Month: January 2007

What Do We Do?

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On our About Page on this site I have written a little bit about what we do as full-time volunteers in Youth With A Mission (YWAM), but I have never actually written all that much about it.

Last weekend was my 30th birthday and we are looking at my 30th year to be a significant one for us in ministry. It’s exciting to look ahead and see some of what God has planned for us.

You can read more about what we do at 2007.billandtamara.com, which is a web-site that we set-up to help us raise prayer and financial support for this new year, and keep people updated on what we are doing…

Easy Install Instant Screen Door

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Screen Door that has Easy and Quick InstallationBecause of the location of our back door is will be nearly impossible for install a normal screen or security door on it. The top of the door jam is right at the bottom of the ceiling. This works fine for the main door, which opens inwards, but it means that we can’t install an outward opening security or screen door because it will hit the roof overhang on the back of the house.

In the latest Handyman Magazine there is a screen door advertised that would work great, except for one problem which I will outline at the end of this post.

The “Bug Off Instant Screen” is a hanging mesh that is secured at the top and then automatically attaches on the sides and bottom with magnets and Velcro. It claims to install in minutes without any tools and it doesn’t damage the door frame. The instant screen door is available in many different door widths and heights and would fit perfectly in our back door.

The problem that we would have with it though, which Tamara pointed out to me as I was getting ready to order it on-line, is that our 9-month old could push right through it and tumble down the stairs. Because it doesn’t actually have a closing or locking mechanism like a normal security or screen door would have, there is no security with it, and there is no way to keep the little (short) people from getting outside through it.

We might be able to revisit this idea once we get our deck up on the back of the house, with a child gate above the stairs of course, but for now we are stuck with the main door always closed…

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The Results of the Late Night Painting

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Last week I did a bit of late night painting on the posts and banisters out the front of our house. Almost as soon as I was finished it started to rain, which had me really worried about the paint (it was an undercoat) running off.

Thankfully the paint didn’t wash off, but seeing as how it was 11:45 at night when I finished I did miss one of the shorter posts, and a bit under the handrail. I also had a few streaks on the last post that I did, but I’m not sure if that was the rain or the fatigue that caused that one…

What to do with our Concrete Stumps when Building in Under?

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Tonight I got an e-mail from someone who is Renovating their Queenslander here in Townsville. They have enclosed underneath and are currently adding a bathroom, bedroom and rumpus room. They had a question though about what to do with the concrete stumps that are under the house holding it up.

Concrete Stump under QueenslanderThe concrete stumps used under many Queenslanders are quite large and very difficult to conceal. The ones that we had at our old house were about 300mm x 300mm square (unfortunately the image on the right is the best I can find tonight). These stumps are quite ugly and can be difficult to work around while enclosing under. So what can we do with the concrete stumps holding up the house?

The solution that I suggested was to restump the house with new steel stumps, or even just the stumps that are in the way or too obvious. You can see them under our house in the story House Concrete Slab is Complete.

The new steel stumps are available in 75mm and 90mm width, depending on the load that they need to bear. The great thing about this size is that they can easily be concealed in walls, which are what we are planning to do under our house. It is something that you can attempt to do yourself if you are game enough, or the guys at Northern House Raising can also probably do it for you (they raised and restumped our house).

Some questions for you:

  1. Does anyone else out there have any suggestions about what to do with the concrete stumps?
  2. Is there an easier / faster / cheaper solution to make them look nice without having to go through the trouble of replacing the concrete stumps?

Your ideas would be appreciated and would help this person out with their own renovations.