Shad's Shop - Power & Light

Due to support of friends and family Shad has been able to purchase the material to rewire his shop and primer and paint for the outside. They are going to paint it a blue/grey with white trim to try to match the house. He says he thinks his new lights are a lot brighter than his old ones were.

He wasn't able to get the same breaker box as before so here's the panel he purchased, though he may replace it in the future.

A shot of the light switches by the door. All of the outlet and switch boxes melted in the fire, though some of the wiring survived in places behind the insulation.

A new light outside and yesterday while he was at work his wife and three children started on the painting. They put on the first layer, the primer, and it's looking 100% better already. They did a WONDERFUL job! (I may be a bit biased on that though.)

Shad said it will be a little while before he can do much of anything else, other than finish painting. He needs to save up for larger purchases and his wife insists that she needs to buy groceries (just kidding). On the building itself he needs to buy insulation before putting anything else in. He would like to eventually buy an AC/heat wall unit like we put in my studio. He previously hadn't paneled the walls, the insulation was visible (see the first two pictures of the first post) so I don't know if he plans on paneling before putting in a workbench and shelves. THEN he can start thinking about replacing his tools. All in good time.

AGAIN, Thank you ever so much for all of your prayers and support. We are so very blessed to have all our friends and family in our lives!

Shad's Shop - Starting Over

First a big THANK YOU! to all who have donated to Shad's rebuild fund. A day short of a week after the fire and he's moving forward. An amazing find was his large nail gun, that he was hoping was at my house, turned out to be inside his shed on a shelf in the left front corner. This was one tool that he was really hoping wasn't in the fire because he needed it to make his rebuild easier. When he found it, it was covered with soot, black. But as he started to removed the black he realized that it still had it's paint and the plastic trigger was in tact. Fortunately, also, was the fact that his pancake air compressor was in my studio safe and sound. To begin the rebuild All Size Sheds donated a panel to replace the one that cracked on the back wall. This is now replaced.

All Size Sheds also gave Shad a good deal on a new window and hinges for the doors. The new window is installed, the doors have yet to be worked on.

A truckload of trash bags were hauled to a burn pile at a friend's place out of town and two truckloads of metal have gone to the salvage yard. Making headway!

After a couple days off work to tackle this he's back to work tomorrow. I'll post more as he progresses.

Shop Fire

Got a call last Friday night (05/11/12), caller ID and distinctive ringtone said it was from my son's home. His wife was on the other end of the line, "The shed's on fire!" What? Did you call 911? I'll be right over.

Three or four years ago my son had an All Size Shed built behind his house so he could work on his various projects, and to get all his tools out from under his wife's feet. Slowly he started purchasing equipment to make his work easier. Then came the CarveWright machine.

What a pretty little machine and what fascinating things it could carve out.

Last Friday he was working on his nephew, my grandson, K-Monster's last class project for the school year. It was almost done. They had left it to go in the house for a few minutes and the next thing they know the neighbor is pounding on their door yelling, "the shed is on fire!" My son had left the shed door open, as he always does, so when he ran out and saw it was out of his control he shut the door and cut the power to the shop. Then he yelled at his wife to call 911 and stuck the garden hose in the broken window to try to knock some of the fire down.

After calling 911 she called me and I jumped in my car and drove right over. I passed downtown and saw the volunteer fire department getting ready to go. It was only seconds after I arrived that the fire department started pulling up and got right to work putting out the fire.

We have a wonderful, well trained, volunteer fire department. I've seen them at work at other much larger and more devastating fires. Our community is blessed to have them serve us.

The aftermath of the fire...

This was the following day. I would like to point out the distance between the house and the shop. The house has NO damage, not even heat damage. The fire was contained completely inside the shed. We, my son and I, are of the belief that the cement siding that is used on All Side Sheds is the main reason the fire was contained. I believe the roof might have been saved due to the loft.

This is looking from the doors straight to the back. The worst of the fire was the right back corner. The stand to the right was the dust collector that we believe to be the origin of the fire.

Dust collector to the far left with drawers visible in the first two pictures beside it.

Drill press and shelves that were in the back left corner. A.C. in wall to far left.

Dust collector to the right and I believe the CarveWright where it fell over and burned.

