Allan Family Year End Update 2020

 

It’s been a long strange year for all of us. Our sincere hope is that even if you are not too happy, you are at the very least healthy and safe.

The past year in Pine Grove has been spent, for the most part, on house building. At least six months work remains until we can consider this project “done”; however, strides have been made. The interior is completely sheet rocked and painted. Rita and Emily spent the weeks prior to Thanksgiving getting the bamboo flooring down on the main floor. Kitchen cabinets are all but complete, save a countertop which is on order. The major accomplishment has been installation of the downstairs lavatory, giving Chris and Rita two bathrooms at their disposal for the first time since 1989! The kitchen sink is now installed, negating having to wash dishes down in the barn sink. Sleeping accommodations are still in the little house at the top of the property, for now, at least until the county finals our permit.

Rita soldiers on for Caltrans. She is looking forward to retiring in approximately four years. She may have a bit of the short-timer’s syndrome. Work on the house takes up every other waking moment. We have stayed on the property without venturing too far out since March, which I assume is the same story for many of you.

Anne gave us some big news recently, she is now engaged to our soon-to-be son in law, Jack. Wedding preparations are being made in broad terms for now. They are saving up for a wedding at the old Girl Scout camp in Idyllwild a couple of years from now.  She has been lucky enough to be able to work from home this whole time. She is still with Cartoon Network working as a Production Coordinator on Craig of the Creek. Jack along with the cats, Jojo an Pippin, keep her company.

Emily has been on the unemployment rolls since Disneyland closed. She was able to spend most of the summer in Pine Grove with her parents, building a sound recording booth for her voice acting work. The build took over a month, as well as a couple days of installation down in Anaheim with her parents. Emily is weighing her options, but with her sunny disposition, she will come out of this just fine.

Chris hasn’t been doing too much other than painting walls, trimming-out doors and windows, and installing fixtures. He has taken on the role of fundraising chair for the local non-profit railroad group, but time to devote to that is hard to come by. Hopefully next year things will slow down enough to be able spend more time raising funds (we’ll see!). Chris also looks forward to starting the build on the O scale model railroad in the barn next year, once most of our living room furniture is moved into the new house.

Kona the dog is a bit confused as to why we are spending so much time in the new house. She is slowly getting acclimated and enjoys laying in front of the gas stove. Some days she just lays up on the hill overlooking the property, waiting for squirrels to come out of the trees so she can chase them back up.

That’s 2020 in a nutshell. Everyone out there stay safe, get your shots when they come available, and keep in touch with those you cannot physically visit with. Love to all. See you next year!

Chris, Rita & Kona

Allan Family Year End Update 2019

Another year is behind us. We accomplish a lot in our lives, and got a bit further down the road on our projects. It is our hope that all of you had a great year full of all the things that make life worth living.

Chris and Rita's main project continues to be the construction of their house in Pine Grove. Early in the year we finished off the exterior, so it at least looks like a house from the outside. The only big items still to accomplish are the garage doors, which have been on order from Home Depot for two months, along with a ceiling and railing for the front porch. A great deal has been achieved on the interior, including 95 percent of the plumbing, which includes all doodads associated with that like the hot water heater, fire sprinkler system, and even a hot water recirculating pump. Our friends Roger and Gloria from Woodland helped us cut a ditch down from the water tank, and now the house is hooked up to the water supply. Rita is working her way through the electrical. The hardest part with wiring is figuring out the codes and where all the fancy switches need to be. Pressing on through the winter and into the Spring of next year should see us actually getting some insulation in as well as the A/C and heat. After that comes the dreaded drywall. Stay tuned.

Rita with her boss accepting a
Certificate of Achievement for online training.

Rita is counting down to retirement in 2025. The best part about her Caltrans job is she gets to work from home (or barn, actually) which saves on time and stress of a regular commute. She has taken on a volunteer position for the local Girl Scout unit as their treasurer, and this summer she made rockets for the camp with the help of Emily. Gardening is another pastime, taking care of her roses, and harvesting bucket after bucket of tomatoes.

Heather Cook, Rita, and Emily at the Girl Scout Camp with the rocket launcher.

