We didn't get much done this break.  We had been looking forward to being very productive and having lots of fun with family but - well - things were really just pretty subdued.

Bryan spent most of his work hours during break trying to fix the upstairs shower.  To avoid spending another hundred dollars for shower bits, he took the downstairs shower out and re-used the practically new fixtures.  It was proving to be a freeze risk anyway, that far out from the main part of the cellar and on the very outer wall of this poorly insulated section of the house.  So he finally got the plumbing done, moved some wiring that was in an inappropriate spot related to said plumbing and replaced some of the small plastic bits inside the fixtures which were causing lots of dripping.  We have a shower upstairs now and we are all excited about how awesome the bathroom is going to be when we are done but it was very frustrating to spend so much time fussing with something that should have been fairly quick and easy instead of making progress in other areas of the room and the house.  We keep discovering more and more areas where the cold sneaks through and the warmth escapes.  We're generally cold just about everywhere in the house except the upstairs bathroom, right in front of the woodstove or in the LR when the fireplace is running.  Propane is expensive, though. 

We did get to play with lots of friends and family over break and we did a lot of much needed relaxing but we still didn't see everyone that we really wanted to see.  We didn't spend much time with my mom (but she did get to visit my sister in Rochester for the first Christmas any of us has been able to spend with her in many years - which is great!)  and I missed my dad's unexpected visit before Christmas because I was at work.  We didn't get over to my brother's house at all.  I still have three undelivered gifts under the tree.  

We did enjoy having people over for Christmas day and we discovered that the pool table - excuse me - billiards table make an excellent banquet table when covered with plywood and a nice table cloth.  Lots of elbow room for 12 people!  The kitchen was functional and lots of good food was enjoyed in spite of not having a dishwasher, kitchen cupboards or a counter top.  The South Studio was sealed off with plastic and made an excellent walk-in-fridge for all the leftovers.

If anything, Christmas break showed us just how over extended we are in general.  We're trying to re-organize our priorities a bit but that is hard when the thing that takes up the biggest chunk of our free time is Bryan's commute. 

We'll work it out.  It's January with February at the door.  Things always feel bleaker than they really are in this part of Winter territory.

Maxx took an immediate liking to the Nativity set again this year.  I had to scold him several times for taking the nice set off the window sill and playing with it with his action figures.

Then one day I walked into the living room to find this.  Apparently he thought Baby Jesus needed a bodyguard.

Here are the kids hanging their socks by the new fireplace.  I was hoping to get a photo of Ziggy enjoying it but ummm... well, it has a thermostat and turns itself on and off so one day he was lying there enjoying the residual warmth when it came back on.  Now getting him to relax near it is hard.  He looks at me as if to say  "No way, Crazy Lady.  I'll just get nicely to sleep and it will make that big 'FWOOFH!" noise with the flames and everything.  It might eat me."

He likes his new squeaky bone, though.















. . . .

Those little cows in the corner there are NOT Great Grampa Stark's.  They were Gramma Bea's cows.  One of them, Inky, was sold to pay the taxes on the farm one year.  It was a big, fat, unhappy, hairy deal.  Gramma was heartbroken.  And Angry.  It was the only fight my mom remember her parents having.

Poor Inky.  Poor Gramma Bea.


In other news, Christmas is still coming.  The fireplace is in and works wonderfully.  I have to clean the house today.  Wish me luck!

Ready or not!

Bry took a personal/sick day on Friday so that he could make it to a doctor's appt. for his wrist and knee and get some extra work done on the house.  So we had a long weekend, including a nice relaxing Sabbath being iced in.

Here's what we (well, Bryan, really) accomplished last week and this weekend :

He ripped out the shower downstairs (it froze last week when the temp got down to a shivery 0 degrees)  that space will now become more studio storage.  Yay!   Then he spent several hours replacing insulation that was moved out of the way during wiring and pluming projects and spraying several cans of Great Stuff in holes, cracks and gaps.  This raised the overall temperature in the South Studio by 10 or 15 degrees and made the upstairs and living room noticeably warmer.  Hooray!

He finished the insulation in the Living Room and got most of the wallboard up and the outlets for the Living Room wired.  So now we can put in a Christmas tree and hang lights and stuff.   The tree will go in the corner near the big window.  The ugly TV will go upstairs for the season.

