Gratitude and tar babies

Russ and Ammon made it safely across the country with the rental truck. Four young missionaries, along with our ever-faithful, ever-hardworking daughter Angela, came to help unload. We were so grateful for their help. Most of the things went into the garage we have been working so hard to make more weatherproof. Some came into the house, filling a formerly empty living room and adding more life and homie-ness to this big old house.
This picture is Russ and me on top of the garage, tarring the metal roof. We have found some really interesting things as we have worked on this property. As a matter of fact, as I cleaned out the garage floor before filling it with stone, I was reminded of a song Russ used to sing regularly- the only "Thanksgiving carol" I've ever heard of: Alice's Restaurant. Only instead of putting garbage in a church where the pews used to be, someone, or maybe many persons, collected it in the garage, along with other areas of this half-acre. I found lots of glass- enough to make me wonder if there used to be a glass shop in there, lots of miscellaneous tools (not surprising in a garage, even bones (fortunately none big enough to make me suspicious of their origins) and lobster claws (someone here ate well!). Among the toys, food wrappings, broken pottery, and old pens there have been even larger strange objects, one of which was actually a "tar-baby". In an area along the driveway we found a very heavy, black, cylinder which puzzled us at first. At this point I can't remember exactly who it was that realized what it was but we found out it was a tar-baby. It could have been put into some sort of melting device then the liquid used to tar something. We took the tar-baby to the dump because we had no way to actually make use of it and went to good old Home Depot and bought our tar in liquid form in cans which we carried up the ladder to the roof and sloshed a good thick coat all over, to make sure the inside of the garage stays dry and the metal no longer rusts. Our work on the property continues but at a blessedly more leisurely pace.