Chris has managed to accomplish a few things this past year despite some health issues. Starting on Father's Day weekend some pains started up, After multitudinous tests at Kaiser they deemed him in "perfect health." Pains have subsided for now at least. He has got some O scale modeling in between house projects, as well as volunteering to fund-raise for the local railroad preservation group. A high point was a fundraising trip aboard Roger and Gloria's private railcar the "Two Rivers" from Woodland to West Sacramento in November.

Rita prepares the snacks and visits with our wonderful neighbor Patria aboard the Two Rivers.

No update would be complete without letting you know how our Akita, Kona is getting along. She is still taking care of us, and keeping the squirrels in the trees. Treats are the highlight of her day, unless of course she is lucky enough to get a ride in the truck, and maybe even a walk through Lowes in Martell, where she gets a lot of attention.

Kona enjoying the snow.

Anne was promoted to Production Coordinator at her employer, Cartoon Network. We are very proud of what she has accomplished in a short period of time. Her short commute from Sunland/Tujunga to Burbank is also a bonus. She has been able to take on some extra work as a colorist and continues working on commissions from time to time. Her significant other, Jack is her anchor, and has been able to find work at Alamo Brewhouse Theater in downtown LA. They were both able to travel to Ohio to visit Jack's family earlier this year, which was a nice break for them.

Emily and Anne at the Cartoon Network Halloween party.

Emily is finishing up school this semester at Fullerton State. She will get her degree and decide what is next for her.  We are proud of her as well for getting herself through school while holding down her job at Disneyland. She has been there three years now, and has been promoted to lead. Emily has also been taking voice acting lessons to add to her already busy schedule.

Beefsgiving Dinner at Harris Ranch with Rita, Heather (Emily's friend and roommate) Emily, Anne and Jack.

While we don't see each other as much as we would like,  we do get together when we can. Our Thanksgiving this year was a week early, due to the girl's work schedule. We met in the middle of the state at Harris Ranch. We had a delicious dinner at the steakhouse, which we deemed our "Beefsgiving." The next morning we retreated to our respective ends of California.

Those were our highlights for this past year. It is our hope, as always, that all of you have a great holiday season, and  a safe, happy and productive 2020. We hope to see you all soon, either in person or online. Until then, please stay in touch!

The Allan Family

Allan Family Year-End Update 2018

Well, another year is in the books, and what a year 2018 turned out to be. We accomplished quite a bit here in Pine Grove on the house project, and the girls accomplished a good deal in their lives back in the Southland.

The seemingly unending process to get the house permits approved finally ran its course by the beginning of the spring. At that point Rita started with the digging of footings for the house slab, and three concrete pours later, we were ready for the house kit to be shipped. The panel kit was shipped from Indiana in late June. Arriving three days earlier than we planned, we had to scramble to bring in forklifts and hire the local tow company to bring in the panels as there is no way of getting a big rig onto our property. Dealing with logistics that day and the overly grumpy truck driver made for a long process.  Nevertheless, day by day, with the help of family and friends, including Mike and Patria Rhodes, our next-door neighbors, and Chris’ friends Roger S., Roger C3, and Paul, the Tyvek-wrapped shell of our house stands as a testament to our perseverance. At the time of this writing windows are being installed, with hopes of getting some siding in place before the end of the year. Chris hopes to move in sometime before he and Rita turn sixty, four years hence.

Rita continues working out of the barn in the meantime. She has taken a volunteer position with the local Girl Scout Service Unit as a treasurer. Between that, house building, and the regular prowling around at estate sales in the county she is keeping busy.

Much the same for Chris. Lots of house building, not much time for model railroading, etc. He has been helping out from time to time volunteering to raise some funding for the Amador Central Railroad group. They have a 10-mile shortline railroad here in the county that volunteers are working to preserve.

Anne and her boyfriend Jack have moved into a snazzy apartment in the greater Sunland/Tujunga area of Los Angeles in October. This enabled Anne to move out of our friends Billy and Marie’s house in Norwalk, saving her a great deal of stress in her commute to Burbank, where she works as a Production Assistant at Cartoon Network. Mom and Dad got to drive down to help them move in and get situated, the first time they have been back to LA in 2 ½ years.

