Mini-bikes

Several years ago Tori and Tina got mini-bikes for Christmas. Tori was about 11 at the time and was able to drive hers that summer. Tina has been driving Rod crazy about learning to ride the mini-bike by herself. So yesterday, Rod took a breather from the house and spent about an hour outside with Tina and the bike. She is not ready to ride by herself yet, but by the end of the summer she will be all over it.

Zac Graduates!

Tuesday night was a late night (these days aren't they all?) It was Zac's graduation and we were so excited to go. The ceremony was at the coliseum downtown. It was unbelievable to me that they went through this ceremony in just over an hour and there were 400 graduates! Zac was beaming :-)

After the graduation we went to Darlene and Larry's (Zac's grandparents) and stayed until about 11:00. We enjoyed our time with our "second" family. We love these guys.

Tops in SCIENCE

Awards Day was Monday at Tina's middle school. She is in the 5th grade and this year has been a different year for her. First it was her first time in Middle School, second it was her first time going to a school with more than 35 kids in her grade, and lastly it was her first time in a public school and not a private christian school. She has done extremely well and we are proud of her.

During the award ceremony yesterday she received the award for highest grade in Science in her class. She was surprised because she thought she was getting the language award. She said afterwards "I don't even like Science!" Just goes to show that you might not like something, but if you are given the genes then you can still be good in it! (I was an excellent Science and Math student - which means I was not the greatest in English and explains my blog writing :-0)

Midnight (or at least real close to it)

We hope our final electrical inspection happens today. If it does, then our inspection for the occupancy letter will be tomorrow. One huge job that was still outstanding was the stairs going down from the deck. Rod skipped Tina's ballgame last night so that he and my Dad could work on the stairs. When we got home at 8:30 they still only had a 2 of the steps put up. (Dad already had all the steps built from over the weekend) So there was a lot of "brain" work going on to figure out how to do it before they were even ready to start.

At about 9:30 or so, they had all the steps bolted on. Rod and I started working on cutting off the boards for the hand rails after Dad left and worked until almost midnight.

This morning Dad is already back over here working on the railings that will have to be done by Wednesday.

Nap Time

We are all tired and ready to be out of these campers... getting up at 5:15 every morning is hard and this morning was harder because Tina had a nightmare at 4:30. Once we all go to bed, if the kids need me in the middle of the night they are NOT to leave their camper. They have to call me on my cell phone. Rod is on call and last night was the first night this week his phone didn't ring sometime in the middle of the night.. mine did.

This afternoon the girls just couldn't help it and they were resting on the couch. All of the sudden I realized it was very quiet and looked over there to finding them both sound asleep.

New Oven

My appliances are all installed and have power turned onto them now. So how fitting that the first thing I cook in my new oven is 48 muffins for a party at Tori's school. My kids are both known for filling in all the gaps for parties. My Mom passed this trait down to me that we enjoy feeding people. If you ever come to my house you will notice that I am always cooking for people or making sure there is something to eat. Apparently I am passing that along.

The oven is a double oven and I am already hooked on being able to cook 2 things at once on different tempreatures! I am going to love it.

Chicken Pox

No. The kids do not have chicken pox... our house does. We were so close on the painting and then the drywall people came back to touch up the walls. It looks like we have calamine lotion all over our walls. I guess painting will be in our future for the weekend.

Granite Delivered

Counter tops were a hard decision. I liked the granite and the solid surface. Picking colors were hard and the final decision came down to the fact that the granite was a little cheaper than the solid surface. For the bathrooms and kitchen counter tops it was about $4,500. We bought it from a man named Gary from Parker Granite and I would certainly recommend him again!

The delivery was somewhat hard. I did not realize how fragile granite is. They were saying as they delivered it that if it twists when they are carrying it in, it will shatter. Luckily the plumber and his helper were here in order to help Gary and his helper. Jim pitched in a little.



Master Vanity:


Kids Vanity:


Kitchen:

Closet Organization

Who knew? Closet bars are required for an occupancy letter (and toilet paper holders which will be a post tomorrow or the next day) So we need the closets ready before we can move in. I wanted more than just a bar - I wanted organizers. This was a task that I tackled mostly by myself. Tina did come in there for a few minutes, but she got bored with it pretty quick. I only had 1 wall anchor that caused me problems, but the hole is covered by the tracks :-)

Rod's first official hole in the new walls!

