Carrie

Carrie has been on break since December 23th. She is flying back to Colorado today and will do some skiing before classes start again on Monday.

Carrie in second grade.

Click to enlarge

Carrie has spent most of her holiday at the dentist. She had 2 cavities filled and all four wisdom teeth removed last Thursday. Three out of four wisdom teeth were impacted and required removing bone to get them out.

The oral surgeon took no chances, he gave Carrie valium, laughing gas, local anesthetic, and general anesthetic, with some percocet thrown in after the procedure.

Carrie oral surgeon was a nice guy, but no matter how nice..this is what they all look like to me.



I must say Carrie was a trooper, the swelling is minor and she is back to her old self.

Back Home

Last weekend we had most of the family back home, Carrie has been away since August and John was last at Braefield Farm in October.

My sister Sue came up from Virgina to see Carrie and John.



Jim, Margaret, Andrew, and Rachel came for dinner on Saturday. We had a lovely time, it was great to have the house full of people again.

Thanks to Jim and Margaret for the pictures shown here.

Two Lovely pictures of Carrie and Rachel


Click on pictures to enlarge

John, Carrie, Margaret, and Rachel on the living room sofa.


Click to enlarge

I don't have many of these, but here is a great photo of Jim.

The Barn

The barn at Braefield Farm is known as a bank barn. It is so called because it was built in the side of a hill and the second floor is at ground level on the back side of the barn. This style of barn construction is standard in Chester County. This keeps the lower section of the barn cooler in the summer and warmer in the winter, as more than half of the lower level is below grade.

Our barn was built in two sections, the early section is mostly stone with post and beam interior and the later section was originally sheathed in board and batten. On the second floor you can see the original end of the barn, there is a stone wall inside that was the original end wall.

The original boards are still there and are in good shape. The boards are random width you can see the original boards in the pictures below. The barn was eventially covered in shingle, aluminum, board and batten, and stucco.

I took some pictures of the barn this fall. You can see the original stone section and the later shingle section is on the other side of the silo. These pictures show the back of the barn, the second floor.


click on picture to enlarge

Here are pictures of the front of the barn which was sheathed in aluminum and end section. The small structure on the far right in the picture of the front of the barn is the milk shed and is stucco. The end is covered in shingle and was an addition to the original barn.


click on picture to enlarge

This fall we had Marty Davis and his crew sheath the entire barn in board and batten. the old shingles and aluminum were removed and the new boards were put on over the original old barn boards. The original barn boards are still in good shape.

The barn looks fabulous. We will have the barn painted in the spring to match the rest of the buildings on the farm.

Margaret sent me this comment as she was watching the crew "I've been thinking about it all week as it facinates me that they could build a structure that size with the tools they probibly had /or didn't have and where did those huge boards come from?"

Thanks to Jim and Margaret for the pictures of the barn under construction. I didn't have a working camera and Margaret kindly took pictures for us as the barn was under construction.

The barn as seen from the Tenet House.. during and after construction.


Click on pictures to enlarge


The end of the second section of the barn.


Click on pictures to enlarge



The back of the second section of the barn under construction. I will take a picture of this section completed. The barn doors were also rebuilt and put on sliders.





The front of the barn. You can see the stone end of the original barn at the end of the overhang roof.

Soccer 2005

Polly played soccer this fall for Holderness . The team finished the year with a 7-4-2 record. Polly said that she had a blast this year playing soccer, the girls on the team were great and she loved her coaches.



The coaches put comments and these pictures on the Holderness website. Here are a few that mention Polly.

Polly Evans, along with an aggressive defense, kept the opponent's ball out of the net.

Among the most hard-working of the team today were Polly Evans, Lina Encalada, and Anna Hosmer.

Polly Evans did an excellent job in the net, with help from Stephanie Allen's solid protection inside the 18.

Polly was pleased and surprised to received the Coach's Award. This award is a great tribute to an athlete and we are very proud of Polly.