Emily continues her studies at Fullerton State. She is taking a heavy class load so as to finish up her degree next year. In her spare time, she works evenings and weekends at Disneyland, in and around the Fantasyland section of the park. She also coaches track and field at her old high school in Cerritos as well. Emily had a bit of an auto accident this past year, but she took it in stride and learned a bit about the ins and outs of auto ownership in the process. Luckily she was not injured.

Kona, our Akita dog, still seems to like us, and looks forward to her “talks” with the neighbor dogs through the fence, and getting treats several times a day.

All the best to everyone, happy holidays, and remember to keep in touch-  and stop in when you are in the neighborhood!

Love from,

The Allan Family

Allan Family Year-End Update 2017

We have survived our first full year here in Amador County, and for the most part we have few regrets about leaving the urban sprawl. The routine is mostly broken up with projects aimed at getting our house built, so we can move out of our “modest’ accommodations.  In the past year we have had the pad for the house graded, and just recently received the plan package (all 10 pounds of it!) to submit to the County for a building permit. Once the concrete pad and block walls are done, they will ship us the house, in panel format, out from Indiana. Once the kit is here it will be up to us to nail it together. Suffice to say, it will be a couple of years before we move in. For the time being, we are comfortable and look forward to getting more accomplished.

Rita continues to telecommute from our barn/living room. She is quite busy writing classes for Caltrans and in general keeping things going around here. Keeping the girls’ education on track, with loans, grants, etc. is another pastime. Her new hobby is drainage, and keeping the rain from washing our property down into Ridge Road. When it’s drippy outside she can be found in her rain gear trenching away, trying to convince nature which way the runoff should go. Rita dug out the paved section of the driveway this year and got some sealer down. This took a couple of tries, suffice to say the second time she did it cones and tape were put up so the mail delivery didn’t drive in and mess it up! She is also getting quite adept with a chainsaw, something of a necessity when you live up here. Rita also became proficient in AutoCAD during the design of the house, which Chris appreciated!

Chris looks forward to the day when the house is done, and Rita’s barn office can be turned into his hobby room. Until then there is plenty to do getting the Tiki bar decorated, cooking a few meals, and myriad other chores that must be performed to keep the wolves at bay. He has been practicing his cocktail making skills, much to the delight of Rita and the neighbors. No one has complained so far, but practice makes perfect. Volunteer work has taken a back seat for now to getting the work done on the property, but Chris hopes to get back to that again one day.

Anne continues her college life at San Jose State. She has a boyfriend, Jack, who lives in Ohio, so that makes things rather complicated for her. Jack visited over the Thanksgiving weekend, and was a welcome addition to our family. She teaches elementary age kids art as a side job, which pays for plane fare, and goes home to Pine Grove every couple of weeks to see the folks and do laundry (sometimes not in that order). She is applying for internships for the summer and next school year. With any luck she will fall into something she really enjoys doing while showing off her artistic talents.

Emily is in her second year at Fullerton, continuing in the Drama program with her sights on perhaps one-day teaching. Most nights she can be found working at her job at Disneyland, where drama abounds. She enjoys mingling with the guests, as well as the extra cash. She made it up to Pine Grove a few times this year, even driving herself up once, which qualifies as her very first road trip.  She is quite possibly going to spend a semester in Wales next year, which should give her a more “rounded” view of the world around us. Her parents are looking forward to possibly visiting if she goes over.

That’s about it for this year. Thanks to all our friends that managed to come up and visit or at least keep in touch. Our dog Kona loves visitors! With any luck, next year we will have pictures to share of a house framework. Fingers Crossed!

Love from,

Chris Rita Anne Emily & Kona

Allan Family Year-End Update 2016

Greetings!

Once again we hope this is finding everyone in good spirits and ready to tackle 2017.  The past year has been one of change for all four of us. Change is normally good, taken in small doses but 2016’s events have not qualified as a “small” change for the Allan’s. 2016 presented us with some big challenges, tiring moments, and a few moments of satisfaction, and the pace does not let up.

Most notably, the biggest change for us was a change of venue. Immediately after Emily’s graduation from High School we packed up the Lakewood house and moved into our property in Pine Grove, located in Amador County in Northern California. We settled Emily into a cozy apartment in Anaheim and set off in our U-Haul over the Grapevine for the last time.

