Labor Day Weekend

I hope everyone had a restful Labor Day weekend before the busy fall season gets here! We had a very productive three day weekend.

Early in the week Dad and Grandpa poured my front porch. While they were doing that I finished the painting of the white walls. Once the front porch was done we could install the door into the garage from the porch and start putting some siding up. It's all looking pretty good there.

Mom and I did some painting in the bedrooms this weekend. The color is a taupe and I like it a lot. So I'm not keeping all my walls white...for those of you who were worried about my boring house. :) Painting is a pain, and Mom and I struggled with it a bit. The cut ins were drying a completely different color from the rolled paint. We came up with a system yesterday to make sure that doesn't happen anymore though. The rooms are looking good. We'll have to do a bit of touch up on the ceiling, but the rooms are looking very nice. :)

Sunday Dad had tickets to the Loons game. So we took quite a few friends and family to enjoy the game with us. We had a great time and we were glad everyone could join us for our down time.

It looks like Mom and I will be painting tonight while Dad pours the step into my house from the garage.

Concrete and Paint

The weekend was a full weekend and we accomplished quite a bit. No pictures though...sorry.

Thursday night Dad wanted to pour the bottom step into the garage from the front porch. He had built the form on Wednesday night. When I got home from work Dad said, "I'm going to get some concrete, I'll pick you up on the way home." So he got the left overs from a truck coming back loaded into five 5-gallon buckets and two garbage cans in the back of the van. A good thought...but reality turned out to be a bit different. By the time we got to the house the concrete was setting up pretty good in the containers. Dad had a vibrator and with some added water the step turned out pretty good. However, to extract the concrete from the garbage cans I had to chip at it with a shovel, and load it into buckets. It was pretty tough work, and I have some blisters and sore muscles to show for it. Dad said it didn't go quite according to his plan...but the end result turned out pretty good.

Dad and I both had the day off Friday. We worked on getting the front porch ready for concrete. I hauled wheelbarrows full of sand across the yard and into the porch area. Dad worked on the forms and flashing.

Saturday we wanted to pour concrete on the porch, but it was 90 degrees out with a forecast of rain. So we decided to hold off until we get some nicer weather. Saturday Dad finished working on prepping the porch, and I got to sand the walls and prep for finish paint. We decided to cut out early in the evening for dinner and to do some maintenance on my truck (replacing the brakes).

Sunday we decided that we would paint all day. We painted the garage and most of the ceilings, bathrooms and closets. We ran out of paint around 9:30 last night. One more bucket of paint today to finish the three rooms we need to do and the white portion of the finish paint should be complete. But the best part is that the ceiling painting will be finished! That part of painting is a bit of a pain.

That's the update for this week. I hope everyone had a fantastic weekend!

Fun Filled Weekend

What a weekend! I don't have a bunch to report, as we were pretty busy this weekend, but as you can see from the pictures we have most of the house sided. The rest of the siding consists of smaller pieces, so we're waiting until we get the front porch done to see what size scrap we have to work with for the chimney and other sections.

Grandpa and I were able to finish the north end of the garage on Saturday before I had to leave. Grandpa was then able to finish the wall with the door in it after I was gone. Dad got the chimney ready for some siding and ran the gas line to my fireplace.

Laura had a friend up this weekend to do the triathlon in Sanford. They did a relay with Laura swimming, River biking, and Megan running. If the field would have been even they would have won...but the lost to a team with 2 men on it...and only by a minute! But they had fun, so that's what counts. After the triathlon Mom, Laura, River and I went to the Tigers' game. Luckily they won that game of the series...I can't say that they did so well the other two games.

Sunday Dad and I did some shopping at Home Depot and worked on the house for a couple hours. My cousin Steven had his Eagle Scout ceremony Sunday afternoon. So we headed to Saginaw for that. Steven has been out to the house to help put down the floor. He's a great guy and a very decorated boy scout. He had a large number of friends and family come to recognize his achievements. As I listened throughout the ceremony to the qualities of a boy scout, Steven fits those qualities to a T. I also had to smile when I heard that his Indian name given to him means "tall loyal helper" because that is Steven. Steven now joins three other fantastic members of the family in the Eagle Scout rank, two cousins and a great uncle. Congrats Steven!

This morning I was also happy to find out that Paco and his wife have welcomed the newest member of the Pi Rho clan to their family, a baby boy named Carson.

So not A LOT of news on the house, besides the fact that we are still moving along at a quick pace. But some fantastic news from family and friends...which we all know makes our lives as rich as they are.

Happy Monday!

A Quality Day with Grandpa

This week was a busy one for me. But I got a lot accomplished while the rest of the family was out in New York enjoying a national softball tournament. (Laura's team ended up 4th after losing to the 1st and 2nd place teams, including a former Olympic pitcher!)

