For Kicks and Giggles

The House: 28 Weeks

2012-02-10T09:58:00.004-07:00

These last few weeks have just flown by! It seems like only seconds ago I was writing up last week's post, and here's another one... wowser.

There were some fun things that happened this week. My mom--who is always so generous with her time and babysits for us quite often--was out of town, so I only went out on Saturday and not any of the weekdays, which ended up being a good thing because I am pretty sick. But here's what's been going on.

On Saturday, my dad, Cody, and I went out to build and spent the time at our own house getting it ready for sheetrock and siding. Dad and Cody added another set of 2x4's and some sheathing around our garage door frame. Apparently the concrete was too wide at the bottom or something (I'm not exactly sure why the frame had to be widened), so we had to fix it. That was a problem on all 9 houses, and ours was the first one to get it done, since it wasn't a huge priority. While the boys were fixing the garage door, I, Lisa, myself, insulated the framing around the stairs. If you can't tell, I'm very proud of myself. :) (But more proud of Cody and Dad for the framing job... insulation is pretty easy. Okay. Really easy. Just messy.)

While I was all dressed up in my insulating gear, we did a project I've been hoping to accomplish for several months, but wasn't sure we would get it approved (but we did!): We put some sound resistant insulation around the laundry closet. Cody and I bought this as one of my Christmas Presents, and we got the OK to put it in, so we did! I figure it's a $30 project now, but if we get sheetrock, we'd never be able to do it (unless we redid the sheetrock, would be over a thousand dollars)... you know the saying, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, right?

We also tucked some insulation around the bottoms of the bathtubs. It helps keep the water warm when you're taking a bath.

While we had the nail gun over at the house, we also made sure all our blocking was really nailed in well. Our Project Manager helped us move our dining room light fixture location so that we can center it over our table. Lastly, we snuck in some CAT-5 internet cable. Shhhh, don't tell anyone!

That was all on Saturday. During this week, we've had another fun thing: we met with the lighting guy and ordered our light fixtures! He called Cody at noon on Thursday and set up an appointment for two the same day. Ack! Thank goodness I've been browsing the websites for weeks and already had written down what I wanted. I typed it all into the budget worksheet we had and printed it off for Cody to take out to the meeting, since we couldn't go together (no time to find a babysitter). I even put in any possible upgrades I would like (like a 4 light vanity instead of a 3, etc) and the increased cost. I was trying to be helpful. Well, apparently I was very helpful, because the lighting guy had never seen such an organized order. He was able to write everything down and get the order in in half an hour. It usually takes way longer than that. And the great news is that we were able to get all the fixtures I really wanted and stay within budget! (well, I should clarify: we were $66 over budget. But we just payed the overage out of pocket and it wasn't a big deal.) We got an extra $115 in our budget, however, because we already have lightbulbs. I'm so glad that those couple of years ago when Sam's Club over ordered on energy saver lights and marked them way cheap we went ahead and bought six boxes of them. They've paid for themselves ten times over already.

The electricity and gas got activated in the house this week, so Cody plugged in our microwave (that we carry around in the backseat of the car along with our other building tools. HEY! we're the smartest ones there! we don't spend $20 a night eating out, and we still get a hot meal. So don't knock it.) in our OWN house! I have mixed feelings. I always thought I'd be the first one to cook in our house. I'm just going to say that warming up leftovers doesn't officially count as cooking. And oh well--it'll always be "my" kitchen.

And lastly, we had sheetrock delivered on Thursday evening! There's a possibility they're even installing it today, but I don't know--we don't go out on Fridays. We may need to go out there tonight and check it out anyway. I'm just too excited, I guess. :)

Whew! Lots of little things going on! Here's how the other houses are faring.
House 1: Not much change, other than a little bit of trim and the garage framework being fixed.
House 2: Finally got stone delivered to finish up that last corner! But it hasn't been put up yet.
House 3: Same as house 1.
House 4: Trim, baseboard, stair runners, closets, garage frame, and all kinds of things going on. They're pretty much ready to caulk.
House 5: Starting trim and baseboard, interior doors, and closets. Last of stone delivered, put on, and grouted. Stone FINALLY done there! Tent came down.
House 6 (ours!): See above. ;) Wall insulation done, sheetrock delivered.
House 7: Starting trim and baseboard. Interior doors installed, closet shelves being designed.
House 8: Wall insulation done, sheetrock delivered and installed.
House 9: Had a big setback: the head clearance over the stairs was too short (by just half an inch... ugh). So we had to tear out the stairs. Nobody is happy about it. The poor homeowner had to take a lunch break while a couple of guys took the sledgehammer to the staircase-- it was just too hard to watch. The stairs will have to be rebuilt, slightly steeper than before, before sheetrock can be done. But meanwhile, their stone was delivered and finished. Their tent can come down now too!

Still no "really exciting" thing. It will be great when it does come, but right now I'm plenty stoked about what is going on. We're getting a house!

11 month old Baby

2012-02-10T09:28:00.002-07:00

Eleven month old Katie Bubble... that's just nuts!

Katie is now a walker. She walks everywhere, climbs up and down the stairs, and is letting her personality shine. She's still physically so little that it surprises me how much she can do! She's started giving 5's and waving bye-bye. She babbles baby talk all the time, and says "boo!" (more like just makes the B sound) when she plays peek-a-boo. She will imitate motions and sometimes even sounds too. What a big girl!

The other day Katie heard the bathtub running for Lee and Anna. She loves bathtime more than anything. She hears the water and comes as quickly as she can. So on Wednesday when she heard it, she immediately went in. I was keeping an eye on her, but also scooping cookie dough, when I heard a splash and Katie was kind of spluttering. I ran down there and she'd climbed in the tub--clothes, diaper, and all! At first she didn't like that she got some water on her nose, but then she broke into a big grin as if to say, "Look how smart I am!" I had already given her a bath that day too. Oh well. She loves baths, she can have two a day if it makes her happy.

She still doesn't laugh much--just smile and kind of squawk. I wonder if it will always be like that, or if she'll ever figure out how to get a good ol' belly laugh out? hm. Only time will tell. But usually she's a happy girl, unless she is sick or teething. Or if you're trying to feed her baby food. She doesn't like baby food. She likes to eat what everyone else is eating.

And that's Katie! I am astonished at how quickly she is growing up. We love her sweet little bald head and her wobbly "zombie" walk and her bumpy little teeth and her sniffy nose and the way she blows raspberries and says "sss sss sss" and everything about her. We love you, Katie!

The House: Extra hours

2012-02-06T18:11:00.004-07:00

Occasionally, we've been allowed to come in on "our own time" (non-required hours) and do some extra projects to make our house extra nice. Today, we're doing a really special project I thought deserved its own post.

We are cutting rosette blocks that will go above the corners of our doors and windows as a decorative trim.

We took the MDF board we have available for our trim. It is 6 inches tall and 3/4" deep, and about twenty feet long. First, using the table saw, we stripped it in two (not in half... one side was 2 3/4" tall and the other side was about 4" tall). Then we used the chop saw to cut them all 2 3/4" inches wide. We just set up a little clamp on the chop saw so that we can push the MDF right up to that and cut without having to measure every little piece. So, if you're keeping tabs, that ends us with two types of block, one 2 3/4" square and one rectangle that is 2 3/4" by about 4". Then, I take the router and round off the corners with a 1/8" rounding bit.

Cody takes the squares to the drill press, which we've fitted with more clamps and wood to correctly position the pieces, and using this awesome bit we bought on line, stamps in a rosette. It is a 2 1/8" diameter circle.

The last thing we do is make sure all the cuts are clean, and sand if necessary. The rectangles only get the routering on three sides and no rosette. The edge that will touch the floor does not get routered.

By the end of the evening, our box was full of rosette squares and plain rectangles. I think they will dress our house up very nicely! I am excited to get them installed so I can take pictures of the final product, so stay tuned for a few more weeks to see how it turns out. We made about 65 of each today, and that will be mainly for the doors. Eventually we hope to trim the windows and the basement doors (we will need to finish the basement first, obviously), but that will come in time. The good news is that we own the bit now and we have the measurements all down so we can make more if we ever need to. And before you feel all sorry for us spending our free time building (ha, as if you feel sorry for us! We took this on ourselves!), we only spent about two and a half hours total on this particular project, and most of the time one of us was running inside to get kids baths and check on napping Katie and stuff. Pretty spankin' awesome, I do say!

Super Bowl Sunday, our way

2012-02-05T17:01:00.002-07:00

Today Katie was running a fever, and with Lee still just getting over the stomach flu, we decided not to go to my Grandma's Super Bowl party. We were bummed, but then tried thinking of some ways to party ourselves.

First, I made a dinner of buffalo chicken bites (which have been in the freezer for way too long) and some spinach artichoke dip along with fresh bread. We also had sliced veggies and RB floats for dessert. Easy and quick. Now we are watching the Superbowl, and are doing something that is making the game way more fun than previous years. Since we're not big football people but still love any excuse for a party, we're doing a wager war.

We started at dinnertime with a little survey where we made up a bunch of silly wagers. You know, things like "How many commercial breaks before the first Doritos Commercial?" and "Who will win the coin toss?" and "Which team will call the first time out?" Then, we all made our guesses. Whoever wins (or comes closest) gets a point. At the end of the game, we'll tally up the points, and the winner gets a little prize.

We always get way too stressed over cheering for a team we know nothing about. Why not cheer for the game and the family time instead? To me, that's the best kind of Superbowl Party I could ever hope for.

Happy Gaming Day, friends! I hope you all find fun ways to enjoy it with your family.

The House: 27 weeks

2012-02-03T10:09:00.005-07:00

This week was a major landmark for our group. Sum total, all nine families and volunteers, we have put in over 10,000 hours. That's right friends, four zeros, ten-THOUSAND hours building. That is pretty mind blowing!

And you know what? It shows. The houses are really taking shape and we know we're entering the homestretch (ha ha! get it? home stretch? aw, I crack myself up) of this major marathon of building. Subsequently, we're getting antsy to move in, and the stress level is continuing to rise, and as we work on individual homes and those homeowners become very picky about the interior of their house (as they should be), it can cause some friction. But, we're fighting through it. To say this was perfect, stress-free, nothing but fun would be a lie. It always has been, and continues to be, long hours of hard work. We miss our children and want our new home to be nice, and after all, we've been building for 10,000 hours! But we're getting there. We're closer every day.

On Monday the last three homes including ours had the 4-point inspection: framing, plumbing, electrical, and heating. We were missing some truss anchors in the garage, but otherwise we passed. So yesterday (Thursday, February 2) we were able to finally move on to the next step: INSULATION!!!

They insulated the last 3 houses yesterday, but ours was last last, which I'm actually really grateful for. Otherwise, we never would have gotten these pictures and this little movie. The subcontractors have a great big truck that they pull up to the house.

First, they go through and put a special fabric-like sheet on the walls and staple it to the studs. This will hold up the insulation. It's quite tough. They put a special insulation-rated cardboard on the eaves and use spray foam around that, where it's too tight a spot for the blown insulation. Around windows and doors, and in the holes where the cords or pipes are run, also gets spray foam. We made sure that every tiny hole got filled. Then, at last, they bring in their big huge hose, poke it through the fabric, and blow in the insulation fibers. When it is all done, it is quite compact and you can immediately tell a difference in warmth and echo in the house. It is SO cool. Or warm, I should say?

In this pic, the pink walls behind Cody are already done, but the whitish wall to his right is not done. This was about 4:00 PM. They finished up at about 5, vacuumed up the fibers you can see on the floor, and then headed off. Our house is all insulated now! After the sheetrock is done, they will come back and do the attic.
Our big project last night was to get those truss anchors done so that sheetrock can come in, maybe sometime next week. When we originally did truss anchors, we used a compressor and nail gun. But alas, all the compressors are being used in other houses, so we did these guys by hand. Cody is a superman! It was cold. (See him on his little ladder there? Yes, he did put on a jacket.)

So, that was this week at our house. Here's everyone else:
House 1: Trim, baseboard, stair runners, window sills, done! (Well, we will do more baseboard once the flooring is in, but for now, it is done.) Closet shelves all built. Ready to move on to the next house!
House 2: Trim and baseboard, stair runners and window sills done. Closets *this* close to being done.
House 3: See house 1--ready to move the saws to the next house. Woot!
House 4: trim around doors done, baseboard started, closet shelves started.
House 5: no change from last week.
House 6 (ours!): Inspection passed, wall insulation in, truss anchors fixed, getting ready for sheetrock.
House 7: subcontractors finished sanding off the wrong wall texture and now there is a ton of dust in there. But, the walls are smooth!
House 8 & 9: Inspection done and wall insulation done, just like ours.

So, that as they say is that. The awesome thing I was hoping for didn't happen quite yet, so you'll still just have to wait. Ha, you'll have to wait just like us! :)

Life as *I wish it weren't

2012-02-03T09:54:00.003-07:00

I cannot believe how busy we've been the past few weeks. I'm sorry I haven't been posting much, because despite being busy, these are weeks I want to remember and cherish and I just can't because of time constraints.

Katie is walking all over the place. She's learned how to climb stairs too, which is a good thing. Now we don't have to block off the stairs constantly.

Annalisa has cut up a couple of things recently, and I'm trying to find more clever ways of hiding the scissors. Seriously! I can't understand how she goes to time out, cries pathetically over her misdoings, and then goes and does it again. What the? Three year olds. sheesh.

Lee is sick today, again. He's already had one round of the stomach flu and now another. I'm not thrilled. I just hope it doesn't go through all of us again. It was bad enough the first time. Also, Lee is undergoing testing at his elementary school to get some special education. Remember last year when I talked about the measures I was going through to help him? Well, he's still behind, and his concentration issues are becoming greater every day. So even though we are living with my parents and it takes me precisely 15 minutes each way to drive Lee to school, I'm keeping him in the same class until this testing is done. I have high hopes that together we'll find a good path for him, that will teach him to enjoy school and become successful at it.

As for Cody, well, it feels like we hardly see him. He works all morning and builds all night. But we know this is temporary and I'm very grateful for his hard work. He truly is a wonderful man.

And me? I'm just trying to keep it together. I'm so grateful to my parents and Cody's parents who are sacrificing so much right now to help us get our house built. In a few minutes I'll post about how the house is coming, but for now, know that we are busy but happy and trying to keep life together and our kids healthy and happy. It's a juggling act, but we're getting there. It may not be pretty, but it's life as it should be.

Hairbow Mania

2012-01-29T10:00:00.000-07:00

Cody packed all my crafting and hairbow supplies. It is taped up in a box, buried in our storage back at the old house. But after just a few weeks of living here with my folks, I couldn't stand it any more. I just HAD to go get some ribbon and clips and make something! Especially when my sister in law requested some Aggie Clips (go USU!), and then my little sister found out she's expecting a girl (a new head to bedeck!), and... well, I always get carried away.

Happy Groundhog day! Yes, this is a groundhog. See the little teeth?

And all my new bows of recent: the blue A, Big Blue the Bull (Aggie Mascot), a new Valentine's clippie, and of course the groundhogs.

The House: 26 weeks

2012-01-28T09:40:00.002-07:00

Here we are, creeping along, building every day. I swear it's getting closer to being done, but I think this was the first week I really had one of those "I wish we weren't building" moments. Don't get me wrong--it wasn't a "I wish we had never done this," it was more, "I really miss my husband! I wish our house was DONE! Let's go out and finish this thing so we can sit in our living room and look out the front window and cook in my kitchen and watch TV from our couch!" kind of moment.

But the good news this week, is that we were all on finish work. We are in the houses now, where it is warm and the construction lights are bright and you don't have to wear thermals AND sweats AND jeans AND double socks. There are still a few projects that we have to do outside (namely, there are 3 houses that are still waiting for more stone to be delivered before that can be finished entirely, then we have some garage framing to fix, then we plaster the foundations with the finishing cement, and painting the doors), but the majority of what is left to be done is now inside work.

This week, we were trained on how to do trim around doors, baseboard, building the shelves in the closets (which we can design any way we want! aaah!), putting in window sills, and stair runners (baseboard around the stairs). We have a few people who have been trained on one or two of those things, and they'll go through and do that on each of the nine houses. That way, we can really specialize and get good at it, and it goes faster. So we are working in three houses right now, but all kind of rotating between them, and it's hectic inside as everyone is doing their own thing but sharing tools. If it sounds a little crazy it's because it is. Cody and I worked on trim and baseboard in House 2, while their homeowners did the shelves, and someone else did the window sills. Same things were going on in House 1 and 3. I suppose I'll detail this more in my house-by-house, which is right now:

House 1: Trim, Baseboard, and window sills started.
House 2: still waiting on stone for outside. Trim, baseboard, and window sills complete as far as we can go right now. There were a couple of doors that had the wrong swing on them, and so those have to be fixed, which means they obviously can't be installed or trimmed. Closet shelves designed and being built. *Also, we don't put baseboard where vinyl or laminate flooring will be, only where carpet will be. We'll finish that baseboard later.
House 3: Trim, baseboard, window sills, stair runners all done. Working on shelving.
House 4: Interior doors installed.
House 5: Waiting for stone to be delivered.
House 6 (ours!): Electrical done. Cody and I went back on Thursday to fix a few framing things. We need to have wood blocking on the ceiling in the corners so that the sheet rock will have somewhere to be screwed into. Most of the blocking was done several weeks ago, but there were a few missing spots. Also, one of our linen closets in a bathroom goes in front of a cabinet. The cabinet guys came through to do some preliminary measuring and said that the spot for the cabinet was too large, by about 3 inches. So our project supervisor told us to add a few studs to effectively thicken the linen closet wall. The more we looked at it, we thought, "hey, instead of making the wall thicker, let's increase the size of the closet!" So we got permission, made a few cuts, and moved two walls. Instead of using 6 8' studs, we used 3" of base plate and just one 8 stud, and ended up with a 3" bigger linen closet. Pretty smart, eh? I've been thinking about how this is all getting easier and easier, as we become more comfortable with the tools and the jargon and more confident in our own skills. I thought the same thing as we started using the finishing nail guns. They're cute little staplers compared to our behemoth 20 pound nailguns that we used on the subfloor, sheathing, and framing. I don't even flinch at the saws any more either. You know what? Building a house is empowering! (anyway. enough of my tangent. on to more houses...)
House 7: Sanding, sanding, sanding, sanding subcontractors. Remember how they had the wrong texture on the walls? Well, it's gone now. One more reason to ALWAYS double, triple check before doing something.
House 8: Stone finished! Tent down. Electrical done.
House 9: Waiting on more stone to be delivered, so the tent stays up for now. Electrical done.

