Perserverance

Most of the men are still here ... they had originally planned to go back last night ... but they wanted to stay and finish the job. Crazy. Seriously. But, I pray that the Lord does bless each one abundantly for their hard work. It's just amazing to watch them work hard day after day - smiling, laughing and picking at each other. Every morning, bright and early, they are back at it again.

I hadn't shown you a picture of Josh working at brick laying yet - here he is. He is the one who organized the crew and has done an excellent job of keeping things rolling. He is also giving up spending time with his beautiful family to be here with us. A million thanks, Josh! And, a million thanks to you, too, Tricia for holding the home front while he is here.




Did you know he did this, Tricia? :)


Progress continues to go extremely well. They have the full house wrapped and are working on the tower.


Ben - I need to brag on him to his wife. He is cooking breakfast for the guys each morning (they are in a cabin about 3/4 mile away)! Someone also washed and cleaned my crock pot for me - rumors have it that it was Ben. Tom has also been a huge help it sounds like - waking the crew, doing dishes, etc.


Benny - pettibone driver, scaffolding setting, mud mixing, sitcom tune singing, animal loving, hard working dude. We kind of wondered why Mercy and Lilly weren't eating their dog food ... Benny has been feeding them snacks :)



My artsy shot - I was trying to blur the foreground ...


Current progress (as of a couple of hours ago).


Rance has been doing a great job of acid-washing the house to clean up the excess mortar. I offered to help, but he told me that I could have an easy day today :)


See? Before on the left of the quoin corner - after on the right. Cool, huh?


The reveal!!! This is the back of the house - acid-washed and scaffold free. Whoo-hoo!


Two sides COMPLETELY finished!


Just for fun ... bugs just grow bigger in AL - here is a bumblebee taking residence on the water cooler.

I have wanted to post every day for the sake of the loved ones back home, but baseball/softball games have interfered. In fact, right now, John is at a softball game with Savannah or I wouldn't be getting this post finished :)

I can't say it enough - Thank you for letting your loved ones come and now thank you for letting them stay! I told each of them that they were crazy for staying :)

Oops - gotta go do my popsicle delivery!