Hitting Rock Bottom

You'd think that moving into the house would have solved any and all of our problems, but moving into the house made our lives much more complicated.

After moving in, we had the huge task of packing and moving all while living our regular lives. We couldn't find anything once it was put at the new house, because there was nowhere to unpack it and put it away. Not having a master closet has made it difficult to find clothes. Not having a second bathroom made it difficult to sleep at night, because kids would be tramping through our bedroom at two in the morning. Trying to find tools to continue building has been difficult, because the tools are no longer easily accessible and are not organized among the boxes and car tools that have been stacked out in the little house. Everything has become so much harder.

Since moving in, Trevor dug up the pipe outside, and found the clog. We replaced twenty-seven feet of sewer pipe, and let me tell you... it was a smelly job.

We mudded, taped, textured and carpeted the basement, and finished the stairwell mostly.

We have blinds.

I built a coffee table out of old wood, Trevor moved a light in the living room, we painted window trim, and did a bunch of little jobs here and there.

We still don't have insulation in the attic, which makes for a hot sleep for the girls in the basement. The upstairs is chilly, and the basement is a sauna. Also, no closet, no doors downstairs, and really a lot of projects to finish still.

How all of this sounds to you, I don't care. You can think I'm complaining, or not (I'm not). I think it's going to take a long time for us to come back together and heal as a family. We became so broken during the last few years. It was hard sacrificing so much for this house, even relationships. We've got a long road ahead of us and have been taking some really good steps towards healing. I recently took a parenting class that helped me a lot, even with my relationship with Trevor. lol. I realize I'm not his parent, but the class was very insightful with helping me look at relationships differently.

Now that the bulk of the building and the main push to finish things is over, we can begin to take the steps we need to move on.

Maybe this whole post sounds dramatic to you. I don't care. I will tell you this though: If you are someone who thinks I'm over-dramatizing this, and you wonder what I do or have done with my days, just know that you have judged me wrongly, have no idea what you are talking about, and can go take a flying leap off a tall building. lol. But seriously. GO. I don't need or want judgement in my life.

Halloween 2018

Living the Dream

Yes. Yes. We are living in the house.

We are living in the house!!!!

We are almost all moved out.

One more week of moving and cleaning.

Stay tuned for photos of the chaos and mess.

Technical Difficulities

Hi all,

I'm sorry I've been having some blog problems lately. I know it's been going on for a while, but I just didn't have the time to fix it or figure out what was wrong. Today I finally felt like tackling it, and I think I have it worked out now.

Here's my quick update on life:

I put Logan back in school. I published a post about it, but apparently it never published and now it's erased. *sad face

I'm packing us up and we are getting moved over into the town house.

The transmission in the van broke on my way to take Logan to see the ear specialist. It was a very sad day. I'm driving the jeep around now, and we are fine. So many silver linings to find in life, even when it doesn't go the way you think it should.

My dad and mom came and helped us finish the girls' bedroom in the basement and lay carpet in both the kids' bedrooms. We are almost all ready to move in now. Which sounds funny I know, since we are already moving in. But I never thought I'd be building and moving in all at the same time, and yet here I am.

I'm finding it hard to find motivation anywhere. This house-building marathon has had every emotion attached to it, but I'm to the "I'm done" part. I'm serious. I have no problem getting over there and continuing projects and building and mudding and taping, texturing, etc , but when I get home at night, the last thing I want to do is pack. I just want to lay in bed and have a foot rub and eat a piece of bread (because I have no motivation to make dinner).

Anyway, did I mention that the whole basement is dry-walled? Yep. It's all done. It's not mudded or taped, except for the girls' room, but that can happen after we move in.

Also, Brad finally came and almost finished on Saturday! It's a miracle! I hope he finishes before we move in all the way.

There are little miracles all over in my life, and even though we've had to really push ourselves and sacrifice a lot, I know we've been watched over and blessed so much through this whole thing. There have been so many people who have served us and given us a boost through this as well. I'm grateful that people can be so very good and kind, and that families are here to love, support and help. We couldn't have gotten through this without our families.

These were supposed to be white. It's a long story. I'll fix them later.

It's Been a While...

Hey everyone. I know it's been a bit. We've been working hard and trying to get things done around here.

Mostly, I've been spending my days working in the master shower. That thing is a beast. I just grouted the floor this morning, and should finish up the tile tomorrow (you grout the floor before you finish the bottom row of tile on the walls).

I'm packing up the house, and getting ready to move. I feel very up in the air right now, but I know that the worry could eat me up if I let it. So I guess I'll just let go and trust in God's plan for our family. It will all work out.