Well... This word has several different meanings and on Sunday afternoon it meant the place that we get water from. In preparing to get our final electrical inspection and the plumber to come back this week, we needed to get the pressure tank for the well moved inside the house. Dad and Rod moved both the electrical and the water lines into the house. All looked good at the start, the tank had power and pressure. Of course, this is the point where something is going to happen... the valve for the pressure tank is a one way valve and Rod didn't know that. So we only had water at the campers when the pump was on. For Rod to take a shower on Saturday night we had to run a hose pipe from the inside pressure tank outside through a door and let it run until the tank got low enough that the well pump kicked on and then the campers could have water as long as the hose pipe was still running and the pump stayed on.

So Saturday night is spent out to eat with Tori, Tina and Zac and then a hardware store run for an 18" drill bit for the hammer drill. Dad and Mike "shared" the cost of buying the hammer drill and now Rod has contributed a new drill bit to the mix.

It really only took Rod and Zac about 15 minutes to get the hole through the brick, 1st layer of 2 1/2" of Styrofoam, 6" of concrete and 2 1/2" more of Styrofoam.

(I'm not even going to talk about the fact that in both pictures Rod and/or Zac is holding the plug into the extension cord..)





Before the hole...


After the hole...

Everything

Sunday morning was the youth led service at Tori's church. She was in the Everything skit as a drunk (if you know Tori, you know this is so NOT what she is!). The teens did an excellent job. Tori was the only freshman that was asked to be a part of the skit.

Zac's Graduation Present

Zac is going to graduate this year. Rod wanted to give him a gift that he can keep from years. Rod remembers getting his first tool box and decided that Zac needed a good tool box to keep his tools in. Over the weekend Zac came up and stayed the night on Saturday and we decided to go ahead and give him his gift. I think he liked it.

Verve

We have a new toy in the house... it is called Verve. This is the "brains" of the lighting. Verve is a system that allows control of all the lights from control panels placed through out the house. We have 2 upstairs and 1 downstairs. From here you turn lights on, dim them, or turn them off with the push of a button. Then you can program scenes where a single button will affect multiple lights. Inside the rooms, there are not any light switches only remotes that use kinetic energy (so no batteries) to turn the lights on or off. We will be mounting the switches any where we want with double sided tape. Also because it uses radio frequency to transmit the signal it works from about 300 feet away. I will be able to have a remote in my car to turn on the lights when I get home in the evening before ever going into the house.

We also have 22 can lights that take LED's. These are extremely energy efficient and are also controlled by the verve.

Stairway

No we have not fallen off the face of the earth... just been too busy to take the time to blog....

From previous posts, you know that Rod is doing the trim work in the house. One item that a trim carpenter normally would do is the stairways. We decided that Rod didn't have the time to learn how to do it right, so we paid a man named Jeff Hill to come do the interior steps. We had already bought all the supplies from 31W Trim and had it all ready. We bought oak treads and the balusters we did a pattern of two double twists and then 1 basket. To install all of this Jeff charged us $1300 to do these steps. It was hard work and his helper didn't show up! We are very pleased with the job and how the steps look. Now we only need to sand them and stain them when the hardwood gets placed down.

Comments

Many people have said that they cannot comment on the site. I checked it today and realized it had a restriction of only registered users could comment. I have now changed the setting where anyone can post a comment...

New Addition - Josie and Maple

We welcomed two new additions to the zoo tonight. I know, I know most of you are thinking that we were just too busy to have something else to take care of... but oh no, we needed 2 more goats. Why you might ask? So that they can have babies and then we can have even more...

Really, Rod wants more weed eaters. We have 50 acres of briers, weeds, etc. and these guys love this stuff. They are two very sweet females and I am confident that we will have babies.

Remember at school when they had a "boy" table and a "girl" table? Well we have a boy bowl and a girl bowl.

Bowl # 1 "boys" - Toby is male and the black and white one with horns; Billy is the white one without horns; Bowl # 2 "girls" - The two new ones are Maple the brown and black one and Josie the white and brown.

Downstairs Drop Ceiling

Rod knew the drop ceiling downstairs was something that he could do if he absolutely had to, but he also knew it would take him a long time to get it done... Jim, the builder, got a quote from one of his men and when that quote came back at $2,500 we said "do it". They were in and out of here in only about 4 hours! I'm sure it would have taken Rod at least a week to get this done.

Kitchen Cabinets

The cabinet guys came on Friday. We had the cabinets custom made from a place in Lyles TN called Custom Trim and Cabinets. We went with a maple cabinets. For all the kitchen cabinets, master bathroom vanity cabinet, and the girl's bathroom vanity cabinet the total was a little over budget at $7,800. However, I did get the soft close drawers and that included the knobs and pulls. Tori and Tina's bathroom is only paint grade wood because they want to paint theirs white.

