Home & Garden

Story and Photos by Joe Wilkerson Fire – a simple word that can draw so much emotion. Few things compare to its power and importance to our lives -fire lights the dark, both strengthens and weakens steel, destroys and restores forests, heats our homes, cooks our food, propels us around the world. It has the ability to create and destroy. ...

Making a Cliff By Joe Wilkerson Often, we are presented with challenges that require out of the box thinking to solve. I learned through a series of successes and “learning experiences” that when these challenges arise, if we take a step outside of our comfort zone, we can achieve remarkable advances in ourselves and our abilities. One of my favorite ...

By Bart Streb As a child I would visit Pop (my grandfather) in his mountain home on Easter. April in the mountains is a time for preparing the garden soil and planting cool season crops. My memories of working that Appalachian clay are not laborious but wondrous. An acre of freshly plowed soil to investigate, seeds to plant, horse manure ...

By Meredith Bernard A dock to a lake is as necessary as peanut butter is to two pieces of white bread and Smucker’s jelly. Simply put, it’s where lake life happens. On the dock is where babies get their first feel of the water on their chubby toes, where little ones catch their first fish with Grandpa, where teenagers find ...

Retaining Walls By Joe Wilkerson Often times as we envision our outdoor landscape our imaginations are limited by the current state of our property. We may want a patio off the back of our house, but the room isn’t available. There may be water issues washing away once pristine landscape beds, or worse – collecting against the foundation of the ...

A Soggy Scenario By Bart Streb As I sit here on this rain-soaked Saturday my mind wanders back when I owned homes built in 1960, 1978 and 1993. Rain-filled seasons like we have had always remind me of the fear and worry I had dealing with moisture issues in those dated homes. I remember rain soaking into window frames, into ...

By Joe Wilkerson In the fall issue of Hyco Lake Magazine we addressed how to make an outdoor living decision. In that article we reviewed The Inspiration, The Budget, Meeting the Builder, The Initial Meeting, and The Proposal. From inspiration to construction and completion there is a lot of moving parts that need to be monitored to ensure we are ...

Greetings from the Garden! By Bart Streb March is a planning month and a time to get a little dirty. We have days of spring-like weather that greet us early in the year and here are some tips to get you started. Put on your old sneakers and pants and let's get gardening! Find a Great Location Think about an ...

Story by Joe Wilkerson Undertaking any home renovation can be a bit overwhelming. Marrying your budget and vision with seemingly infinite product and design options can be quite a challenge. Compound these issues with weather, difficult site conditions, schedules, etc. can lead to quite the headache without careful planning. The time you spend planning your project with a qualified builder ...

Sue Gates Puts Farm-Gained Knowledge to Use as Homebuilder By Phyliss Boatwright Over the past two decades, many in and around Person County have had to transition from farming and textiles into other careers. Sue Gates of Rougemont used skills she learned on the farm to become a contractor in the home building industry. After graduating from NC State University, ...