He also got the space for our gas fireplace framed up with backer board in place and ready for tile.  Our oil company is coming on Tuesday to install a new gas line and hook it up.  It will be a wonderful addition to the house, making the living room very cozy when we want to cuddle and read or watch a movie there and it will be a big help when we need to let the big woodstove go out so that we can empty the coals - usually once every week & a half or two weeks.  Eventually Bry will build a nice mantle around and above the fireplace which will include a place to hang stockings, shelves for books, movies and/or trinkets and (someday when we can afford it) a flat screen TV hidden behind a mirror.

He got a good start on the installation for the upstairs shower.  (We're currently on sponge baths or charity showers at Mom & Dad's or Jonathan & Nichelle's!)   Hopefully later this week we will have either the shower or the bathtub ready to use in the upstairs bathroom.  Oh - one other little piece of wonderful news - the Upstairs Bathroom is the most comfortable room in the house in terms of warmth.  You can get warm fast in front of the Fisher Stove down here in the studio but it is a rotisserie style of warmth - you need to keep turning to get warm everywhere!  But the bathroom has a nice, cozy and even ambient temperature.

Molly has been making these wonderful 20 point Moravian Stars (see top photo) all weekend out of some gorgeous card stock I bought a while back.  You can find instructions on how to make these stars in several places - we found ours on Jenny Harada's blog.  She advises using old Christmas cards but Molly wanted to make lots and have them be look like they belonged together so a packet of color & pattern coordinated card stock is perfect.  I buy that stuff to use as background for me bead and jewelry photos so I only need one of each nice sheet, the packets usually have 3-4 of each pattern so everyone wins!
And yesterday we took a wander out back and cut our tree.  That was fun - there was lots of slush under the snow under the layer of ice.

Check in later this week for more decorations.  It's still rough in here but I'm sure the kids will make it festive!




. . . .

The bad news:

It is cold.  Very cold.  The windows are not finished being framed in yet so all the warmth from the house pours out from around the windows on one side of the house, being replaced by cold pouring in from the opposite side of the house.  Most of the doors have big gaps where cold air screams through, too.

So basically, we're cold.  Very cold.

The shower pipes froze last night.

By turning off the pump in order to address the frozen pipes issue, we have discovered that the steady trickle of water coming into the basement is not ground water seeping in but rather is water being pulled up the pipe by the pump and spilling out through a crack in said pipe somewhere between the house and the well.  Luckily for us this discovery was made After the ground was frozen and there is 2 feet of snow on top of it.  Good Times.

The good news:

Bryan was NOT killed by a stupid driver who pulled out right in front of him this morning on his way to work.  (That pretty much trumps all that other bad news up there.  I'm unbelievably thankful for that.)

The upstairs bathroom now looks like these photos and actually is a little bit warmish.  Bry is actively working on getting the shower installed upstairs ASAP.  The downstairs shower is no longer a viable option because, obviously, it freezes too easily.

There is now a drier in the upstairs bathroom.  (Thank you, Neighbors Tabors!)







P.S.  Sorry that these photos are a bit sea-sick.  The lighting is really weird up there and I was being quick with the camera.










. . . .

We've been a bit overwhelmed lately.  I don't even have time to spell it all out - suffice it to say that it is getting cold and we Still haven't had time to finish the soffits and fascia on the new roof or get the new windows framed in and insulated.  Rather uncomfortable, really.

BUT.  The Ft. Jackson house has sold.  Woo Hoo!  We're not going to make any money on it but a family has moved in - he is a construction contractor and she loves the house so all is well there. 

We have re-thought our color scheme for downstairs - again.  One thing we have learned is that you NEVER buy paint until the very end.

(Does anyone want to buy two huge buckets of pale blue paint?)

Because our plan for the layout of the downstairs has changed slightly and because the cabinets we had priced and planned for last winter are no longer available, we have had to re-think our whole plan for the downstairs.  I'll tell all in another post once I've got caught up with the mess in this house (it is truly amazing how much volume the cabinets in the Ft.Jackson house were hiding!) but in the meantime - here is a short overview of our color scheme:

Kitchen walls - Dark teal (yes, really)

Living Room walls - that dusty pink and/or the chocolate brown - tile work with will be done in that faux aged stone tile with a few decorative tiles thrown in.

Cabinetry and Built-ins in both rooms - pale mustard yellow with that dark formica flecked with gold and teal for the counter tops.

Ceilings - the paler yellow

Paprika Curtains in the LR, teal throw pillows and other accents, something lightweight and cream or kitchen curtains.

We hope to have at least some of it done before Christmas!

O.K.  Time for some real life work.  (The color chips look so much better in real life - I've played with the color balance but digital cameras just don't manage blues against reds very well.)

Trenton is unimpressed.