Some exciting things are slated for this week. I won't say what they are, just in case it doesn't happen. And, to leave you all paralyzed in suspense....

Katie's accomplishment

2012-01-24T08:07:00.003-07:00

She's been so close--standing unassisted, or walking with fingers held, or even a couple wobbly steps by herself, but it was her Sunday dress that sealed the deal. She got so sick of trying to crawl in her little outfit. It just was NOT working. She fussed about it for a while, then she just stood up and started walking around. Then she realized, "Hey, this feels pretty good! No sore knees!" Sure, she still falls over quite often, but she stands back up and gets going again.

For the record, both Katie and Annalisa walked at age 10 months and 11 days. How's that for a sisterly bond?

The House: 25 weeks

2012-01-21T07:49:00.003-07:00

Twenty-five weeks building... seems like it should be some kind of benchmark or something. We're nearing the end of 6 full months. It feels like we've been building forever, and yet it feels like we have been building just a few days. We are definitely anxious to get the houses done, especially after this week (read on).

December and January, up to this week, have been record-breakingly dry. In December we only got .10" of precipitation, and normal is 1.5". Even now there's no snow on the ground. But this week it rained, and rained hard. We got nearly an inch of rain just in the last three days. There's actually a flood warning issued for our town right now because the ground was frozen, and then this rain, and it's pooling bad. So, on Thursday, Cody thought he would be working on rock all day and ended up helping several people in our group prevent/clean up/battle flooding in some of the basements. "House 2" had it the worst--their lot is particularly muddy, and then they have a big hole underneath a cantilever that has a window well in it too, and the window well is too short, and also a valley on their roof drops right there. All of this combined, and they had two feet (and rising) of water in the window well pressing against the window and glass. They opened the window to relieve the pressure on the glass, but then of course all the water poured into the basement. Our neighbor came to the tent where Cody was working on stone in tears, and they all put down what they were doing and ran to her house to clean up the water and try to stem the flow with tarps and walls of rocks and mud. Cody said everyone got covered in mud, but the homeowners were very grateful. These kinds of problems won't exist (or at least won't be as bad) when we have gutters on the houses and the final grade done. At any rate, after cleaning up the flooding, the gratitude poured out and they had an especially productive night because some of the little dramas we always battle were able to be put aside. So see? God does work in mysterious ways. :)

In other GREAT news, the electricians came back and did our house! Woohoo! It only took them 2 days to run all of the wiring for light fixtures and outlets and cable. I'm excited about some of the things they did; particularly, placing outlets higher on the wall wherever we marked TV's, and also putting in the reinforced light fixture outlet in the master bedroom and living room, meaning we can eventually upgrade to a ceiling fan in there. Cool stuff.

This week:
House 1: Interior doors installed.
House 2: Interior doors installed. Flood averted. ;)
House 3: Interior doors installed.
House 4: mudding and taping done.
House 5: mudding and taping done, walls textured. Stone and grout done until, you guessed it, we ran out of stone.
House 6 (ours!): electrician done.
House 7: mudding and taping done, and walls textured with wholly smooth texturing which the homeowner did NOT order and does NOT want... yeah, we'll see how that pans out. He swears he's going to make the subcontractors come back and sand it off. I had a bad feeling this would happen somewhere, because the subs admitted on house 1 that they didn't have the order list, and so far they've just been doing the texture on every house without asking. For now, this issue is to be continued... dun dun dun....
House 8: Stone on and grout started, woot woot!
House 9: Stone almost all on. Keep in mind they're the only dry stacked, so it is taking us longer to put up, but once we're done, we're done! (that is, IF they have enough stone...)

I have a poll running for which will happen first: we finish stone on all 9 houses (minus the pieces that had to be reordered) or Katie walks?

Wonder Women!

2012-01-19T21:20:00.000-07:00

I saw a picture of an apron like this on Pinterest and fell in love. My mom was so awesome to help me put it together (which is great, because I'm not very good at sewing).

Every girl needs to feel super, especially when we're up to our elbows in bread dough and soapsuds. Now, we have a fun little reminder of just how wonderful we really are. We are Wonder Women!

Cody's 31

2012-01-19T08:43:00.003-07:00

Yep, I'm kind of behind on my blogging. Sorry.

Cody turned 31 on Monday. I had planned to take him snowshoeing and then get some lovely seafood for dinner, but we ended up getting the stomach flu on Sunday and Monday we were still recovering, so we ended up having lasagna and sourdough bread instead and played a few games at home. It was still a fun day.

Cody, we love you! I'm so grateful you are mine. Happy Birthday!

The House: 24 weeks and into 2012

2012-01-15T06:42:00.002-07:00

We've had over a month of short build weeks, due to holidays and rock/grout shortages, but this week was a full 35 hours again. It felt so good! Well, for me at least. I think we're all getting anxious to get these houses finished--and we're definitely all sick of stone. Putting in some big hours again felt like an important step in the right direction.

Meanwhile, we saw our subcontractors for sheetrock and insulation, but still no electrician. I'm getting somewhat annoyed, because they told us (personally) that they'd have our house done before Christmas. Urg. Oh well, this is the life of construction, I suppose. Hurry up and wait.

So, here's what' going on out at our neighborhood:
House 1: No change (sheetrock, mud, tape, texture done)
House 2: Still missing some corner pieces of stone and the grout between them, but otherwise stone is and grout is done. Tent taken down and moved.
House 3: No change (see house 1)
House 4: Insulation and sheetrock done.
House 5: Insulation and sheetrock done. Stone and grout all done--except (you guessed it) we ran out. I think the tent will stay up, though, since it doesn't need to move to a new house. It can just wait until the stone arrives.
House 6 (ours!): No change. Waiting for electricians.
House 7: Insulation and sheetrock done. Stone and grout completely done (the corners it needed came in time to finish). Tent moved.
House 8: Tent set up, scratch coat on.
House 9: Tent set up, scratch coat done. This house is going to be slightly different because their stone is dry stacked: in other words, there is no grout. We're excited not to grout it because grout is not a pleasant job. But it has to be done a little differently because the stones have no spaces between them. On the other houses we've used little stones or 1/2 inch pieces of ply wood to space the rocks out. This one we'll have to be more cautious on how they're placed; but when the stone is on, we'll be done. And since this is house 9--we'll REALLY be done!

A song for 10 months

2012-01-11T08:27:00.001-07:00

The Greatest Gug-Gug-Things
(To the tune of "My Favorite Things")

Standing and crawling and bathtime and Mommy,
Broncos with Daddy and even more Mommy,
Humidifiers with an Elephant nose,
Are things I love--as everyone knows!

Small, noisy toys that I steal from my Brother
Quality time that I spend with my Mother
Quick little naps that I take on mom's lap,
All make me happiest-happy-hap-hap (Hey, YOU try to come up with a rhyming word for lap that means "happy!")

When I bonk my nose, or I'm just too tired,
Then I'm feeling sad.
but give me a few of my favorite things--
and then I won't feel so bad!

Mac and Cheese and blueberry puffies,
Sippies of water and no-nosie-stuffies,
Licking Gramp's glasses and pulling dad's hair--
All make me feel like I haven't a care!

Grabbing whatever mom has in her hands,
Banging the cupboard with Grandma's nice pans,
Slobber and kisses and playing peek-a-boo,
These things will make me so happy too!

Sticking my tongue out and playing stark naked
getting my toy back when Annalisa takes it,
Crawling on mom's bed with no diaper on--
Just do these great things and you'll ne'er go wrong!

When my diaper's full, or my mommy's gone,
Then I'm feeling sad--
Just let me go do all my favorite things,
And then I won't feel so bad!

Destructo baby

2012-01-06T15:12:00.004-07:00

I may or may not have talked about "Destructo Mode" before. At any rate, here's the latest casualty:

The pieces at the top of the picture (to the right of the puzzle) were all we had left. We've been working on it for over a week. I'm guessing we only had about 50 pieces left of a 1000 piece puzzle. The crunched corner? Katie. all Katie. I'm debating whether or not we should even attempt to finish it now... I guess we have to, since now I'm afraid some pieces may be missing after Katie grabbed it. She had the biggest look of triumph on her face when it happened; she'd been attempting to sneak a piece just to chew on ever since we'd opened it. She happily ignored the pieces tumbling in her lap, as she held the one corner she'd managed to nab in between her fingers and sunk her little chompers right into it. The good news is? They're only babies once.

The bad news is, they're only babies once.

The House: 23 Weeks and rolling along

2012-01-06T08:57:00.000-07:00

I forgot to do my weekly journal of the build last week...woops.

The holidays have been kind of hard on our whole build schedule, but I have high hopes that now that it's back to normal schedule, things will perk right up again. We've been plugging away at the stone and it's coming along, albeit slowly.

Last night Cody and I worked on insulation. Insulating wasn't supposed to be our job, but there was a hiccup in the original quote and we had to shuffle around the money and work a little bit so that we could use spray insulation on the floor joists in the basement... anyway, long story short: we now insulate the garages and part of the basements ourselves. Other than the fiberglass everywhere, it's not a bad job. You simply cut the rolls of insulation to size and gently tuck them in between the studs. We wear safety goggles, masks, gloves, and long sleeves while working with it, and we take a cold shower when we get home (hot water can melt the fiberglass and fuse it into your skin... eeesh...)--but some still got in Cody's eye and scratched it pretty badly. He went to the doctor today and was given some antibiotic eye drops to help it not get infected. So, he's pretty miserable after that, but I actually enjoyed doing the insulation. I enjoy doing the things that I can do well and quickly. And, it felt good to take a short break from the tedium that is rock.

Anyway... besides rock and insulation, we didn't do a whole lot else. The subcontractors took Christmas off, so our electrical is on hold for a while. A few more houses got insulation and the mudding and taping also got done in a couple more. On Saturday (New Year's Eve) there was a pretty hefty wind and a couple of our tents were damaged. A piece of our Code Wrap fell off, so Cody and I fixed that on Tuesday. Here's a picture of that little goodie.

While we were working on our flapping Code Wrap, though, we did see some happy thing:
(I know it's a black tarp. it's what's under the tarp that counts.) New concrete stairs on our back patio! No more two foot drop off! We were thrilled to see some concrete go in. It's been months since anything has been done, but the weather has been so nice that they were able to do some. Of course we got super excited and ran to Brent to ask him if this meant we could get the driveways done right now, but our hopes were quickly dashed as he explained to us that concrete on concrete is okay, but if you dig down an inch or two, it's still frozen solid (hm. explain the mud you can lose shoes in then...?). Oh well. Everything they can get done now still gets us closer to being entirely done.

So. Here's the house-by-house from the end of this week (January 6, 2012):

House 1: Sheetrock, taping, mud, and wall texture done. They chose to have "wholly smooth" wall texture, which is done by scraping mud across with a trowel. This was one of our options (but not one we picked for our own house). Rock, grout done, tent down and moved. Attic insulated. Back patio stairs placed.
House 2: Sheetrock, taping, mud, wholly smooth texture done, attic insulated. Tented for stone, stone all done except for a few corners that weren't delivered, grout started.
House 3: sheetrock, taping, mud done. Attic insulated. Stone and grout completed, tent off and moved (to house 7).
House 4: Insulation done, rock completed, grout all done. Garage insulated.
House 5: Insulation done. Garage insulated.
House 6 (ours!): Back patio stairs placed. Stone and grout 100% completed.
House 7: Insulation done. Garage insulated.
House 8: Plumbing started, heating started.
House 9: Plumbing and heating started... maybe completed? I'm not quite sure.

It's interesting to see the disparity right now between house 1 and house 9. House 1 has had plumbing done for months! But they'll all be done at the same time. House 1 may be getting everything super fast, but at the end they'll have to look at their completed house every day and keep building while we finish the last few houses. Which is why we're very happy we're House 6. We don't get much first, but we don't get much last either. :)

Well friends--on to another week!

New Year's Party

2012-01-05T20:22:00.004-07:00

We went down to Southern New Year's Eve. We had a day off of building and Cody had a day off work, so we made a quick decision to run down and spend the weekend with Cody's family. It was a little hectic, but lots of fun. These kinds of opportunities are very rare for us right now, so we were excited to take advantage of it. We had a great time hanging out and chatting and just enjoying the break. Cousin Autumn taught Annalisa some of the finer points of playing dress up:And the biggest highlight was riding Dixie with Daddy.
Happy New Year, and thanks again to Mom and Dad S for inviting us to come play!

2011 Top 10

2011-12-31T23:59:00.000-07:00

Cody and Lisa's top 10 stories from 2011.

10. Married 6 years!
9. Everyday moments watching our children grow and learn.
8. New callings as Nursery Leaders.
7. Annalisa getting potty trained--and becoming a very independent "big" girl.
6. Lisa's hometown of Minot, ND flooding severely
5. Lee Starting Kindergarten
4. Lisa's Gall Bladder removal surgery.
3. Moving out of our old house and in with my parents.
2. Constructing our new house.
1. The birth of our sweet daughter, Katie Verda.

Happy New Year, everyone! As you can tell, this year has been an important, full year for us. It's been full of ups and downs, bumps and bruises, smiles and tears. But it's made us stronger, happier, better people. We have filled the year with love--and that's the most important part. I hope you have a fabulous evening and have had a great year as well. And if you haven't, well, then, at least it's over now. ;) Love ya!

The House: Pondering Layout

2011-12-27T11:09:00.004-07:00

I've been thinking a lot about the layout and purposing of space in our new house. Since we are building it ourselves, we can pick some things to design ourselves--things like closet shelving and placement of cables and phone jacks etc. I want to tell you a little bit of what I've already decided, but I'd also like to ask thoughts and opinions. But I'll get to that later.

First of all. Here's a refresher on our floorplan:

The first little personalization we've already done is putting extra stud backing behind where doors will open, behind shower curtain rods and by windows, and where we want to hang TV's. The next things we are planning now are closet shelves. The bedroom that faces the street will start as Lee's bedroom, but we plan on finishing the basement and at that point Lee will move downstairs and that room will become an office. So, we're designing it as a room that can easily convert to either purpose. In there, we've put a CAT 5 line and a phone jack, to make it easy to put in a computer. I want to put mostly shelves in that closet and not so many rods so that papers and printers and whatnot can be stored in there. Not to mention, Lee is a boy. He needs more shelf space and less rod space. I actually don't plan on putting any full-length rods in that room. (like for long dresses.) I plan on doing shelves on each side of the closet and double rods in between. Is there anything else I should think about?

Now, Anna and Katie's bedroom is the one that faces the back yard. On one side of their closet I'll have double rods, then a large section of shelves in the middle, and a short single rod on the other side for full-length dresses. I'm trying to think of colors to paint it, but that will still be a long time coming, so no big deal.

I've been pondering on how to make the entry way more guest friendly, since we don't have a coat closet. I want to build a bench that has shoe spots under the bench, and above it have either cubbies with doors or curtains, or just a set of coat hooks where we can hang backpacks and coats. On the top I want a shelf with some baskets to hold keys and mittens. I want to put this on the wall to the left of the front door, right where the laminate floor will be. Cody wants to put it to the right of the door, between the sidelight and the big front window, and put a TV on the wall to the left. We have a piano that needs interior wall space, and we plan on putting it on the wall adjacent to the laundry closet. How to set up the living room? Where to put a TV, if we put one there at all? How to arrange furniture? This is a slight battle between us, so I'd love for you all to weigh in. :)

The next thing I've been pondering is how to store everything. We have these nice little linen closets in the bathrooms, but we don't have a big one in a hallway. So today I decided that the closet in the kids' bathroom will be our cleaning closet. I'll put shelves on the top half, but leave the bottom part open so I can put our vacuum and steam mop and broom in there, and on the top I can put my cleaning supplies. The bathroom will have some other open storage shelves where I can put towels, and an extra-long vanity where I can store extra TP etc. I, personally, feel like a genius for coming up with this. :)

Lastly, what are some things you love about the houses you all live in right now? What do you wish was different? How would you fix the problems--or prevent them from happening altogether? Is there something you would suggest we do to make sure our home is as kid-friendly and comfortable as possible?

