HOW ARE THINGS GOING ON YOUR END?

Well, we had a storm while John was in New York on business, and it took all the Tyvek off the house - except for the front of the house where the big windows go in, because that’s the side that didn’t get any wind.  On the other three sides, all the Tyvek came off.  And there was nothing I could do about it, because Andrew and Sarah were the only ones that were with me, and they couldn’t help me put it back on.  I just kind of looked at it and went, “Crackerjacks.”  I didn’t even tell John until the day he was coming home.  I wasn’t going to frustrate him while he was there and couldn’t do anything. 

SO, WHAT DID YOU DO?

(laughing)  I just took pictures of it.  That’s all I could do.   John asked me, “Did you do anything?” and I said, “Yeah, I took pictures.”  And he said, “You would.”  (more laughing)   By that point he was laughing too, because he knew, what else was I really going to do?    I told him I considered (for about five minutes) grabbing some ladders and taking the scaffolding outside and trying to put it back up.  And he said, “I’m so glad you didn’t do that.” 

DID IT RUIN THE TYVEK?

They ended up putting some of it back up, but we’re going to have to buy another roll.  It’s not such a bad thing, but it’s a set back none the less.  Last week, we did get more cement poured in the basement.  The other thing was, our second HVAC guy came out to quote us.  We’re looking at either a heat pump or geothermal.  I need to read more about geothermal.  It might take ten years or so to pay for itself, but from what I understand it will be much better for the environment.  Long term, it’s a better investment.  It will all come down to how much it is up front and how it amortizes out over time.

WHAT ELSE ARE YOU WORKING ON?

Next Friday, which will be our next house building day, we need to go through and draw little outlines in the bathrooms for where the sinks and the toilets will go, because John will start doing the rough cutouts for that.  We were supposed to do that this past week, but we focused on trying to get as much of the Tyvek back on as we could, and then we decided we were going to deal with the cement, as opposed to marking the bathrooms.

All we want to do is get it enclosed as quickly as we can.  I ordered the garage doors today.  So, we ended up with chocolate brown garage door that will match the windows.  I ended up getting garage doors that have little rectangular windows at the top of the door.  They are supposed to take about ten days to come in.   Everything is going to happen at about the same time.  I checked on our insulated window units for the front of the house - the trapezoids - and the glass is cut for them and is going in to be tempered.  So my guess is, that we’ll have those by the end of next week, which will be nice.

On last Monday, while the guys were fixing the Tyvek, I took all of the trim that we’re using on the outside of the house to hold the windows, and I sanded and painted all of it.  That was my big job. 

WHAT ABOUT YOUR DOORS?

We have the two main entry doors.  We finally moved them over to the house.  The only thing I need to do is pick up hardware, and then they’ll go in.   We need to order the door for the basement.  I was going order that today when I ordered the garage doors, but I couldn’t remember if it is 32″ or 34″ so therefore, I didn’t order it.

WHAT ABOUT ELECTRICITY?

We spoke with our PP&L guy.  We’re working with three different people at PP&L.   There’s the person in charge of our account.  There’s a technical person.  And there’s a pole person.   So, the technical person called and left a message because, the pole person came out and said we need to have two more trees cut down.  I asked them to come out and mark the trees that need to come down.  I’m afraid of cutting down trees that we don’t have to. 

HOW MANY TREES HAVE YOU CUT DOWN?

John would have a better idea of that, but I would say probably fifteen to eighteen.  I have enough firewood.   I don’t need any more of that.  Actually, one of the members of our church does woodworking, and he’s been coming by and taking our larger logs.  We had some really nice cherry and walnut, and we said, “You haul it away, and you may have it.”  And in return, which he didn’t have to do, he’s making us two side tables for our living room.  So, we’re actually going to have our own wood, turned into something that we can use in our new house.  I am so excited about that, because he’s an amazing wood worker, to begin with.

SOUNDS LIKE YOU’RE ROLLING ALONG THE TRACK.

Yes, slowly but surely.  I guess because of the Tyvek, we just felt kind of stuck.  But now we’re moving ahead.