Digging, Back-filling and Bees

This week we had a little bit of everything. The electrician and plumber finished wiring and pipes in the house. Zeke dug a huge trench for wiring from the house almost to the driveway. After that he and I cemented together piping in the trench and then backfilled a good portion of the trench, some is still left to be done. Jeff and Scott began the second layer of insulation on the siding of the house and were able to put in a few more windows. One of the pictures shows the kitchen, now with 2 more windows. Holes were dug for the posts of the front porch, as shown in one of the pictures above. Abby lost her other front tooth and was unable to put it under her pillow for the toothfairy (she did not swallow it... apparently she has an emotional attachment to this particular tooth). Paul was playing in the woods and unbeknownst to him, he stepped on a bee hive. Luckily, Sam, my 12 year old brother in law, was with him and realized what had happened. He grabbed Paul and ran. Paul was rescued and got away with only 2 bee stings, one on his arm and one on his ear. His arm was fine but his ear was really swollen, as you can see in the picture. A day later his ear is back to normal. Today Zeke, Jeff and Scott began the first pieces of siding on the house, I will post pictures next week. We also hope to soon have a basement floor and a front porch. The heat has been unbelievable this week and we are hoping for some cooler temperatures in the next couple of days.

Calling In The Subs...

Upstairs... In this picture you can see (from Paul's bedroom) into the bathroom and in the background the kids loft area and then into Abigail's room.

The kitchen/dining room. Look at all the windows!

In the foreground is the retention basin, then the house and wood shed.

This picture is taken from inside the living room. The woodstove will be in front of the steps. The kitchen/dining room is to the right. Mine and Zeke's bedroom is behind the steps, as well as the down stairs bathroom.

Zeke with the siding we have stained. The color of the wood is a little more red then we expected.

I have been busy staining the siding for the house. The color we chose is 'Abbey Brown.' The electrician and plumber have been busy putting in wiring and pipes. Jeff has been working on the retention basin. Zeke has begun digging a ditch for the electrical wires. In the next week we hope to have the electrical and plumbing rough-ins complete and hopefully the septic will have begun. We also hope to soon have a front porch. We are happy to be done school! The kids are happy (and so are we) that summer vacation is finally here. It's nice to finally be able to concentrate on the house. The kitchen cabinets are set to arrive any day now.

We're back!

It has been a busy 2 weeks. I apologize for not posting for so long. We have been very busy with the house and the end of the school year. I also turned 30 last week!

The house is coming along beautifully! The sheathing has been completed. The frame of the kitchen/dining room is now up. The entire house has the first layer of insulation. The second layer of insulation will not be added until after the electric and plumbing has been roughed in, which should happen this week. The framing for the interior walls just went up this last week and the kids are super excited to be able to go into their rooms. Abby is planning where she wants her furntiture and Paul is busy building and destroying things.

We took a little family trip to 'Wood Heat' to pick out our wood stove and pick up some piping. Good times!