Utilizing a bit of persistence and Rita’s boundless energy we are settled into our buildings here in the Sierra foothills, and look forward to beginning the main house build in the spring. Still plenty to do with trees falling over and trying to stay warm!

Rita is now many hours closer to her Caltrans headquarters in Sacramento, but still continues to telecommute from Pine Grove. Designing training courses for the construction division take up her work hours.  The property is her main focus during her free time. For Christmas she received a gas-powered chipper/shredder which she has made good use of. A friend gave her a “brand new” never used 20-year-old chainsaw which came in handy Christmas Eve when a 36-inch oak tipped over into our neighbor’s fence.  Needless to say someone isn’t going to run out of firewood for a while.

Rita brushes some preservative on a handrail at steps headed toward the barn.

In the latter part of the year we adopted a 3-year old Akita from a rescue in Walnut Creek.  Chris named her Kona due to her coffee colored coat. She was somewhat abused as a puppy so it takes her a while to warm up to people, but she is enjoying having over an acre to run around on. She also enjoys visiting the neighbor dogs and running up and down the fence with them.  Kona is a welcome addition to our family.

Anne is now in her third year of the Animation program at San Jose State. She works incredibly hard and is turning out some really awesome designs and artwork. She left the dorms this year and moved into an apartment with three roommates within walking distance of the campus.  Anne is earning a little extra cash teaching art to elementary grade children in her free time, which she really likes. Online gaming takes precedence over sleep occasionally but she is making lots of new friends.  Her parents do get to see her every couple of weeks when she drives to Pine Grove for laundry privileges.

Emily has begun her meteoric rise to stardom by starting her college studies at the drama department at Cal State Fullerton.  Her independent lifestyle in sunny Southern California seems to agree with her and she loves her classes and the people she is getting to know. This past year she graduated with honors from Whitney High in Cerritos, along with starring in the lead role in the yearly school drama production. Emily still keeps close tabs on her old Whitney High School “family” and helps out with drama and her other passion, cross country running.Emily also earned here Girl Scout "Gold Award" this year and got to take part in the big presentation gala in Pasadena this summer. Leaving her part-time job at Katella Deli proved to be a good move as she was able to land a job at Disneyland, as a hostess on the Storyland Canal Boats.  This work helps her to hone her drama skills and is a good foothold into the entertainment world. Her parents don’t get to see her much but they are looking forward to Emily spending a week in Pine Grove during winter break.

The girls hang out with Kona during our tiki-themed Christmas party.

Chris has been working to keep up with Rita which is all but impossible, but he is trying. One project after another is the order of the day, including getting the A/C & heat pump installed in the barn, putting up a new pole and pulling in a new 200 amp service, getting the tiki bar useable as our temporary kitchen, and working on the CAD designs for the new house, to name a few. On Wednesdays he helps out in Jackson with the Amador Sawmill group, restoring machines for the high school shop program and other restorations. Occasionally he also helps out with the steam sawmill at the county fairgrounds in Plymouth. A main focus once the house is built will be to install his O-scale model railroad, which he is making parts and pieces for now.

Hooray! Another challenge.

Adjustment to a new situation is neither easy nor painless, but we are lucky to have new neighbors and friends that are helping us along, giving us advice on who to use for certain things, or even how to survive the frigid winter. This place will be good for us once we are truly settled, until then we will not be bored!

All the best to all of our friends and family, it is our wish that you have a happy, prosperous and safe 2017!

Chris Rita Anne Emily (and now) Kona the dog

Paradise Under the Power Lines.

My earliest memory as a child growing up in Covina was when Dad and I picked up Mom and my brother Scott at the hospital after his birth. We were in the good old ’61 Chevy Impala, no seat belts back then. I probably remember this trip because we had to stop at a grade crossing somewhere to let a train pass.

I have spent all but thirteen of my years here in Southern California.  My desire to move out is not due to any one thing, just a conglomeration of lots of little things. I suppose my childhood was idyllic, by most standards at least. With three brothers and my oldest sister Patty (my younger sister Mary was born in the Bay Area) packed into a 900 square foot house in the San Gabriel Valley, I still managed to find plenty of time to myself, riding my bike across the street, hoping for the Pacific Electric San Bernardino Local to come ambling by, wishing the “Wig-Wag” signal at Vincent Avenue would activate (that crossing is now a Metrolink line, with trains whisking by at 79MPH) That was the high point of my day.

