With just a week before Tara and I move to Vermont officially, my brother-in-law Paul helped me install several important upgrades for our work truck. Among them were a snow plow mount with quick releases for the hydraulics, some handy auxiliary floodlights, and a small hidden winch for pulling trees out of the woods (and maybe cars out of ditches, if we happen upon someone in need of help).

I say "we," but really Paul did most of the work. He is a wizard with a welding torch (and anything with an engine), and most of the equipment we installed was stuff he was kind enough to sell or give to me. I did design a template for diamond plate shields to cover the gap between the truck and the bumper after the mount was installed, though.

I had the shields cut at Midway Iron, and I was blown away by how easy the process was. I was in and out in less than an hour, and it only cost $30! After my experience trying to find someone to cut a prototype of the camping oven Tara and I designed, I was expecting to pay a lot more.

I think I'm going to start calling our truck "the limo" when we mount a snow plow next winter. The extended cab and 8ft box was long enough already—with the plow added it is going to be ridiculous! Here is the completed project, also showing off my hard-drive magnet-attached license plate cover:

Thank you Paul!!