MOVING DAY!

Yesterday was moving day. I can't believe how many people showed up to help us move! People we know and love from both 2nd and 8th ward, and people from the 8th ward that I am sure will be our new friends. I asked Kylee to write down everyone's name so we could send thank you's but she and I didn't know them all. Brother Ashton brought over his huge trailer and loaded up the entire storage unit and brought it over to our new house. Of course, he had tons of help, but the huge trailer made for only one trip instead of many. Brother Empey and Steven made many trips and hooked up the washing machine and then came back and hooked up the stove and frig. They also helped with our food storage last week too. Sister Ashton brought over scones and Sister Hall brought over cookies. Everything was at our new house by about 10:30. Can you believe that??? We started around 8:30. So that was amazing.

Zach is having a crummy time. He is pretty depressed about having to change wards and Priest quorums and the funny little inside jokes they all have. I didn't think he was really close to many of them as he never hangs out with them, but apparently he just likes the fun they have together shoveling people's snow as a surprise, or going camping together, or scripture time by the Bishop during Sunday quorum meeting...

And then today is Kylee's birthday. The house is all in a jumble so I think we will be celebrating later. Oh well! Kaitlin was and still is stuck with that as her birthday was on November 1st and we were in CA then. We did go to Old Country Buffet and have cake and ice cream, but no presents as I did really shop while I was there other than to take David grocery shopping. So we owe a couple of girl's a birthday celebration. Perhaps we will have to surprise them with something. I don't know. I guess we will have to figure something out.

Kind of a Sad Day

We all got released from our callings at church yesterday. I guess that's it then. Time to move on. We haven't figured exactly when we are moving - still have cleaning to do and selling our house so... But it will be weird for everyone to just go to church and have no responsibility.

Look What We Got Today!

I met our builder, Ken Gale, out at our house this morning and received this from him as well as our new house keys. All of the inspections have been done, and we are ready to go. And all less than four months! There are a few things that Ken is going to still do like the tiles on the tub in the master bedroom haven't been installed yet, nor have the mirrors in the bathrooms gone up or the shower door. That is about it, except the parts that we need to do. We have clean-up and finish painting the girls bedroom are the things we have to do before moving in, and then some things we will do after we move in. Pretty exciting!

TAGGED!

Well that was a pain in the neck! I am an incompetent blogger and couldn't for the life of me figure out how to get this tag image onto my blog. I tried what I thought was the most logical quickest way to do it, but noooo... I had to make it into a jpeg and copy it into a folder and then find it on my computer and... And then I didn't like the way it looked so I had to do it again...So you can see I am pretty incompetent in this area. Plus I am not very successful in making links yet either, so we will see what happens when I go to try that at the end of this posting when I attempt to tag other people. I really need lessons - where is that enrichment class? And I have short term memory as now I can't remember what I am supposed to talk about in this tagging. What a way to start my day - already feel like a dork!

Okay - so step one says I am supposed to link to the person who tagged me. Well, my first attempt didn't work. And my second - and the help center told me it couldn't help me with my request, so now lets see. Hmmm. I have done this once before, so I should remember how this works. My friend who is making me struggle and work hard at something I am not good at, is actually appreciated as hopefully I will remember all about how to make links, since I have to make quite a few with this tagging.

The Next Day - finally to step two - I will get there yet. I almost forgot what I was supposed to do here since I got so sidetracked with my first sentence for the day. But I know - seven random or weird facts about myself. That is hard as I try hard not to be random or weird...unsuccessfully of course, but I do try to kid myself and my kids (and especially other people) that I am very stuffy and straight-laced and serious, and usually it works. So I guess that would count as my random fact number one, especially since there are only few people that know I am really super casual and laid-back and even weird.

Almost Day Number 3 - It will be in 30 minutes. Six more random facts.
- President Faust sat at my desk in my bedroom and conducted temple recommend interviews when we lived overseas.
- I would love to learn how to paint. My kids took a class and it looked like a lot of fun and some of my kids were very good at it too. Conner was just a toddler and I knew it wasn't practical at the time for me to take the class along with them, but I would like to some day.
- I bruise super easy. Practically if anyone looks at me cross-eyed I get a bruise.
- I very rarely get the hiccups. I usually swallow them and they are gone. This makes my kids and husband very mad as they get the hiccups rather frequently.
- I used to have an embalmed baby shark. We had dissected sharks when I was in seventh grade and the mother shark had four babies inside of her. I got to keep one, and my dad stuck it in embalming fluid. I had that shark in a jar for about 15 years or so.
- I am extremely afraid of heights. It even makes me nervous when someone else gets close to an edge and I can feel myself go into panic mode.

