Memorial Day Weekend Madness

Whew! We just blew through a 3 day weekend in a blink of an eye! The girls are exhausted, as am I, but we are ready to enter our last week of school...yee haw! We had several late nights and a picnic with a bunch of friends today, so I am about partied out. I need to get MC's mojito recipe...

The house is now entirely painted on the interior. I intended to paint the Master Bath in left-over paint from our last house, but apparently it froze in the garage this winter. It was solid in the can. After a quick trip to Lowe's (I am getting utterly tired of quick trips to Lowe's), I got paint and covered the walls on Sunday.

Then returned this afternoon to do a faux treatment in a ragging technique. It took a long time, but looks nice. I did it in our last bathroom, which was much smaller and consequently did not take nearly as long to complete!

We were pleasantly surprised to see the crew out on a holiday up on the scaffolding.

They have finished the ceilings in the Great Room. Isn't it gorgeous? Now we just need our chandelier. The crew were offering me various stuffed and mounted animal heads to put on the walls...a very kind gesture, but I think I'll pass.

The girls' walls are quite bright. I'm hoping they are able to sleep in this room!

The yellow looks good in the Mud Room and Bathrooms.

Siding is up above the hip roof on the entrance side of the house...

...around the breezeway door and under the garage eaves in front.

The kitchen cabinets are scheduled for delivery on Wednesday, and they plan to start putting in some of the lighting this week.

Perhaps a Prescription?

I've gone from getting extremely anxious to getting seriously spastic every time I visit the house these days. Things are getting SO close to being done, and I am SO tired of living in this apartment (and while we are on the subject of being SO tired of things, I'll mention that I'm SO tired of being J's cyber school teacher...she's tired of me too). I pace. I jump around. I growl. For some reason, none of these things seem to make things happen any faster. We have 5 more days of school, and 3 more weeks of apartment living. I wonder if JP could put me in a medically induced coma until then?

Lots of guys working out at the house today!

Today they are priming the walls. The primer is tinted, so the colors are similar to the final thing. Our "weeping willow" is very nice, although lighter than I anticipated. They didn't have the girl's room primed yet, so I still don't know what the "lemon mint" will look like. Through some miscommunication, the builder thought I wanted the mud/utility/T's Own Private Room to be "butter". After I thought about it, I thought it might be quite stimulating, so we're going with it! This is a shot...sorry it's so dark...of the green color in the library.

They have nearly finished the siding on the entrance side of the house, including soffit over the door. There should still be some cedar detailing over the front door.

The last green door for the breezeway is in. There will be one more door on the other side of the breezeway, and then the house will be closed up!

Here is the cork flooring that we picked up in Pittsburgh yesterday. It will go in the library. I love the way it looks!

The well man finished putting in the rain water cistern. It's not exactly what we were anticipating, but he hit bedrock one foot too shallow, and we told him not to jack-hammer. He also found another spring, which is why the hole was full of water in my last post.

I counted nearly 100 light bulbs that we will need for the house. That's a small fortune when you are considering compact fluorescent bulbs throughout. Anyone know where you can buy light bulbs in bulk?

If there is a front door, we can move in...right?

Oh yeah! We have a front door! Of course, none of the doors have any door knobs yet, but they are there...hooray!

In addition, the siding is completed on the front of the house

and the driveway side.

The ceilings are finished. This is in the master bedroom, showing the finished ceiling against the tray. The tray will eventually have faux tin tiles (I think).

The great room, kitchen and dining room will have wood ceilings. They have been working on staining the wood.

They have also been painting trim in a buff color.

The well man finished connecting the well to the holding tank to the house.

Now he is working on digging a hole for the (much smaller) rain water cistern. This water will be used for watering the garden and washing cars, etc. Or we could use it for a swimming pool!

The builder is working on installing our on demand water heater. He tells us that we are the "greenest" clients that he has ever worked with. We are still sad that many of the "green" things that we hoped to incorporate were too expensive to seriously consider.

Some seedlings are sprouting in the pig garden, despite the nasty horse hooves.

One Month To Go!

