Sunday, May 22, 2011

Duck Derby

Despite the cold, windy weather (at least it wasn't raining), we had a nice time at the Duck Derby. Ainsley loved the bouncy castle and slide best (of course), but the duck race was fun to watch too.








Week 10

So, for some reason this isn't letting me move my words - so short of throwing my computer out the window I am going to post and walk away!!! Everything about the week is at the end...
Ian's first bandaid
Trampoline fun

"You start us Mom." Ready, Set, Go!

With windowsHearth


Basement showerHardiplank on side of house

Peeking out the window
Current pic - today
Thinking these two colors for exterior house and accent (stone below)

What a beautiful week we had, and how nasty the weekend has turned out - so frustrating! At least we had our Tuesday together. And with it staying lighter later we were able to enjoy some time outside with the kiddos after work too. House work is plodding along - the wall connecting our current building to the new house (the final wall in Ainsley's bedroom) was built, our windows were put in, the roof was prepped for shingles, and they started putting up the Hardiplank on the outside. Our hearth was built in preparation for the fireplace being installed - maybe tomorrow. The radiant for the main floor is complete and they started on the second floor. And most of our plumbing is in. They'll transfer us to our tankless, on-demand hot water heater and remove our current beast as soon as the propane tank has been installed. We added a circulating pump to the heater so the hot water is circulating in the pipes at all times and you always have it the second you turn on the water - yay!!! It'll also be true of our current location which is nice. And I will be taking our old water heater to my office to use there since my heater there is 19 years old and on the verge of kaput!
Dean & I dropped the kids off with Kelli yesterday for a couple hours and went to Sears with a listful of things to buy - fun times! We ended up getting 45% off all our appliances and 1% cash back which basically gave us our microwave for free! Such a good deal that we ended up buying a new television for the house and a riding lawnmower! These are the things we got:
Ainsley's doing well - LOVES her big trampoline! She wakes up in the morning asking to go on it and never wants to get off. She got to play with Payton yesterday and it was the highlight of her week.
Ian likes the trampoline too, although it's tiring on the arms to hold him on it! His new fave though, is definately the play kitchen - he will literally spend hours opening and closing things and taking dishes out and banging them around. He's started clucking his tongue this week and thinks it especially funny when you do it back to him. He's really such a happy chappy and pretty easy going.
Today, another rainy day, we're headed into PA for the Duck Derby race - thousands of rubber duckies coursing a 100 yard section of water. I'll post pics afterwards - pretty neat to see. That is provided Dean finishes watching the Day of Reckoning for the relegation fight in the EPL - currently Blackpool fighting to stay up.

Sunday, May 15, 2011

Week 9

It's been very rainy this week, so it doesn't feel like a lot has happened with the house. Our new move-in date is August thanks to the weather and the additional work finishing the basement. At least money is not as concerning as it was... even though we're well over our budget from the bank, we've been stocking away every little penny and it's adding up! So new decisions this week include: circulating, on-demand water heater; 500 gallon buried propane tank; and a skylight above the entry instead of a dormor. We are waiting on quotes to make decisions on: whether or not to have the circular driveway put in, bookshelves built in library, and custom built-in's in closets. The work on the house this week consists of the roof being put on, a temporarily framed front porch and stairs, and the plumber starting his work. The plumber (Prima donna #1) showed up on Tuesday and told our framer that he wouldn't work without stairs (we had been entering via a ladder) and they needed to drop everything and build him stairs immediately. Needless to say, that didn't go over very well and the plumber ended up leaving. The framers conceded and built him temporary stairs Wednesday. So Friday he shows up with his dog, drops the dog off on the driveway and leaves! I'm trying to load the kids in the car and this little dog keeps trying to come into the garage and eat the cat poop! Our contractor had a little talk with him, so we'll see how he is next week.


Dean and I both worked on Tuesday this week which made for a very long week (10 days in a row for me come Friday). Friday evening Dean went with a friend to Seattle to a concert (System of a Down - he didn't even know who they were - just wanted to go to a concert!). Ainsley, Ian, and I met up with friends at the Sequim Irrigation Festival carnival. Great fun for Ainsley! Her and her buddy Payton had such fun together that she cried the whole way home saying "No Payton, don't go Payton". I'm afraid a little of me has worn off on her though. The first thing she saw from the parking lot was the 3 story pink slide and kept wanting to go on it. Finally we made it there, I got to the top with her and then she dug in her heels and would not go down! She also screamed "Mommy, I'm scared, Mommy, Mommy" the whole gator mini-rollercoaster ride and hung on to a big girl for dear life on the spinning strawberry ride. Esp the rollercoaster, just broke my heart hearing her scream like that. But then she rides on the carousel, the hot air balloon, and the car rides and is laughing and happy!!! At least those went well!