So that is it. Now I will have to see if I know enough people to tag that haven't been tagged. Looking at my list - I guess not, sorry guys, I haven't been blogging for very long so I really don't know that many people yet. I guess I will tag Rochelle. I had a few more people on my list, but the links weren't working and I am tired of playing so I am going to post this and be done.

The Story of Our House

We finally listed our house with a real estate agent this week. Kind of a sad moment for us. I just thought I would record the love story we have had for our home as it has been more to us than just a house. And this house must surely be loved as even though this house was built back in 1963, we are the second owners. The first ones lived here until quite a few years after her children were grown and raised and her husband had passed away. She moved to Seattle to live near her kids. But she was here for nearly 30 years, and we have been here for 17.

When we moved to the Tri-Cities in 1991 so Brad could work for Boeing we lived in a hotel for the first month and then moved to an "A" house after that. I began looking for a home for us to purchase and gave our real estate agent some specific guidelines as to what houses she could show me. The home needed to have a two car garage, needed to be at least 2000 square feet, and it needed to not be in Pasco. That was my only stipulations. She was very good at showing me exactly that. And nothing seemed to call out to me saying, "This is it." But lets back up a moment. Not having lived around here prior to 1991 and knowing nothing about the schools, wards, towns, etc. and wanting the best for my family, I prayed before I ever started my search for a home. I prayed that we would find the place to live where our family could grow the most in the gospel, and where we could serve the most and grow through our service. Michael was only 7, Courtney nearly 5, and Erin almost 3. I was homeschooling, so I didn't really care about the schools, but I had checked out Hanford High and knew the kids who graduated from their had the best GPA's and test scores and went to great colleges.

Day after day the real estate agent took me out to look at houses. I perused the newspaper and even picked up one of those free Land and Home magazines at the grocery store. I read it avidly and came to house that I thought might fit my family's needs and showed it to the realtor. She looked it up and said, "It doesn't have a two car garage, it only has 1901 square feet, and it is in PASCO." I told her then don't bother and she continued to show me other houses. Of course, they all began to blend together. We even looked into buying land and building ourselves, but we didn't really know anything about that so that was really questionable. Day after day after day, the house in the Land and Home magazine pestered me. Finally, I told my agent to take me to the house so I could get it out of my system. After seeing all of the storage, the great organization of the house, and all of the bookshelves and built-ins, I knew I had to show the house to Brad. We went back that night, he walked around the house and said, "This is our house." We gave an offer on the house, and moved in a month later. And as they say, the rest is history.

We have loved this house so much. So why are we leaving? I use to visit teach a sister in the nursing home. We often talked about her family that lived in another ward here in Pasco and it made me very sad, as they rarely came to visit her. She never got to go for a walk outside with her children or grandchildren, even before she became an invalid. She lived there for many years until she passed away. It was always sad for me to go there to see her as I could see how sad she was. After talking to Brad, we decided that as long as we were capable, that was not going go be our family. We wanted to be able to have a place where Brad's folks could come, or my mom or my brother, or whomever. We began looking at homes through out the Tri-Cities, but wanting to stay in Pasco and never could find a house with as much storage as we have here, and still be able to have an extra room or two for other family members to come live with us. Every house that we saw we would have to use the extra rooms for the food storage, etc. We invited a contractor to look at our home and discussed adding on an upstairs, or an extra room instead of our covered deck, or even digging out a basement. He strongly suggested we not doing any of those options as it is too expensive and we would never make any money on it when we went to sell years later. We even bought a piece of land on Road 56 and held onto that for a few years before selling it. Finally after praying again, we jumped at buying the land off of Road 76 and began building. We aren't doing anything fancy, just somewhere that if we ever need to have a place for our family to come live, we have a spot for them.

So, it has been with much trepidation that we have finally put our home on the market. If you know of anyone who is looking for a home with lots of storage (we have a storage room with shelves and a work bench, built in book cases in the computer room and family room, built in cubbies in the family room, an attic with pull down ladder, a crawl space that we have shelves in for our food storage - and plenty of space for a couple of buckets to be stacked on top of each other), pull out drawers inside the kitchen cupboards, storage closet on the back deck, 3 bedrooms, 1 1/2 baths, 2 carports, and by the way - we had the house measured - it is actually 2113 square feet, not including the attic or crawl space.

Best of all - we have the best ward! Even with all of the changes in the stake I am so sad to leave behind this ward. My older kids have grown up here and have great memories. Zach (16), Kylee (13), Kaitlin (11), and Conner (6) were all born in this ward and some are reluctant about leaving behind their teachers, friends, etc. I know we aren't moving far away, but this has been home. We have loved Pasco 2nd ward and they have been so good to our family. My children's testimonies and mine have all been strengthened here. We have really grown strong in the gospel. My prayers were truly answered in our move to this house that we thought wasn't even on our prospect list.