We have been promised the keys to our new house in 4 weeks from tomorrow. The builder has been ill this week, but some of the crew were out today working on the siding. They put soffit under the eaves of the prow, and have the upstairs set of french doors in.

The dry wall finishers are moving right along. The walls look nice and smooth and ready for some paint!

The Oak flooring has arrived and looks beautiful!

New week things should really start looking great! I can't wait!

A Bright Spot

It was dry but cloudy most of the day today...a nice break from the 24/7 wetness we've been having lately. I think it is happening because we are trying to get the shingles on! J got her school work done in record time today, so we had time for baking Chocolate Chip Banana Bread to share with our builders while L napped.

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

recipe adapted from The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook

3 c flour (1/2 whole wheat)

1 c sugar

1 1/8 tsp baking soda

3/4 t salt

2 c mashed bananas (about 3-4 large)

9 T melted butter, cooled**

3 eggs

1/2 c yogurt (plain or vanilla)

1 1/2 t vanilla

3/4 c mini chocolate chips

Whisk together dry ingredients. Combine remaining ingredients except chocolate chips. Mix all ingredients together until moist. Divide into 2 small loaf pans, greased, and bake at 350* for 45-50 minutes. **This recipe actually works without all this butter, as I discovered after coming home from delivering the bread and finding my melted butter still in the microwave! It is a bit more chewy than normal, but I think I'll try decreasing it for the next time!**

We arrived on Poplar Ridge just as some sprinkles started to come down. The girls and I disappeared into the woods for a stroll, where we were sheltered from the rain by the trees. We looked half-heartedly for ramps and morels (no crawling through the underbrush, in other words), but none were to be seen from the path.

The photo at the beginning of this post is of our Solatube in the kitchen ceiling. In spite of the fact that it was gray and rainy, you can see that it let in quite a lot of light! This is the way it looks from the outside...just a "bubble" on the roof!

The roofers did manage to get most of the roof shingled so far this week, to my delight. The hip roof, and garage remain...probably just part of a day's work for them!

The dry-wallers have made good progress on the first floor. Most of the walls and ceilings are covered. Here is the kitchen...

...and the great room. Hubby noted that the rooms are feeling bigger again now that they are being closed in. Seems paradoxical, but it's true!

The power was turned on in the house today, the builders used the first 2 indoor outlets instead of running an extension cord in from the pole. They also got the siding on the house and breezeway behind the porch. The windows are trimmed out, and the soffit is going on...looks nice...like a finished house! They will still have to paint once everything is sided, but it LOOKS like progress!

I worked my last day of the school year yesterday, so I am feeling on top of the world! According to what I've read, J should have met the criteria to complete her school year by the end of this week as well. I would like for her to finish her subjects before summer, but we will still be finished well before moving day.

Girls Just Wanna Have Fun!

That is the song I had blaring on the radio this afternoon as SEVEN (count 'em) girls were leaving Poplar Ridge. We actually made 2 trips up the hill today, as we were anticipating the cement truck today to pour the basement floor...thought it might be nice to see them pour a little bit, seeing as our entire house is concrete and we've missed it all so far!

This morning we were able to see the hoses/pipes for radiant heating in the floors of the girls' rooms on one side, and the Exercise Room and extra Bathroom on the other.

They were also laying re bar to prepare for pouring footers for the porch between the house and the garage.

This afternoon, with blue skies above and 70* fresh air blowing on the hill, we returned with friends in time to see them pouring the footers. The cement truck poured into the bucket of a tractor, which in turn dumped the concrete into the footers. Someone had to slop around down in the hole to jiggle the air bubbles out and level it all off.

The floors downstairs are all smooth and neat.

The shingles and siding have arrived. Our builder expects windows and doors next week.

A good end to a good week!

Color Samples

Here I am, wasting time on the computer, when I should be doing school with J! I just wanted to post an idea of the exterior color scheme. So here is an idea:

Keep in mind: 1) The colors are not exact because we are getting our siding, shingles, windows, doors and paint from different companies, not just the one that had the sample. 2) There will be no shutters. 3) The gingerbread on the eaves is tentative...just brainstorming at the moment.

Ta-da!