The summer has flown by, and still Brad has not returned to finish the HVAC. Oh well. It's gonna be a heck of a bill. I just know it will be worth it.

The house is transforming inside and out. We shopped the end of summer nursery sale and got three cheap bushes for the front of the house. Trevor has leveled out all of the dirt mounds outside now and we have grass growing in almost every spot. The trim inside the house is almost finished, and the double doors to the master bedroom are built.

We are working on purchasing gutters for the house now. The carpet is inside the house and ready to be installed in the boys bedroom.

The water heater is installed, but doesn't work. Trevor is working on getting new coils for the water heater this week. Hopefully ASAP because we really need to pass the plumbing inspection.

The ward is supposedly going to be helping us get the tree down in the next couple of weeks as well. I hope!!!

That's all for now. I'm going to get packing. I'll try to get some photos up next time.

Progress Over Perfection

I am tired and sore today. My hands and back are killing me. Yesterday while Trevor moved dirt outside, I made countertop templates and then countertop molds. About that time, Trevor hurt his back trying to dodge Will who had run in front of the full wheelbarrow Trevor was moving. So I took Trevor home and came back with the two oldest kids and we mixed and poured the kitchen countertops. This was another different technique we tried this time.

We worked until just before 11 frantically mixing and packing the concrete. My back will never be the same. Two 100 lb bags of sand and three 100 lb bags of concrete. I did the mixing, the kids did the packing. I was thinking about what a blessing it was that I was able to mix all that and my back was able to hold up to it. Honestly. That's a job that most people rent a mixer to accomplish. I'm sure we had angels helping us. It was horrible.

This is what we worked on last week. The kitchen is in!! The kids and I started painting this week. We hope to have it finished by this weekend.

I

Am

About

To

Show

You

Our

Wood

Floors.

Are

You

Ready?

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?????



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Before:

 Applying first coat:

Still applying first coat:

Done:

It's not perfect, but I'm pretty dang happy with how it turned out.

My arms feel as if they've been ripped out of their sockets. I haven't been able to sleep because my left shoulder hurts so terribly. Buffers are no joke my friends. But... it's done. It's DONE!!!!! That reminds me of The Man From Snowy River. We should all watch that today. 

I can't wait to see how it looks dry. I bet it will have way less shine. I'll update later.

Howdy, everyone. It's been a bit. We have been plugging along. You know... sanding. Sanding my life away. Sanding from dawn until dusk. Those edges sure take a long time. This weekend will be d-day for our wood floors. I'm 

 a little terrified,  but it's one of those jump in feet first things. Meanwhile, I made this happen today:  

 

 I tried something different with this countertop. It's called the press technique. It looks a lot more like stone and less like concrete.
                            

The floor is sanded. The edges are not. But THE FLOOR IS SANDED!!!

I built a concrete countertop. Then Logan and I broke it. It was still green when we moved it. We should have waited a few more days. Lesson learned. 

Making Serious Headway

 Hey all, we layed more tile! We are having drain problems in the other bathroom, so we decided to put in a second bathroom before moving in. The drain problems are outside the house between the house and main drain. We think it might be caused by an old cast-iron pipe that sat empty for a few years, or maybe a tree root. Who knows, but we can't call roto-rooter in because we aren't even supposed to be using the bathroom yet. So until we pass final plumbing inspection, we need to help the problem.

 It has been Spring Break this past week. I decided to do something drastic that would help everyone feel like we had done something big, even though we didn't. I got the girls' ears pierced. It was fun and scary for Samantha especially.

Then, we had a fashion show with new clothes from Grandma and Aunt Alysa. 

 Remember the legs my dad and I turned on his lathe? Well, I'm finally building the cabinet for them. This goes into the master bathroom. Wait until you see the sink that sits on this!!!

 

 And finally, we've been working on the kitchen cabinets. It took many hours to modify the cabinet below for this awesome sink.

 And I forgot, one last thing: We dyed raw eggs this year in between conference. Then we hot-glued the eggs to yarn and tied them up between the trees in our back yard. Imagine shooting a raw egg with a bb gun!! It was a lot of fun. Every time the kids shot an egg, they would get to hunt a candy egg from the grass behind where we were shooting. It's just an extra step, I guess.
                     
One more really, really last thing: For anyone who I told we were going to be refinishing the wood floors this weekend. The person who was going to help us, and insisted on renting the sander and everything, backed out on Friday night. It was disappointing. Oh well. We had other stuff to do though, and it worked out just fine.