Merry Christmas 2011

2011-12-25T00:00:00.000-07:00

We've had a very busy year, but not too busy to pause and remember Christ our Savior. We hope you all have a very wonderful Christmas! Love, Cody, Lisa, Lee, Annalisa, and Katie

The House: 21 Weeks building

2011-12-24T07:20:00.002-07:00

With the Holiday season here, we've had a few rough hours weeks. Everyone is off going to parties or stuck in snow etc, but we keep trucking on with the build. Here's where the houses are this week:

House 1, 2, and 3: Insulation finished, Sheetrock up! What an amazing difference it makes!
House 1 and 3: Stone DONE! Finished! Tents taken down and moved to House 2 and 7, and set up.
House 4: Electrical done and inspections being done. Stone finished, grout nearly complete (until we ran out of color.)
House 5 and 7: Electrical done and inspections on the way. (after inspections comes insulation.)
House 6 (ours!): stone and grout (finally) COMPLETE! Every last bit! done done done! It required moving around a tarp and using a space heater because we had to take the big tent down before it was done. Still not sure why, but we did listen to the boss.
House 7: Scratch coat of mortar applied.
House 8 and 9: heating done, plumbing mostly done, and House 9 finally got the last window fixed and installed.

We're not building today (Christmas Eve). On last Thursday, I brought out some little smokies and cheeseball and we had a regular Christmas party under the tent at House 7. Some very kind people have brought little gifts for each other. I love the feeling of camaraderie as we build. There's always some little drama going on, but that is to be expected. Mostly we enjoy being with each other and have all found some true friends in our build buddies. And whenever the building gets tough, I just look at our front window and imagine a Christmas Tree there and lights on the roof and I think, "Next year, Lisa, Next year."

The House: Blood, Sweat, and Tears

2011-12-21T08:54:00.003-07:00

Framing had splinters. Subfloor had scraped up knees. Windows had smashed fingernails. Propane heaters hurt the eyes. Grout has little abrasions that sting like the dickens. We've seen nails in feet and and fingers. We've tripped and scraped and bonked and generally just owie-d our way through building our house. But at the end of the day, we are still overwhelmingly grateful for the opportunity to be working hard on our new home.

Addressed: To Kids Everywhere

2011-12-19T17:02:00.005-07:00

Dear Children of the World,

At this time of year, I receive billions of letters asking for toys for Christmas. I'm really happy to oblige; giving is what gives me the greatest joy in the world. But since giving should be a two-way street, I'd like to offer up my Christmas Wish List to all of you. This year, I would like all you children to:
-Listen to your mommies and daddies. They love you and want what is best for you, and I promise they have more experience than you might think. Listen to their advice and their instruction and be obedient.
-Clean your rooms, and put away your toys. My elves and I work very hard to make them nice--you need to work hard to keep them nice!
-Do something nice for someone else. You young children can make the world a brighter place when you smile and help out.
-Go to bed on time. And I'm not just talking about Christmas Eve--getting good sleep will help you grow healthy and strong. So don't complain when your mommy tells you to get in bed. Just do it!
-Please hang up your coat and wipe your shoes before you come inside.
-Be grateful for everything you have and remember to say Thank You.

Now, I'm very busy and must get back to work, but if you want to make me an extra-happy Santa, please check off my Christmas List!
Love,
Santa Claus

Middle School: A memoir

2011-12-19T14:21:00.000-07:00

Middle school is an ugly time for most people. It's when we hit puberty and have braces; we have pimples and clothes that don't fit. It's the time of our first crushes and, most of all, a time of great change. My memories of middle school were right along these lines. Mostly I try to block out some of those awkward moments, but there are some that have proved to be the most special, influential, and dare I say it? cherished memories of my life.

In seventh grade I took keyboarding. My teacher had a "whiz of the week" award that she would give to the fastest typer that week. I consistently would type around 60-70 words per minute, but had too many errors to count. I worked hard on decreasing my dependency on the backspace key, and after about ten weeks of work, I finally hit 74 WPM with only 4 errors. I was so proud of my little certificate that didn't just announce my "whiz of the week"-ness, but also the whiz of the month--and eventually, whiz of the semester. That was a pretty special moment for me.

I also won Student of the Month twice (once in seventh grade, and once in eighth grade). I was awarded a little plaque and got to shake the principal's hand while the counselor snapped my picture. I still have those little red plaques somewhere buried in a box.

One of my favorite classes in Middle School was choir. It was taught by a bubbly lady named Mrs. Speiser who had a pretty good NoDak accent. She had us sing such great songs like "Oh Lutefisk" (to the tune of O Tannenbaum) and a plethora of Disney hits. Every year we would perform a variety show. In eighth grade I was awarded my very own solo. I sang Irving Berlin's "I Love a Piano." I wore a black velvet dress, long white gloves, and a turquoise feather boa. After tapping into the sexiest side I had as a thirteen year old girl, I sang my song in front of the whole school and afterword, my English teacher said I was a ham. I took that as the greatest compliment a girl could get.

Also in Eighth grade, my appendix ruptured and I had to leave school for a week for surgery and recovery. My science teacher came to the hospital and brought me a book to read. Now, I regret never getting around to reading it (though in my defense, I was on morphine). But it was still a very nice gesture. I had to wear sweat pants or pajama pants for a month after the surgery to avoid reopening the surgery wound. I'm not sure what anyone thought of me at that point, but I can at least say nobody said anything mean to the girl with the perma-sweats.

My school had a swimming pool, and for a few weeks of the year we were all given basic swimming lessons. We were required to swim the length of the pool underwater, tread water for five minutes, and dive to the bottom to retrieve tar-covered bricks. I realized then that the only possible way to find those bricks was to wear goggles. And yes, it took me a few days to figure that out.

While I was in eighth grade, I tried out for the school's Science Olympiad team. We had to stay after school one day and take a basic Science test. I was accepted on to the team along with a couple other friends. The team was then broken up into pairs and given a couple of events that we would compete in. My two events were water quality and the egg drop. My friend and I built a contraption that would catch an egg that was dropped from eight, ten, twelve, and fourteen feet high. We lost pretty badly at that event. But the water quality--we had no clue even where to start. We found a few books on water quality, but never really read them. When it came time for the regional Science Olympiad event, we went in worked together on a written exam about Water Quality testing. We had no clue what we were doing, so we made guesses throughout the whole of the test. We giggled our way through it, and when we were finished we laughed about our horrible blunder. When it came time to award the medalists for the whole Olympiad, and they announced our names as first place winners in the Water Quality Event, we were downright dumbfounded. I carry that little gold medal still as a tribute to all educated guessers in the world.

I could continue with this memoir for many more pages--like about getting our Hepatitis C shots and doing archery on the stage, or about the tar they put on the roof every Fall and how that smell still takes me back to sitting in Algebra class... The sights, sounds, and smells of middle school still stay with me. Even though I completed middle school well over ten years ago, it still is with me; as it is with everyone. But this Summer, our silly but beloved middle school looked like this:
Now, Erik Ramstad Middle school has been labeled a complete loss. I know I've talked about the Minot floods on here a few times, but I just had to walk back through memory lane today. I'm sure there will be another school where the teachers will drop bricks to the bottom of the pool in the name of better fitness. I know there will be a stage where young girls will first test the waters of stardom. I know there will be halls that smell like roofing tar. I know there will be shop classes with camouflage-colored CO2 cars. I know that the only thing truly lost was a building--the memories I hold will last forever. But it still makes my heart hurt just a little bit to know that my school is gone. So it is with a tear in my eye that I bid farewell to my old school. Goodbye Erik Ramstad Middle school; I will remember you with fondness to the day I die.

Boxes

2011-12-17T22:12:00.000-07:00

Well, we did it. I really should say Cody did it, since I can nearly count the boxes I packed on one hand... But anyway. We're packed. We're moved out. We're no longer residents of that house. Some things I learned:

-It is ten times easier to move out of a place when you're not living there. When you have to wear clothes and use dishes and brush teeth and take showers and sleep in beds, you can't touch any of that, making it impossible to pack it. So I'm grateful we just grabbed our clothes and a few toiletries and came up to Mom and Dad's to live, so we could pack everything much faster.
-Cody's PTO was finally approved and we couldn't have chosen a better week. It was nice for him to have plenty of time to spend packing and cleaning.
-For a family about to move, nothing is a more thoughtful gift than some nice, sturdy, clean, identically-sized boxes. Well, except for maybe pizza coupons. :)
-And lastly, occasionally you just have to give in and eat microwave dinners.

I'm still shocked that all of our stuff fit in this one bedroom (well, probably closer to half or two-thirds of our stuff, since that doesn't include the clothes we brought up to Mom and Dad's, our couch, box springs, piano, and a few other items...):

Holiday Baking

2011-12-17T11:36:00.002-07:00

Since moving out of the old house, I feel kind of like I'm double timing Christmas. Which is actually a very good thing, because it means I'm really enjoying myself! I've been indulging in all kind of holiday baking--keep in mind that I usually enjoy the baking more than the goodies themselves. There's just something about the smells and the warm stove, and the memories and all the nuts and chocolate... At any rate, the baking itself is not a chore for me. Just lucky I guess. ;)

So here's our holiday treat lineup:

Famous "F" Fudge
Aunt Bev's Peanut Butter Cups
"Yule Logs" (which I invented last year: pretzel rods dipped in caramel, dipped in chocolate, and drizzled with white chocolate and sometimes rolled in nuts)
Peanut Brittle (my first time this year!)
Caramel Cashew Popcorn
Toffee Balls
Peanut Busters
"Christmas Punch" (our own version of spiced cider with cranberries)
Homemade caramels dipped in chocolate
Chocolate dipped Cherries
Cheeseball and crackers
Mrs. C's Star Cookies

Have I made you drool yet? ;)

The House: 20 Weeks

2011-12-16T21:29:00.003-07:00

Twenty weeks building. wow. It seems wild to think we've been building that long, but also that it has gone so quickly as well. When we started I compared it to being pregnant--lots of work, lots of pain, but lots of excitement and in the end you get a beautiful new family member. That's certainly still the case.

We took down the tent from our house this week and started another house on stone. Of course, though, a mere day after taking the tent down our corner pieces arrived. We thought we could get by with just a little tarp over the one corner, but our manager wants us to re-tent the garage (not the whole house, but still a big tent). Ugh. Why couldn't we have just waited one more day? Those 100 foot tarps are heavy, not to mention all the lumber and scaffolding we use! Oh well. We at least get to look at this gorgeous sight now:

Meanwhile, subcontractors have been hard at work inside the houses and we're seeing some fun progress all around. Here's where the nine houses are sitting at the end of week 20.

House 1: Drywall delivered; Stone and grout still almost all done. We got all the stone on that they had and had to order some more, which came in on Thursday. So there's still just a few pieces to put up and then they will get grout, and then it will be done. Most of the grout was done on Tuesday.
House 2: Insulation completed
House 3: Insulation completed; Stone and grout nearly completed--similar story to House 1.
House 4: Electrical done; Started putting up stone
House 5: Electrical done
House 6 (ours!): Plumbing and Heating completed, Electrical started; stone and grout nearly completed and tent moved to House 4
House 7: Plumbing and Heating completed
House 8: Plumbing started
House 9: Heating started

Once the electrical, plumbing, and heating is all done, there is an inspection done. After the inspection we get insulation and then on to drywall--which is a major step as it signifies the beginning of the finish work, also known as the beginning of the end. :) But until then... Keep on buildin' keep on buildin' keep on buildin' buildin' buildin'....

Really? a 9 month old baby?

2011-12-11T10:11:00.000-07:00

Our little Katie is growing far too quickly! This past month she's completely left her infancy and entered into full-fledged babyhood; bordering on toddler. It's amazing how suddenly that seems to happen.

Kate's two top teeth are about to break through, and she's had some hard moments with teething. But her big break through this month: standing! She's crazy! She can stand up for several seconds without holding on to anything. I'm afraid she'll take off walking at any second. With these new found standing skills and wicked fast crawling, Katie has found great pleasure in touching anything she can find. She enjoys exploring the world around her, even at the expense of some unsuspecting plant or Christmas decoration.

I'm really proud of our baby girl and the way she's handled the crazy situation we're in with moving and building and whatnot. Sometimes it's hard to find a quiet place to take care of a baby, but we do our best and are so grateful we have our little Katie Bubble. Happy 9 months to you, Katie-gug-gug!

The House: 19 Weeks

2011-12-09T08:06:00.003-07:00

Goodbye, week 19!

We had a few setbacks this week. I hate setbacks. We have 3 houses right now (ours, House 1, and House 3) that have all the stone on, except for a few small sections because the company didn't deliver enough stone for us to finish the whole house. Our house still is missing one corner of stone from last week's corner fiasco. We did everything we could on the other two, using every tiny piece of stone we could find, and we just plain ran out. Then, there was the problem with the grout. Apparently we all ordered our grout color using an out-of-date sample. Over at House 3, they mixed up the grout and it was bright orange--like, hunter's orange. It was awful. Of course the homeowner nixed that immediately, so we went over to our house. I wanted grey grout, but through a miscommunication, we ended up putting in black (I wasn't there on Wednesday, Cody was, but he didn't realize I didn't want that color). I could have put up with the black, but when we went back on Thursday to finish it, there were a lot of bubbles in the grout and other problems, so we ended up chipping it all out. It wasn't very happy. After three hours of chiseling out grout, we just went home early. We needed it. So, Saturday will be a fresh start and we have all learned an important lesson on being careful with grout--like, beyond careful. Grout is one of those things that must be perfect. Pretty good just isn't good enough any more. Bubbles in the grout will cause it to crumble and crack the stone, so we are all going to slow down and be extra cautious, and triple check every grout line before moving on.

But anyway. At least the sub contractors had a good week this week! Here's where all the houses are:

House 1: Every piece of stone they had is on. Waiting on another shipment before we can finish. Also, wall insulation in! (Ah man, I can't wait to tell you all about insulation when it's our turn! It's stinkin' cool!)
House 2: wall Insulation
House 3: stone all on and waiting another shipment; grout getting started. Rough electrical done, wall Insulation done
House 4: Rough electrical done
House 5: no change (plumbing and heating is all done, has been for a few weeks)
House 6 (ours!): stone all on except those four corner pieces, grout half on and then off again. :) plumbing and heating done, including... BATHTUBS!
House 7: plumbing and heating done
House 8 & 9: No change

Sorry no pictures this week. I lost my phone. :/

Moving again

2011-12-07T14:15:00.003-07:00

Oh how I hate moving!

We tried so hard to finish our new house before we had to leave the one we're living in, but it just didn't happen. So, over the next week or so (either this weekend or the next) we'll be moving in with my parents once again, and living there temporarily until the new house is done.

Why, you may ask? Our landlords have been so kind to us just letting us live here for the last year, but it's time to move on now. They need the space for their own growing family and their brother (who moved into the basement last weekend), and Cody and I feel like we're in the way. Leaving has been a tough decision--especially when you factor in Lee's Kindergarten and Cody's work schedules. But we really think it will be best for us to live with my parents for the next few months. Which leads me to another bummer.

Our new house won't be done until mid April, no matter what. If we went out there and built 60 hours every week, it wouldn't make a difference. Why? Because only 2 driveways and back porches have been placed (ours and House 1). They can't touch the frozen ground until Spring. So even though we cruised through shingles 3 weeks faster than predicted, and are already ahead on stone, it won't get us into the houses any sooner. We're all quite heartbroken, but are trying to make peace with that fact and finish up our part. If we have any down time, I hope it is at the end of the build so that we can all have a few days to pack and clean our houses before moving. I always said this whole affair was an emotional roller coaster; this is yet one more dive in the journey.

One last random fact: once Cody and I move in with my folks, there will be only 2 families in our build group of 9 that don't live with parents. Silly, huh. We've all had strange ends to living in rental homes that have put us in strange situations, and since we're building our own homes, we all have thought the same thing: why rent an apartment for a few months? Mostly, I'm just grateful for my wonderful parents who are willing to put us up when it feels like life is crumbling around us, and I'm grateful that this time around we can easily see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel. I'm grateful that we can move out of this house with smiles on our faces and hugs and love, instead of like last year which was so horrible. It may be a tricky couple of months, but it will be for the best. And that, as they say, is what is up.

Just a bit more from Cali

2011-12-06T06:34:00.002-07:00

I had to share some of these clips from the Talent Show. They're the only ones I took that were small enough to fit on the blog easily. Maybe if one of my siblings puts the whole thing on YouTube or something, then I will link it. Consider this a teaser. :)

The House: 18 weeks and no roofing

2011-12-02T10:57:00.005-07:00

On Tuesday Cody and I went out to build together, as is normal because my mom graciously babysits on Tuesdays. We started stone! It is a new project that we were both excited to start. But after just a few minutes of carefully sculpting mortar and having to ask before placing a single stone, Cody realized it was too much tedious artwork and just "not his thing." So, I got to go build the rest of the week and he took care of the kids. It felt great!Putting on stone is really interesting. It can't freeze, so we have giant plastic tents we put on the fronts of the houses, held up with scaffolding. Underneath we run some propane heaters and put up bright lights, so building has been quite pleasant this week. If you get up on the porches where all the heat flows, it is almost sauna-like and you wind up in your shirt sleeves. On Wednesday and Thursday we even had some cold winds blowing, and we were just so grateful to not be on roofs any more!

