At least the outside.

(This is the metal bender that has been in our yard the better part of the year…I’m wondering if it might be gone soon??)

We also have a new door for the inner part of the basement. THAT is a huge improvement. It still needs paint and hardware but it’s up, and in place and just waiting for this room to have drywall.

The work has only started on the inside.

Our assignment is to strip off the plywood walls that used to line this room. Our contractor will be here this afternoon to take measurements and tell us what he needs in the morning to begin to drywall the ceiling. (I’m hoping since he’s working inside, the work will move a little faster.) I’m apprehensive and excited all at the same time.

I’m ready for the new ceiling…the women visiting for fellowship enjoyed watching the show as one of the cats (who has gotten into the attic), poked her head through the gap and refused to come down so we could take her outside and then of course, she repeated the process all over again.

Then there was my lunch last week. I was sitting in the family room on a particularly breezy day. I had taken my tomato soup to sit on the sofa and eat a late lunch. I felt the air sweep down over me and suddenly I was showered with insulation from the attic.

Nothing like insulation in your soup.

The big boys have been working to take all the wood off the walls. Jacob removed the in-wall aquarium he had gifted our family at Christmas a couple of years ago. (I’m excited he’s replacing it with a 30 gallon for the new family room!)

The little guys take the stripped wood to the burn pile each day.

Everyone works together and the job gets done. I won’t say “in no time”, but it does get done!

The goals for coming weeks are as follows:

Repair, hang and mud the family room ceiling
Rework walls between our two kitchens (it’s a long story and will probably be longer since we’re about to have three, lol!)
Add french doors to the new family room
Open the pass-through to the new dining room
Rework, drywall and mud the walls in the new kitchen, and dining room
Install new cabinets and counter tops
Move to the new kitchen/ we will be doing demolition of the old kitchen
Open the library wall and add french doors to the library side of the new family room
Drywall, and mud the new family room
Install wood floors and tile to the new kitchen
Build new steps to the attic from the family room
Drywall ceiling and walls of library

(That’s the current working list for the contractor)

Our list includes:

Finishing the resource closet (for him this means hanging the shelves then we caulk and paint)

Finishing thing little boy room (we started the painted road on the additional walls- it has to dry for three or four days between coats before we can go to the next step).

Work on the yard, making it neat and ready for the appraisal (this is a BIG job!)
Start the garden (not related to the appraisal, but necessary…Matthew used the remaining cinder blocks from our basement to build new raised bed gardens. Jacob has been bringing boxes home from his job to line the beds and we’ll be able to use a good big of compost from our chicken yard for the dirt!).
Find a place for our furniture and belongings from each room as they are under construction

–This part has actually been the hardest, yet most rewarding job for me! We have made trip after trip to the thrift store. We have a bag of things going to our church to see if anyone there wants some and there has been so much trash collected we are going to be taking our THIRD trailer load of trash this weekend to the county landfill.

We even have one stack of books going to our local book re-seller. Those are the best since they give us a credit toward future purchases. We’ve used these to buy school books for the children.

I *HATE* clutter and I feel like I’ve lived in it for too long in these recent months.

I’m calling all of the above “extreme nesting”. *smile*
I think back to our pest control man, Keith, telling us we needed our own reality show just to show the transition of this house. I think he’s right.

Well, that’s the house updates. I can tell I’m beginning to slow down a bit with the work I’m doing. I’m so thankful the Lord has given me the energy I have had and willing hands to help with the process!