Mountain Has Been Moved

Pastor Steve sent out this email to the congregation this morning. Keep those hoses and sprinklers coming, please. And we're looking for an hour of your time each week watching grass grow -- and a little more.

Dear Members & Friends of Emmanuel:

As Warren Weber announced – the mountain has been moved! But it has been spread over our grounds to level our lawn area and hydro-seeded. Now we are presented with a “new” challenge.

For the next month, it needs to be watered 4 times per day 7 days a week. It is imperative that we do this as the hydro-seeding cost $1,650 and we need to protect our investment in a new and better lawn.

Larry Gibbons is in charge of this task but he cannot do it alone. He needs your help. The plan is to have hoses and sprinklers strategically placed so that all areas will be covered.

You can help by volunteering to take a shift of approximately one hour to turn water on and off in various zones. We cannot walk on the seeded areas so with the help of the hoses and sprinklers you have lent us (we still can use more), there will hopefully no hose dragging (hooray). Larry will provide training sessions on procedures.

Larry will have a sign up calendar at church on Sunday or you can contact him at (425) 485-1290 or by email: lgroses@comcast.net. It is important that we help him with this.

Please prayerfully consider how much time you can give in the next 4 weeks.

Grace & Peace,
Pastor Steve

Drywall and caulk

On Memorial Day, there were three crews working at the construction site.

Outside, a team was starting to caulk all the places where the siding met windows or walls or roof or pipes.

One worker appeared to be cutting pipes to length for installation the next day.

And a large crew was finishing up installation of drywall in the classroom wing.

You might want to take a look the blog entries Drywall, Drag erasing, Dirt and shovels, shrubs and trees and Fill me in. Although dated earlier to keep the sequence of events accurate, they've all gone up just before this post.

Drywall

Putting up drywall sure changes the look of a place. No more raw wood and see-through walls, but large expanses of white. Note that there is siding on the long walls of the clerestory.

The drywall crew was about half done with installing insulation and drywall in the Matthews classroom wing when a small contingent visited after Sunday services.

A lone laborer with a rake was getting the larger rocks out of an acre or so of fill dirt that Warren had smoothed out earlier in the week.

Drag erasing

On the Monday after the great planting of ought 9, I remembered to get a picture of the southern planting bed that I had skipped on Saturday. This was the first bed planted on Saturday morning.

At the same time, Warren was out driving in circles in the newly spread dirt to smooth it out with a heavy wire drag.

Most of the newly planted trees were staked along the north edge of the property.

Larry and Dick were working on transplanting some of our flowering trees and shrubs to where they would be both protected and visible from the new sanctuary and nursery windows.

Meanwhile, plumbing, electrical and framing work continued inside the building. Tar paper was up on the clerestory in preparation for installing siding.

Dirt and shovels, shrubs and trees

Crew members started arriving just before 8 a.m. Saturday for a day long work party that Erik and Warren had organized. Erik had specified and ordered the plants, which the city had to approve. Warren had 40 yards of topsoil hauled in.

Erik had outlined two planting beds -- both on 104th Avenue Northeast -- one by the sidewalk just south of the big church sign and one at the north corner of the property. He also staked out locations for 10 street trees along the north border of the property.

By the end of the day, Erik, Nolan, Caleb, Warren, Don, Jim, Bram, Bob J., Larry, Lori, Cameron, Steve, Deb, Lee plus Alida, Hank and Allie and several of their friends had it all planted.

Still to be done: staking the trees, planting a third bed near the driveway entrance after the mobile units are gone and digging is done, figuring out what to do with the plants for that bed in the meantime, and watering all the new plantings regularly.

SATURDAY WORK PARTY ALERT!

The trees and shrubs have been delivered. There are more than 18 cubic yards of nice topsoil waiting to be spread in planting areas. Two planting beds and several spots for treees have been designated.

We start work at 8 a.m., but come anytime. It will be a beautiful day to do yardwork. It is unlikely we will run out of things to do before it is time to go to the Adult Fellowship Potluck at Lee and Sydney's. So, bring your shovels, rakes and wheelbarrows and a willingness to get down and dirty for a while.

See you there.

No more mounds

As the work week drew to a close, crews were busy preparing to put siding high up on the center structure, installing lighting fixtures, running still more pipes for the fire sprinkler system and moving dirt. There were probably a few other things going on, too.

Warren, with some help from his brother, has moved the two big mounds of dirt. The larger was created when the new foundation was dug. The smaller one in front was created when the new water system was installed near the street. The mounds are being spread on the front yard to smooth out a couple of steep spots and on the yard south of the Matthews wing. That had become very bumpy over the years, so this will allow us to start anew creating a smooth lawn.

