Progress

After a long weekend, we have four walls framed up. Hurrah! It is really starting to take shape now. Big A, Big Moe, and Brandon worked during the week two nights and Big A worked all weekend. It was a very productive weekend for him while the kids and I had some fun at the Dunedin Fine Arts Center on Saturday and then running errands on Sunday. The weather here is so insanely hot, Big A cut it a little short on Sunday - he just couldn't take it anymore. Now that the walls are up, we spent some time outside in the space talking about the layout and how things will look when it is complete. Big A snapped chalk lines to show the size of the bedroom, closet, and bathroom and for the first time I started to really look forward to having the project complete. It is going to be so fantastic to have a space for everything. It is also going to be nice to have a bathroom we can both fit in at the same time. There is still A LOT of work to go - the hard part comes next - framing up the second story and tieing into our existing house.

Wall up

Big A, Big Moe, and Brandon worked Tues after working all day and got that one wall up - yeah! They got rained out, but at least it is starting to take shape. While we are getting by just fine inside the house, it is pretty tough on the nights Big A works after work - I had both kids screaming at the same time, and bath and dinner are hard to do without his help - although much thanks to Mimi for pitching in :). Of course as soon as he came in Little A was a perfect angel, so he was able to get her to bed without too much drama. It is going to be a very long few months.... There is no game this weekend so hopefully we can get a lot accomplished working as much as possible. I think Big Moe will be out on his boat enjoying some downtime so it will be up to us to keep the momentum going.

Floor Down, Walls to go!

Progress!!!! That big pile is all the dirt Big A moved with the bobcat. I don't know what we are going to do with it all - it is sitting right where the pool is going to go (one day a long long long long time from now....) We had an inspection on Wed to insure the framing was strapped down properly and we passed. There was one small strap that needed to be fixed and of course they don't sell that particular strap anywhere so we had it overnighted. Little A had fun helping by giving Daddy nails and shooing away the mosquitos! The guys worked last Thurs (9/4) and got the floor sheeted. It really made the footprint look bigger which was good :). Then they worked Saturday and got one of the walls framed -- BUT we lost one of our helpers (BRANDON!) part way through the day and couldn't get the wall standing (if you look closely you can see it in the picture). Big A had to go to the football game on Saturday evening so he cut the day a little short as well - GO GATORS! It was so super hot anyway, I was afraid Big Moe was going to have a heart attack so it is probably a good thing they didn't keep going. Everyone took Sunday off and they plan to get that wall up this week - hurrah! We have lots of decisions to make about windows and other details - I have been given my list of tasks to do - we'll see how much I can get accomplished in the next week....

Framed Floor

We are making some real progress now! After the bobcat expedition last week, we now have a BIG pile of dirt in our backyard. Little A had such a good time helping Daddy! Last Saturday, Big Moe came over and the real work finally got under way. Big A worked on putting beams along the existing house structure to get the tie- in correct and make sure it would attach properly. This pretty much took all day. Grueling work on his back up under the edge of the house trying to pound nails in the right location. He ended up doing a lot of pre-drilling because the old wood is so hard, the nails were bending. Grandma came to town and took Little A for the day which was a huge help to me. They had a great time (and so did I!). Sunday the guys worked a half day - we had to go to Little A's open house for school that afternoon, not to mention it is hotter than hell right now, so Big A was ready for a break. During the week Big Moe and Brandon came over a few evenings to keep the momentum going.

This weekend was Labor Day and Big A, Big Moe and Brandon worked most of the day on Saturday - it was rainy so they had to dodge the thunderstorms, but they got A LOT done (thanks to Brandon for sticking around Saturday afternoon!). It is finally starting to take shape. In fact, they didn't work on Sunday or Monday because they ran out of lumber. Big A did some minor work on Monday and now we are ready for the next phase which is putting sheeting over the floor joists. The codes require tons of strapping and bolting and nailing which has taken a lot of time in this early phase. Pretty soon we will have walls going up which is very exciting.

Life is still going fine in our cramped quarters. We struggle every day to stay organized and control the clutter. Little A is still sleeping well in her crib (poor girl!) and Little T napped through a great deal of pounding over the weekend, so I really can't complain. People keep asking me how long this project will take to complete. Right now, I just take things day by day and try to enjoy the process, and not think too hard about the end result. It will be done when it is done. It will probably take a lot longer than we think so to put a time limit on it at this point will only be frustrating. Big A is so lucky to have the skills to do something like this with his own two hands. We are also fortunate to have good help when he needs it. Big Moe has been very instrumental in getting started and he has provided lots of guidance in the initial layout.

Sheeting and walls to come next - Hurrah!!!!