Things quieted down at night when I would sit out on the front lawn and wait for the Helms Bakery truck to come by with fresh goodies, and maybe a birthday cake my Mom ordered the week before. Other times I would sit and watch the glow of the wildfires high in the San Gabriel mountain range. Funny thing; the smog was so bad in those days, even though we practically lived at the foot of the mountains, I didn’t know they were there until I was 10 years old. In fact, some days were so bad you couldn’t see the traffic light a block from our house.  At least the air pollution has gotten better, the noise pollution, not so much.

Dad moved us en masse north to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1976, to continue his career with Caltrans on the new Antioch Bridge project. I spent 13 semi-blissful years going to high school, then college, eventually moving myself up to Tuolumne County, where I met my wonderful wife Rita. We were married in 1988 on Presidents Day weekend in bucolic Sonora, CA. Rita’s job with the construction company then took us to Rhode Island, where she was an engineer on the new Jamestown Bridge construction. I thought New England would be akin to a Walt Whitman poem. Unfortunately, the state was pretty much paved from one end to the other. I waited until May for spring to come, being used to the trees getting their leaves by March. I pleaded with my Dad to get Rita a job with Caltrans so I could come back to my beloved California. After twenty minutes on the phone with Sacramento, she had that job, in charge of construction on the east end of the new I-105 freeway in, you guessed it, Los Angeles County!

By happenstance we settled in the far eastern reaches of the County, in Lakewood, in a condo where you could literally walk out your front door, take twenty steps, and be in Orange County. Rita’s office was in Cerritos, a former dairy city that is in LA County but seems to acts like it is in Orange County. Lakewood turned out to be a good choice in the beginning. By 1990 we had purchased one of the cookie-cutter houses using my overtime pay, and moved in. Houses in this part of Lakewood are separated by a scant 15 feet. Privacy is not part of the bargain.  

In Rhode Island I couldn’t land any kind of a real job. After we moved to LA, thanks to some good friends, I was employed in the entertainment industry, where I stayed for the next 15 years. I was planning on living in So Cal for 3-4 years, and, assuming Rita could get a promotion or a transfer, move back up to around the Sacramento area. Fate intervened. Twenty-six years later, here we are, still in Lakewood.

Don’t get me wrong, Lakewood isn’t a bad place, it’s just not where I would choose to live the rest of my life. Conveniences abound, but as we know, conveniences come with a price. Living three minutes from an In-N-Out Burger has certainly had consequences.

In our little house, nestled next to the San Gabriel River (paved) under the buzzing high tension wires, things started out great. Our new neighbors threw a pizza “block party” for us when we moved in, we all quickly got to know each other, and everyone on the cul-de-sac had had started a young family. When new people moved in they came over and introduced themselves. The city hosted Rita’s Girl Scout troop for a decade, and there was a real sense of community here. Now most of the kids have grown up and moved out. There are neighbors that have lived in close proximity to us for upwards of ten years that I have never spoken a word to. New neighbors tend to be inconsiderate; they have loud parties well into the wee hours. New people don’t seem to have a sense of place or a sense of community, but they sure have a sense of entitlement. This place is for the young, and we aren’t that any more.

With two precious, precocious and driven daughters to raise, the best course was to stay put until they were both out of high school. Why move when your kids can attend the best public high school in the state? This required us to endure the changes our formerly quiet little community has gone through.  Used to be you could just hear taps at sunset, on the bugle, soft and mournful when the flag was being lowered down the street at the Long Beach Naval Hospital. That property is now a shopping mega-center, with a 26 theater multi-plex and thousands of cars going in and out daily. Sheriff helicopters are constantly circling the freeway across from us in Hawaiian Gardens, and every other car turning the corner next to our house is blasting its stereo at or near the pain threshold all hours’ day or night. Unsavory looking persons in dark hooded sweatshirts can be seen meandering up and down the cul-de-sac like the boogie man from stories. The freeway roars 24 hours a day. The 605 (yes I will always say “THE” before freeway numbers) used to get quiet at night, now it isn’t even quiet on Christmas morning. Sirens blare at regular intervals like we live in Midtown Manhattan.

