Open house open house

A couple weeks ago, we had our first party at DGE. We called it an Open House Open House, since our house is still "open." It was family and a couple friends, and we had a lot of fun. It was a warm but not hot Friday evening, and we served wine, beer and a light dinner (Chicken and Peach Salad with Goat Cheese, Tomato Feta Tart and Rocky Road Bars). We "toured" our house (took oh, about 5 minutes) and then noshed in the shade of the veggie garden. I hope it's the first of MANY fun gatherings we have at the new house.

Our progress has slowed some as we've had a lot of other stuff going on in life. But here are photos, taken a couple weeks ago, that show the house (mostly interior) as it is today. Next up is Roofing, HVAC, Plumbing, Electrical, Siding, then all the interior stuff. It's going to be awhile . . .

Front of house with most of sheeting up

In the master bedroom, looking toward street

Does this look like a good size for the shower?

Yay! No more ladder to get to the 2nd floor!

"Bonus" area, someday to be craft room

It really feels great to be able to walk around the rooms and feel like we did ok with the design and layout, and try to imagine what it will feel like to live here. I'm one lucky girl.

More progress

We spent the day at the house yesterday. I mostly worked in the garden, and sought out the shade with my book, but Melissa got step one (pun intended) of the stairs complete. No more ladders to get to the second floor! It was hot (over 90) but it's amazing how cool it was inside the house. Thankfully there was a breeze, and the roof panels have some fancy reflective material that really shield the heat.

It's amazing how having the second floor and roof panels make it feel so different--and like so much has happened in a couple weeks. There is still months more work to do (more outside sheeting, roofing, plumbing, electrical, insulation, sheetrock, etc etc, etc, but there's enough in place now to really see how great it's going to be.

We spent some time on the second floor (yes, I had to climb the ladder again--NOT my favorite thing) reconfiguring the upstairs bathrooms yesterday (wow--this is a nice benefit of not being tied to plans and paying someone for each change) and I think it's going to work out nicely.

In the meantime, I picked 3 summer squashes, lettuce, nasturtiums and cilantro. And I pulled all the sugar snap peas out of the beds. The weeds are taking over, but I can't bring myself to use the Roundup in the vegetable garden. There's gotta be a better way.

Here are the photos of the house progress:

Front. Office on left. Panel (center) waiting to go to 2nd floor

Back. Living room right, kitchen center, laundry, garage left.

Side. Living room left, office and door right.

Step 1 of stairs.

Holiday weekend, after the fact

They were predicting temperatures in the high 90's and low 100's for the 4th of July weekend, so we did what any sensible people would do: packed up Willie and headed for Donner Lake. We're so lucky that we live only an hour away, that we can go to the house pretty much anytime we like, and that it's usually 20 (or so) degrees cooler up there.

Because we'd given blood on Saturday morning, and it was super hot, we got a very late start (packing up the hot car with low energy was just so unappealing!), but made it there by dinner time. We spent Sunday hanging out, and most of Monday too. It was fun to catch up on magazines, go sailing, watch Willie swim in the cold lake water, and relax. All in much cooler temps.

Monday, we headed back before dark, and then got to meet my friend Kathy and her daughter for some fireworks watching (and yes, we wore red, white and blue). The display seemed a little lacking this year, but how cool is it to hang with the friend you've had since age 2 on the neighborhood hill where you watched fireworks from probably around age 4 until 14? It's fun to think of all those years ago, hanging with our moms and listening to their conversations and now my friend's girls doing the same with us.

Hope you all had a nice, long, patriotic weekend!

More house photos later this week: the progress is exciting!

And the next day . . .

It looked like this:

Luckily, we had a crew of three to work on getting these trusses in place and other hard for a girl-and-her-tractor alone work to do. They'll finish out the week, and then we'll continue on (me documenting, rooting, and encouraging, Melissa doing the actual work!)

This morning it looks like this:

I took some photos yesterday evening to try and document what the house looks like pre-2nd floor. The truck with the trusses is there now. I wish I were there to see it, but rest assured, photo documentation is going on!

Here's how it looked late yesterday/early today:

Front of house, looking southwest. Garage on right (cut off).

Back of house, looking Northeast. Livingrm slider opening on right.

Side of house, with office doorway and livingroom windows

Garage end of house, with laundry rm window and slider opening

Tonight/tomorrow will be a whole new story, literally!

Garden bounty, and Tuesday will be an exciting day!

Though I go to the new house site nearly every day (it's about 4 miles from where we're living), I keep forgetting my camera! Part of the 2nd floor is up, and tomorrow the trusses come, which will make the house go from it's current 1 story frame to a 2 story! EXCITING!

I'll get out there tonight and take some before photos.

In the meantime, here's a shot of Saturday's harvest from my garden:

Sugar Snap Peas














This winter, I planted a lot of seeds, and with the cool spring we had, the sugar snap peas went crazy. The sweet peas are blooming fiercly, too. These Sugar Snaps are just about finished, and the tomatoes (I planted 13!) are blooming now and I'm hoping they'll set fruit soon.

For tomatoes, I planted Sungolds, Brandywines and Boxcar Willies (chosen for Willie our dog). I also planted (though not from seed) 4 hot peppers, one eggplant, two summer squashes (one's ready to pick today!) and a cucumber. I lost the Ambrosia melon, but have lettuce, parsley, chives, cilantro, basil, arugula and lettuce. And a lot of weeds, which will probably be the end of me. I'm trying to be organic, and the weeds are out of control. I try to keep them weed-whacked and just look the other way. It certainly isn't a magazine photo-worthy garden, but I love it anyway. I can't wait until I get to live where my garden is!

Uh oh, nearly a year

OMG. I knew it had been awhile, but I didn't realize it's been 11 months. I've had grand plans to get back in the swing of things and start documenting the house construction. Though it's been going slowly, I fear I won't be able to catch up.

What's been happening? Well, the teardown is complete, electrical panel (and wiring to pole) has been moved, and the first floor is just about complete. The upper floor joists are going in, and trusses should be delivered in about 2 weeks. WOW! That seems like so much, until I realize that it's taken a year for all that to happen. That's ok. It's the process, right?

It's a good thing I didn't realize when I started this post that I don't even have a recent picture. Sigh. I like to think I'm on top of everything, but maybe not so much . . .

This isn't even close to being up to date (note right hand portion of original house still intact) but the best I can do today. And I'm going to try and be a more frequent guest here. We'll see . . .