Even More Walls!

Mud room, laundry room, master bed, bath & closet completed

Dining room openings are done!

End of day: dining room plus walls for Tom’s office done!

More Walls!

More walls went up today! Jessalyn is standing in the doorway to the mud room. To the right is the doorway to a short hall, by which you find the doorway to the master bedroom.

Home Construction Update

Tom and Stephen have been very busy working on the house. For those of you who don’t know, these two are building the house all by themselves! They’ll hire a crew to frame and shingle the roof, but that’s it. The exterior walls are finally completed! Lumber was delivered yesterday and they started working on framing the interior walls. They finished the kids’ bedroom walls and the bathroom wall today!

Looking through the master bathroom window (yesterday).

Stephen, left, standing in the kids’ bathroom and Tom standing in Jessalyn’s bedroom.

Looking back (from about where Tom & Stephen were standing) into the kitchen, master bedroom and master bathroom. The doorway to the right goes onto the screened porch.

View from the back of the house. The three windows are in the master bedroom, and to the left is the porch.

Front porch and entrance.

Interior walls now in place (today). Large opening is for a pocket door. Kids’/guest bathroom is directly in front of door. Bedrooms are on either side of the bathroom.

View from the front porch down our driveways.

View from the front porch looking away from the main driveway.

View from street looking up our driveways (driveway to left leads to the garage, driveway to right allows you to park in front of the house).

Rendering of what the exterior will look like.

Rainy Day Picnic

It was sprinkling a couple of days ago, so Jessalyn got in her rain gear to play outside. I don’t know if the fact that we had just watched “Singing in the Rain” inspired her to take this jaunt or not. She thought it was so funny that Gene Kelly was dancing and singing in the rain, especially when he jumped around in the puddles. After playing in the rain for awhile, she thought it was perfect weather for a picnic. So, picnic basket in hand, along with a yogurt to snack on, she headed back outside and enjoyed the relatively cool weather, the sprinkles, and the covered swing. Lee was forced to stay inside (which he was unhappy about), but he managed to make his own fun.

Taggie

Jessalyn likes to dress her stuffed animals up. Actually, she loves to dress her stuffed animals up. All of her favorite animals (her favorite changes daily....I’m usually greeting first thing in the morning with “Mama, today _______ is my favorite!”) have worn all of her dollies’ clothes at one time or another. She even has a teddy bear which Maka and Grandandy have bought outfits for (fairy with wings, rudolph and ballerina outfits). And while that teddy gets to wear the outfits, so do the other animals (“Mama, sharing is a nice thing to do,” Jessalyn has told me more than once). I’m often faced with the undaunting task of making clothes for her animals (“Mama, can you make ________ a dinosaur/octopus/halloween/some other impossible costume?”). While Jessalyn was on her Rudolph kick, which lasted for several months, she even made antlers and red noses for some of her animals.

Bambie, left, with red nose and antlers

Wooly with antlers, collar and saddle

Her all-time favorite lovey, though, is her blanket, “Taggie,” so named for all the tags encircling the blanket. She’s loved Taggie since we gave it to her in her babyhood. 

And although she now sometimes goes weeks without needing Taggie, she eventually declares “Taggie is my favorite now!” So I guess I shouldn’t have been too surprised when Jessalyn decided that Taggie needed some clothes, too, and promptly dressed her in a diaper and a dress!

It looks like Lee is carrying on the blanket tradition, since he is usually in the company of his own Blankie. I wonder if he’ll be dressing his blanket up as super heros in a few years...

Hopscotch!

Jessalyn decided she wanted to play hopscotch this morning. So we got out the sidewalk chalk and drew out the game. Lee was quite excited about hopscotch, too. Actually, he was excited about the chalk! Our game was interrupted a few times by stray rolie polies, which Jessalyn promptly rescued from being smushed.

The organizer

Rolie Polie Rescue

Rolie Polie

Summer Fun

Hard at Play

Hard at Work

Jessalyn has been eyeing a certain stuffed animal at the store...a cow wearing a hood. She really, really, really wanted it. Not that she needs one more stuffed animal. “But I don’t have a cow,” she told me many times. So, in order to earn some money to buy the $3 cow, we told Jessalyn she’d have to do some jobs. She loved the idea right away. “Mama, how do you spell ‘fire fighter?’” A minute later, she proudly showed me a piece of paper with “fire fighter” written on it. “That’s the job I want. I’ll be a fire fighter, and then they can give me money, and then I can buy the cow!” Hmmm. Great idea, but not an immediate solution to her problem. I explained to her that it takes a long time to be a fire fighter, that you have to be a grown up and go to fire fighter school. “Well, I can go to the fire station and help them put on their uniforms. They can pay me for that!” Disappointed that that idea probably wouldn’t work out either, she moved back to her piece of paper. “Mama, how do you spell ‘nurse?’”

A few careers later, we came up with weeding in the back yard. She was pretty enthusiastic about it, even if she did do a lot of dawdling and rolie polie searching. Later that afternoon, we headed to the store where, after surveying all the animals wearing hoods, she decided that the cow was still the best choice!

Pulling weeds

We had  no idea anything besides weeds would grow back there!

The prize!

Fourth of July

We went to Nashville for the weekend to visit my brother and his family. It was very far (the kids traveled great, though!), very loud (4 kids in one house, what do you expect?), and very fun! The morning after we returned home, Jessalyn declared that she was ready to go back again. I think we’ll wait more than 14 hours before taking another 9 hour trip!

Lee (15.5m), Jessalyn (5), Charlotte (12.5m), Anna Grace (4)

Lee and Charlotte

George and Lee

Jessalyn riding a pony!

Lee and Charlotte

Charlotte & Jenny

Lee swinging

Everybody swinging!

Jessalyn & Anna Grace in the princess castle

Sweet angels ready for bed