Because of our choice of stone (it's a really easy pattern to learn on), we are one of the starter houses. We have 3 houses with tents on right now, and our team has broken up into 3 small groups and everyone is doing something. On Wednesday, we started our house and one more house with stone. I loved our stone color, but noticed that the corners were oddly red, and they're supposed to be grey. I asked our project manager about it, but he didn't seem too concerned so I just tried to sort out the best ones for the corners. We got the majority of the corners on when I went to go get a saw. I started talking to another homeowner (owner of House 1, which we wanted to start, but couldn't because his corners weren't delivered yet), and he said he wanted to come check out how we were putting up our pattern, since he had ordered the same pattern--just a different color. As we were walking to our house with the saw, I asked him what color he had chosen, and he told me it was a reddish-purple. And his corners were missing. And mine were reddish purple. Why I didn't put this all together in the first place is still a mystery, but when we got back to our house and looked closer, we saw a second label on the box of corners--the first label said our name and stone color, but the second label had his name and stone color. I'll admit I was frustrated. There was nothing in the box to note which stone was to go with which house, so we pulled off all the corners we had put on and cleaned them off. First order of business on Thursday was to sort out which ones were theirs and which ones were ours. It ended up being a really screwy order because they didn't give us enough stone at all (we're about 4 feet short) and his were all one size instead of a variety of big and small. Anyway. We can laugh about it now, and we're grateful we caught it before the mortar had set so solid that we couldn't pry it off. But here's the picture of the first stone going on (SO exciting!)... ....and then a few hours later, the first stone coming back off (bummer man!):
You can see the color difference in this photo pretty well (and keep in mind, these were the "good" ones!):

Porch is almost done!
Now, each house:
House 1: getting stone on, rough electrical done
House 2: rough electrical done
House 3: getting stone on
House 4, 5, 7, 8, 9: All roofs completed, but no interior changes
House 6 (ours!): getting stone on, heating done, rough plumbing done

The House: 17 weeks & Thanksgiving break

2011-11-28T11:38:00.003-07:00

Right on the top of my post-vacation-to-do list was going out to the house and picking up the time cards, as well as doing a little tour to see how things are coming along. Now, we're actually into week 18 for building purposes (our build weeks run Saturday through Friday, remember), so I won't put up a house-by-house this week. Also because I'm really not sure where each house is at. But, I saw some pretty amazing and VERY exciting things as I did my little walking tour with Lee this morning.

#1 mostest awesomest thing ever--ROOFING ON ALL 9 HOUSES IS DONE!!! I suppose there's one house that needs about four shingles trimmed still, and then a couple of houses have some decorative eaves above the garage door that needs to be done, but the actual climbing on the roof and laying shingles and cutting out vents and things like that is now complete. What a major relief. Now the snow can be beautiful again. And, I'll have you note that this is about two weeks faster than our build manager predicted. (I'm not saying we're ahead of schedule. I'm enough of a construction worker now to ever say that.)

#2 Amazing happy thing--Our rough plumbing is done! *remember that sub contractors do plumbing and heating

#3 do-a-dance thing--Our heating is almost entirely done, including vents, furnace, floo, and duct work.

#4 leap of a heart--The front of our house has been tented and the tar paper and mesh has been applied to the front, so we are ready to roll with scratch coat and then stone.

In case you noticed and were wondering why the mesh is about a foot away from the window: shutters.

We can't wait for Tuesday when we get to go build again! It's amazing how much we've missed building while we were on our trip. We miss our neighbors and the camaraderie and the exercise and the air, and we miss our home. We're happy to be back now.

California Extravaganza

2011-11-26T18:32:00.004-07:00

Here I am, on the last day of our vacation. Cody is washing the kids upstairs after playing on the beach. I'm washing some laundry so that we'll have clean clothes to wear in the van tomorrow as we drive home. It has been a wild crazy week, but a nice change from the normal crazy.

Major highlights from the last week (since I think you'll probably like highlights better than a mile long travelog):

Making pies and enjoying Sara and Eric's Pad Thai
The Beach
Taking lots and lots of naps (I think Cody averaged 2.5 a day while we were here)
The kids' talent show
Reading books with Grandpa
A plethora of smart phones
Family pictures
Playing at the park
Thanksgiving Dinner, of course! (And all gluten-free, except for the rolls)
Nearly wetting ourselves with nerves from the crazy Californian drivers
Shopping
Movie night
Near constant snacking
Cousins

And endless fun.

end of this week

2011-11-19T10:39:00.002-07:00

Wow. It has been a big week, and my list feels rather untouched. I'm going to re-post it now, after a week of work and with my changes. Maybe after I do that I'll realize that I haven't wasted this week away, and I'll be proud of myself for what I did do.

-Finish shingling our roof, and also try to put in extra hours at the house, especially Saturday 11/19 *DONE!
-Do laundry *Done
-Clean house *Absolutely NOT done. But, we have been doing the dishes and I did get a chance to sweep and mop the floors and scrub the bathrooms. So right now it is just cluttered.
-Find volunteers to build next week, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday 11/26 *Done
-Return some clothes to Kohl's and maybe get myself a new shirt *Done, though I didn't get myself a new shirt... I did one better. New pants. Aaah.
-Finish 2 Christmas projects *Done, and can I just brag about how awesome they all turned out?
-Wrap 3 Christmas presents *Wish it were done, but I lost the tape.
-Find GF graham crackers *Removed from my to-do list when my sister Kathy found them for me.
-Pack suitcases for a 5 day vacation *Kids clothes have been packed. Nothing else though. :/
-clean the van and kid's carseats *So close to done! I have the van emptied of all the crud and was about 3/4 of the way through vacuuming it when Katie was jumped on by two little hooligans and I realized my opportunity to finish it had just passed. Hopefully that opportunity will come back before Monday.
-Make bread, probably twice. *Gave up on this one... hey, something's gotta give. We mostly ended up eating chicken nuggets and pizza this week.
-Find someone to pick up time cards *Done

Other things that weren't on my list but still got completed:
-A massive-o shopping trip in a horrible snow storm to get all of our trip supplies
-Everyone was fed, everyone was bathed, everyone was clothed... well, mostly clothed. okay. I admit it. Anna and Katie barely made it out of their PJ's every day and Cody spent the week in sweats, and I think Lee kept putting on dirty pairs of socks that he would hide at the foot of his bed at night. THERE! I said it!
-I snuck out to see Breaking Dawn at midnight on Friday with my sister Sara.
-I only lost it about four times. Pretty good, I'd say, trying to plan and pack for a week-long vacation with 3 kids while my husband worked 60 hours plus this week.

We all have a tendency to set way too high of goals for ourselves. A thought I've had a lot recently is: Decrease your expectations and increase your gratitude. Instead of being frustrated that so much didn't get done, I need to be grateful for everything that did get done. And, I need to be very grateful that I still have Sunday and Monday morning to finish the packing!

The House: 16 weeks building

2011-11-18T08:05:00.003-07:00

I called it: last Friday's big volunteer push really revived spirits and got us excited again. Consequently, this has been a great week!

Saturday morning, which is the first day of our build week, dawned rainy, which turned to snow about ten in the morning. We simply can't roof with any type of precipitation, so our building manager told us not to come in until the weather cleared at about 2. It was actually really nice to have a few hours to take naps and play with Daddy, especially considering that he's been going out to build every available moment. Cody has been very dedicated, and the past two weeks has put in a total of about eighty hours at the site. We've been watching the weather like hawks and try to be building whenever the weather permits, whether it's a required day or not--even having dinner and FHE at the house on Monday so that Daddy could work into the night. We miss him and his hands are all scratched up, but he's been able to get a lot done and we are that much closer to a home of our own!

Driveway cutout!

Here's where the houses are at now:
House 1: rough electrical done (still tented for stone), back porch poured
House 2: back porch poured, Roof finished
House 3: Roof Finished, tented for stone
House 4: Roof started and finished
House 5: heating vents and furnace in, Roof started and nearly finished
House 6 (ours!): heating vents started, back porch poured, Roof started and finished
House 7: Roof started and finished
House 8: black tar paper on for stone
House 9: no change

Today, Friday 11/18, we have no required hours and it's also rainy--which is great. Tomorrow will probably clear up. It's good to have an excuse to spend a day getting ready for our vacation. Now, time for a quick story. As you all know, we're supervised by a licensed contractor, our supervisor Brent. He's a good guy and his primary job is to teach us what to do and to make sure we don't make mistakes (or at least fix them when we do). We asked him if we had a general time frame for when we'd be done. He's estimating mid-April, and roughly around this schedule: Finishing Roofing--Mid-December; Finishing stone work and all exterior--Mid-February; Finishing interiors and the open-house--mid-April. At first we were all kind of depressed at this news. But I'd much rather look at is as a challenge. He thinks it will take 4 more weeks to finish the roofing--let's prove him wrong! 9 weeks to rock? Let's do it in 8 or less! Already we're ahead of his little schedule. We have less than 3 houses to shingle now, and that won't take four weeks. But anyway, that's the "plan" as of now. Good thing to have for posterity.

The House: A beautiful sight

2011-11-17T08:15:00.003-07:00

I was going to save this for the end of the build week, but I'm just too excited about it. Cody, with the help of some great volunteers and group members, finished this on Tuesday, 11/15:

(there's still a few shingles that need to be trimmed and we plan to paint the plumbing vents black... but all the shingles are on. AMAZING!!!!)

Sometimes I just love myself.

2011-11-16T16:47:00.002-07:00

I forgot how awesome all my Holiday Prep posts from last year were. I hope you all are having fun getting ready for Thanksgiving!

http://codylisa.blogspot.com/2010/11/holiday-prep-organizing-organization.html

This week

2011-11-14T06:42:00.002-07:00

This week is going to be another very busy week. Just for fun, and for posterity's sake, I thought I'd write up my to-do list. And, so I have an easy place to check what we still have left.

-Finish shingling our roof, and also try to put in extra hours at the house, especially Saturday 11/19
-Do laundry
-Clean house
-Find volunteers to build next week, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Saturday 11/26
-Return some clothes to Kohl's and maybe get myself a new shirt
-Finish 2 Christmas projects
-Wrap 3 Christmas presents
-Find GF graham crackers
-Pack suitcases for a 5 day vacation
-clean the van and kid's carseats
-Make bread, probably twice
-Find someone to pick up time cards

And why is my list so long this week, other than it's always long? (and why doesn't my list look more like this?) Because next week we're going to California for Thanksgiving! It's been months since we even left our city, and over a year since we've gone on any type of vacation. We really, really need this trip. We've been so overworked and stressed with the building and Cody's 2 jobs and three kids... yes, it is time for a little vacation. It's going to take some major organization to make it happen, but we're determined. Here we go!

The House: Alisa's Volunteer effort

2011-11-11T21:26:00.003-07:00

Cody's sister Alisa is the bombdiggity. She is a college student and has classes during the weekdays (well, duh), which makes it really hard for her to volunteer at the house during weeknights. We totally understand, and told her not to worry about it--but she asked us if she could come out on a Friday. Well, even a week in advance today's weather looked good, so we told her to come. She asked if while she was coming out, if a few of her friends could come with. I heartily agreed and promised dinner to whomever she could round up.

What was going to be a small group quickly escalated, as things with dinner tend to do in a college environment, and soon we had a huge list of volunteers signed up! I made two massive pots of soup (about 4 gallons total between Bacon Corn Chowder and Chili), and recruited some help to make desserts and bread. Then, we toted everything out and put people to work.

All in all, Alisa was able to round up 25 volunteers--more than we've ever had on the site thus far. Add to that several family members who came, and also we had most of our group come out to help teach people what to do, and this evening--which is normally not required hours--we had 38 people on the site! That's incredible! We usually average about 14. In a matter of about 3 hours, we worked hard on roofing, keeping 6 nail guns unusually busy; did scratch coat on another house, and installed the last of the basement windows that arrived. It was an amazing few hours--just what the doctor ordered before we get more snow this weekend.

I feel like I should give another quick update, since things changed so much tonight from where they were even yesterday (I won't put anything in that didn't change from yesterday, so you can see exactly what happened today):
House 1-Tented for stone, basement windows finished
House 3-roof nearly completed
House 4-Scratch coat on
House 5-roof started
House 6 (ours!)-roof started, nearly 1/2 the way done
House 7-roof nearly completed
All 9 Houses: stone delivered! I had a fun time going from house to house, looking at each family's choices for stone. Our grey, square stone has beautiful hues of blue in it that I think will be highlighted by our siding. I couldn't be more thrilled with our choice.

Today was a good, hard work day. We needed it. We needed to see some fast, big progress to rev our spirits back up. Thanks Alisa!!

8 months old

2011-11-11T18:45:00.001-07:00

Today Katie is 8 months old! My how time flies! I like looking back at my monthly posts about her and seeing her developmental progress.

This month Katie likes to stand up more than she likes to sit down. She won't hold still unless she's asleep, and even then she moves around. She will pull herself to a stand on anything she can grab, including mom's pant leg, or a scooter Anna is trying to drive, or even just a pillow on the ground. She's getting better balance at it every day, and only needs to hold on with one hand to stay steady. She also likes to dance when she's standing, and is getting better about sitting on her bum instead of face planting when it's time to get back down.

Katie has two new little friends in her mouth now, and boy are they sharp! She hasn't bit mom yet, which we hope stays that way. Teething has been kind of hard for her, and she's been drooly and grumpy. Anything that touches her hand goes immediately to her mouth.

Speaking of going to her mouth, Katie has taken a serious liking to solid foods, as long as she can feed herself. She hates having a spoon jabbed at her face, so we do a clever little dance of letting her hold her own spoon. It takes a lot of concentration to feed Katie a bowl of baby food! She also likes to eat little bites of cooked vegetables, bread, rice, pasta, or her little "baby treats." She also loves drinking from a cup, when she gets the opportunity.

Katie is a fast crawler and wants to be where the action is. As I'm typing this, Katie is trying to get in the bedroom where Lee and Anna are playing. They keep closing the door so she can't see them, and every time they do, she cries. Then they open the door, and she's happy as can be.

Katie handles being away from mommy pretty well. The acceptance of solid foods and the ability to crawl really helps her to be independent. While I spend as much time as I possibly can caring for my children, we're also trying to build a house and I occasionally need some alone time (Heaven forbid!). It's good to know that she can be happy when someone else is in charge.

Lastly, something very cute that Katie does and is unique to her: we call it "sniffy nose." She scrunches up her lips, squints her eyes, and breathes nosily through her nose. Then she smiles. It makes us laugh every time!

The House: 15 Weeks

2011-11-10T19:59:00.006-07:00

This week has been kind of slow. On Saturday--our biggest work day--there was an inch of fresh snow everywhere that kept us wet and very cold. I took Cody and the crew lunch on Saturday, and when I got there, Cody was soaking wet and half frozen to death. He'd been installing drip lip without brushing the snow off the roof first. He used his rock climbing gear to harness himself to the roof, and he was just sliding back and forth to get where he needed. So, I ended up trading him pants and buying him a package of socks just so he could dry off and get warm. Yes, that did mean that I drove home with a baby blanket over my lap. :)

Things we've been working on this week: Cody has been the lone man on the drip lip job. Then we have two small teams of roofers, a small team of guys doing scratch coat (the first coat of mortar on the front of the houses where the stone goes), and the girls have been working on the metal frame work, the black tar paper and mesh backing for the stone.

Meanwhile, we did have some good work done by our subcontractors this week--and it's a good thing too. Cody went out for a few non-required hours on Monday simply because the weather was good. He talked to our plumbers and heating guys, and they promised us all nine houses would be ready to roof very soon. It's been good to see the plumbers out there, since they've been MIA for a month or so.

Here's where the houses are:
House 1: Shingles finished, scratch coat on for stone.
House 2: Shingles almost finished, scratch coat on for stone.
House 3: Shingles about 3/4 done, scratch coat on.
House 4: Drip lip done, mesh framework for stone on.
House 5: drip lip done, plumbing done, heating vents done.
House 6 (ours!): plumbing done
House 7: Shingles started, drip lip done, plumbing done
House 8 & 9: drip lip done, plumbing and heating vents cut through roof so we can shingle

*At this point, all 9 houses are either getting shingled, or are ready for shingles. To be ready for shingles, they must have tar paper/roof underlay down, drip lip on, and have the plumbing and heating vents run through the roof.

Quiet Kindergarten moments

2011-11-09T09:35:00.002-07:00

I'm sitting here enjoying the warm sunshine streaming through the front window and hitting my toes. I realized it's been a while since I've sat and rambled about life, other than building the house, that is.

With Lee in Kindergarten, I get a few hours of just two kids at home a day. I always have these grandiose plans that I'm going to pack boxes or deep clean a bedroom or scrub the kitchen. And somehow, it rarely gets done.

But occasionally, I get one of these quiet moments where Katie is napping and Annalisa is playing nicely and I try to decide if I should quickly attempt one of my projects or just enjoy the quiet. Today, I'm just going to enjoy the quiet and de-stress a bit. I encourage you all to do the same. :)

Meet Napoleon.

2011-11-05T11:55:00.003-06:00

"I caught you a delicious bass."

I probably should have seen this coming, but I thought I had put my foot down hard enough to avoid it. You see, we have a friend who likes fish tanks. He decided Cody should have one, so he brought us one one day.

I'm not talking about a little bitty fish bowl. I'm talking about a 50 gallon behemoth. "Now you can have your own fish tank!"

50 gallons? For a family who will be moving in a few months? NO, I said, unequivocally NO. NO fish until after we move. The end. Period. Do I make myself clear?

Cody called me one day and asked me to go take measurements so he could build a reinforcement for the tank in the basement. I asked him why he needed to reinforce the tank if it was going to remain empty until after we move. He avoided the question. I went downstairs with a measuring tape and saw two inches of water and some rocks in the bottom of the tank: cleansing solution.

NO! NO FISH until AFTER we move! THE END! I do NOT want to move a full 50 gallon tank in the dead of winter! PERIOD! Do I make myself clear?

That night, Cody came home and built the reinforcements himself.

NO NO NO NO!!!! WHAT DID I SAY ABOUT FISH BEFORE WE MOVE? NO!

