Jaime's Top Ten

The top ten things I'm most excited about re: the new house.
10. First-floor laundry.
9. No more stairs and baby gates!
8. No more carpet.

7. My OWN bathroom! (Well, I'll have to share with Matt, but at least the boys will have their own).

6. More room- more storage - more space!
5. My OWN office. No more working in Jayden's "room".
4. Carter and Jayden will have their own rooms :) Jayden won't have to sleep in my "office".
3. Bigger kitchen.. enuf said!
2. "Mud" room for Matt's messy shoes.
1. GARAGE in which to park my car!! No more scrapping windows!
(ga-rage [noun]: a shelter or repair shop for automotive vehicles) Does a 4- wheeler constitute as a "vehicle"??!

The latest challenge...

... our framing was at a standstill because we needed to get to the cement footings that were poured (now buried under the ice!) for support beams, etc.

This is our basement. Matt talks about the ice down there but I never imagined it was so thick. I had no idea until I stopped out there yesterday to take pictures. He is standing on the footing they needed to get to (that they already "cut" out the ice with chainsaws) where the stairs will be.

So, Matt and a few friends have been working all weekend with chainsaws and ice augers to cut through the ice down to the footings. CRAZY!!!! Along with keeping heaters running to melt the ice and pumps going to pump the water out of the basement. (I'm still amazed that our framer hasn't thrown in the towel and walked away from this project!)

Matt assures me that now since the footings have been reached (YAAY!! Matt has a very sore back to show for this!) .....the framing can start. Wheewww. As for the basement floor, the foundation wont be poured until all the ice is gone (obviously!) and the weather warms up. Where there's a will... there's a way!

not much happening...

Progress on the house is slow. I am told we have a "floor" or at least the floor trusses are in place. Now we're hoping to get the foundation poured in the basement... as soon as it's warm enough to do so. Framing will follow- yay!

But meanwhile, we had a great time in Cancun! We missed the boys like crazy but they had fun with grandma and grandpa Drewis.

Here's a pic from the 7th floor of our hotel.

Happy Thanksgiving... turkey, potatoes and foundation!

We have basement walls!

Waiting...

I was told to be patient and expect delays... but I don't wanna!

First we waited for the rain to stop and the land to dry to dig the basement. Now we're waiting for the foundation to be poured. The footings were done last week, then came a holiday (Veteran's Day) and now we're waiting for the foundation crew to have time to come finish the walls. I've been told that should happen tomorrow! So that's exciting.. finally we can "see" the start of the house. I'll post pics soon (I know concrete is pretty exciting, huh!?).

So meanwhile, here's a pic of the boys on Halloween :)

Just a couple recent pics of the boys... Carter looks a little scared in this pic- but that's a pretty normal face for him when Jayden is around!

Lake Drewis

We've got a start to the basement.. but it's now a lake :( It's supposed to rain all week.