Jenn redeemed herself by coming over to help me paint fascia on Thursday. That was a huge help, because it only took me a couple hours to finish it yesterday. Some of you have asked me what fascia is. If you look at the pictures of the outside of the house there are some 2x6s running along the bottom edge of the roof. The fascia goes over top of these. They are cedar boards and I've painted them a darker shade of brown than the siding. These are only a small portion of the boards that were painted. The rest are sitting on scaffolding on both ends of the basement.

Grandpa came out on Saturday to help me put up siding. We had a bit of excitement with the hole saw in the morning...but don't worry...everyone is ok...no stitches were necessary...just a band-aid. :) As you can see from the picture, Grandpa and I got quite a bit done! We sided two walls completely and half of the garage wall. I kept offering to let Grandpa go home, but he wanted to keep working and get the garage wall at least up to the window. You have to do a bit of cutting to fit the pieces around windows, doors and stuff. Grandpa was pretty good at that, so he wanted to make sure I didn't have to deal with it if I decided to do some more siding by myself on Sunday. He was getting pretty tired though, and I don't want to be the reason he overworks himself! Paco was nice enough to bring us lunch when he came out to check on the progress! Thanks Paco! The weather on Saturday was not the greatest. It rained on and off. Some of it was light enough that we worked through it. Other times it gave us a nice break while we sat inside and watched it pour for 5 minutes or so. It never rained for a long time, but it did rain hard enough to make it a muddy mess outside.

Sunday I mowed the lawn at home and took care of Mom's flowers and watering her lawn before I went out to the house. I emptied an entire can of wasp spray and only got rid of about half of the nests! I have to get those taken care of before Dad puts of fascia...they seem to think that is a good place to build their little nests. I decided just to finish painting the fascia and then spend a couple hours watching the Olympics. It's not often that I get to watch swimming and diving on TV. And to get to watch that caliber of swimming and diving is a treat.

I hope everyone else had a great weekend too!

Paint, Ceilings, Siding, and Lake Tara

This weekend was another productive weekend. It looks as though things are moving along quite smoothly and quickly right now.

Grandpa and I finished siding the South side of the house on Saturday. The two small sections of wall where the bathroom comes out from the wall need siding. Most of the pieces are cut for that though...I just have to draw some lines to keep them level because it is real easy to get them cocked at an angle on those small pieces. Mom and I finished siding some of the back side yesterday.

Dad keeps trying to get ahead of us laying out the siding, so we can go to town, but he got busy playing in Lake Tara yesterday and is not quite far enough ahead of us right now. Since they have pushed the topsoil off to the side in preparation for fill dirt I have a huge section of exposed clay in my side yard. We've had a couple big rains in the last few weeks and the clay does not allow the water to drain, therefore I have a lake in my side yard. So Dad dons his yellow rubber boots, takes a pump and a shovel, and heads out to play in the mud to try to dry it out. That's what he did for a good portion of the day yesterday. I had to get a picture of it, because as you can tell, it's a pretty good look for him.

The drywallers were back this weekend too. They were patching up a few areas and texturing the ceilings. All of the ceilings were finished yesterday. I had a knockdown texture put on. I've posted a picture, but it's kind of hard to tell the texture. The mud goes on as a brownish color, but dries white...it's kind of interesting. There are still a couple patches he needs to make on the walls, but it's looking really good.

We had a nice surprise yesterday. Grammy and Grampa McKibbin stopped by to check on the progress! I haven't seen them in quite awhile so I was happy that they stopped out. Grammy brought her delicious magic bars for us too! I LOVE those things. She said they aren't her best batch, but I tried to make them once and they didn't turn out so well. So Grammy's worst is still better than my best attempt! I haven't broken into them yet, but I definitely will tonight. :) Thanks Grammy!

I took Friday afternoon off, so Mom, Laura and I went shopping for carpet, tile and paint colors. I found some fantastic carpet and the lady at the store helped me match some paint colors to it. I am no longer keeping my walls white! I know that will make Hannah and Laura happy too. :) Most of the walls will be a pretty neutral color, but not white. I'll add some accent colors into the walls in the rest of the house as we go, but after talking to the women at the decorating store I was pretty excited to not be keeping my walls white.

My neighbors down the street had a Jimmy Buffett themed "get to know your neighbors" party on Saturday night. It was a pretty good time. I cut out of the house a bit early to head down and meet my neighbors. The neighborhood is a great neighborhood with some fantastic people living there.

Mom and Laura have a national softball tournament in Buffalo, New York this week/weekend. It looks like Dad is going to go with them. So they are leaving on Wednesday and returning Sunday. Hopefully Dad will get far enough ahead in the next couple evenings that Grandpa and I can still work on siding next weekend.

We picked up a bit of cedar yesterday for fascia. So I will be painting those boards in the evenings this week. Jenn, you've got another chance to help paint! I'll see you this evening at the house? :)

I hope everyone had a great weekend...Happy Monday!