For Grandma

Ok, Grandma - here are some pictures of the 2nd floor. :-)


Our first stairs. None of us has ever lived in a house with stairs. It's so exciting! (right now, anyway...) :-)




I'm sure we'll have a different view a year from now.
Little Girl in her room - still need a window frame moved... (her closet is to the right and her bathroom is out of the picture.)

















Bear in her room (closet behind her to the right - bathroom to the left)


Yes, we were walking around UPSTAIRS and across the "bridge" with wide-open walls framed. Yes, my knees were a bit wobbly at times... The kids were actually very careful. Of course, they were threatened to do so. Little Buddy is crossing here and Little Girl is waiting at Bear's bedroom door for her turn to cross. (To the right of Little Buddy is the open family room - to the left is the staircase - there will be wrought iron railings across here.)






Bit in her room - an awkward shot because her room is down a hall and I wasn't going near the edge to get a clear shot into her room. Wobbly knees. Her bathroom and closet are all on the right of the picture.










Second floor is taking shape.


Rafters going up. The house is looking rather tall because it's sitting up on a hill.


It's difficult to see, but they delivered the windows yesterday and they're all up on the front porch between the garages.

Hard at work early this morning. Still haven't moved one of Little Girl's bedroom windows, but while I was out walking the construction super stopped his truck to say hi and told me they were working with the framers to get that resolved. The framers need to have something on paper to look at and they're having trouble finding the blueprint info they need to set it straight. Fortunately, they aren't building this house again in our neighborhood, so we can tweak some things and no one will say, "but that house has... and we want that too..."

Spider Lilies

This post is for the fabulous young lady who now owns these beautiful spider lilies in the front yard... *wink*

We have big beautiful blooms out front today.

Notice that one of these blooms has red tips on the "spider legs" and one has yellow tips. I'm sure that means something to their genetic make up...

Now, there are times when I'm surprised about things that pop up out of the ground in some of our beds. I had forgotten that we had planted those spider lilies out front because they had been dormant for two years. However, I can NOT think of what this thing is. Any ideas what we planted that would be coming up NOW and looking like this...??? I'm anxious for it to open so I can see what it might be. Tulips bloom in the spring, don't they??

A Bloom Just in Time

We were hoping to harvest a few bulbs that are dormant right now before we head out of our home of 10 years for good this weekend. There are the snowdrops from Mawmaw. There are the numerous day lillies - from Mawmaw. There are a few things I don't even know about until they come up - most of them from Mawmaw.

Then, there are the spider lillies we dug up at Little Mawmaw's house in Louisiana two years ago after she died. We brought those home and planted them in a few places in the front yard and the back yard. We haven't heard from them since. That is, until yesterday.




We have three that shot up in no time out front. Guess we won't be taking these with us. If it completely opens up before we get everything moved, I'll take another picture.



It's so fun to see these things grow. I can't wait to get overwhelmed with all the backyard (and front yard!) potential in the new house next spring! Got some 4 o'clock seeds just waiting in a baggie. Never tried those here... :-)

Walls and Woes

As we watched and waited all week for framing to begin, I was so glad to at least know why it wasn't going. They began delivering the framing materials on Monday. However, we knew nothing would start going up until they fixed the electrical box by the utility pole.

They had originally installed the pole on the southern corner of the lot. However, the hook up was actually on the northern corner of the lot. Don't know, didn't ask... So, I think that because there was no utility pole there, the unknown and covered up electrical box just got clobbered by all the equipment out there. THEN, they had to replace the box to get the utility pole hooked up so the framers could start working with their compressors. I'm so glad we knew about the electrical hold-up or I might have gone nuts looking for progress on the framing all week long. As it was, the box finally got repaired late Wednesday. Utility pole hooked up on Thursday and - woo-hoo - walls on Friday.

Then on Saturday, we found our first "stuck in stone" woe... Our 2nd bathroom (Little Buddy's) has a drain set for a shower instead of a tub. It's on the 1st floor, so it's LITERALLY stuck in stone... Of course, all the plans show a tub. There are good things, of course, and we'll probably get a nicer tile out of the deal. BUT, who thinks Little Buddy is going to be squeegeeing his glass shower every day...?? Yeah, exactly! Ugh. I really liked the idea of just buying him a new shower liner every few months for his tub. Every time he uses our glass shower in our bathroom, it's like shower, conditioner and soap explosions all over the place... Ugh. BUT, I did pray many times over the past 24 hours for God to help me come to a peace about his bathroom situation (oh, my goodness, how bad is my OCD! What a drop in the bucket of other things worth worrying about!) and I do feel much better about the discovery now. It's certainly not like we're going to have them infringe upon the integrity of the foundation by moving the drain now...

The 2nd floor is decked and they should be starting the 2nd floor framing bright and early Monday morning. No rain predicted for the week, so it should be a very productive house-building week.

In the mean time, it's utter chaos in our current residence as we prepare to move out of our home of 10 years next weekend... Even the kids are feeling the bittersweet emotions of the move from the only house they've really ever known. Bit got "stuck" yesterday in her packing and just couldn't do anymore. She was overwhelmed. I found her sitting on the floor in her room just staring at everything. It's nice to know they feel an attachment and appreciation for what we have here. Four more school nights of shower sergeant duty as the kids share one bathroom... I REALLY have great visions of how much easier it's going to be in the rent house with a couple more bathrooms for the kids. High hopes.