The next day, after church, our friend calls us up and says, "Hey! I've got a surprise for you! Can I stop by?" He comes in with a...

large mouth bass.

Then he tells us we'll need to go to the pet store in the morning and buy a filter for a 50 gallon tank so that the fish won't die.

For the record: Fish are not good gifts to give friends.

Thanksgiving Turkey Hairbow Tutorial

2011-11-04T11:08:00.009-06:00

Because of the raging success of my other tutorials (that is sardonic), I thought I'd put one up of my Thanksgiving Turkey Hairbows! Please let me know if you like these tutorials, because they're kind of a lot of work to put together, and if nobody likes them, I might as well save my time. :)

How to make a Thanksgiving Turkey Hairbow

Preface-- This is one of the more complicated hairbows I make. I find a lot of joy in making these, which is why I do it. It takes some time, and is more like sculpting ribbon than tying knots. It also uses a lot of small pieces that have to be hot glued, so I try to hold things with clothes pins or use my scissors to push down on them so I can avoid burning myself. I must also apologize for the quality of the photos: they were taken on my phone. I hope you can see what to do, even if the photos are kind of poor.
Tip #1--If you want to make two matching bows so you can put them on pig tails, make two at the same time. Cut your ribbons at the same time, do each step twice in a row. That way you'll end up with two that look almost identical. If you make them one at a time, you'll be more prone to cut a ribbon longer on one or put your feathers on in a different order, and end up with Turkeys that don't match. I always make 1 bow for my baby on an alligator clip, so I can attach it to a head band; and 2 bows on barrettes for my 3 year old who has enough hair to put in pigtails.
You will need:
-brown ribbon (in this tutorial, I use 1/2 inch thick ribbon because that was what I could find at the store. I've also used 3/8 inch thick, which have been very cute as well, just a little less chubby.)
-Other "Thanksgiving colors" for your feathers. I am using red, yellow, and green. Orange would also be great, or even cream.
-Red and orange/yellow ribbon for the beak, wattle, and feet
-googly eyes
-alligator clips or barrettes
-hot glue and scissors, of course!

1) Cut your ribbons for your body and feathers. I like to do each of these about 2" long. You'll need three pieces of brown for the body, and a total of five feathers (I really like 2 red, 2 yellow, and 1 green). You could do extra long feathers, of course, or do each one a different color, or do more than five--it is up to you.2) Glue your brown strips into plain loops, so they make O's. Cross over the feathers and glue them together at the ends, so that they look like this:
3) Glue your brown loops together, putting the outside loops in the middle of the inside loop, like the Spider body tutorial, like this:
4) Now make the head. This is probably the most complicated step, so if you find it too tricky, just make a regular round loop. But here's how I do it: use a clothes pin to clip brown ribbon to a dowel. Then cross the ribbon over itself and glue down.
Repeat in the opposite direction (loop around the dowel, cross over itself, and glue down). In the end, it will be almost a figure eight pattern and you will have a wide side and a narrower side. Your "wide" side will have two pieces of ribbon that barely overlap, and kind of form a more rounded face for your turkey. This is the same way I make the heads on my Halloween Spiders. While the head is still on the dowel, I like to glue on my googly eyes. Then I cut the extra ribbon and slip it off of the dowel. Voila! nice round head!

5) Make the beak by crossing over a very small piece of yellow or orange ribbon and pulling it as tight on itself as you can, so it makes a triangle. Hint: fold it over and pull it tight, glue it, then trim off the extra. Don't cut it super short and try to glue the short ends together. You'll just end up burning yourself. I still use a clothes pin to hold it together so I can avoid touching the hot glue. These pictures should help:The red wattle is very simple: just a short piece of red with one angled side. The neck is optional, but very simple: fold over a 2" piece of brown ribbon on itself and glue shut. From the side, it will make a teardrop shape. Here's all my assembled pieces, ready to put together (body, head, feathers, neck, beak, wattle). I forgot to do the feet until later, but that's just an angled piece folded in half and glued on a slight angle so that they make a V.

6) Assembly time! On the bottom of the head, put a drop of glue and put the wattle on so that it sticks out under the eyes. Then put another drop of glue and place the beak on top, again making sure that it pokes out underneath the eyes in the direction you want. In other words: make sure you look at it from the front before gluing them on. I slipped my head back on the dowel to do this so I wouldn't burn myself.
Then put the neck on the back of the body.

Now attach the head to the neck, making sure the beak and wattle are between the head and the body... so the head is on straight. Look at it from the front as you do it, and you might have to kind of work at it to get the head on in the right direction to maximize cuteness.
Now flip the turkey over and put the feathers on the back. If you've lined your seams up right, all the feathers should go over seams and kind of cover them. I like to start with the outside feathers first and go in, so red first: Then yellow above and slightly on top:
And lastly the green one right in the middle.

Attach the feet of the turkey off the bottom. I forgot to take a very good picture of this step, but in the following picture's background you can see my partner turkey with the feet already on. It's not hard though: just dab glue and make sure the V feet poke out the bottom. 7) If using alligator clips, line one with ribbon (any color that matches, but I usually use brown for this one) and then put a line of glue on the clip and adhere it to the back of the turkey. If you need help knowing how to line the clip, see my Halloween Pumpkin tutorial.

At last, the final product:

The House: 14 weeks, 3 months done

2011-11-04T09:15:00.000-06:00

There have been some pretty exciting changes this week! The most exciting for me (other than the free hot chocolate cards our neighbor gave to us): a DRIVEWAY! I literally squealed when I saw the forms and gravel delivered. On Tuesday the metal forms were there, the rebar was sticking out when we arrived. At about five, some guys came in and filled it with gravel. On Wednesday (11/2), during the day, they poured the concrete, then promptly covered it with blankets so that it wouldn't freeze and crack. They also put up big "Stay off the driveway!" signs. Our house is the third to get a driveway. I told you we were mixing up the order. When you see the layout of the neighborhood, you can understand it better... Here. I'll just show you.

*Map NOT drawn to scale, or even close to scale. Map Key:
White-A lot we're building on
Grey-Road
blue-a lot that already has a house on it
green-empty land

So, now you can see how we're next to "House 2." Since House 1 and 2 were getting driveways this week, we got one as well. House 7 has a big pile of mortar in the front yard, so they weren't ready for a driveway yet; besides, the subcontractors are planning on doing 3 at a time. That's how many they can get done in a day, and they don't want to prep a house for a driveway and then leave the forms sitting there for very long. Like I said, right now we are moving around as it is convenient for us. When we were framing, we needed a little more space between houses so that we could frame and subcontractors could put in foundations and roofs and stuff. It's always been about what's the easiest to do in what order.

We've been building hard for over three months now. It's hard to say how far along we are, especially since we're now fighting the cold and dark, but I think we're hovering around a third to half way through the build. That's based off of comparisons with previous groups, and with the total hours we've put in so far.

So this week, Cody finished all the windows he possibly could put in (some haven't been delivered yet, or were delivered wrong), then moved on to "drip lip." This is a metal trim that goes on the eaves of the house, right under the shingles. It helps move water away from the house. Cody said it's not all that hard to put in, but you have to be on the un-shingled roof to do it. That means standing on the roof underlay, which is very slippery (especially in the dark, when the frost is forming). Cody is the smallest guy in our group... well, probably the smallest guy I've ever met... so he's good for this job. He doesn't fall as easily.

Now, on to what happened around the neighborhood this week.
All houses: power boxes put in! We have all underground utilities (no overhead power lines), so our power boxes are outside and the pipe that will contain all the cables was buried. This is pretty momentous: we can now get electricity to the houses.
House 1: Shingles on, driveway poured, mesh/framework done for the stone, first layer of mortar for stone
House 2: Shingles half way finished, driveway poured, mesh on for stone
House 3: mesh on for stone, drip lip done, first layer of mortar for stone
House 4: heating duct work done (by sub contractors)
House 5: no change
House 6 (ours!): driveway poured, drip lip done a few things fixed (like a door frame, some missing nails, a strip of Tyvek behind bathtubs that will hold up the insulation, etc)
House 7: dry-in done--including windows and doors, drip lip on, mesh on for stone
House 8: code wrap done, windows all installed, "clean up" completed. No exterior doors have been delivered yet.
House 9: code wrap done, windows installed (except for the gabled dormers, which we have to figure out how to do, and 2 windows which were delivered wrong), "clean up" completed

It's still hard work. Instead of coming home hot and sweaty we come home cold and shivering. But it's still exciting, and I'm still grateful for this opportunity and everything we're learning.

Trick-or-Treat 2011

2011-11-01T08:48:00.002-06:00

Annalisa: the Princess Cat. A natural choice for any 3 year old girly-girl.

Lee: The Duct-tape skeleton. Daddy helped him make his costume.

Cody: The Dracula .... with no fangs or blood or face paint, of course.
Katie: The short-necked giraffe.

We left a big bowl of candy on our front porch, since we were unsure if we would even get trick-or-treaters at our current house. Since it was our one and only Halloween living here, we weren't terrifically concerned about it. Then, we first visited our Grandparents' houses, then decided to go trick-or-treating in our new neighborhood. We weren't sure if anyone else would be out there, but we wanted to check it out. Besides, our new neighborhood is fairly enclosed, with lots and lots of young families. (It's the nature of the area: because it is almost entirely self-help-houses, everyone has a similar income and age group. Not to mention there is a school a block from our new house.) Anyway. We were SO glad we went out there! There were kids everywhere; almost every house was lit up with pumpkins and Halloween decorations. We could easily walk from house to house. People were friendly, and if they weren't home, most of them had something on the porch. It was awesome to do some traditional Trick-or-Treating.
Annalisa and Lee were such troopers, and were happy the whole night long.
At last, mom OK'd the consumption of the candy: the spoils of WAR! :)

Note to self: Buy lots of candy next year. I have a feeling our house is going to be in a hot spot for many years to come.

Halloween--of course!

2011-10-30T21:00:00.004-06:00

I love seeing all the pumpkin carving and costume posts popping up all over blog world. We're definitely going to jump on this bandwagon!

With all the craziness of building a house and holding two jobs and having a son in Kindergarten, it feels like our quality family time is dwindling. This morning when I woke up, I realized it was the first time I'd woke up next to Cody in weeks... he just gets up early with work or building... Consequently, we try to savor every second we get together. We've been doing some fun things to get ready for Halloween and to enjoy the Autumn together.

Today we had a pre-Halloween party with my side of the family. We made yummy Jack o' Lantern pancakes for dinner along with Mummy Fingers, Witches' brew, and... baked omelet... hm. Better think of a better name for that one. Anyway. It was fun. Afterword, we carved pumpkins and then enjoyed our dessert of Ghosts in a Graveyard and made some roasted pumpkin seeds with garlic and smoked paprika. mmm.
Now, I plan to blog stalk for a while and see some of your fun Halloween activities!

Sometimes

2011-10-28T11:35:00.002-06:00

Sometimes we all have a bad week.

Our hair looks funny.
Our kid gets in trouble.
We stub our toe.
We get a scratchy throat.
Something comes out totally wrong.
Someone gets mad at you for no good reason.
We run out of chocolate.
There wasn't a new episode of Glee OR CSI.
The furnace doesn't work right.
We can't sleep, even though we're tired.

And for one reason or another, we just can't get out of this bad rut. All we want to do is run away from it all or go cry. Probably both.

Sometimes it just happens.

And that's okay. It is part of being human. We should all make peace with the fact that there are bad weeks out there. I need to make peace with my bad week as well. It will get better, but not if I continue to dwell on the bad things that have happened. They're over now, and they're so menial in the long run.

Alright. Time to shake it off and step up. And maybe go reload my pantry with chocolate. :)

The House: Week 13

2011-10-27T09:41:00.006-06:00

This week I traded out my sunscreen, bug spray, cooler, and sunglasses for thermal underwear, extra socks, a thermos of hot soup, and ear muffs.

Name of the game this week: the dry-in. I tried to look up an official definition, and in my twenty-second Google search I didn't find anything. So I'm making up my own. When a house is dried-in, it is, well, dry! That's not to say there aren't still things going on the outside. The items that truly keep the house dry are the roof underlay, the house wrap, and the windows and doors. Siding, soffits, gutters, shingles, all of course do their part, but for all intents and purposes of this blog, when I say "Dry-In" I mean the aforementioned. (Roof underlay, ALL windows and exterior doors, and completed house wrap.)

Cody worked more on windows this week. He's getting very good at making them perfectly level so that they will open and close easily. I learned that when windows are hard to close it's not because of the track: it's because they're not straight. Funny Cody story: Cody, his dad, R.G., and I were putting in windows on House 5. On the last window, they got it caulked with silicone and lifted it to put it in, when they realized it didn't fit in the frame. So they pulled it down and realized that the wall had been framed incorrectly and would need a fix before the window could be installed. Cody then scraped off all the silicone into his hands and RAN from House 5 to our house, which is over a block away and smeared all the silicone onto the next window so that they "wouldn't waste it... It's still good!" silly silly Cody. I just hope there's no dirt or hairs or anything in that silicone... Incidentally, the mis-framed window took a few hours to fix, but it is fine now.

This week I worked more on house wrap and helped Cody with windows. We had other small crews working on roof underlay, "clean up" framing, exterior doors, the trim that goes around the garage door, and probably more things that I forgot.

Another silly story from this week: When we were originally touring the neighborhood, we liked this kind of olive-green siding color, but there's a house across the street from us that has already picked it, so we went with blue. We asked our next-door neighbors (House 2, P) what siding color they picked, and guess what they told us? "We liked that green, but since it's across the street, we went with blue!" I didn't think it would be a huge issue, since the blue is pretty neutral, and we have different floor plans, different stone, etc. But our neighbors thought about it a while and decided to change their siding color. There's a $50 change fee for this kind of thing, and I was going to offer to pay half since it was mostly our fault the P's wanted to change their house color... but when they told our program manager about the situation and how we'd have matching houses next door to each other, he waived the fee. So now we won't be matchers any more, and I think the P's are happier with their choice (at least, I hope they are!).

OK. enough rambling. Where are we now, after 13 weeks of hard work?
House 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 (ours!): DRIED IN!
House 7, 8, 9: House wrap, roof underlay all done. They were still being framed when windows and doors were delivered, so they didn't get theirs delivered yet. Once those get delivered, we'll get right on it.
House 1, 2, 3, 5, 6 (ours!), and 7: Shingles delivered. Subcontractors have been out working on heating and plumbing in several houses, but it's kind of been all over the place. They'd been on vacation for a few weeks, but now we're catching up. We have to have plumbing and heating vents in before we can shingle, since they go through the roof. Once the houses are dried in and the floo and plumbing vents in, they're ready to shingle. So, obviously, we've got to get these houses going! We're hoping to shingle a house in about 2 nights (or 1 Saturday). We have an overall goal to get all the shingling done on all 9 houses, before Thanksgiving. Of course, we won't all be on a roof; we'll have smaller teams doing stone or other jobs while there are people on the roofs.

On to another week!

I just love this picture.

2011-10-26T09:54:00.003-06:00

Artichokes

2011-10-24T19:07:00.003-06:00

Something that really brings back memories for me: eating artichokes. When we were kids, on very special and rare occasion, my mom would cook whole (fresh) artichokes. Considering the cost of artichokes, and the youth of us kids, it's no wonder that we would usually share one or two between us kids. We'd savor every bite and the only unhappy words were when someone took even a single petal over their share. And then we'd get down to the tender heart of the artichoke and drool impatiently while mom scraped off the choke and handed us our little forkful that we'd slurp down while wishing there was more. I'll never forget the day we each got our own full artichoke to enjoy ourselves--we felt so grown up and so special and so spoiled!

When I saw artichokes for a dollar apiece at the store, I bought two, thinking that Cody and I would enjoy them and give the kids a few bites to try. HA! They ripped through those artichokes so fast, I had to take a handful of petals to my plate just to have a few.
Even Katie got in on the artichoke fun.
And now, the famous joke:

Arti was a gangbanger trying to work his way up into the mafia. The mob boss gave him a hit list telling him that he'd be payed a thousand bucks a hit, so Arti started following his first victim. They were in the local Safeway grocery store, when the victim rounded a quiet corner and Arti struck, choking him to death. When Arti turned around, he saw the horrified expression of a little old lady dialing 9-1-1 on her phone. Panicking, Arti choked her to death as well just and a second later the police arrived and arrested him. The infuriated mob boss refused Arti's thousand dollars and only paid out one dollar in spite. The newspaper reported the headline the next morning: "Arti chokes two for a dollar at Safeway."

ba-doom-ching.

Halloween Spiders Hairbow Tutorial

2011-10-23T09:33:00.000-06:00

Another hairbow tutorial, since the first one was so fun to make. Please let me know via comment if you try out making your own hair bows--even if you don't know me personally, I'd love to hear from you and see if it worked out okay!
Halloween Spiders Hairbow

-1/2 inch thick black ribbon. For some reason, I can never find solid black in my stores, so I'm using this black and white polka-dot with white trim ribbon. I like it, but use what you can find. Hey, you could even do it in a different color. I've seen some mighty cute pink spiders out there!
-3/8 inch thick ribbon to line the clip (red is shown)
-Alligator clips or barrettes, about 55 mm long
-1/16 inch black grosgrain ribbon
-googly eyes
-1 soft red pom-pom, if desired
-hot glue gun and scissors
1) cut three strips of your black ribbon--one long and two shorter. The long one should be about 3" long, the shorter ones about 2 1/2" long. Wrap them around your fingers so you can get a feel for how big the abdomen of your spider will be. If you want it bigger or smaller, by all means, do it!
2) Pin your strips into circles and glue shut.

