The Kid's Tree in the Loft above the Great Room
The Adult Tree in the Great Room (still looking for a lightweight lighted topper)
Tuesday, December 2, 2008
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Tuesday, October 28, 2008
We are a "Certified Backyard Wildlife Habitat"!!!!
We have had our property certified as a "Backyard Wildlife Habitat" by the National Wildlife Foundation http://www.nwf.org/backyard/. We should have a sign to post in the yard soon, but for now it appears that the word is out. Here is a new visitor that just started coming around in the mornings yesterday and today. I couldn't really get a great picture because he was about 70 ft away and I shot the photo through a window and screen. I don't have a powerful zoom on my D-SLR yet, so this is the best I could get with a little cropping and sharpen filter in Photoshop.
Kaila was the first to spot this guy yesterday. She said she saw a deer run through the yard and it looked wierd, "like a big dog with huge horns on it." I was a little intrigued with that description so I had her to describe whether the horns were big or little - she said big and made a HUGE gesture with her hands - so I was thinking we must have Bambi's Dad walking around and was expecting like a 12-point or something. As it turns out, this little guy appears pretty young - for a minute I thought it was a goat! Nevertheless, he does have antlers - although I couldn't get a good enough look to count them and I'm not sure my photo is good enough either. Anyway, I hope he sticks around a while and brings a few friends too. Enjoy!
Sunday, October 5, 2008
Solar Tour and Artwork
Below are photos of a piece of artwork by local artist, Nicholas Yust that was installed at the house (very early) this morning before the Solar Tour (Thanks Nicholas!) He trained at the University of Cincinnati and does some fabulous metal work. This looks absolutely awesome in our house - the photos do not do it justice - especially daytime photos. I can't wait to take some at night when the house is dark and the only lighting is on the piece itself.
The solar tour today was very sucessful - it was a guided tour on a planned route this year, so we really were only alotted time from 9:55 to 10:30. We tried to keep to that schedule as much as possible, but we still had some stragglers afterward until about noon, and then a few more came around 2:00. All in all, I think there were between 75 and 100 people who toured the house today - not too bad considering last year we had between 150 and 200, but were open all day from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm. Feedback on the house was all very positive, and we were also featured on the front page of the Home Style: Life & Leisure section of the Cincinnati Enquirer today. We attended the solar tour kick-off Gala at Governor Strickland's residence in Columbus last night, and were up bright and early getting the house ready for the tour this morning. Overall it was a great day and I think everyone had a lot of fun! Thanks to all who attended!
The solar tour today was very sucessful - it was a guided tour on a planned route this year, so we really were only alotted time from 9:55 to 10:30. We tried to keep to that schedule as much as possible, but we still had some stragglers afterward until about noon, and then a few more came around 2:00. All in all, I think there were between 75 and 100 people who toured the house today - not too bad considering last year we had between 150 and 200, but were open all day from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm. Feedback on the house was all very positive, and we were also featured on the front page of the Home Style: Life & Leisure section of the Cincinnati Enquirer today. We attended the solar tour kick-off Gala at Governor Strickland's residence in Columbus last night, and were up bright and early getting the house ready for the tour this morning. Overall it was a great day and I think everyone had a lot of fun! Thanks to all who attended!
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Storm Damage
After the remnants of hurricane Ike ripped through the Ohio Valley yesterday bringing sustained winds of 50 mph and gusts reported up to 80 mph for several hours, we feel lucky to have such little damage to the house. Here you can see part of a 40 ft tall pine tree that snapped in our front yard and the neighborhood men trying to get it down safely without damage to my newly installed raingarden.