We Beat Ike!

We've woken up every morning this week to drizzly rain and wondered if the trucks would come despite the on-again-off-again rain. We desperately hoped the foundation would be poured and set before all the major hurricane storms hit this weekend. I checked by the lot Thursday morning before I headed out of town all day for a meeting and when I got back I was both thrilled and hugely disappointed.

They had poured the foundation that day!

I had missed getting pictures of the big concrete pumping truck!

I was so looking forward to getting that picture for the books. Plus I knew Little Buddy would think that was just way cool. By the time I got to the lot that afternoon, the regular cement truck was pouring the last of the double garage to finish up the foundation.








We had a meeting with the construction super today and then went out to watch them begin to pour the aggregate driveway.









The driveway and most of the sidewalk is now poured. I don't know when they'll come back and do the rest of the drive down to the street. They're waiting until after Ike dissipates to deliver the framing package. We should actually see a house on the lot by this time next week. Oh, so exciting!

VERY surprising - Dad let Little Buddy climb up into the Cat that they left sitting on our the lot this afternoon after doing a bit of rough grading after all the foundation work. Cool photo op.

"Remarkably Easy" House Story #2

So, from where I left off last time...

We put our house "back on the market" after the first offer fell apart at closing.

Four days into manic-mom mode again, we had our first showing and (a few days later) an offer. After some finagling back and forth, we came to an agreement and went through the inspection and waiting period all over again. I told Dad that if we did this too many times, the inspectors were really going to be hurting to find anything at all that needed fixing. (I think they must have a pre-set quota on things they have to find wrong...)

With this offer, we would once again be planning to rent the house back, but this time it would only be until the end of September. Our new house is not scheduled for completion until February some time (well, they say January 26th, but we know how these things go...) SO, within a day or two of this realization we were presented with a solution to our short-term rental situation with 4 kids and a 50 pound dog.

We have some friends who used to go to our church that have a house on the market that they haven't been able to sell yet. However, they were presented with a perfect handicap accessible house to purchase shortly after putting their house on the market and went ahead with the possibility of 2 mortgages for a while. It's been several months now. Well, more than several months. They have some renters right now that are moving out mid-September when their new house is completed. Even though this house is on the market, the owners don't mind having renters because they are having to pay two mortgages. Even though we're having to move twice, it's nice to know we're actually helping them by living in their house. Not easy for us to have to make two moves, but good to know we're not the ones benefiting from it.

Now, I laughed at the irony. Have you seen it yet? The thing I dreaded most was living in a house on the market for very long. Isn't that funny? It's interesting how God can give you a peace about what causes you anxiety. Not take away the anxiety but help you live through it. But, then I got to laugh even more because they've decided to take the house off the market while we're living there so they can start the clock over on the listing (and we can do some painting and stuff for them while we're there - I may solicit some wall paper removing tips...). Whew!

We closed on the sale of our house the first day of school. Almost 10 years to the day that we signed the papers to begin building the house. We are now renters in "our house". Feels weird... We'll be moving the last weekend of September, so if you don't get an address update from me for our next rent house, let me know. Phones and e-mails will stay the same.

It's Almost Time to Pour!

Oh, look at all those wonderful sandy square mounds inside the forms!

Oh, plastic stuff! So close!

It's hard to see from here, but all the rebar and post-tension cables are spread across and levelled out.

Oh, and you can make out the juliet window in the back now, too.

Driveway forms and cables in place.

The last time we built a house, the driveway was done almost at the end of everything. Seeing it in place already makes it feel like we're farther along than we really are. BUT, it's so exciting to see the driveway in place because if you've ever been to our house now, you know what a HIKE it is to walk or drive up our driveway. We were pretty specific about this concern for the new house because the house is still a pretty good grade up from the street. Oh, this driveway is exciting! You think I'm crazy, don't you? :-)

Here's the swing on the drive and I think I see a basketball goal in the near future! Imagine that! Basketball in our driveway! How fun!

Getting the finishing touches on the prep work for the foundation. Come on inspectors! Let's get this concrete party going!

Another Brace Face

It's been a week of mashed potatoes and macaroni for the boy...





Notice the maroon band-thingies. (You'd think I'd know the correct terminology by now...) He was trying to decide between blue or red, but when he saw they had maroon there was no question what his choice would be.

First Day of School

Our "first day of school" was rather eventful this year.

We sent two off to middle school:

I mean, we sent one off to middle school the first day. And the 2nd day. Bear had to brave the first two days of school on her own without big sister. And she did AWESOME. Bit finally joined her sister at school on the 3rd day.

BUT, she was back at home with fever on the 4th & 5th days. (Blood work finally came back today and confirmed - mono. Oh, has Dad had a hey-day with that one! Fortunately, we can kid with the "kissing disease" because we know better. Dad still won't let it go, though.) :-)

Little Buddy went off to elementary with Little Girl as the big responsible brother he is to watch over his little sister. (insert choking sound here...) What would Little Buddy do without his little sister to make sure he has his things in order...

Oh, look! There's the token picture (shadow) of mom walking into the elementary school with everyone. We seem to get the same picture each year...

First day of school 2006

First day of school 2007

Not to leave you hanging or anything, but "House Story #2" came to fruition this day, too. I'll get to it soon enough. I promise. :-)