This is what remains of the CarveWright. Good thing to come out of this?! The project was still in the machine, finished (which is why we're sure it wasn't the CarveWright that caused the fire) and still usable. They just had to get it out of it.

A couple days later it's nearly cleaned out...

And today he said he's ready to start over...

The shop was uninsured. It is his building setting on rented property. The only thing covered by the owners insurance is the house, not even the contents. He had looked into insurance but needed to get with the agent and hadn't been able to that. I think he's taking this much better than I am. He's young. The only thing he's asked is help in hauling things away, though I think he has that covered now. What he wants is for this to be a cautionary tale to everyone with machine shops...

DO NOT LEAVE YOUR MACHINERY RUNNING UNATTENDED! 

Not without safeguards, or cameras, or some way to keep an eye/ear on what's going on with them. He thought he had taken everything into consideration and didn't think he had been gone that long.

Shad has not asked for money, but members of the CarveWright forum that he is a member of has asked for some way to donate to help him get set back up. So he has set up a donation site with PayPal. Any money that you might be able to donate will be greatly appreciated. The shop will eventually be rebuilt because he is a builder, he can't help himself, he has to build.

Genealogy Meeting Golden Wheat Chapter AHSGR

Click on newsletter to enlarge.

Bierock Bake Fundraiser 2012

Our Golden Wheat Chapter AHSGR held its annual bierock bake to raise funds. There was a lot of prep work that went into getting ready for the day but...
Here's how it works:

You need lots and lots of dough...

...and because it's frozen you have to warm it up...

...and you need lots and lots of meat & cabbage...

...that needs to be measured out just so...

...then you roll out the dough into nice little circles, put the meat and cabbage filling on it and pinch it all together nicely sealed.

At peak production in the afternoon we had two stations with 3 rollers and 1 sealer.

Before baking they need to rise...

Sorry I can't supply you with the smell, that would just be teasing you anyway, since you can't have one, but aren't they beautiful?

We don't want to leave out all the other hard workers, we had plenty of great help with keeping the baking sheets cleaned up and ready for the next batch, plus all the other needed tasks in the kitchen...

And one of the most important jobs, getting the finished product all boxed up and marked for who they are to go to...

Another GREAT fund raiser! And it seems like no matter HOW MANY we bake, there's always more people asking to be put on the list to buy them.

R.I.P. Rick Gannon

Farewell my friend, you will be missed. The worlds's a better place for having had you in it.

Folklore Meeting Golden Wheat Chapter AHSGR

The Folklore Meeting of the Golden Wheat Chapter AHSGR is always on of the favorites. Members bring traditional ethnic foods to share and enjoy. I didn't get pictures of the food this year as that I was busy setting up equipment. It was pretty much gone by the time I got to it, which doesn't take long at all with THIS meal.

A big THANK YOU to my granddaughter for coming along and helping me with the equipment and running the camcorder. She did a fabulous job!

Skywatch

The granddaughters were here this last weekend and we had gone out to the studio to work on crafts (a later post). Grandpa called out to the studio and told us we should be getting pictures of the sunset, so out we went. The sky was ablaze!

The younger granddaughter, being the precocious child that she is, decided to divide the clouds with her mighty staff. (It appears that the lamppost in the lower right was also leaving skid marks on the clouds.)

Walking to the backyard we found that the moon had been treed.

The older granddaughter freed it and held it aloft so it could find it's place. She needs no one to give HER the moon, she can capture it herself.

The clouds looked so much like fluffy frosting that the older granddaughter decided to give it a taste and took a long sample with her finger. Must've been like Cotton candy.

The following night was much darker with heavy clouds. When the moon broke through I found she that calls herself The Mysterious One cupping the moon to give it relief from weight of the clouds.

I hope you enjoyed our skywatch pictures as much as we enjoyed creating them. :)

Golden Wheat Christmas Party

Time for our annual Golden Wheat Chapter AHSGR Christmas Party. We had wonderful attendance this year, we even had to set up more tables as families came in. The children's choir was unable to be there, but we were completely entertained with the story of Christmas, family stories, singing and Harold's wonderful story of Christmas.

Wishing Everyone a Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!