Rookie's 1st Buck

Ol' Deadeye Karter got his first buck today. He is so excited. He and Uncle Grizz went up on Goslin Mountain, the spot where Kolby killed his first buck and the place Karter used to hunt with Pop. It proved to be the perfect spot. And somewhere Pop is smiling down on Karter and is as proud as he can be.

It should also be noted that Karter was shooting my Grandma Mary's trusty ol' .270. We have affectionately the gun "Mary". It was bestowed to me in 1995 as a Christmas present, and Grandma Mary has never regretted her decision to hand this gun down to me as it has been used well and I treasure it dearly. It had been quite a few years since "Mary" (and Grandma Mary) killed a buck with that gun, but Karter got it sighted in this week and told me, "Mom, I could drill a quarter at 200 yards with it now." when he came back from shooting Thursday night. He was excited and ready for his first rifle deer hunt.

His day started early as he and Uncle Grizz got up at 4 am to make the long drive to an area near the Utah/Wyoming state line above Flaming Gorge. Karter tells the story like this: "We were hiking up on top of Goslin, looking down the hillside. We were headed towards a patch of trees when we stopped to glass the hillside. We saw a few does first but then I heard Grizz shout Pop's famous words, "The last one's a buck!". I sat down and put my gun up to scope out the buck, resting my elbows on my knees to steady my rifle. It didn't take long for me to decide I was going to take this buck. I had buck fever and I had it bad. I wanted him. I told Uncle Grizz "I'm going to shoot him, Grizz. I'm going to shoot him." The buck was standing broadside to me, about 187 yards away, so I jacked a shell in, got the buck in my crosshairs, and squeezed the trigger. The next thing I know Grizz was shouting, "HE'S DOWN! HE'S DOWN!".

"At first I didn't believe him and I sat there saying, "Really? Really? Are you sure?". But sure enough, my buck was down; one shot through the lungs and he moved no more. Then the work began. I took on the task of field dressing the buck myself then Grizz and I drug him back up to the truck."

"I am very excited to have killed my first buck. I was so pumped up about it and very proud of myself for hitting the buck in the vitals with the first shot, right where I was taught. I thank my Pop for teaching me how to hunt and instilling in me a love of hunting, and my Uncle Grizz for taking me with him all the time and being my hunting buddy. I also love "Mary", my mom's .270. I like hunting with a gun that has been passed down through my family and has killed deer before."

Karter Rook- 1st Buck- 1 Shot- 12 years old, Oct. 23, 2010

Karter- Everyone Needs One

What would I do without my Karter? He's such a great kid. He is Kolby's #1 helper on this house project and has worked his butt off. We are very proud of him and love him very much.

So...this one's dedicated to KARTER.

Hanging Sheetrock-






Kai helped where he could too. He's spraying popcorn ceilings for me to scrape off. (and might I just add that I HATE those stupid popcorn ceilings? What a mess!)


Ally is good at looking cute and avoiding work....


But it just leaves her plenty of time to teach Kai how to dance...


and shoot her .22




And even though he worked all day, big brother was still there to help his little brothers with the gun. What a great brother!

Showing Kai how to load it...


This kid's a good shot!


Karter adores Kenyon and will help him with anything. The other day Kenyon told me, "Mom, guess what? Karter sayed he loves me today!" Awwwww!


And he cleans up nicely too. What a handsome kid!

DEMOLITION!

We tore into that house right away and worked on demolition all summer. Karter's favorite tool of choice was a tire iron. LOL (Hey! It worked great, ok?)


"Wanna spend the night at my house?" really meant, "We'll make you work in our remodel house for food." Karter and his buddy Weston had fun busting out walls.




Knocking the wall between upstairs bedrooms down...


Upstairs living room stripped down (almost)



DURING- basement- from living room looking to the south down the hallway. Drywall gone- insulation still needs to come out. Major improvement already though, huh?


Kid's living room- black stuff on vapor barrier is mold. Lovely, huh? It still smells wet down there. I think it will until all that insulation comes out. Heating and air yet to go in at time of photo (it's in now tho).


Taken from corner of little boys' room. The brick wall will stay and so will the cool western looking chandeliers. I'll clean them up and keep them. The little boys want a western/cowboy room so those fit perfectly. The built-ins will get a paint job and that brick will get a wash down. The hole where the stove pipe went for the wood burning stove will be covered up, but that brick pad where the stove sat stays. The little boys say that will be the town streets when they play farm.

We will also put some french doors in that large opening to the kids' living room.


Other corner of the little boys' room. We'll build a closet over there. They've got a HUGE space. We're excited about it.


5 HUGE dump-trailer loads hauled off so far


Kitchen and hallway- see my pretty hickory cabinets? They're ready to go in. We ust need to sheetrock!


Upstairs bathroom expanded- picture it without all the pipes in the middle. The tub will sit here, toilet will go in the corner and that other box is the shower base. I am standing where the vanity will go (you can't see me tho since I'm taking the picture). 1/4 bath will go on the other side of the shower base.


Lots of sheetrock and tile ready to go in the upstairs living room. That's what the drywall looks like when you rip the paneling off, too. That'll take some fun mud work once we get the sheetrock up in the rest of the house...


Kenyon- this little boy has worked his butt off in this house. He is always willing to help with anything and he works HARD. He loves tools and fixing and helping out. LOVE this child!


Poor guy even stepped on a nail one day. It went right through those sandals into his big toe. It was very traumatic for him and he talked about his "injury" for 2 weeks. Awwwwww!