We were without power for almost exactly 24 hours, but Duke Energy is reporting that power will not be restored to everyone for about a week. All in all, over 800,000 people in the Duke service area - about 90% of it's customers were without power at some point. That is the most in this region's history according to the local news reports. I think there are still about 500,000 people without power. We had sent many of our crews down to assist with Hurricane Ike clean up in Texas, but the crews had to then be recalled back to Cincinnati. So we have to wait for those crews to get back home. Luckily, we had little damage and only one day and night without power. The kids were troopers and we tried to make it fun like camping. The worst part was driving around this morning (with all of the traffic lights out) to try to find ice to save the food in our refrigerator. We were able to cook with our grill and gas cooking stove inside, and our solar hot water heater performed beautifully of course. So the refrigeration was the only issue. For those of you that called to see if we were exempt from the power woes because we were solar, remember that we have a grid-tied system, so when the grid goes out, so do we. This is to protect workers who might be out working on the line - it wouldn't be good for us to be sending power down lines that they thought were dead. And also, we do not have any battery storage for our solar power, so we were just as much in the dark as everyone else. But again, it wasn't really that much of an inconvenience except for the refrigeration and having to fill the toilet tanks with water from milk jugs because no power to our cistern pump means no power to fill the toilet tanks with our rain water. There is a small add-on system that we can get that has some additional safety features and a small bank of batteries so that we can run critical circuits from solar power when the grid goes out. We may consider that more seriously now.
Below you can see that all of the siding and solar panels on our house made it through the storm safely and are in top shape. The only damage to the house was to the western-most sunshade above the first floor window. You can see below how it was damaged in the middle when a branch or something hit it. Actually, it's great that the sunshade was there to take the impact and protect the window.
We were without power for almost exactly 24 hours, but Duke Energy is reporting that power will not be restored to everyone for about a week. All in all, over 800,000 people in the Duke service area - about 90% of it's customers were without power at some point. That is the most in this region's history according to the local news reports. I think there are still about 500,000 people without power. We had sent many of our crews down to assist with Hurricane Ike clean up in Texas, but the crews had to then be recalled back to Cincinnati. So we have to wait for those crews to get back home. Luckily, we had little damage and only one day and night without power. The kids were troopers and we tried to make it fun like camping. The worst part was driving around this morning (with all of the traffic lights out) to try to find ice to save the food in our refrigerator. We were able to cook with our grill and gas cooking stove inside, and our solar hot water heater performed beautifully of course. So the refrigeration was the only issue. For those of you that called to see if we were exempt from the power woes because we were solar, remember that we have a grid-tied system, so when the grid goes out, so do we. This is to protect workers who might be out working on the line - it wouldn't be good for us to be sending power down lines that they thought were dead. And also, we do not have any battery storage for our solar power, so we were just as much in the dark as everyone else. But again, it wasn't really that much of an inconvenience except for the refrigeration and having to fill the toilet tanks with water from milk jugs because no power to our cistern pump means no power to fill the toilet tanks with our rain water. There is a small add-on system that we can get that has some additional safety features and a small bank of batteries so that we can run critical circuits from solar power when the grid goes out. We may consider that more seriously now.
Below you can see that all of the siding and solar panels on our house made it through the storm safely and are in top shape. The only damage to the house was to the western-most sunshade above the first floor window. You can see below how it was damaged in the middle when a branch or something hit it. Actually, it's great that the sunshade was there to take the impact and protect the window.
Friday, September 5, 2008
ATTEND THE OHIO SOLAR TOUR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Hi everyone,
I just wanted to remind everyone that this year's Ohio Solar Tour - as part of the National Solar Tour sponsored by the American Solar Energy Society - will be Saturday, October 4th. We're on the tour again this year and we're really looking forward to it. Our tour will be the second stop on the Cincinnati East Tour that kicks off at the Melink Headquarters in Milford. Tour guide books and other info should be available on the Green Energy Ohio (GEO) website soon. Check in there at www.greenenergyohio.org and click on Solar Tour on the left sidebar. Make sure you look for the 2008 Tour info because the last time I checked, they still had the 2007 info up there. Hope to see some of you in October! If you have any questions, just email me at nuttergreenhome@yahoo.com Thanks!
I just wanted to remind everyone that this year's Ohio Solar Tour - as part of the National Solar Tour sponsored by the American Solar Energy Society - will be Saturday, October 4th. We're on the tour again this year and we're really looking forward to it. Our tour will be the second stop on the Cincinnati East Tour that kicks off at the Melink Headquarters in Milford. Tour guide books and other info should be available on the Green Energy Ohio (GEO) website soon. Check in there at www.greenenergyohio.org and click on Solar Tour on the left sidebar. Make sure you look for the 2008 Tour info because the last time I checked, they still had the 2007 info up there. Hope to see some of you in October! If you have any questions, just email me at nuttergreenhome@yahoo.com Thanks!
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