3) On your large loop, seam-side down, line the inside right edge with glue and press the outside left edge of a smaller loop into it. Seams together, of course; like shown below. Repeat on the other side, so your big loop is in the middle and the smaller loops are on the sides.

4) The head can be a little tricky, so wrap the ribbon around your fingers and play with it until you get the look you like. You can easily do two small loops glued together just like the abdomen, but here's how I usually do my head: Loop your black ribbon over into a circle, but twist the end ever so slightly so it kind of sticks off to one side. Glue shut, like this:

Then bring your next end back around and glue the back of the head. It almost makes a figure 8, but the loops come forward. Like this:

Then cut off the two loops from the spool of ribbon.

5) Attach two googly eyes to the front of the head. The front is, of course, not where the ends of the ribbon meet up.
6) Line your alligator clip or barrette with ribbon. I like to use red with these spiders, but you can really use any color you like. (I didn't put pictures up of lining a barrette. If you want to see how, look at my pumpkin tutorial.)

7) Now, cut four equal length of the skinny black ribbon and seal each end with a small dab of clear finger nail polish (or burn ever so slightly in a candle) to prevent fraying. These pieces should be about 3" long each. Pinch them together, put a dab of glue in the middle of your lined hair clip, and place the middle of the skinny ribbons right in the glue. Legs!

I swear it's red on that clip, even though it looks very orange

8) Now, glue the abdomen on the back of the clip. On an Alligator clip, make sure the back goes over the thick part where you pinch the clip open. You want him to look like he's about to pounce--not like he's looking up into Heaven. :) Barrettes aren't that particular. Then, glue the head to the front. Glue it both to the clip and too the abdomen, so he really looks put together.
9) The "finishing touch?" Glue a fuzzy red pom-pom into the middle of the abdomen for some visual interest.

Our completed spider bow, ready to adorn the head of any sweet unsuspecting baby!

Also, you could instead put these on a pin for a clever little brooch. We love making our own holiday bows because it's so festive. I'd love to hear from you if you try out this tutorial! Good luck, and happy hair days!

Halloween Pumpkin Hairbows Tutorial

2011-10-22T08:31:00.008-06:00

After seeing a relatively large amount of traffic to my blog searching "Halloween Hairbows," I thought, "what the hey! I'll give the people what they want!"

How to make a Pumpkin Hairbow:

Materials you'll need:
-Orange, brown, and green ribbon. I like 100% polyester, grosgrain ribbon. I always buy 100% polyester because it is the most versatile, and I will probably use this same ribbon for other projects. You can curl 100% polyester; you can't curl any other type of ribbon. I also like 3/8" thickness for this project.
-Alligator clips or *barettes.
-Hot glue gun and hot glue sticks.
-scissors, of course.

1) Cut the orange ribbon into five strips: one long one (I like about 2 1/2 inches), two medium (about 2 1/4 inches), and two short ones (about 2 inches).
2) Wrap each orange strip into a circle and glue shut, so it is just a plain loop.

3) Make a cross-over loop with the brown ribbon and pull it quite tight. Glue to keep shut. It should be quite small: this is your stem.

4) cut a green piece with diagonal ends, fold in half, and glue to stay put. This is your leaves.

5) Now, attach all your orange loops together. On one edge of the inside of the largest orange loop, put a line of hot glue. Make sure your glue goes over the seam of your loop, since that will be the back of the bow. Line up one of your medium loops and press the outer edge in, so that they kind of telescope together, seams together. Like this.
6) Repeat the same process for all the loops. Make sure your middle loop is the big one by putting the medium loops on either side of the large loop, and then the smallest loops on the outer ends. In the end, it will look like this.
7) On the back of the orange pumpkin, put a bead of glue and attach the brown stem, poking up on the side you want the top. Then adhere the green leaves in the same manner. I kind of did it backwards when I was making this tutorial... obviously it doesn't make a huge difference, but I would have liked the leaves on the back more.

8) Line your alligator clip with ribbon. I chose brown, but you could use any color that matches your bow. I like to do this by first clipping the alligator clip to the end of the ribbon, and then putting hot glue on top. Since my clips have a hollow center, the glue pushes down to the bottom and keeps it together, but prevents me from making a massive mess or burning myself while I'm gluing.
9) Trim off any excess ribbon and try to clean up any hot glue webs or dribbles. If desired, paint any raw edges of ribbon with a dab of clear nail polish to prevent fraying. (Some people like to use a candle or a heat gun for this... I'm afraid of hot stuff, so I like the nail polish method.)
10) Finally, glue the back of the orange pumpkin--if you've done it right, it will be a row of seams--to the clip and enjoy.

One more look at the final product:

*Note: if you're using barrettes, you will do it the same way. Just line your barrette with ribbon first instead of a alligator clip. I have two girls, a 3 year old and a 7 month old. My baby gets alligator clips because I can easily slip them on to head bands. My 3 year old gets barrettes because they stay in her hair very nicely, especially over piggy tails.

The House: 12 weeks and rolling

2011-10-21T10:51:00.002-06:00

This week has been one of the funnest (for me, at least) of the whole build thus far. We finished the ninth house with the framing, and so we have all moved on to new jobs. We have two guys assigned to putting on roof underlay/tar paper, three guys (including Cody) assigned to windows, two on doors, two continuing on "clean up" (keep reading for that) and all the girls have been working on Tyvek house wrap. It is a blast to work with different people, and to see lots of progress done each day. Because each of these jobs only take a few hours per house, we're moving around a lot more than we were while we were framing. It is really refreshing to see stuff get done each day. Like I said, FUN!

At our house, we completed our "clean up." And by clean up, I don't mean just sweeping the floor. I mean cleaning up the last few framing jobs before plumbing, electrical, and eventually sheetrock.

First, we take these metal brackets called truss anchors and put them on every other truss, but it is staggered between front and back of the house... weird to explain. Impossible to take a picture of. If you want to know more, come visit. :D The anchors are the diamond-shaped metal brackets shown.

One option we have is to use extra wood to put additional stud backing anywhere in the house. We put some behind where doors will open, to reinforce where the doorknob hits the wall and hopefully prevent holes; also we put some above every window where curtains go, behind towel racks and behind were we hope to hang TVs. Since these are not part of the floor plan, we had to come in on extra hours and do it ourselves. Of course we were perfectly willing to do that!
Another little "clean up" job was the blocking on the ceiling. Anywhere a wall ran parallel to the roof trusses, they needed extra blocks of wood to sheetrock. So those had to be measured and placed every two feet, like this:
Not pictured: another wall in the basement had to be framed. We skipped that wall in the original framing because we wanted to get the roofs on before the snow came. There was also some fire blocking put into the load bearing wall, and then a good sweeping with a push broom and one last check to make sure everything is done. We are ready for our plumbing and hope it comes soon.

Also done on our house: Roof underlay! We have two types of paper that goes on the roof, and certain areas need a double layer. No rain seepage for us. Nope nope nope.

And lastly, we had some people put on the Tyvek House wrap (I suppose I shouldn't call it Tyvek... the brand is "Code Wrap"), and we even had some of our doors put in. In this picture, we have 2 guys working on the back French door, and 5 girls working on house wrap. Cody said more doors got in besides just that one, but it was dark so he didn't take a picture.
So... after all that, here's where each house is standing at the end of 12 weeks building:

House 1, 2, 3: Roof underlay, House wrap completed, all windows and exterior doors are in. These houses are now water tight!
House 4: subcontractors did plumbing. House wrap almost done, roof underlay done, exterior doors on, starting windows.
House 5: House wrap almost on, but no roof underlay quite yet. Exterior doors on.
House 6 (ours!): "Clean up" finished, house wrap almost all done, roof underlay done, most of the exterior doors on.
House 7: Roof underlay on, house wrap started, working on "clean up" there.
House 8: No change from last week (all framed, roof on, waiting for inspections to be done)
House 9: Finished framing, subcontractors put on the roof trusses and sheathing.

One random tidbit: I'm the secretary for our group, which means I calculate the hours everyone is putting in and submit them to the corporation every week. Sum total man hours put in by our group, through the whole 12 week build so far: 4548.25. We're over 1100 hours above the minimum required.

Finally, want to know the best way to motivate a bunch of people to do construction? FOOD! :)

I heart my kids

2011-10-17T09:57:00.002-06:00

Once again, I tried to take pictures of the kids. And once again, the vast, VAST majority turned out like this:

We'd get so close and then one kid would look away or stick out their tongue or something like that. Kind of frustrating, maybe. But very cute in the long run... looking back at it, I wouldn't have it any other way. I love their goofiness, their childhood, their silly faces. I love my kids!

The House: A milestone

2011-10-15T16:13:00.002-06:00

Big big milestone today: We have finished framing all 9 houses. Yeah!

Also, I cinched down my tool belt a notch. :)

The House: 11 weeks into the build

2011-10-14T08:19:00.003-06:00

After last week's storm, the weather has cooled off drastically. Gone are our balmy 80 degree days and working in T-shirts. But we did have sunshine and crisp Fall air this week--and you know what? I think I like it even better. I took cookies out last night and my neighbor B.D. gave me a big hug and said he missed me out building, and I felt so at home and so loved. Our little build group has already bonded so tightly, it feels like family. Have I ever mentioned before how glad I am we chose to build our house this way, and how excited I am to move in? :)

House by house update time! You will start noticing that the houses are not getting worked on "in order" any more. I originally numbered them in the order that we framed them, but they will get roofs on in a new order because of ease in tool placement. That's really what it's always been about--where can we put the tool trailers, where can we put the electricity, etc. But for the sake of continuity, the arbitrary house numbers I've assigned to each house will remain the same. Today, I'll put the first initial of each member's last name so that I can help myself remember the order in the future. Oh, and by the way: we are no longer working in Team A/Team B. With a variety of new jobs, we've been split into even smaller pairs or even single workers, and everyone is everywhere now.

House 1, L: plumbing, bath tubs, furnace and vents all in courtesy of the subcontractors. We put on the tar paper/roof underlayment and the tyvek house wrap.
House 2, P: no change.
House 3, K/C: plumbing and furnace also all done, and tar paper/roof underlay went up last night.
House 4, H. & House 5, C/J: Roof blocking, truss anchors, basement fire blocking, non-essential framing done. This is all stuff we do. You see, when we framed the main floor, we skipped a few non-essential walls so that we could get the roofs on faster. Those walls are now being built. You'll be hearing more about that soon as it gets to our house. These two houses are now ready for plumbing and furnaces.
House 6, S. (ours!): Roof blocking done... which I forgot to take a picture of. We basically cut 2x6's and place them on top of the walls, between the roof trusses, so that there's plenty of wood for the sheetrock to drill into. Also: some of the non-essential basement framing is being done.
House 7, D.: Roof on (of course that's a subcontractor job, as you already knew).
House 8, G: Finished all interior and exterior framing and sheathing, including the garage. Roof on.
House 9, L: Almost done framing. There's still a little bit of work that needs to be done on the garage. We're probably about four hours shy of finishing that house's framing--and then the major framing will be DONE!

Also delivered this week: front and back doors! Next week will continue to be a big one of change and learning new things. We had a Tyvek crew get trained this week and we also had a couple of roofing crews get trained. Next week, we'll be doing Tyvek and roof underlay and starting shingles, and we'll also have some people be starting placing windows and exterior doors. Our first goal was to finish the framing before it snowed. We made it! Wahoo! Now our next goal is to get the shingles on before the weather gets really bad... although it will probably snow a little bit before we can finish all 9 houses. Once we get the shingles on, the windows and doors in, and the rock on the outsides, we'll be able to be inside the houses. Even without a furnace running it will be warmer inside, so that is an exciting prospect.

Katie friend at 7 months

2011-10-11T11:24:00.000-06:00

This has been a big month for Katie. She learned how to sit up, crawl on hands and knees, and even pull herself to a stand. She's starting to figure out solids a little more too. She prefers to feed herself instead of being fed, and likes to chomp on little bits of bread or cracker or rice.

By the way, she completely skipped the army/belly crawl.

A little while ago Katie participated in an infant cognition study. She watched a screen with a bouncing ball for about ten minutes. She didn't even cry. She's getting happier every day and her colic is so much better. She occasionally has a fit at night time when she's very sleepy, but her new found independence from crawling is helping her be happier.

Enjoying the season

2011-10-11T10:08:00.002-06:00

We enjoyed a super fun Family Home Evening last night. Even if we weren't home. :) Close by us is a historical farm and visitor's center with some fun Autumn time activities. Like this monster slide:
A corn maze--of course! (and incidentally, look at those GORGEOUS snow-covered mountains)

And pony rides.

We ended with some cinnamon-caramel popcorn and a lesson on following the directions Heavenly Father has given us--just like following the map in the corn maze. We are certainly enjoying the Fall and upcoming holidays!

The House: Week 10 and bad weather

2011-10-07T11:12:00.005-06:00

We all knew it would happen. Mostly we're just grateful that we got a solid two months without weather problems. But the bad weather finally arrived--cooler, and rainy. It's supposed to clear up next week, but it set us back a bit this week.

To compensate, Cody and I and his sister and mom went to our house on Monday for Family Home evening and put in a little work. We installed most of our roof truss anchors--which are metal brackets that hug both the trusses and the load bearing walls and are nailed down with special nails. Also, we put some extra studs in the walls where the doors will open, behind shower curtains, and other places we might like. We also picked up a bunch of big rocks and put them in the bottom of our window wells to assist drainage.

This week, here's what happened:
House 1 & 2: plumbing in, including bath tubs. (no sinks, of course.) The subcontractors are also working on the heating ducts. Tar paper has been delivered, ready for the roof.
House 3: no change. (plumbing done)
House 4 & 5: Similar to ours, people have been putting in truss anchors, extra studs, and doing some extra framing in the basement. Getting ready for plumbing, electrical, and heating work.
House 6 (ours!): see above. That little bit of work we did on Monday was all that happened.
House 7: Roof on.
House 8: Interior framing almost done, garage almost all done. Hopefully we can finish that one up on Saturday with plenty of hours to spare to get started on roofing.
House 9: Bearing wall, green plate, rim board, and floor joists are in. Then we got stalled by the rain.

Yesterday we took the rainy day and turned it into a clean-up day. We needed it, I'm afraid. There was wood everywhere. We filled a coupleb of dumpsters and then put the rest in big piles. All usable pieces have been moved to the houses still being framed. We're trying to use every little piece so we can return as much as possible and stay under budget. At the end of this whole process, any budget we have left over we can use toward landscaping, air conditioning, sprinkler systems, or even just to pay down the principal of our loan. Also, hopefully the weather won't be such a setback. Once we're working under the roofs, we can brave the rain. It's just this framing that is tricky--it really needs to be dry to use the big power tools. Water + electricity = not good things.

Tailgate time

2011-10-06T10:59:00.002-06:00

We had a tailgate party a week ago and watched our team on TV. Sadly, they had a heartbreaking loss, but we had a great time cheering them on. I love finding ways to celebrate life's small moments and make every day into a party. Don't you just adore Lee's team spirit?

The House: 9 weeks/2 months down

2011-09-29T17:12:00.004-06:00

We've now been in 35 hrs/week-full-build-mode for 2 months. Our Team A/Team B is barely intact as different home owners have been pulled to work on new projects. We are working hard hard hard and seeing lots of progress, though there is still lots and lots to do. Our projected move-in is in April, though we're all hoping it will be mid-February. Of course, nothing is official yet. It's so far out; we have no clue what will happen between now and then.

So, let's talk about what happened this week.

Everyone (except 7, 8, and 9, which aren't done framing yet): Windows delivered! Check it out in the pictures below. Just delivered, of course. We will install them later.
House 1, 2, 3: plumbing is in, roof trusses have been anchored... I know people have been there building, but I'm not sure what all has happened.
House 4: no change.
House 5 and 6 (ours!): cement garage stairs and cement front porch placed.
House 7 (where we spent our time this week): Exterior and interior framing completed, sheathing on the house done, garage framed and almost all sheathed. There's probably only a couple more hours of work there before it will be ready for roof trusses.
House 8 (Team B working over there this week, minus all the people pulled to get ready for plumbing on other houses): Exterior framing done, starting on interior framing, almost all the exterior sheathing is done.
House 9: no change. It's the last foundation sitting there all lonely and naked. :( We'll be getting to that one very soon, I promise!

Sitting up, crawling, and just plain cute

2011-09-29T13:04:00.001-06:00

Katie has learned how to crawl and sit up this week. She's even pulled herself to a stand a couple of times. Too fast, Katie, too fast! but still fun!

Say Cheese, Lee!

2011-09-28T12:58:00.002-06:00

Lee is proud to report:

The first lost tooth!

At Church

2011-09-26T08:27:00.003-06:00

This is why we love being nursery leaders.

The House: 8 week update

2011-09-23T09:51:00.002-06:00

Look at my roof!!!!

Lots more stuff happening this week. Our teams continue to be broken up as we get some houses prepared for sheetrock and shingles. Our building manager has been asking the homeowners of the fully-framed houses to go back to their own houses to work on lots of little projects. And yes, I'll talk about those when it is our turn.