Dean & I bought a 12' trampoline earlier in the week when we were looking at appliances online (Deal of the Day on Sears.com). We put it together yesterday admist brief bouts of pouring rain and then finally came inside. I am the only one who has tested it out as it has poured ALL DAY today. We have to put the safety netting up next - maybe Tuesday.


Tomorrow Dean and I start P90X fitness program together. We had started it 1 1/2 weeks ago, but my crazy call schedule and our work schedules got in the way. We'll see how it goes, but the only time we have to exercise is after the kids are asleep, so we'll be finishing up at like 11pm - yuck! We'll see how the next 90 days go!


A few pics...
Front deck (real stairs will be in front)


Kid's and basement showers



Where skylight will be








Now that we have stairs the dogs have been able to explore their new home!

Ian traversing the trampoline rim


Maiden jump
















This area under the deck will be hardiplanked in and a door will be on the side where the temporary stairs are so we can use it for storage. Perfect for kayaks!!! We'll backfill in as high as we can and then have a few stairs coming off the front down to a landing, a path winding down to the circular drive and stairs to the side down to the slab. Hard to picture, I know, we even have a hard time of it!!!!

Sunday, May 8, 2011

Weeks 7 & 8

So it's been a couple weeks and we've been running crazy! I've been on call the last 2 weeks and it's been insane - last weekend I was home for a total of 8 hours from 7am Sat until 8pm Sun! And 5 of those hours were sleeping!!! Sat was working and Sun had to go to Seattle for a continuing education class. This weekend I spent Sat from 7:30am to 8:30pm at the clinic (8 emergencies!) and then several hours this morning too. I'm exhausted and poor Dean has had 2 long weekends with the kiddos. And both of us have to work Tuesday, so long week ahead...


Lots of progress on the homefront - roof trusses are up, front deck is started, basement cement has been poured. Roof goes up this week, plumbing starts tomorrow. We are starting to get really excited!!! Every time we walk through the house we plan and dream about how much SPACE we will have and the idea of separate bedrooms is almost a reality!!!! We spent a couple hours at Home Depot today (and last week) looking at appliances and paint colors (Ainsley picked out 20 shades of pinks that are her "favorite"!).


Ainsley's birthday was April 28th and despite it being a workday we had a great evening with her. Everything she does is in three's now because "I'm big, I'm three". The big hit of the night (aside from the sparkle hat from Nan & Grandy and the cowboy boots from Grandma & Grandpa) was the dollhouse. The only prob is the little brother - he loves it too and tends to pull out the pieces and put them in his mouth - not appreciated! It will definately be in her room, but for now it gets pulled down once Ian is occupied elsewhere. The scooter was also a fave. We visited Ainsley's preschool April 26th and loved it! Besides lots of hands-on learning, she'll have music/dance classes, art classes, and even horse-riding every other week!


Ian is a big fan lately of the kitchen - both ours and the play one. He has learned to open cabinets and drawers and loves the play kitchen, especially the phone. He has also started being interested in books - we're breaking out the oldies and Ainsley tends to get a little possessive of her books. We had a talk with our cabinet makers to put together a quote for the bookshelves for the library/office, so we'll see if that will be something we can do now or will have to wait for it. Ainsley has already picked where she wants her bookshelves to be and then where Ian's can be. Ex-librarian-at-heart, I have considered labeling all our books (yes, I have a label maker) with the Dewey decimal system and arranging them accordingly - is that beyond anal??? A little reminiscent of when my Dad picked out the article subjects of all the National Geographic magazines they had saved (like 20 years worth) and wrote a computer program to find the exact magazine based on subject. Hmmm...


Here's some pics from the last 2 weeks...



Ainsley pretending to poo in her new bathroom!


Dancing in her closet (like mother like daughter!!!)


















The stone for our fireplace and front posts






Playing with best friend Payton


















Basement






So picture Dean to the left of Ian and me to the right of Ainsley and that is how we spent that night - not a lot of room! King bed here we come!!!


Vaulted ceiling of master bedroom










Ainsley's frog friend






Basement bathroom