Hump Day!

Halfway through another busy week!

The first of two septic tanks are in...

And surprise, surprise!  More huge rocks!

Stu showcasing his new garage.

Danny and Tim back filled and groomed the back and side of the garage.  It looks really good!

Another view of the septic tank.

With any luck we will have tank # 2 in tomorrow...

Gravel, Concrete and Dirt, Dirt, Dirt

The last few days have been pretty event full...

The garage was filled with gravel.

Looking out from the garage.

Stu and I finished up with the drain tile and felt.

The courtyard finally filled in, not done, but at least filled in!

The guest patio filled with gravel.

And no more dancing around rocky slopes! 

Yahoo!  The "bus" was the first car in the garage!

These were taken today...

The garage floor is now concrete!!

Can't wait for it to dry!

The patio on the side of the house is starting to take shape.

This is the back of the garage.

And the back of the house.

The electrician was out yesterday to do a quick run through with us and the plumber will be out on Thursday (hopefully).  Things seem to be moving right along, lets hope the upcoming long weekend doesn't slow things down too much!

Weekend Update...

Yesterday morning we started early...again!  Another fire...

We were planning a big fire all day, we didn't quite get all the way through, but we got a big chunk of it burned.

Danny our excavator showed up even earlier than we did to dig a ditch for the drain pipe.  Stu and I got all the drain pipe and felt down so Danny will be able to back fill around the house tomorrow.  Yahoooo!

He also groomed the area around the electric box so we could plant throw out some grass seed before the next rainstorm.

The roofers showed up too, later...  but did get the roof completely covered with the felt.

This is a bridge on the way out to the house, both sides lined with petunias, beautiful!

Friday's Events

The frame for the house and garage are complete!  We just need to finish up applying the felt paper to both and we are ready for the next step!

The front porch looks great!  All we need is a few rocking chairs!

After the rainstorm yesterday, we found this in the mud this morning...

Another one of the locals.

Forcast: Thunderstorms...

Wow!  Our house really looks different with a deck!  Haa Haa!  That is for all the clowns that have been sending us "Redneck Hi-Rise" e-mails...

(I took this picture on a trip to Texas...)

Ok, back to reality...  Stu climbed up to the apartment this morning and took some pictures.  I climbed up too, very slowly and carefully!  It's really, really high and I'm not real crazy about ladders or heights...

This will be our front door going into the kitchen.

The crew started framing the fireplace yesterday.

They didn't quite finish the roof yesterday, this is the courtyard taken from the lower backyard.

They got the vapor barrier applied to the outside sheathing.

Now we are waiting for the door, windows and siding to be installed.

The apartment and garage take shape.

This is how we left the house this afternoon...

After dinner we couldn't take it anymore and had to go back to the house to see how much they were able to get done.  We heard the thunder off in the distance, but we figured we either could get ahead of it or it wouldn't even rain out there...  We were wrong on both accounts!

No rain yet...The garage is almost done.

This is the side of the garage and apartment.

The fireplace is covered in the vapor barrier as well.

This is looking from the fireplace to the kitchen...  We'll have a 12 foot ceiling in the living room and 9 foot throughout the rest of the house.

And the rain started just before we left...  and did it ever!!  It was really coming down!  Hope our house is still there in the morning!!

He's A Natural!

Logan's first swimming lesson!

We Have Shade...I Mean, A Roof!

Half of the crew started this morning putting up the sheathing on the house.

And the other half worked on finishing the frame for the garage.

Front view of the garage with the apartment window above.

Stu did a really great job working with the sun angles, window height and the roof eves to make sure we won't be blinded by the sun coming in.

How exciting!  It's really coming together nicely!

Getting Closer...

Yesterday Stu took advantage of the shade on this 95 degree day to work on the trail going to the waterfall.

This was Stu's project from this morning, applying the sealant to the side of the garage.

This is the front porch, or rather, it will be...  They finished up the overhangs.

This is the big beautiful beech tree across from the courtyard.

The trusses for the garage arrived this morning.

And after Uruguay defeated Mexico (World Cup Soccer), the build was on again...this afternoon.

By the time we left this evening, they were still going strong.  With any luck we'll have both the garage and house under cover tomorrow.