Almost a Floor

Josh has been working fast and furiously, along with the other people in the group, and we have some more progress to report. They have now cut and put down most of the floor joists and are probably going to start laying the subfloor today. We also got our garage floor yesterday. We are very excited to be moving so fast and hopefully, with the cooperation of the weather, we can have the house ready for trusses before Christmas. Here are a few pictures of the progress.

Here are a few of the floor joists laying across the hole.

The garage floor.  Still being smoothed over.

The floor joists secured and the rim board attached to the back of the house.

It's a Start

We have started our house!! On Friday afternoon, they delivered our lumber package, so Saturday morning, we started building. It's amazing how much goes into building a house. There is a lot to do before you can even start putting the first wall together, so we didn't get very far. We did get the house laid out and chalked, the green-plate on, and we got the bearing walls built in the basement. Next thing to do is get the floor joists cut and put in place. Hopefully Monday we'll get at least that far. Here are some pics from our Saturday adventures in building.

Our lumber package with our name on it!!

Getting the first wall in the basement laid out.

Putting together the 3rd and final bearing wall in the basement.

Here are the walls.  All standing and ready for floor joists.

It's Beginning To Look Alot Like Christmas

With the help of the boys, we decorated the Christmas tree and got out the decorations yesterday.  It was a real surprise to Josh when he came home.  He has been working at the house until about 8:30pm every night this week.  We went with the pre-lit fake tree again this year, mostly because it's really easy. I think next year though, we might cut down our own.  This small tree just doesn't look as impressive as a really tall one would look in a room with a vaulted ceiling...which our new house will have.  Here are the three boys by their masterpiece.  

Kaleb, Talon and Coby

More Costumes

We're not sure if Halloween is over at our house or not. We just got a bag of clothes and shoes from some cousins and in the bag was this devil costume that Talon loves. He puts it on just about everyday. He told me right before we were going to take the picture that he thinks little devils have guns. Sounds good to me.

Look What We Did!

Well, this isn't our house, but we are still learning to be home builders. We are very excited to have started this project and we're learning so much as we go. We just started 1 week ago and I can't believe how much more I know already. Here is what we've accomplished so far.

Pheasants

Our neighbor Zach shot a couple of pheasants the other day and when we found out that he hadn't taken the meat yet, we thought our kids would like to watch. So we took them out to see just how you get the breast meat out of a bird. I know it sounds gruesome, but it wasn't. Besides, the kids had already watched Zach clean some fish he caught this summer, so we thought it would be okay. While we were standing there talking Kaleb kept saying, "hold it, hold it". So Zach let him hold the bird. It was so funny. He grabbed the thing by the neck and carried it all over the porch. He really thought that was great. Then after he was done, we got to have a little pheasant anatomy lesson.

Kaleb and the pheasant.

Zach showing the kids the pretty feathers. Brady, our neighbor, ended up taking a few of the feathers home in a bag and making an Indian hat out of them. It was so cute!!

Buddies

Talon and Kaleb

Um...Scary!!

So, my 7 1/2 month old is now pulling himself up on anything and everything to stand up.  I'm not sure if I should be happy about this or terribly frightened.  The realization that I could have a walking 8 month old is very scary.  Not likely, but you never know.  

I put the toilet paper on the floor today and Coby crawled right over and stood up next to it. Too CRAZY!!!

Kaleb and Coby playing with the good old T.P.

Moving Right Along

The concrete for our house is now cured and they have removed the forms.  We also got our tar painted on Friday and we are hoping that the excavator will back fill our lot in the next few days. Another update is that we have decided to go with pre-built walls, which is so nice because it will get the house back on track.  As of right now, we are about 2 months behind. With the pre-built wall we can just about put up an entire house in a day.  How great is that? So, with any luck, we will start framing the first house next Saturday and probably have our house framed by the middle of December... we may even have the roof on by then! 

We Have A Basement

We got our basement forms on Friday and they finally poured the walls this morning.  I took the kids over so they could see the cement and boom trucks.  They were very excited.  To tell you the truth, so was I!!  Now if we could just get started building.