Progress!

House progress:
The final pieces for our puzzle arrived on Friday morning. John had put in extra time earlier in the week at the prison, so he was able to be home to work. We spent a good part of the day sawing, drilling, doing more sawing and more drilling :) Then, we decided to prove the concept that John designed. It went together very nicely!! It was actually easier than I was anticipating to put it all together. We are planning on doing "sandwich" concrete walls for the basement level floor. The insulation will be embedded in the wall, so we will end up with finished concrete walls inside and out.

Below is a picture of the test forms that we put together. The pink insulation in the inside is just pieces for now - we will have roughly 4x4 sections in the final form. Also, we will need to add rebar reinforcement for the final pour. It's EXCITING!!! John still has roughly 480 more holes to drill (he has done about 240 so far), then we will be able to start putting it all together. We are also planning on doing a test pour underneath the stairwell to see how the form holds up under the pressure of the wet concrete.




Here's the huge stack of pink insulation. They are forecasting high winds because of Tropical Storm Fay - we have tied down the insulation, but hopefully we won't have to go and hunt it down all over the mountain!


Garden progress:
Here's the first ripe cantaloupe (and yes, it is ripe :).


It tastes really yummy, but it's in the fridge right now chilling.


Blog progress:
I am so excited to share with you that my hubby started a blog to track our building progress! Pop on over and visit him and say hi if you have a chance. I teased him about his sidebar picture, but he likes it for good reason. :)

Soccer progress:
We had our opening day pictures and games. It was really "iffy" whether we were going to have games or not because it was sprinkling outside, but they decided to go ahead and play. Thankfully, the rain didn't really start until after we were close to being finished. My team did SUPER - I was so proud of them. And, the most important thing is that they looked like they were having a blast! I just can't be thankful enough for my great group of kids. We didn't take the camera today because of the rain, but I will hopefully have some pictures to post soon. Savannah did great - she naturally navigates towards being a defensive player, but she did score a goal! I think everyone on my team scored once except one little fella who was soooo close on about 3 tries. Next game, I am certain he will get one.

Unfortunately, the way the games timed out this morning, I missed Hadden's entire game :( Our game was late getting started and his started on time. John said he did a good job playing. He was in tears most of the practice on Thursday night, so I was worried about him - he is a perfectionist and wants to do things perfectly. We practiced outside in the dirt last night and he was doing well. Today when we got home, he said he wanted to play some more today ... unfortunately, dirt and rain don't make for a good playing field :) At least he wanted to play.


Proverbs 1:7 The fear of the LORD is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline.

Have a great weekend!
Shirley