WORKIN' HARD or HARDLY WORKIN'?
These two slackers would help for a few minutes then go play outside. They love the weed jungle and searching for grasshoppers. Told ya those weeds were just gonna get bigger....


Grasshopper hunting...




Total slacker... ;-)


Ice cream break!




Summer storm...


Results of a HUGE storm that put down a lot of water. The water came right in the windows, down into the walls and all over the floor. No wonder the insulation all along the west wall was so wet! The bathroom leak didn't help matters either. But...we'll get it worked out! It will be fixed. We now have window wells and the new windows will be installed any day now. Yay!

The New House

We bought a house in June that needs A LOT of work. It's 2400 sq feet on 2 acres, but it required a complete gut. We have an awesome neighborhood though....

1/2 a mile from the house


Our only neighbor to the west...my cousin Craig's house upon the hill above the lake


Southwest view (ugly fence but we'll fix that)


South View


Our driveway arch, only neighbor to the North and the awesome North view


BEFORE
Only 2 neighbors but A LOT of work. The house was in pretty rough shape. A family lived here, but they didn't take very good care of the place...




The only thing we're keeping- this cool rock fireplace. It needs a major overhaul and cleaning, but it will look nice when we're finished with it. The woodburning stove is coming out. We'll put a cover there for now...a new gas insert later.


The kitchen cabinets don't LOOK that bad, but they were pretty gross. I was really happy when those came out. The floor was quite nasty too. The stove was gross and had moldy food stuck to the side of it. Gag!


Nasty windows


Upstairs bathroom. I can't believe people lived here. Wait 'til you see the basement though....


Upstairs bedroom #1- this room shares a wall w/the bathroom. Clearly there was a lot of water damage.


Upstairs bedroom #2- dark paneling just made it feel so much more closed in.


The upstairs bedrooms have closets back to back. They're coming out, the rooms will be one giant master bedroom and the bathroom will be expanded into bedroom #1, and a walk in closet will be built in bedroom #1 as well.




Looking back into dining room/kitchen from living room. Someone tried to fix the house up a little...


Are you ready for this? You're sure? Going downstairs now! The ugly stairway to HELL....


Look at this! The bathroom downstairs. Major water damage from above!! Yikes!


Laundry Room- It's ALL coming out. Moldy drywall, insulation behind it, cabinets...the works. TOTAL GUTTING of the basement. (thank God!)


Downstairs living room w/ kitchen area- the kids get this room for themselves. It functioned as a kitchen and dining room for the people who built the house. It'll be the kid's TV/Game room complete with a juice bar since there are full kitchen hook-ups. That wood burning stove is going bye-bye. It doesn't belong there anyway.


Kitchen area that will be the kids' juice bar/counter and sink. See the dirt piled up against the window there? There are no window wells in the basement. Rainwater came right in those windows and went down into the walls. Once it saturated the insulation it went to the carpet. I just can't believe people lived with that in this place!


Check it out! Ghosts in the basement! Look at all the ORBS! (couldn't be all the dust and mold flying thru the air could it? LOL)


This was the downstairs living room. Oooo...white paneling! They went with a different look for this room. Love that plush red carpet! ;-) This will be Kai and Kenyon's room. It's huge!


Downstairs hallway looking south....straight into Ally's bedroom. On the right are the laundry room and bathroom, on the left is a big pantry and under the stair storage area. Nice storage area! On the other side of the stairs to the left is Karter's bedroom.


Karter's room- see the water stains on the carpet?


What the heck!? Weird bathroom medicine cabinet on the wall in Karter's room. That was the first thing he ripped down.


Ally's room- we pried up the paneling to see what damage there was behind the panels. Most of the drywall in the basement was moldy. It all came out. The insulation behind it was wet as well so it came out too.


Hole in Ally's ceiling. This is right below the upstairs bedroom that shares the wall w/the upstairs bathroom and is also right next to the downstairs bath were the big water leak was. It caused the ceilings to fall in the downstairs bath and this bedroom.


East side of the yard- sooooo much work to be done in the yard as well. That'll have to be next summer's work though.


2 acres of weeds. Don't worry...they're just going to get bigger and bigger! Also, there are mounds of dirt with trash in them. The person who was hired by the bank to clean out the house for sale came in, threw everything out into the yard and then buried it in big mounds all over the yard. Nice, huh? That'll be a fun task next year. That dirt pile you see running all across the yard is the ditch. It was dug out this year. Really pretty, huh? Ugh...


East side porch. That's actually the front door side. It's in poor shape, but better than the west side porch.


East side of the house looking to the south. Nice view...no neighbors..still a plus! (there is one neighbor to the East in a crappy house. She's a whole acre away though. There is a hayfield in between her house and ours. The only other neighbor is to the North. He's the son of the man who built this house. The family owned all the land, but when the old man died they carved out 2 acres, but never actually fenced it off so we have a lot more property here than what the fences show. We have land in that hayfield, to the south and more to the west as well. We'll have to get the surveyor over to plot it all out then meet with the man who owns the hayfield- 3 Rivers Ranch-.


Big ol' Cottonwood tree w/the remnants of a tree house in it.


Karter was pretty excited about it! This is his summer project next year (if we ever get the yard into shape)


Irrigation canal under the treehouse tree..west side of the driveway...looking North. don't think it's in use anymore though. Water does come in to that silver headgate there and then the water runs across our yard to the hayfield on the East, but I don't think that big ol' canal has had water in it for years.


Check it out! My very own HAM RADIO tower! Wohoo! lol Hey...when the internets go down in a big emergency who's still gonna be able to communicate with everyone? That's right...ME! Got your ears on out there folks? ;-)