Fill me in

Warren just started yesterday to fill in the low spots in the front lawn with dirt from Mound Emmanuel. He also pulled out the remaining stump and roots from the old weeping willow that used to grow near the cross. The williow was diseased and fell over in a winter windstorm.

Paul and Sue were working on the fence around the school mobile unit. The children weren't exactly trying to escape, but they were pushing on the fence between posts where it wasn't anchored tightly.

One photo shows sprinkler heads that the code requires inside a covered wall unit at one kitchen entrance.

I also included a panoramic view of the utility basement because it's a place most of us will never go, starting with the two main furnaces, swinging around to the classroom wing furnance, the entrance and the control valves for the sprinkler system.

Which side are we on?

Sue was busy taking pictures yesterday.

She caught Vitaly and the crew putting up siding, Larry reinstalling downspouts, the tangle of electrical conduits terminating in the pantry, and the HVAC sheet metal in the school office storage room.

Wrapping up the week

Well, once again the crew observed a casual Friday dress code as they installed siding around the south end of the building. Electrical, heating and ventilation work continued apace inside and underneath the building. After the others had washed up for the week, Warren was up on the roof. And Dick was going around in circles out in the yard.

WORK PARTY ALERT: This is a reminder that Saturday, May 16, we will need a crew to help plant the landscaping that the city of Bothell is now requiring along our north property line. Eric is organizing the crew. Check with him at church on Mother's Day or call or email him if you can help.

It's all our facade

The new siding went up all along the front of the building on Thursday. Sure, there are a few spots, most noticeably the front of the clerestory, where it hasn't been installed yet, but it is there for the most part.

Exhaust fans have been installed in the restrooms. There are red caps on the fire sprinklers to protect them during construction. Red plastic electrical boxes have sprung out all over the place to hold fire sensors or alarms. Much of the building just had electrical boxes installed for ceiling light fixtures. The electrician brought in a nifty scissor lift to install them in the top of the clerestory.

The storage closet in the school office is filling up with ductwork. The latest, which looks like dryer vents on the outside, are intake and exhaust vents for a fan that moves air around under the classroom wing. An even bigger duct will act as the fresh air intake for a furnace or two.

WORK PARTY ALERT: The last five photos are a reminder that Saturday, May 16, we will need a crew to help plant the landscaping that the city of Bothell is now requiring along our north property line. Eric is organizing the crew. Check with him at church on Mother's Day or call or email him if you can help.

Fade to black

Paul and Larry spent much of the early part of the week stripping the old siding off the sanctuary building. A lot of that time they were laboring in the rain. Sue caught them here about 10 a.m. Wednesday as they began work on the third section of the south wall behind the rose garden. You can see the rain soaking them.

Larry handled the ladder and the crowbar, while Paul kept tension on the long strip of wood being removed from the wall, carried it away and tossed it mightily onto a pile of its peers.

He descended into ... the crawlspace

Larry and Sue teamed up for a look at what's been going on underneath the floor. With Sue's camera, Larry scooted himself along the floor in the crawlspace under the sanctuary, which may provide better working conditions than rolling around in raw dirt but the ceiling really is a bit low for my taste.

When Larry was done under there, he and Sue went over to the utility basement. This is a little better, if you are 4 foot 10. Larry got a shot of the amazing guy who spends his days working invisibly beneath the floorboards installing the ductwork for the furnaces.

Sue took photos of the three furnaces that will be sitting in this space. One photo, which you may need to look at a couple of times, shows two furnaces. One in the center of the photo is for heating stuff in the direction of the sanctuary; the one on the right will heat areas toward the kitchen and the offices. A second photo shows the furnace that will heat the classroom wing.

Turning the corner

The application of the siding turned the corner from the back of the building on May 1 and started moving down the facade. Today's photos show that.

Also, there's a photo of an odd pipe sticking out of the north wall between the doors for the pre-school classrooms. Warren tells me it is the pressure relief valve outlet for the secondary water heater installed under the Matthews wing. Without this secondary heater, a hot water faucet in one of the classrooms would have to empty out 60 feet of cold, cool or lukewarm water every time before the hot water got there.

Another photo shows lots of conduit headed for the main breaker box. And others show the red covers slipped over the fire sprinkler heads to protect them until the ceilings can be hung. One photo shows a sprinkler head that is without a cover because it will be up in the attic out of the way of construction.