House 1(B team): pipes run for plumbing, and "little projects" taking place.
House 2(A team): same as house 1. Since the homeowners are from the "A-team," and they've been building at their own house almost this whole week, we've been down to just three families framing. On Wednesday, there were just three of us because we had no volunteers or spouses. But we still work hard.
House 3 (B team): also had a little work done to get ready for plumbing, but pipes aren't run yet.
House 4 (A team): no change from last week.
House 5 (B team): finished framing, had roof placed (Subcontractors do our roof).
House 6 (A team) (ours!): finished framing, finished garage, had roof placed.
House 7 (A team): green plate, rim board, load bearing wall, stairs, floor joists, and almost all the subfloor have been done. We also laid out the back wall, but it isn't sheathed yet.
House 8 (B team): basement and garage floor placed, green plate, rim board, load bearing wall, and some floor joists have been done.
House 9 (B team): basement and garage floor placed.

Next week Cody's schedule changes again and I he gets to go build and I stay home with the kids. I'm glad. It's been lots of fun building every day, but I'm tiiiired. (and have a cold.)

The House: Earning our Burgers

2011-09-17T20:39:00.006-06:00

Guess what? We're ready for roof trusses!

The house at the beginning of today:

The day we started framing on our house, I made a bet with the rest of the A-Team in complete jest. I told them that if we tied or beat our record for fastest framing on our house, I'd make them all burgers. After that hard build week, I decided we deserved burgers whether or not we actually beat our record. So I made burgs for lunch and took them out to our whole A-team.

In the long run, though, we really did "earn" our burgers. :) But even better news--Both house 5 and house 6(ours!) are fully framed, braced, and ready for roof trusses next week. On Tuesday we will probably get to start framing houses 7 and 8. We are doing awesome!

So what exactly happened at our house today? We finished the "energy wall" studs, put in the top plates (which are a second set of 2x4's on the top of all the walls that help keep them very strong), put "ladder backing" where interior walls meet exterior walls (which is a set of 2x4s that help keep everything strong as well as allow for easier sheetrocking), finished exterior sheathing, and built the ENTIRE garage, from framing to sheathing to the massive header above the garage door, and even did the stairs. The last thing we do is brace all the walls so that they won't budge a sixteenth of an inch when the roof trusses are placed. Before bracing, the walls are still little flexible. The house at the end of the day:
And y'know what else? It even rained today. This is AMAZING!

The House: 7 Weeks

2011-09-16T03:04:00.006-06:00

Wow, did we ever hit a stride this week! I think everyone could feel the pace pick up. Well, maybe it was just me... but I know I conquered some big fears this week and tried some jobs I never thought I would do.

Over at our house, we have completed the exterior walls and moved on to interior walls. Since we have three awesome framers in our midst, the interior walls fly together. And I do mean fly--flying boards, nails, and in no time, they're flying up. It was a downright madhouse maze yesterday inside! There were three guys laying out walls in different locations, each loading lumber through the windows. A couple of the girls were trying to install all the "energy wall" studs, but toward the end, it just got too insane as we rushed to finish the interior walls before ending. (Which, incidentally, we only missed by 1 2' wall.) My parents came up yesterday, and we continued working on exterior sheathing. It's a lot easier to install when the wall is still laying down. We had to use the 2 story ladder to reach the top of the ply wood. It was kind of precarious. But we did it!

Master Bedroom:
Me in the spacious master closet:

Taking a short break in the front living room window:
Bruce, my neighbor, demonstrating how to properly use a ladder:

Wanna know where each house is now? Okay. For memory's sake. Mom--I've added which team each house belongs to now. We are in team A. We are still one big group, though, sharing expenses and wood, and occasionally tools--but we work separately and only see each other when someone comes over to kife a router or impact drill.

House 1 (team B): The owners returned to their house this week to install roof truss anchors and perpendicular 2x4s that will aid come sheetrocking time, and a few other "small" tasks.
House 2 (team A) &3 (team B): No change from last week (roof in).
House 4(team A): had roof trusses installed and sheathed, and porch and garage concrete stairs placed.
House 5 (team B): interior walls completed, garage framed and mostly sheathed.
House 6 (team A) (ours!): Floor joists in, subfloor in, exterior walls up, interior walls up. I truly think this is the most we've ever done on one house in one week.
House 7 (team A): no change, still just a foundation with a basement and garage floor.
House 8&9 (team B): prepped for cement, with visqueen and tar. I'm not sure if they put on the window wells or not... those are "Team B" houses right now.

Oh, and in case I never mentioned it, here's our normal build hours: Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday from 4-9:30 pm; Saturday from 7-7. That's why there's so many night pictures now. The sun set about 7:45 this week. The waning sunlight and the cooling temperatures are just a sign right now of the impending winter... we're hoping to have shingles on before the snow flies. Lots of work to do to get there. We can do it!

Rice cereal?

2011-09-15T09:13:00.003-06:00

I think the jury's still out on rice cereal...

The House: Hard work=great rewards

2011-09-14T07:50:00.005-06:00

I am proud of myself. It takes some major courage to build a house, you know!

Yesterday (September 13, 2011) we got more amazing work on our house done. We have walls! And I, Lisa, cut out our front door. How many people can say that? I also nailed in most of the sheathing myself. That means using the heavy nail gun--one of the things I was most afraid of at first. But I conquered it yesterday. Go me! My arm is sore this morning though. :)

And since I'm chronicling every step of this journey, here's some information about building exterior walls:

The most important tools for building exterior walls are a measuring tape and a pencil, followed by a hammer and a square. Oh, and of course a pair of gloves and water bottle... First, we measure where the wall goes and use the floor plan to carefully lay out the walls. We have to have some decent math skills to know just where to put the doors and windows. Around windows, we have a trimmer and an extra stud on each side. Doors have to have an extra two inches added to the width of the door for the door jams and shims, then have their own trimmer and extra stud as well. Both windows and doors also have headers built out of 2x10 boards. After doors and windows are determined, then we also place studs every 16". Once the wall is in place, we'll put up more studs in the little wave pattern I explained a while back. It gets kind of complicated, and this is a job that I haven't quite mastered yet, but I try to watch what is going on and learn it.

(And incidentally, on the top of this picture you see the wood house across the street? That's "House 3")

Once all the studs are all nailed together, we measure the board to ensure it is square. Then we place big 4'x8' pieces of sheathing on, carefully lining them up. We like to use a chalk line to mark where the studs are so that we nail the sheathing on right. (The nailing was my job.)
We use a heavy-duty construction router to cut out the windows and doors. Then, at last, it is time for my all-time favorite moment of the build: lifting the walls into place. (I wanted to take an epic movie of this, but the camera tipped back. And I couldn't come turn it off because I was still holding the wall in place. But you can at least see part of it).

After the walls are lifted, we level them, toenail them into place with nails, and then brace them up with long 2x4's.

This last picture was taken at sunset, about 7:45 pm. We stay and work until 9:30, so we were able to get the last two front walls lifted before we left. I couldn't take a picture because it was too dark. When we left, all the front-facing walls were up, and the side walls were beginning to take shape. The back wall is also up, of course.

The House: Subfloor

2011-09-11T20:42:00.005-06:00

On Saturday (September 10), we made some awesome progress on the house. I promised I would blog all these little steps, so here they are!

After the load bearing wall, green treated wood, and rimboard have been installed, we're ready to start placing the floor joists. The joists we are using are a composite particle board, encased by pine 2x4's (in other words, "I" beams). They are the biggest of any of our building materials, and measure between 16 (the shorties) and 32 feet long. We place them every 16 inches across the whole floor. We square off the rim board, then carefully measure where each joist will be placed. We cut the I joists, then place them in and nail them down with great big nails.

They balance in the middle on the load bearing basement wall. Between each joist, about half way through, we place more small pieces of floor joist, so everything is very solid and square.

We use the floor plan to know exactly where the joists should go, if any need to pop out over the edge of the foundation (cantilever) or where they need to be cut short to go around the stairway. Also, corners get reinforced with extra pieces of joist, and there's a few spots like around stairwells that might need some fidgeting to get the joists in correctly.
(By the way, in the picture above, you can see a house in the background, all framed but with no exterior... that is "House 1." Also, if you look VERY carefully, you can see the top of an empty foundation, which is our next-door neighbor and "House 7." Just to give you a bit of perspective on the neighborhood.)

Once the joists are all placed--which takes a lot of work--we can begin placing subfloor. The subfloor is also a composite particle board, 3/4" thick, with a pre-cut interlocking system (a notch on one side, a rabbit on the other). To place these big 4'x8' sheets, we first use subfloor glue on all the joists. Then we place the boards down, square it up, use a sledge hammer to interlock the rabbit into the notch, and then nail them down with the nail gun. The gluing was my job.

Over spots like cantilevers, stairwells, and corners, we usually place a whole piece of subfloor (or a pre-cut smaller piece) and use a router to cut off excess.

Yesterday it took us about 3 hours to place all the subfloor. At last, we nailed in the last board (both the last board in our stack and the last board on the house... how's that for awesome?), and we had just enough time to clean up and go home.

One last thing that happened at the house: while four of us were busily putting down the subfloor, one more guy started the framing of the large back wall. He's a framing master, I think. :) He laid out big long 2x6's and first marked out where everything will go--studs, windows, doors. Then he brought in the studs, built headers for the windows and doors, and nailed everything together. It's all built now. You can see this back wall laying down in the above pictures.

Today, Sunday Sept 11, we took the kids out to show them the floor on the house. They loved running around on the big empty floor. We did find one little nail and let the kids hammer it in. They have now helped build the house.

This is a very special project, and we are so thrilled we chose to do it. We are already forming a wonderful connection with our neighbors and with our home that will stick with us for life. Now, Tuesday--exterior walls!

Happy 3!

2011-09-11T08:51:00.002-06:00

Three years ago, we were blessed to bring our sweet Annalisa into the world.

Now, she's our spitfire little princess. She's so excited it is her birthday! She is having a bubble bath and opened some awesome presents. Lee has been such a wonderful big brother today--playing with Anna's new presents in her way, to make her happy. He even tried to paint her toenails with her new nail polish... but don't worry, we caught him in time. ;)

We will have a little party tomorrow night, but today will be a nice, quiet celebration at home. Happy birthday, Annalisa! We sure love you!

New Furniture

2011-09-09T09:56:00.003-06:00

As if we were bored or something... you know, haven't built anything in a while...

On Labor Day, Cody used my dad's shop tools to build this amazing, beautiful new kitchen table. He's been staining and varnishing it all week, and we just brought it in. Pretty stunning, huh!

Also, we recently bought a new couch. We found it on in a warehouse clearance sale. It's microfiber and exactly what I wanted in a couch--somewhat petite, but super comfy.

We really weren't planning on buying any new furniture until after we move into our new house, but sometimes you just can't pass up the opportunities knocking on your door. We're very happy with our purchases and hard work.

The House: 6 Week update

2011-09-08T22:22:00.003-06:00

Whew, what a week! I am wiped out! Firstly, all week we've continued working in our little mini-groups, labeled the 'A' team and 'B' team. We're in the 'A' team. We really like it. Everyone gets along very well. Now, I'll just go straight through the houses... that'll be easier. yeah.

House 1, 2, AND 3: roof framing done (trusses and sheathing all installed, but no shingles)
House 4 ('A' team): Exterior walls finished, Interior framing finished, garage framing finished, OSB sheathing all placed, house squared and braced, and all the little details that have to be done to get the house ready for roof trusses. Roof trusses have been delivered, but are not installed.
House 5 (on the 'B' team): rimboard, floor trusses, load bearing wall, subfloor, and a few exterior walls are done.
House 6-Ours! (A team): Started tonight! yaaaay! I'll go into lots of detail below.
House 7, 8, & 9: no changes from last week.

Now, our house.
The first thing we do is measure in 6" from every single corner. Then we use a long chalk line to draw a straight edge for us to line up the floor with. This ensures all our walls will be square. You can't measure from the foundation, because the concrete isn't necessarily straight.

After the chalk line is down, we use that to measure from. We use treated wood everywhere that will touch concrete. So first we have to measure them carefully and cut out holes in the green board where the massive concrete bolts come out of the foundation. Then, we lay down a long roll of insulation, that looks like this:

Then, we place the green board that we pre-measured, cut, and drilled. It goes on top of the insulation. Using metal plates, washers, and nuts, we bolt the green board to the foundation.

After that, the inside of the green board gets caulked, and the outside gets the rimboard. Rim board also must be carefully measured and have notches cut out where it goes over the bolts and metal plates. It's heavy too!

Meanwhile, down in the basement, other people are working hard to build the load bearing basement wall. It must be framed according to the floorplan. We again use treated wood on the bottom, but regular 2x4s for the studs and top plates. We use a long string to make sure it is square. When at last the wall is framed, we all help lift it into place.

(Yes, we really did move THAT fast! j/k)

And that's about where we left off tonight. Saturday: floor joists!

But before I sign off, I wanted to send out a very special THANK YOU to all of our many, many volunteers that have helped us this week, and in previous weeks as well. It has already been so fun and so special to have you come help us, and to show you our new home. I hope you've enjoyed it too! It is a huge undertaking and we couldn't do this without you!

6 months of Bubbly bliss

2011-09-08T10:17:00.002-06:00

On September 11, Katie will officially be 6 months old. But since that's Anna's birthday, I will reserve that day for her and post this a few days early.

In this last month, Katie has almost mastered crawling. She gets up on her hands and knees and sometimes even her feet, but has a hard time with the forward motion. She does a little inchworm action to reach toys or toes. Also this month we've worked on taking a bottle (she likes the special NUK nipples). It's hard for her when mommy leaves, but she really is improving.

Katie has a really cute laugh. It's a singular squawk, then a long pause, and another squawk. She smiles and especially laughs at Lee or Anna jumping up and down. Katie still loves to be held, and hates to be left out of the action.

We have loved the last half-year with our little girlie, and can't wait to see what she does next!

The House: 5 weeks, 1 month, becoming a blur

2011-09-02T09:27:00.004-06:00

We've finished our first month building the houses. We've found a rhythm and the newness has worn off (not the excitement...never the excitement). Fortunately, everyone is getting along beautifully and we all enjoy being out there, even if it is really hard and dirty work.

This week we've split into two official mini-groups, with half of us assigned to work together on one house and the other half on another. Each of us have a trailer full of tools to use, along with our own individual sets of tools. At night, we're noticing the sun setting earlier. We've had to set out the big lights a couple of times and wear our headlamps so we can keep working until 9:30. We know that we only have a few more weeks of hot weather and long daylight, so we're trying to get as much done as possible.

Here's our house-by-house update.
House 1: Got roof trusses this week
House 2: still waiting for the trusses to be installed
House 3: finished interior framing, garage framing and OSB sheathing, top plates in. All ready for roof trusses!
House 4: Floor joists and subfloor finished, stairs framed and almost finished (just needs a few more stairs done), exterior walls almost all placed (just 1 left)
House 5: Garage and basement floors finally poured (it kind of took them a while to do that)
House 6 (ours!) & 7: also got garage and basement floors poured! Yippee!
House 8 & 9: Full foundations placed.

When I look at these week-by-week progress updates, I notice that we really are getting a lot done, even if it feels like we're kind of slow sometimes. It is taking some rearranging and a lot of sacrifice to balance work, school and building. We now eat our big family dinner right when Cody gets off work at about 1. Then he goes and builds in the evening. Cody--you are amazing. Oh, and blessed news--Katie took a bottle well this week! Makes me feel much better about the times I go build.

Featured again

2011-08-30T13:13:00.002-06:00

Over at MommyGiggles.com, Lee's goofydom is currently the star of a tagline contest. Go check it out! Come up with a silly tagline and you could win $15!

Kindergarten.

2011-08-30T08:24:00.003-06:00

Yes, you heard me right, Kindergarten. How is this possible?
I feel pretty proud of myself. The only time I got choked up was during the traditional Father's blessings last night. Today, when I took Lee into his classroom, I barely even waved goodbye. He'd already been swept away by his teachers into the wonderland of learning and fun. He is going to have a BLAST.

Annalisa, on the other hand, is crushed. Well, I mean, as crushed as a two-year-old gets. All the way home she sniffled and pouted that she couldn't go to Kindergarten too. But now that we're home and she realizes she has the whole house and all the toys to herself, she's rallied considerably. Yes, little Anna, there are some major benefits to having a brother in school...

So, that being said, in the words of the big man himself:

Go Go Katie Bubble

2011-08-29T14:49:00.003-06:00

She hasn't yet figured out the forward motion, but she's getting good at balancing and doing baby push-ups. I think she's going to skip the army-belly-crawl and go straight to hands-and-knees crawling. Just look at her go!

Take 41

2011-08-27T07:29:00.000-06:00

41. Seriously. That is how many pictures Raychel snapped in order to eke out one decent family photo. She worked so hard at it too, making all kinds of noise and funny faces! She waited for the best shots! But it still took 41 tries.

So what I'm really saying is, appreciate the new title photo. Also, appreciate digital cameras and no wasted film. And Aubri, I miss you and your mad family photography skills.

Raychel, thanks again for the fun picnic in the canyon and for taking the pictures!

The House: Window wells and back-fill

2011-08-26T13:00:00.003-06:00

One more work week down. This week seemed a little slower. It was really really hot out there--definitely the hottest week of the Summer--and everyone was tired. We even had a few setbacks, but we pushed through it and got some good stuff accomplished. Here are some night pictures:

On our house, we hung the window wells and chalked the garage walls where the floor goes. Once that was done, the subcontractors came in and back-filled, which means they pushed the dirt up around the edges of the foundation.

They also laid a layer of fine gravel on top of the visqueen in the basement. One more layer of protection before the concrete!
Here's a peek down in our cellar. On top of the cellar will be the porch.