Our neighbors are great too. Just last winter, I was out cracking snow and ice from the road so I could go pick up my kids from school and my non-member neighbor from across the street came over and helped me. Whenever we have need help, or had to borrow a tool, or whatever, our neighbors are there for us. When we went on our month long RV trip, the neighbors kept an eye on our house and made sure everything was safe, turning lights on and off, mowing the grass, etc. They have always been like this. What more could you ask for!

So if you know of someone looking for a great ward - a starting out family, or a retired couple, someone looking for simple and homey, head them our direction. We would love for them to love our home.

Jumbled Pictures

The back patio - Brother Bassett's work
The front walk way - Brother Bassett again.
The master bath - you can see more of the detail of the cabinets.
The kitchen.
Conner was concerned that we would not remember what the key to our new house looks like, so he took a picture of it in case we lose it.
This looks pretty bad - I was trying to do something else, but am now too tired to fix this so I am going to just let it go, because I don't really care right now.

Before and After

I had permission by the owner of these photos to post them on our blog. I know they aren't related to the house or anything, but this way I will have a record. This is the before:




And this is after:



I told her she should tell everyone she got in a fight and the other guy looks worse than her...Actually she was out in the backyard and was attacked by a wasp or a yellow jacket. It stung her multiple times around the eye on Sunday afternoon, then hid in her hair and was climbing around there too. A different one stung her stomach - but he only got her once. It began swelling last night, but wasn't too bad. She woke up this AM and her eye was completely swollen shut. Brad took her to the doctor and they gave her steroids and three different pills she is supposed to take for a week with one of them being a steroid (told her she couldn't be in the Olympics for a while), and one being nearly as big as a horse pill. She takes one one time a day, one twice a day, and one four times a day. Also she now has an epi-pen that she needs to take with her and use if she gets stung and begins to have an allergic reaction. Remember Pure Luck? It is just like when Martin Short gets stung - if Kaitlin can't breathe, she is supposed to stick herself in the leg with the epi-pen and then go to the hospital. We were given two of these - one for wherever Kaitlin is and one for school. She may not have an allergic reaction as severe as this ever again, they figure it was because there were multiple stings. I will take her back tomorrow so the doctor can check to make sure the swelling is going down. I can already tell it is as she can open her right eye just slightly now. When I went to Win Co tonight I bought a bag of chocolate eye balls as a treat. YUM!

To Spokane and Back - Excuses

I have great excuses as to why I have been absent. After going to Michael's graduation down at BYU-Provo, we brought Courtney and Will and all of their stuff up here to Washington. We unloaded most of their things into our RV - who knew it would make a great storage unit! And then they stayed with us for a few weeks until their apartment was ready for them in Cheney. Erin flew down to Provo on September 1st and Brad moved the Keeler's up to Cheney on the 6th. We had lots of fun - playing games, going to Silverwood, just visiting, shopping, getting ready for school, etc. Zach had stayed in Provo to spend time with Michael and to go to Education Week. He flew to Spokane - his first airplane flight - on August 23rd. So in that time period we went to or through Spokane four times.

We did check on the progress of our house periodically during that time period and here are a few pictures from then: The Master Bath Tub
Our Pantry
Stair Well
From the back door across the family room and the stairwell at the back.
The Front of the House with the beginning of a front porch.
It was nice to see walls instead of just studs. From the time we left Courtney and Will up in Cheney we have been working like crazy. We had to spend time picking out light fixtures (that is an extremely boring date), and picking out paint for both the inside and outside of our house. We had picked a friendly yellow for our outside but the painter said that we won't be happy with that particular color in a few years as it fades in a short time, so we went with a gray color. I also met with the closet guy and we figured out what we wanted for each closet - just basic stuff, we aren't very fancy. Then Brad and I have spent nearly every spare minute at the house painting doors, closets and trim and baseboards, and the living room and the girls bedroom for the past two weeks. The doors we sprayed except for the pantry door, but everything else we rolled with rollers. It sure seems like we are short the pocket door that goes into the living room so I don't know if we still have that or not, and I have about 20 more baseboards to paint. Who knew there could be soooo many and they need at least two coats of paint.



Our kitchen cabinets got delivered to the garage one of the days I was there painting. (Also the bathrooms and laundry cabinets as well.) They just kept on going and going and I thought the trailer would never empty.


Every time we go out to the house Conner uses the facility. Figured this was good bribe/embarrassing moment when bringing home dates type info.
Our Painted House
We actually have a street sign so people don't have to wonder where Jacobs Lane is any longer.
Conner's first day at MCP - he is so excited to be able to go to real school and wishes it was every day instead of once a week. I guess he hasn't learned about homework yet!

Been Chastized

I have been chastized from quite a few people about not keeping up the progress of our house. We have actually had a lot going on so I will just run through it and give my excuses and apologize.

