The girls

The girls got outside yesterday while it was still pretty warm. The giant pond in the side of our yard was where they spent most of their time "fishing"...or just getting soaked. They did however manage to make their first snowmen of the year. This morning they are solid ice and I think are permanently on our front steps for a while. Everything they wore outside had to be dried!
I was trying to take some nice pictures for our Christmas card. Ava has become quite the little funny lady. This was one of the only serious pictures I could get. Lydia could not stop laughing at her. This is one of the pics we choose. They should be out around Christmas.

One Year Ago Today!

Here's a picture of the house, one year ago today. It seems like it's going so slow, but I can't believe how much has been done. For a couple of guys and a weekend project...not bad!
We have a lot to be thankful for.

The State of Hockey!

We were surprised with tickets to the Hockey game a couple of Saturdays ago. My uncle Jim said that he had enough tickets for the girls to go also. Ava was so excited to go to her first Wild game. She kept telling everyone that she was at her first hockey game. This is the second time the girls have been in the suite. They think it is pretty cool. (So do we!) Thank you Jim & Lori!

The three girls in the suite in front of the Harley Automotive Jersey.

Auntie Jacquie teaching Ava how to cheer at the game. We may have to start supervising her visits.
The girls were enjoying their Sprite and snacks at the ledge overlooking the stadium.

Sheetrock

The upstairs is sheetrocked and the guys worked on the main floor this past weekend. A big thank you to my dad, Chad's dad, Mike, and Chad's brother Eric for all the sheetrocking this weekend.
The kitchen from the front door.
the upstairs from the top of the stairs. No railing...be careful!

More House Pictures

Mike, Eric, and Chad started sheetrocking the upstairst last weekend!
Thank you Mike!
Eric and the girls. Eric came out for another weekend of sheetrocking. What a great guy!
Chad's dad put in our heated floor in the upstairs bathroom.
Another picture of the front of the house.

House Pictures

Here's a picture from the road after the siding and a/c unit are done.
The front door.
The front porch. A big thanks to Chad's mom & dad for doing all the work on the boards for the ceiling. They took all the wood to their house and finished them all and put them up. It looks so pretty.

The front of the house from the road. Notice the garage doors are in thanks to Chad's brother Jeremy. You also so take note of the rock around the house. Chad's dad, Roger, moved almost all of the rock by himself with a wheelbarrow! It was a full load of rock in the driveway and now it's all around the house. Thank you!
The back of the house before the siding was finished. The outside of the house is now done! I didn't realize that I didn't have any picture of this. I'll get some soon. Thank you to everyone who helped with the siding. Getting up on the 40 ft ladders and to the top of the scaffolding wasn't easy, but just think...it's done! Good job Chad, Dad, Roger, Dan, Jeremy, and Eric and anyone else who braved it.

First Day of School and Halloween

Ava looked so cute in her little piggies...her bangs are still growing out...

Lydia has been in school for a few month now, but better late than never right? Here she is on the first morning of school. She's already in 2nd grade! Where has the time gone?
I took the girls and my niece to Tom's Pumpkin Patch to get our pumpkins. The girls had a blast and we wound up in the furthest corner of the patch to find our perfect pumpkins. The girls wanted to ride in the wagon, but I reminded them that the pumpkins were in the way. They had to walk. With some minor scrapes and tears, we made it back to the car.
Lydia and Ava really got into the pumpkin carving this year. They thought the guts were really cool. Ava wanted to use the knife to cut, but I still was not ready for her to do this on her own. Maybe next year kid! Lydia did quite well with her carving.
So a bunny, an octopus, and a chicken walk into a bar and the bartender says...

We took the girls to my sisters in Chisago to do a little trick o treating. We hit up the neighbors, then drove over the the Wallmark Lake Wannabies neighborhood where the houses are closer together. It was much warmer this year and the girls had a ton of fun. The sugar high in our house was insane.

October update

I know we have been slacking on the updates but here is what has been done for the month.

Siding: The whole house will be finished tomorrow. We have on section of the lower garage to do. Then some more caulking.

Soffits: They are completely done. Dad has been running all the scrap down to the recycling center in Hugo.

Heating: The furnace is up and running. We had a small snafu when the heating guy cross two wires in the thermostat but that has been fixed. He is now working on the in-floor heat and getting it piped into the boiler so that can be turned on before it gets too cold.

Power: The off-peak meter should be installed today.

I know Rachel has some pictures but I don't have them with me. I'll load those as soon as I get them.

Quick Weekend Update

Just thought I would drop a quick note and picture from our work this past weekend. As you can see the front of the house is done. The only thing missing is the garage doors but we do have them in the basement we just need them installed.

Soffits, Insulation, and a Potty!

Chad and my dad are working on the soffits for the house. On this day they looked happy and not to nervous. The back of the house has not been fun for these two daredevils. I can't wait until they're done.
Here's a view of the house with some of the soffits done. The front is pretty much done now and Chad's parents have been sealing the boards for the porch. Roger has been installing the boards and they look awesome. At night, the lights look very cool from the road. They guys are putting up the trim boards around the windows, finishing the soffits and facia, and will be starting on the siding. Our color is called Woodstock with White trim. It's precolored, so no painting for us!
Roger got an almost new toilet from a job and intalled it in our house. This is the guest bath on the main floor. The port o potty was officially removed last week! The Tyvak wall in the bathroom makes it pretty classy.
My mom and I decided to spend a Friday after work insulating the house. The guys were done doing their stuff late that night and helped us finish the main floor! We passed our insulation inspection last Thursday and are ready to sheetrock. I think the outside is the priority right now.
Ava's excited that her room is nice and warm!

