Snowstorms and vendors and errands and labor and enormous outlays. And gratitude.

Photo copyright Aji, 2017; all rights reserved.

That shot is from yesterday; I had to lighten up the exposure a lot, hence the glare, but it's a slightly closer approximation of the actual color. The only thing I got accomplished today was the next layers on the samples; we had to be out much of the day dealing with errands and vendors and materials and supplies, and when we got home (in the middle of a snowstorm, which subsided but whose second wave will be upon us soon), we had to deal with a major plumbing repair and some other stuff. My schedule has been shot all day.

On the plus side, Clarences Jr. and Sr. will be here at 9:00 tomorrow morning to finish the scratch and start the color coat on the interior plaster. With luck, I'll have some photos. Also with luck, I'll also have photos of the room above with both ceiling and edgework done in brown, and subsequently with the second color coat on at least the walls. Final coat will likely have to wait for Sunday (and it will look very, very different from the way it looks now). Even so, the brown is beautiful. When I went upstairs this afternoon, I was taken aback by how much darker the room suddenly seemed now that it was no longer all white . . . and how much warmer it seemed, which, on a day like today, is a very good thing.

It's entirely due to some of y'all that we were able to get anything done today, and as it happens, we got it all done. Well, the weekend's labor is obviously not paid, since it hasn't been performed yet, but we'll be able to pay them at the end of the day on Sunday. It was an enormous outlay, but thanks to our friends, it's done. But there's so much left to do (and therefore to fund, which is the bane of my existence anymore but there's no choice). So please share the links below:

• Wings's PayPal account, for donations to the house fund. [Thanks to some incredible folks yesterday, I think we are at around $9,600 thus far on this $30K stage. $7K+ of that is going to have to be reserved for the septic, and labor's eating us alive on the daily, so that's going to mean a lot of juggling.] If that link doesn't work, it's tied to his e-mail address: wingsoftaos [at] newmex [dot] com. Also, that link? It's a direct one now, rather than via the "Donate" button, so it should work better.
• His Web site, for sales (always preferable, and the base upon which the whole project hinges anyway, along with paying our day-to-day living expenses) — and just by the way, he's got some really incredible new works up now.
• Our Amazon wishlist, which contains Lowe's cards that will allow us to purchase some materials more cheaply than here in town, and also allow us to divert the extra funds to labor costs.

I truly do not have words to express our gratitude to everyone who gave us a hand yesterday. All I can do is say thank you, and send our love, to all of you. And as I've been saying to folks all week, if you can, please support LauraLee's fundraiser, because she and her girls and their dog are seeing their house on the auction block, and the people foreclosing treated her the same way those repossessing ours treated us. 

All content, including photos and text, are copyright Aji, 2017; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.