I'm still here, don't worry

It's been a long time since I last posted, too long in fact. I kind of got into a bad habit of not typing anything for a number of weeks. I'll try getting back into the swing of things. It's been a little intimidating trying to get caught up on all that happened while my family was here and this is probably the biggest reason for why I haven't written. I'll start trying to post new news on a regular basis (again) and save all the old news for when I have the urge to type and the time (or maybe that should be the other way around).

You can be sure that things have been happening around here; we've not been idle. In fact, as strange as it may sound, I have things I could post here nearly every day if I had a mind to do it! Thursday of last week we dug out the dirt in the courtyard here at the church in order to put down paving stones. Part of that also included digging a ditch a meter deep (I'll let you do the conversion) right next to the exterior wall of the building. This was so we could put in a tar-paper water barrier to try and keep the moisture down in the basement (it makes paint peel and does nasty things to anything made from wood). Then Friday morning, after having to purchase 15 meters of tar-paper (they don't sell it in shorter lengths) because we were 1.5 meters short the night before, we began work again. This consisted of holding the tar-paper in place while all the dirt that was dug out the day before was put back in. After having done this we started leveling the whole area as best we could. This worked out fine and we were done by lunch time. We had been waiting on sand to make cement all day and it still hadn't shown up by the time Daniel had to leave. What do you know but about an hour after he left the truck came! We decided that we had enough time to at least pour a section or two before we would call it quits, but it was going so fast that we just kept mixing and laying until it was all finished. I don't know how other people do it, but I used a hand trowel to smooth out the surface and a small board to level (along with a level). I have learned that, although this works, it's an extremely fatiguing way to lay concrete.

By now, the above said concrete is dry (it's not very thick - about 3-4 cm) and we are waiting on what will come next. Problems with one of the three part-owners of the courtyard (we are one of these) is kind of keeping us from completing it. Funny, it's the same man who said we would have to fix our part of the yard before he would change his no to a yes (on a vote from neighbors; this is a must by law) so we can get our permit to work on the church. Now we've got two projects going but nothing being done - for right now. I think we will probably be putting down the sand a bricks here sometime soon. To be continued...