House updates

Chad and Ava are posing for a picture under a light bulb. This is a big deal for us, so a picture was needed!
My dad is working on putting in some of the light switches that we now use. Ava and Ellie have found out the hard way that they shouldn't play with the switches. Ouch!

I realized I hadn't put a picture of the house up for a while. It's changing every day. If you look closely, you'll see the landscaping that is going around the house. We had to do something to keep the water that falls off of the roof from eroding the dirt away from the foundation. Chad's dad has been very helpful for this! You may also notice the grass growing in the front yard! We've already had to mow.

Our dinner party

My mom, dad, and Jacquie pose for a picture in our living room at one of our first dinner parties at the new house. Chad and my dad were working hard on this Saturday so we decided to bring the dinner to them. We had a few beers and burned part of the giant brush pile down by the lake.

Girls Day

Jacquie & I took the girls to the Children's Museum. We all had a blast! The girls always enjoy painting their faces.


Ava had fun "playing" the guitar in the music video room. She's such a rock star!
Ellie is waiting for her prince while looking out at her kingdom.
Lydia is such a princess!
We were getting hungry, so we took a break at the McDonald's in the skyway. Then we went back to the museum for more fun. What a day!

Electrical & Framing inspection...

Lydia and Chad flip on the switch. We officially have real lights in the house! It's very cool.
Another picture of the panels...
If you look close, the right side of this box had THE sticker from the electrical inspector. This is a very important step in our quest for being finished by Thanksgiving. Yes, I said our goal is Thanksgiving.

Well the inspector came back out early Friday afternoon and was pleased with what he saw. He told us that everything looked great!! Next step FRAMING inspection. I have the city inspector coming out on Thursday.

This weekend Doug and I Got all the three-way switches working so now we can walk into the house at night and flip the lights on.

Now it's Saturday the 30th and the framing inspector was here and only found six things we need to fix. Chad said they are small fixes. He's hoping to have the inspector out to reinspect this coming week. Keep your fingers crossed! When this passes, we're on to siding and insulating.

Chad's car had some things he had to fix this week. We knew it needed work, but were waiting until the house was done. Well, the house is not done but the car was. He was in between the house and my parents garage where the car is taken apart all week. We are currently at the cabin relaxing on this glorious Labor Day Weekend. We'll take pictures and update this week. I'm back to work so the updates should be more frequent. Have a great weekend!

Electric Inspection Update

The inspector showed up Tuesday morning and started looking through the house and asking questions. We got dinged on a few things but we were able to fix those the same day. I'm going to try to get him back out on Friday.

A few things we got dinged on we should have known like the kitchen microwave needs its own circuit (even though we asked an electrician and he said it should be fine) and we overloaded a box or two. Other things we had to fix were:

Add a disconnect to the well power
Make sure where a wire enters a box that it's 1 1/4 inches away from the stud
Separate the dishwasher and garbage disposal so they are on two different circuits
and we had to move an outside receptacle off the kitchen circuit and put it on the outside circuit.

Electrical Update

Ends up that I didn't buy a big enough electrical panel in the beginning. As you can see we have three panels for this house. The one on the right is the 200 amp main panel then it's the off peak panel for the boiler for the in floor heat. The panel on the left is the 100 amp add-on one I had to buy when we ran out of spaces on the main.


Tomorrow (8/19/2008) we have our electrical inspection scheduled. After walking through the house everyday I am hoping that everything will go as planned and I will be able to call for a framing inspection.

Below is all the water lines for the house. This past weekend we got the well running, a pressure tank installed for the well and the hot water heater. We will be looking at water softeners in the next few days.

Bike Riding

Ava has finally started riding her little bike.  She loves wearing her helmet and needed to have a kitty tail on this particular day.  Ava needs to be closely supervised due to her tight corner taking and tipping over.  
Lydia has been riding her bike like a pro for years.  She likes riding around Grandma and Grandpa's circle drive next door and then flying down the hill back to our house.  She makes her mom very nervous.  

Pontoon Rides, Tubing, 4th of July and Weddings

This summer has been a flurry of activity in our family.  The new Marine park opened and is pretty close to our house.  We go their a lot.  The playground equipment is way cool and the beach is pretty nice.  I also was offered a job a week after school let out at a school in Forest Lake.  I'll be teaching 6th Grade at North Lakes Academy  in Forest Lake.  The school is building a new school in Wyoming so this year is going to be crazy.  I'll be at Faith Luthern for the year and in the new school next year.  I can't believe we're building a house and I'm starting a new job.  Driving 6 miles to work will be a definite plus!  We're planning on being in the house by Thanksgiving.  I'm hoping for Halloween.  

We took an evening pontoon cruise on Forest Lake and ate dinner.  This one is Ava and Aunty Bee snuggling during our three hour tour.
4th of July weeked, Chad took a break from the house and accompanied the family to the cabin for the weekend.  Ava is making her usual funny face while sitting with Grandma Reen on the pontoon.  It wound up being a great weekend and a well deserved break for all of us.  
Lydia and Chad went tubing together.  Lydia's courage is growing more and more each day.  By the end of the weekend, she was tubing by herself and swimming like a crazy lady.  We all decided to jump off the pontoon in the middle of the lake and cool off.  The girls are really comfortable with their life jackets and will swim anywear we let them.  
As usual, the fireworks were a pleanty in Cumberland over the 4th of July weekend.  The girls each got their own 3D fireworks sunglasses for viewing the shows in the evening.  Here they are sporting their matching 4th of July shirts, (thanks to grandma) and their glasses.  
Lydia and Ava had fun entertaining Grandma Hazel at our cousins wedding.  As usual, everyone had a blast!