Final Grade

Last week the bull dozier was back to do more work on the yard. He spread that huge pile of dirt that had been around since the basement was dug out. We are pleased with where the front yard is at as well as the huge backyard that we now have. While he was here he only charged me $100 to drive down the driveway and smooth out all the ruts from the recent rains... one of the best $100 we have spent in a long time. (Of course the 4 truck loads of gravel cost over $1,000 and we still need more than another $1,000 worth)

Back Yard


Side of house

Mother's Day - 195 days in the camper

Today is Mother's Day. By far the greatest thing I have ever done is being Tori and Tina's mother. They are amazing kids and I wouldn't change anything about them!!!

We have lived as a family in these two campers now for 195 days. We have went through: Halloween, Thanksgiving, Tori's Birthday, Christmas, New Year's Day, my birthday, Rod's birthday, Valentines Day, Easter, and now Mother's Day. Come heck or high water.. we will be in the house before the NEXT major holiday!!!!!!

We have reached the point were it is all work and little play. crunch time. This is taking it's toll on all of us. They say a marriage is tested while building a house. Luckily for us, we are running on just a few times where we have been angry with each other.

So how am I going to spend my Mother's Day? First I think the kids have a surprise for me. Then I have some amazing people that are not only willing to come help us with the house, but come on Mother's Day. So here is my public appreciation to those willing to come spend Mother's Day with me:

Bobbie Hill - My friend who has been there for me for a long time. She is a great mother and has 4 amazing kids (Justin, Brittany, Wyatt, and Seth) and a great husband (Scott). I am very happy to say that Bobbie and I have been friends for 26 years! I truly think she is a friend for a lifetime and I really, really appreciate her family.

Shelli Wolfe - There have been many times I just don't know what I would do without Shelli. Anytime I need anything, she is always so happy to help. Many things I just couldn't do without her. She also has some amazing kids (Zac and Hayley). Zac has been Rod's right hand man on almost every project that we have done on this land. I don't know what we would have done without his help over the past year.

Christy Davis - My sister-in-law. I couldn't ask for a better person to come into our family for my brother along with my only nephew - Logan.

Mom and Dad - I simply can not say thanks enough. Both my parents have been a HUGE help (by FAR the most help!). But since it is Mother's Day, her is to my Mom. She would do anything in the world for me and does everything that I ever need. She has been the one to work over here at the house, help me feed everyone that has worked, make my kids lunches in the mornings while we are at their house getting showers, and finally... done our laundry for 195 days now. I can't begin to say thanks enough to them both.

Today we are going to have a cookout for all of these amazing Mom's that are going to be up here working on THEIR day to help me and I just can't say THANK YOU enough!!!

Some people just do not know how to drive

My driveway is bad, I will admit that! However, it is certainly passable. I don't have a clue how fast this guy was going up my driveway today, but he said his truck just "bounced" off the driveway. He must have been going awful fast. Rod had to come home from work for a little while. We tried to use a come-a-long to keep him from tipping over while the surburban pulled to give him a little help. There was no way this was going to work. We did move him enough that his back tires were back on the driveway.





Rod is manning the come-a-long and I am in the suburban. Like I said, we didn't get very far but we did get his drivers side back tires back on solid ground which took the fear of flipping over away.



The first tow truck they called out, they said they couldn't help. Here was the "big dog" that they brought out. As you can see, they hooked upto it and lifted the back end back onto the driveway.

Flooding in Sycamore Creek

Here are some pictures of sycamore creek during the flooding Here is a video we shot of the creek taking out huge trees. We stood there and watched about 10 trees fall in 15 minutes from this clump. It was unlike anything I had ever seen before.

Amazing Flooding

Nashville has had it's worst recorded flood. The problems we had from the flooding were so minor, I almost hate to post them. I have personal friends whose homes are currently under water and they don't have flood insurance. So we were so fortunate!

First thing on Sunday morning, Rod was out cleaning out the culvert to make sure it didn't flow over the driveway from the pond to the stream on the other side.


Below is the water crashing through to the culvert on the stream side


And everyone playing in the rain...



Last is the damage to the driveway

Breakfast in Bed

So from the title are you expecting me to say that Rod surprised me and served me breakfast in bed this morning? I didn't think so because almost everyone reading this blog knows Rod and knows I wouldn't be the one getting breakfast!

Today the rain is unbelievable. I am going to post pictures of all the rain in a subsequent post.

So we still have to feed all the animals... And this morning Molly and Dolly (yes the pigs) would not get out of bed to eat. So you guessed it... Rod gave them breakfast in bed so that they would not have to get wet to eat!!!

Check out the nose peeking out from their house.

A Family Affair

One of the items that must be done is the deck railings. Rod and Dad started on them and got 3 sections up. Then after everyone had left yesterday, Rod, Tori, Tina and I all worked together on the decks. We wish we had more time like this together working. It was great family time.