What happened? Now I know it’s somewhat warm (40-50 degrees right now) and we’re still going to go outside like we’ve been doing, but geez. I’m not ready for the winter. Ah well; it doesn’t work that way, does it?

We barely took many pictures this fall, but if you click on the picture below you’ll see a slideshow (does anyone know how to embed a Picasa album slideshow in WordPress?) of only a bit of what we’ve been up to this fall.

Slideshow of Fall 2008 (Picasa Album)

But that’s that. Thanksgiving is over… and my wife and most certainly the kids are already talking about Christmas. I’ve even been told that instead of taking the kids to the park (or the river! it’s sunny out and somewhat nice enough still), I could take down decorations and let them have it (yeah… I’ll pass – she can enjoy that on another day).

Ah yes – there is something else I wanted to post about – my first somewhat major construction project – renovating the kids’ “clubhouse” so they can use it a bit more when it’s colder:

So the plan:

1. replace the steps/ladder (it’s going to be longer and less steep),
2. tear out the picket fence on the top half
3. put up siding to wall in in the entire top half so it’s enclosed, including building a door and a few windows (using plexiglass that can slide open/closed)
4. take out some of the wood in the bottom half so it’s no longer a sandbox
5. put up siding for 2 walls in the bottom (and another window on one of them)
6. probably add a few pieces of 1×6 / 1×8 and add a table-like surface
7. build a bench or two into the walls for each level and maybe even a fold-up/down table

So that’s the general plan. I’ve written a fair amount of it down on paper and have been to Home Depot/Lowes to check out prices and availability, but I really want to model it out using some software. Towards that end – would you recommend any free/trial modeling software? If you have any other thoughts or if you’ve done something like this before and have some advice, let me know. I know a few people that can help out here and there too, but probably not at this planning stage.