Now, week 4 house-by-house update:

House 1 & 2: still waiting for roof trusses. They were delivered on Tuesday and supposed to be installed Wednesday. We were all so excited to see those trusses go up! But on Wednesday we found out the price we were quoted had been raised. The corporation opted to go with a new company, meaning some more paperwork and waiting on the roofs for now.
House 3: subfloor and stairs have been finished and the exterior framing is done. We're just starting the interior framing. It is a new floorplan--new to our group--so it's taken a bit of work to figure it out.
House 4: Rim board has all been installed, the basement load bearing wall is built, and the majority of the floor joists have been put in. This is also one of the new floor plan, which features a new staircase. It's really not a big deal, but it means the stairs have to be done before all the floor joists are done.
House 5: No change since last week.
House 6 (ours!) and House 7: gravel in the basement, window wells, and back-fill done.
Houses 8 & 9: No change since last week.

The House: Next few small steps

2011-08-23T22:28:00.003-06:00

As promised, some of the "small steps" we take toward building our house happened tonight. We place massive sheets of black visqueen plastic over the whole basement floor. It will provide a moisture and vapor barrier. The large rolls of visqueen are very heavy, and have to be trimmed into place. Also today, the subcontractors sprayed the outside of the foundation with black waterproofing tar. I'm learning that there's few things in life that can't be fixed by a good whack with a hammer. :)

The House: 3 week update

2011-08-20T15:37:00.005-06:00

Last Thursday technically marked the end of our third build week. We are working hard, and seeing a lot of good progress.

First of all, here's what's going on at our house:
(This is the back of the house looking down in. Note the shadows from the metal brackets... I'll talk more about those later.)

The foundation was dug out and placed by the subcontractors. Also new this week: rough plumbing and sewage pipes installed in the basement. There's still a two or three foot hole around the edge of the concrete. First, we go down in the basement and clean off the edges of the walls, so that there's no rubble to detract from the waterproofing.

Also, subcontractors tend to be messy, leaving boxes of empty water bottles and soda cans down in the foundation. That's gotta be cleaned up. (They're fast and do a good job, so we'll forgive them for using our basement as a garbage dump...)

Then, you go around the outside of the house and using a hammer, whack off these little metal brackets that were used to hold up the forms for the concrete while placing. Some are up high and are really hard to get out, but you just keep whacking them until the metal breaks off. See the small metal brackets? I've kept one as a souvenir. I think I'll make a shadow box of all these building materials when I'm done.

Now, time for a full update on where we're out.
House #1: Ready for roof trusses! This means all interior walls have been framed, exterior walls are framed with the fancy offset stud system, sheathing has been installed on the entire exterior, and top plates have also been installed (they support the roof trusses), stairs have been built, and they even have the porch set and garage stairs done.
House #2: Also ready for roof trusses!
House #3: Rim board, basement load bearing wall up, floor joists installed, subfloor installed, stairs built, and just starting the framing of the exterior walls. Also, the owners got engaged. He proposed right there in their garage on Thursday evening. Waaaaah. :D
House #4: starting rim board, which is the wood that is bolted directly to the foundation. You'll learn more about it when it is finally our turn.
House #5: Basement and garage floors are placed.
House #6 (ours): see the first part of this post.
House#7: same status as ours.
House #8: hole dug and footings placed.
House #9: Hole dug.

It's hard work out there. We come home hot and hungry and tired. But it is absolutely amazing. I'm so glad we're doing this.

yep, that's about right...

2011-08-18T09:18:00.000-06:00

The House: A little epiphony

2011-08-16T22:02:00.003-06:00

Do you have a measuring tape? Do you know how to read it? I've used measuring tapes all my life. Today I finally realized why all the 16" marks are red. (16, 32, 48, etc) Wall studs are 16" apart. It's a heck of a lot easier to stretch out your 30' line across the whole wall and just quickly walk down and mark all those red lines!

Now, class, raise your hand if you never knew why 16" were marked red... :D

Cody the Hero

2011-08-15T18:54:00.002-06:00

Cody was driving home from an appointment about an hour ago when he noticed some smoke coming from the side yard of a house. He thought they must be grilling, but realized it was too much smoke for that. When he got just a bit closer he realized the side of the house and the fence were on fire. Nobody was outside, so he immediately stopped and grabbed the sprinkler from the front yard and started dousing the flames, pausing only to throw open a door (no knocking politely this time) and yell at the people inside to get out. He kept working on the flames while the residents called 911. Fortunately, he was able to help them get most of the fire out quickly, but five more minutes and the whole house could have been lost. Who knows--someone might have even been injured, especially considering the fire started from the outside and was getting into the attic when he arrived. It would have been a massive fire before anyone even smelled smoke or the fire alarms went off. The residents of the house said they suspect the fire was started by a cigarette butt.

Cody came home just as I was putting dinner on the table, a little disheveled and smelling like smoke; but I think he is a real hero. I love him so much! He said the moral of the story is not to smoke, but I think the true moral of the story is to be aware and willing to help, just like my husband the Hero.

The House: Getting a foundation

2011-08-12T11:31:00.002-06:00

Out of the nine houses in our group, ours is the seventh to get a foundation. (Five are already placed, and there's one next door to ours at the same stage as ours.) So, we know exactly what is going on and have seen it done several times already. But anyway, here's pictures of ours!
Wednesday 8/10: We have footings! Kind of a different angle for the picture of the footings, placed down in the hole. They have to let those dry for a day first. You can see the rebar poking up out of the footings, ready to receive the rest of the foundation. To give you some perspective, the lower right corner of the picture is the garage and behind it is the master bedroom (well, not in the basement, but on the main floor it will be).

Thursday, 8/11: The subcontractors are placing the forms for the foundation. The big truck in the forefront of this picture is holding the forms, but you can see the men placing the forms down in the hole. I'm sure today they are placing the rest of the foundation.

So... week 2 of the build is done. We enjoy building so much. We are making some great friends and love being out there working hard. We now have another house with a subfloor and the first few beginnings of framing. The house we started with is almost ready for roof trusses--with interior walls framed. I'm learning there are a lot of little steps you might not think about. I'm glad we have a few people in our group who have framed before, because I would be lost with out them! I'll go into detail on all these "little steps" later. Until then...

Little Lady at 5 months

2011-08-11T11:12:00.000-06:00

My goodness, how this last month flew by!

Katie is now a whopping 5 months old. She is developing very quickly. This month, she started laughing and is attempting to scoot around on her belly. She has mastered a sort of face-plant-bum-lift that pushes her forward a bit, but since her face is in the ground, she can't see where's she's going. Then she usually gets mad and gives up. But she is learning!

Katie still is breaking our family records for the most clingy and most crying baby. She wants to be held constantly, and absolutely cannot stand to be left alone for any period of time. If I'm doing dishes and set her in her bouncy seat, she has to be pointed so she can see me, or she will wail, even though I haven't even left the room. I'm not exactly sure how to fix this issue, or if I even should. Since she is still less than a year old, I'm not really concerned. I give her as much tummy time as I can every day, and sometimes she just has to wail it out while I get things done. But we both love our snuggle time, so I indulge her a bit too.

I am still so so grateful that she is a good sleeper. It is simply astounding how much I can do when I get a full night's sleep!

Anna's dolly

2011-08-05T11:25:00.000-06:00

Why is it that we spend so much money and effort on toys for our kids, when they'd prefer to play with mom's shoes? And Why oh Why must it be Mom's nice shoe, and why must she hide it from me? And most of all, why must she get mad when I finally ask for it back so I can leave the house?

The House: 1 week down, umpteen to go

2011-08-04T21:08:00.003-06:00

Tonight we finished our first full build week. We had some help from volunteers (my parents and Raychel: THANK YOU!!!). Here is a recap of what has been accomplished:

-5 houses now have foundations.
-2 of those houses have window wells, water proofing, concrete flooring, and have been back-filled, and have the exterior wall supports installed.
-2 of those houses just have the window wells, water proofing, and backfill done.
-and one of those houses also has the basement load-bearing wall built, floor joists installed, subfloor installed, and at least 3 (I wasn't there to see if they got another one) exterior walls framed and lifted into place.
-2 more houses, including ours, have been staked out and have been dug, but there is no concrete yet. Here is the pic of our empty lot, being used only for extra gravel and dirt:

And here is the picture of our freshly dug hole!

-

We are making progress. At times it feels like we are going excruciatingly slow--especially when we are overmanned and underworked. But now that we all know what we are doing, and we have more than one house to work on, we are able to keep busy for the whole work time and get lots done. Our group seems to be working together very well so far. We know there is still a long way to go, but we are all willing to work hard and be happy. There are a couple of guys in our group who know what they're doing and are patient and kind enough to explain things to those of us with less experience. It's really nice, especially considering our project managers are more like inspectors. They show up a couple times a night for maybe ten minutes, overlook things, and leave.

Well friends, that's that! Time to go to bed. After this long hard week that Cody worked through, I'm tuckered out. Goodnight.

The House: Lots to Learn

2011-08-04T10:20:00.003-06:00

I've said this to Cody at least twenty times: It's not about expertise; it's about attitude.

But when it comes to building a house (and this could easily be a metaphor for all walks of life), you at least need to learn what you're doing! There's plenty of projects to do and work to get done if you go looking for it, and then ask questions when you get there.

Yesterday we built an exterior wall. I left before they lifted it into place, but it was still fascinating (for me, at least) to learn about. We're using a somewhat new technique of off-set studs. I found these diagrams online. In traditional exterior-wall framing, you have all 2x6" boards that line up like this, right?:

These types of walls are fairly easy to build, but they're not very energy efficient. The heat/cold can pass right through all the studs, as they directly connect the outside to the inside. Also, to run wires through the walls, you have to cut a hole through each stud. So instead of using that method, we're using this one:
(this is a cross-section view if the wall) We have offset studs. They are 2x4 instead of 2x6, so they don't extend from back to front. Instead, we have more studs that go about 2/3 of the way through the wall. This means that there is much less direct transfer of heat through the walls, more room for (sprayed) insulation, and no need to cut holes in the studs for wires, since they can just snake right through. Cool, huh!

Another nifty trick I learned was to apply the outside sheathing to the wall (big solid pieces of particle board that surrounds the outside of the house, between the studs and the siding), while the wall is still on the ground, before you lift it into place. That way you don't have to hold up the sheathing while nailing it in. Of course, though, if you place a solid board on top of the wall, how will you know where to nail? Well, we had a group of people mark all the sheathing with 16" chalk lines that would line right up with the studs when we placed it down, so the guys could just nail it on super fast. It's at moments like those that I'm grateful a few of us know what we're doing--or at least think things through well in advance so we don't end up with stupid mistakes.

We're still just a few feet into our very long marathon of building. But it sure is fun to learn and try new things!

The rains came down and everybody cheered!

2011-08-01T12:10:00.002-06:00

Only one thing to do on a rainy Summer day: go play outside!

The House: I'm not the only dork around here...

2011-07-30T17:25:00.002-06:00

I called myself a dork for spending several hours using MS Paint to create a scale imitation of our house. But I'm not the only one overly excited about building these houses!

One guy in our group came to build today wearing a white T-shirt with the words: "Days building" on it and three little tally marks. Another guy showed us his sketch of his lot with the landscaping complete. One girl giddily walked through her storage room when we were placing plastic in the foundation, and told me where she was going to place shelves and every last item she would be filling it with. When we received our packets of tools, one guy started singing Christmas songs and thanked our building manager, calling him "Santa Claus."

Have I mentioned just how excited we all are?

Today was a big day out at the site--the first full Saturday. Cody went out bright and early, arriving at 7:00 AM armed with all kinds of tools, sunscreen, water, and snacks. I spelled him for a few hours in the midday, but then he went back out. We started the framing of the first house. This took screwing down plywood to the foundation, then outer plywood supports to those, raising an interior load bearing wall through the middle of the house (in the basement), and then placing the I-beam floor joists across the top, which will be the floor of the house. When it eventually rolls around to our turn to do this, I will put up lots of pictures. I'm actually quite glad we're not the first house. While it is hard to watch our lot sit there covered in rocks, I know that we will be pro's when it is our turn and it will be done fast and efficiently. That is, if we ever figure out what we're doing... :) With nine houses, we are one of the biggest groups to ever do this project. And I just wanted to remind you, in case you were wondering: everyone in our group builds together. The nine houses are staggered in their build sequences so that there is always work to do. When one house is getting framed, others are having foundations poured by the subcontractors. When one is having cabinets installed, others are being painted. But in the end, we wait for all nine houses to be completed, then there will be a big open-house party, and then (and only then) we can move in. But of course, that is still a long way away.

One bit of semi-related, very very good news: Cody has been moved to a permanent shift on one of his jobs! He now will work mornings, with weekends off. Perfect! He can help build every evening and Saturdays, and we don't have to fret about his schedule changing all the time.

Apparently I am a slow shopper

2011-07-29T12:33:00.002-06:00

Annalisa got bored while we were shopping this morning. I had a watermelon beside her in her car-cart, and she put her head on in and fell asleep like it was her pillow. She didn't even wake up when I pulled the watermelon out to purchase it--she just laid down the rest of the way and kept on snoozing.

The House: Second "first" day at the site

2011-07-26T20:51:00.002-06:00

We finally got to go back to the house today and work! It has been far too long. Several of the foundations have been placed, but our lot is still a pile of rocks. Our next door neighbors get back-filled tomorrow, so the rocks and dirt will be moving soon. Today I went out by myself since Cody had work. My amazing mother was kind enough to stay with the kids. We put big sheets of black plastic in the bottom of a couple houses and hung the window wells (yes, hung, because they are not surrounded by dirt yet). We also got all our tools and chatted a bit with each other, sharing our excitement and worries, thrills and nerves.

One thing I found out to day that has me praying in thanksgiving--the funding for further houses is gone. If we had not been bumped up, we would not have gotten the house. What an amazing blessing! I wish the funding was still available, because this is an amazing program; however, we are grateful for this opportunity and know it is the right thing for us.

Now, we go back Saturday to hopefully start framing. Some people we talked to who have already finished building said this is very much a "hurry up and wait" kind of program. I can already see what they mean. :)

Katie's first big laugh

2011-07-26T08:00:00.000-06:00

Pioneer day

2011-07-25T12:00:00.003-06:00

In Utah, July 24th is Pioneer Day. We went over to the city's celebration for breakfast and some fun activities this morning, and I thought it was high time I take some pictures!

Lee is working hard on learning to ride his bike. He did even better on the walk home.

Dates with Mommy

2011-07-24T07:58:00.002-06:00

Occasionally when I was a kid my parents would take us on a date for some one-on-one time. I'll never forget driving to Spokane with just my dad (this was when we lived in northern Idaho) and eating at that restaurant with the dancing chicken and the amazing corn muffins; and dad actually drove back through the drive-through at the end of our meal to get more corn muffins. I was shocked! Mom would NEVER do something like that!

So this week I had planned a date with Cody to go to the local Opera, which my parents and sister + her husband are performing in. However, a last minute schedule change made Cody unable to go. I searched for a different Opera buddy, when I realized that Lee was old enough to accompany me. I knew it might be a little thick for him--it's the traditional Russian Opera Boris Godunov--but I decided to take him anyway. Good culture. And overall, I'd say he did pretty darn well for being a five year old boy going to a three hour long Opera in a foreign language. He wiggled. He whispered a bit. But we didn't have any outbreaks of screaming or whining. We had a good time; Lee says he didn't like it because of the bad guys (there is one scene where Grandpa got his gun stolen and someone else got shot), but the costumes and music were ok. Lee practiced behaving like a Gentleman, which he thought was silly because apparently Gentlemen live in churches, not houses.

Annalisa, of course, was insanely jealous that she was too little for the Opera. "But I'm FIVE!" she would cry. "No, sweetheart, you're two." "I'm three on my birthday!" she would cry harder. So I promised her she could come to Aunt Sara's Tupperware party with me on Saturday (yesterday). That, plus going down to Daddy's office for a few minutes (strictly off-limits in our home) appeased her. So yesterday it was Anna's turn. As we drove to Sara's house, Anna asked me at every turn, "Is THIS the Tupperware party?" Even though it is only about seven minutes away, Anna was thrilled when we finally arrived. We were the first ones there. Sara gave Anna some toys, but she got bored rather fast. She took all the magnets off of Sara's fridge. After the cake demo, we gave Anna a piece. She sat down on her chair looking very bored. I held her in my lap for a few minutes and she fell dead asleep. So we put her down on Sara's bed and she napped through the remainder of the afternoon, eventually waking up in time for the family pioneer-day BBQ we had last night.

So, my first official attempt at Mommy-kid-dates were both pretty goofy, but hey! that's what parenting is all about. I know both kids felt singled-out and special, and that was the important part.

Best Friends

2011-07-20T16:18:00.004-06:00

My kids are best friends. Of course they fight. But they love to play with each other, squeal with delight when they see each other, and find endless sources of interest to talk about. Just a moment ago, Anna set up this little spot for Katie and helped her put her head on the pillow. She (Katie) is now lying on the floor, happier than she has been in a long long time, because she can just kick her feet and watch her brother and sister play.

In other random news, I found another thing we can all do to help Minot rebuild after the devastating floods. This one you don't even have to pay for! Just go here:

http://www.livepositively.com/#/americasparks/vote

And find OAK PARK in MINOT, ND. Vote as many times as you like! The park with the most votes on Sept. 6 will be awarded a $100,000 grant. In the rules they suggest using the money for "nets for the basketball hoops" or "A new hiking trail." For Oak Park, how about new everything? They need the money so desperately. Anyway. Just do a good deed and vote, ok? :)