What Have We Been Up To?

Riverton, Utah       High 55 Low 37

It's still been a bit cool but is forecast to warm up later in the week.

Cindy has been busy with her yard and in between quilting. She seems to over-do and ends up with a back ache most night. Partly because of this and just because, we decided to get our hot tub going. We haven't had any water in it for about 10 years because kids don't know how to shower before they got in and it got so dirty we decided not to use it. But now that we are empty nesters, we felt like it was time to get it going. There were a couple of problems however. The first was that one of the two pumps wouldn't go. the second was that lots of crud had lined the circulating pipes from not being used. I could have had the Spa Place fix it but decided to try to get the pump going myself.

This is the pump and motor. The round hole at the left center is where I tried to turn it before I took it out. When I check the price of a new one it was going to cost about $500. dollars and that was part of trying to free it up myself.

It was a lot of work to get the pump out because it is bolted down with 4 bolts, two of which are buried by one of the 2 inch flex pipes on the inside of the motor. After playing with it for about two hours, I finally got the last two nuts off and could finally get the pump out. The two nuts are not getting replaced. I had tried to turn the pump with the inlet taken off but it wouldn't turn and that's why I had to remove it. I debated on buying a new pump and motor but finally decided to tear it apart. I couldn't get the pump off the motor but the end plate on the motor would turn so I knew it was the pump frozen up. I finally grabbed the armature in my hands and held the pump housing with my knees and it finally turned. I oiled the pump and when I put it back together and turned it on, it ran, although a little noisy at first so I felt I could put it back together. After getting everything together and filling the pump, a lot of dirty scum came out so I had to drain all the water out, change the filter and clean the Spa very well. Fortunately on filling it the second time, very little dirt came out which I was able to syphon out. 

We tried the Spa out last night and it felt wonderful. 

While Cindy was outside, she noticed the roof of our gazebo looked like a shingle was missing. After I check it out, the 20 years it has been up took its toll on the South side shingles, and some of them will have to be replaced.

I got some pictures of  some of the flowers that Cindy wanted to get home to see.

Thanks for visiting.

Back in Utah

 Riverton, Utah   High 63 Low 34

We drove back to Utah from Yuma on the first of April. I don't know if it was because it was Easter weekend, but we had almost 700 miles of lots of traffic with more police than I ever remember. Las Vegas was especially bad. We did have nice weather all the way with only a little wind. 

For the first time, the border check station south of Quartzsite was closed and the news keeps telling about all the immigration at the Mexico border.

It has been a little cool here with quite a bit of wind. It even snowed one morning but it all melted by noon. 

I needed to get back to do some quilting for my only customer. She had three quilts for me to do. I got those finished and have started on Cindy's quilts.

I felt like I needed to see a dermatologist to look at some spots on my head and when he checked me out, he told me that some were pre-melanoma and used liquid nitrogen to freeze them off. He did suggest that I wear a hat more when I'm outside in the sun.

Our quilt store told us that batting was scheduled to get a price increase, so I bought enough to last me a while. 

Cindy has been making more quilts and doing lots of yard work. She still over-does and ends up with her back hurting every night. She has started planting flowers and getting the garden ready. My daughter Paula is supposed to come out this afternoon to help Cindy plan the garden. She also wants to plant some things.

One reason Cindy wanted to come back so soon was to see her Daffodils which we haven't been able to see for a while. She got to see a lot of them this time.

We still don't know if we are going to do any traveling this summer but Linda, Cindy's sister, has said she would like to see Olympic National Park in Washington. We haven't seen it either and think it would make a good trip. We're not sure what there is to see and do there and I'm sure Linda will research it. We all like the coast. We were close to the Park once but didn't make it there. I still need to work on the trailer brakes. 

We went to our first yard sale yesterday and Cindy found some material for a good price. She got about 5 yards for $3.00. We also found a few other things that we didn't know we needed.  

Sorry, no pictures this time.

Thanks for visiting.