think it was successful. My shoulders are quite affected by the tenseness of the tendons and muscles that control them and are near my neck. I wish I knew the names of them and something about the condition. It seems to be aggravated by my playing fiddle, which is unfortunate considering how much I enjoy doing that.
Wednesday, July 11 Noon playtime at the Soup Kitchen/Food Bank, followed by SAIL exercise.
It was awfully hot (no a/c) at the noon lunch & play/sing date, but the food was super–donated by Ellensburg Pasta Company, including spaghetti, tomato sauce w/ bratwurst pieces and all topped with cheese. Quite yummy, and included sides of mixed green salad with tomatoes, watermelon, pears, and garlic bread. Once home John and I had an afternoon snack — a piece of carrot cake covered with strawberries from yesterday evening’s work. John went out this morning and picked about 5 more pounds and he fixed them while I was in town. They haven’t been frozen yet, so we will have some for dinner, and then before bed, we put them in freezer Ziploc bags.
I took in the 3 new songs for Evelyn and me to try out, and we made some changes that I have to do. I need to lower Hi-Li-li, Hi-lo to the key of C from G, so we can sing it. I also have some note changes and one chord to change in I Want A Girl, and I made up and added a newly created verse, “I want a guy, just like the guy that married dear old Mom. He was a jewel and the only one that Mamma ever had; A neat old gentleman with heart so true, one who loved nobody else but her. Oh, I want a guy, just like the man that married dear ol’ Mom.
I added two more verses to I’ll Fly Away; there was only one on the music I transcribed from. Evelyn knew at least one more. I found a nice rendition of a You Tube video by Randy Travis, where I got the rest of the lyrics.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLka8rRyIGg
However, there is a great story that goes with the original lyrics, written in 1932. I have reproduced it on our new web site, at the link below:
http://www.ellensburg.com/nancyh/LyricsPlusStoryI’llFlyAway.html
I really don’t need any more work to do, but it is too hot to do anything anyway… even house cleaning. God forbid I should want to do that! I did load the dishwasher when I got home.
Thursday, July 12 Our 43rd anniversary. We had a rather busy day. John worked a lot outside on chores including with the horses. I stayed inside most of the morning working on music corrections on the 3 songs we tested yesterday. Today I carried copies for everyone, and we did amazingly well as a group, on the new ones, before we played our regular stuff. Charlie brought their visitor from Belarus (Paulina, till Sept 9th), who is part of the Children of Chernobyl project here in the states. Today’s meeting was 2:00 at the Rehab where I had physical therapy for 7 weeks after ICU in the beginning of 2010. It was amazingly cool in there today. Normally it is very warm. We didn’t have much time after getting home, but we both rested. Then we took off for a 7:00 meeting of our trail riding club. A local veterinarian (Sam, for Samantha) spoke on the topic of laminitis in horses. Sadly, we have experienced this twice.
Friday, July 13 Nothing much planned but I went to SAIL exercise and took my 86 yr old friend to do some shopping afterward. She needs assistance with reading labels, because of her macular degeneration. John did an amazing amount of yard and animal work yesterday, until late. He was worn out and so I helped put together dinner. That’s about the first time in 3 years for my creating a dinner from scratch. He has been extremely supportive of me forever.
Saturday, July 14 This is our day to play music and be fed at Briarwood Commons retirement home (a series of individual apartments at a reduced rate). I picked up my friend again on the way in and she enjoyed visiting with old friends and listening to us play music. She was able to sing along on many songs (we gave them the lyrics to most things we played). There were only THREE of us there today, two violins and a mandolin (occasionally he was on violin). What a nice food spread today! Three plates of little ¼ -sized sandwiches of tuna salad, chicken salad, and egg salad; a bowl of green salad; a bowl of cut fresh large strawberries; a bowl with cut up pineapple, cherries, and mandarins in a white sugar sauce. Wait, there’s more! Another bowl of a different and very good homemade chicken spread with Triscuits. Some Sun Chips and a whole table full of desserts including a birthday cake for one of the residents. We sang Happy Birthday at the start and at the end to her. Also on the dessert table were homemade chocolate chip cookies, frosted butter-sugar cookies, pound cake, and other goodies. One of the residents who sat on the front row with my friend is 99 years old. Afterwards, I took my friend to Fred Meyer to pick up her meds. On the way home, it started looking like rain and a few drops fell on me on the way home and for my walk into the house. I put on my large sombrero from the car, to act as an umbrella. The clouds never produced much rain, but there was a storm with thunder north of us on the mountains. Now it is cloudy and cooling down. John rested and then went out to work in the yard again, leaving me to finish the blog for this week. He is removing a fence between two parts of our pasture where our new pole building will soon be. Film at 11 – just kidding.
Sunday the high is supposed to be just 78 – then slowly rising through the week with some thunderstorms in the area.
Hope your week was a good one.
Nancy and John
Still on the Naneum Fan