All this came to be too much for me, and I told Rita I wanted to move back to the Gold Country in the Sierra Nevada foothills, and she graciously went along with it. Lucky for me. Granted, the grass is always greener on the other side, and every place has its problems, but hope springs eternal that the life we make for ourselves in Amador County will be somehow simpler, and a tad quieter. It damn sure will after I install the double-pane windows in the new house.  So long Lakewood, and thanks, you were good to us.

For the most part I am looking forward to closing the Big Iron Gate at our driveway and retiring. The world going by outside can just get on with it, without any interference from me. Thanks to Rita I now have my very own Pacific Electric Wig-Wag signal I can activate whenever I want. Now if I could just get time-traveling Helms Bakery trucks to stop out front every Thursday evening at dusk. - Chris

Magnetic Flagman Co. Wig Wag signal.

Allan Family Year-End Update 2015

As 2015 comes to close, Seasonal Greetings, Merry Christmas, etc. to one and all! We hope this finds everyone happy and prosperous. Another busy, busy year has come and gone for the Allan family here in Lakewood. Highlights follow…

The general scheme of things for Chris and Rita is to move to Northern California next year, to our property in Pine Grove, located in Amador County. To date the barn is now finished; our tiny cabin is almost finished out on the inside, and the shed which will, in the short term, serve as our kitchen is up and ready for build outs. A great deal needs to happen before we can occupy the land, including running permitted underground electrical and water, and get our current house ready for the market.  Target date for the move remains June 30^th of next year.

Rita continues to telecommute upstairs for Caltrans. She technically works out of Sacramento so she will be that much closer after the move. Her Girl Scout troop will disband next year, now that Anne and Emily and many other girls in the troop have earned their Gold Awards.  A new skill was learned this year, laying out and mortaring cinder block retaining walls around the upslope sides of the barn. Her projects abound, and she is seldom bored. If she ever is, there is always her trusty Kindle Reader. The next big item for her will be to take the house plans for Pine Grove and redesign the layout to suit her taste.

The life of Chris involves a lot of going back and forth; to drop off Emily at school, to the garage to work on O scale railroad models, and shopping for new and exciting food items that meet the criteria of the new diet Rita and he are on. So far weight has been lost, but not enough as yet. Chris is anxious to get up north and leave Los Angeles County behind. He will work as the advance party to get things ready so that when Rita finally shows up she can get right back to work. The O Scale model railroad is already designed. He will start building upstairs in the barn as soon as they move into the new house. Until then there are no shortage of tasks for Chris.

Anne is working through her sophomore year at San Jose State in the animation program. Her portfolio was reviewed and accepted so she is good to go for another year!  Not much time for her to do much but go to class, do homework, and if she’s lucky, sleep. She is happy when it’s time to come home for a break. Her artwork has come along nicely, and Chris and Rita are wondering where she got that talent from? The summer job was as a counselor at the Long Beach Girl Scout camp. She enjoyed it, most of the time. Anne also got to go to see her favorite people again at an internet convention in Austin, Texas at the end of the summer.

Emily is finally in her senior year at Whitney High in Cerritos.  As predicted, she is practically running the place. As president of the Drama Club, Team Captain, and a few others, as well as being on the Cross-county and Track & Field teams, she spends most all of the daylight hours at school.  She sang and danced in the schools delightful production of “Mary Poppins” just prior to Thanksgiving, and will be in two additional shows before she graduates. Over the summer she earned her Gold Award by building an 8 foot by 16 foot storage shed on school grounds, to be used for prop and costume storage. Mom and Dad, as well as the rest of the drama kids helped a little. Emily is not quite sure which college she will be attending next year, but Fullerton State in Orange County is a front-runner.

Sadly we lost our beloved dog Missy this year. She was a loyal member of our family and she will always be remembered. After a suitable period of time we will get another dog, but likely not until we are settled up north.

That’s about it for us, again we hope your year was a good one, and if it wasn’t, well, at least it’s almost over now- so hang in there! (FYI- We will send out our new address after we get a PO Box next year.)

All the best,

Chris    Rita     Anne    Emily