After my last update we took turns having the flu. And of course, no one had it at the same time. So it took two weeks to get it out of our system. I had to do a walk thru with the electrician and tell him where we want outlets, phone jacks, satelitte cables, lights and switches. Sure glad the electrician knows what he is doing as he was able to give lots of pointers as I don't really don't have much experience in making those kinds of decisions.

Then just as we were getting ready to go to Utah, the plumber at our new house said the garden tub we had picked out wouldn't fit inside the spot, so we had to go and pick out a different tub. Then he told us it would be much easier for us later if we put in the tub/shower in the unfinished bathroom in the basement now instead of later as then he can hook it up and test for the water pressure with that in place as well. So then we went and bought a tub and shower at Home Depot. That in itself was an adventure! We needed to have a two or three piece tub in order to get it down the stairs, so we got one that was two pieces, but at Home Depot they are already screwed together, so of course it wouldn't fit into the back of our van. If they were seperated we could put one half in at a time and take two trips. We didn't have any tools and Home Depot said we couldn't take it apart at their store anyway. Since it was almost closing time we went home and then the next morning (Tuesday the 12th) - before Erin and Brad went off to work, we invited Zach to go with us, all went to Home Depot using a borrowed truck. Once there we loaded the tub/shower unit into the back of the truck and then tied it down, but still had Erin and Zach sit in the back of the truck to hold down the fiberglass tub to keep it from tipping over. They reported that there was no movement, but it was rather chilly. Once out at our house, we struggled to unscrew the screws, except for Zach who seemed to have a knack for it and was able to unscrew the screws alone, while the rest of us were making each screw a two-man job. Then we carried each piece into the house and down the stairs and put it into the right spot. Boy was it a tight squeeze! It fit exactly right - no room to spare, so it was tricky putting it in, but we managed with Erin manhandling the tub and forcing it into the right spot.

Later that same day we left for our trip to Utah. We went down there for two reasons, the main one being to attend Michael's graduation from BYU, and the secondary one to pack up and bring Courtney and Will up here to Washington as they will be going to grad school at Eastern in Cheney. The graduation was great - I will post pictures later and packing and driving up here went relatively smoothly but we didn't get home until very late Saturday night. We were able to unload their truck and stored most of their stuff in our old RV until it is time to take them up to Cheney.

Then we had to get school schedules and do some school shopping, so I have been a bit busy. Before our trip to Utah, we also celebrated Conner's birthday. His birthday was actually the day of graduation, but we told him we wouldn't be able to do much fun things for him , so he chose to celebrate on the Sunday before. He wanted a pinata, so Conner and I made a pinata - a panda bear - with Todd as our model. It turned out really cute, and Conner loved breaking it open and getting tons of candy.

Most of the siding is on - it is pretty heavy duty, the front porch is up but not the banister for it, and the house has lots of wiring running through the walls. The AC/Heater systme is almost in. So progress is being made. Plus we finally figured out what color we wanted the outside of the house to be painted and what kind of rock we want to have installed on the outside. Much of the progress left to do is inside so changes on the outside will mostly be minimal. Here is the last picture I took there:

Bored and Cleaning

Dad has kept us busy cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. We have been glad dad goes to work everyday so we could have a break. And it was nice to have to take the kids to the park for swimming lessons, so I wouldn't have to clean, clean, clean. Are you getting the picture that we have been cleaning? Not just cleaning, but scrubbing, polishing, and disinfecting. We put the house up for sale this week. Just stuck the sign up on the front lawn, and now we need to advertise. I will have to get to that this upcoming week. It really seemed sad the first day to see a for sale sign on our front lawn. Now it doesn't bother me in the least. I took pictures of both the inside and outside of the house so we will have those for advertising, but I won't bore you with those as you have seen this house. But it is exceptionally clean. I do need to do the outer windows, but I even cleaned the window sill tracks. Well, enough about that boring stuff. Except we did go over to the new house and clean there too. We just went through the throw away pile and pulled out the good enough to make shelves wood and carried it to the back of the lot. We figured we paid for the wood already, why not put it to use later. Then we also cleaned up a bunch of junk that has been sitting around and began sweeping, but that is really a lost cause until we get all the windows and doors in. Speaking of which, some of the windows are in, and the shingles were begun to be put on today. Our builder is really good and didn't want just some old cheapy shingles on our roof, but the roofing company didn't have 40 year shingles in stock, so we ended up with 50 year shingles. So that is really good. Ken really likes to keep a tight schedule. Here are the latest pictures taken just today. The front of the house, the back of the house, and beginning to shingle.

It Looks Like a House

We all went out to the land on Saturday evening before the Pioneer Day Broadcast. Zach was a bit reluctant - "How long are we going to be there?" "Are the workers going to be there too?" Only a short time - we have to be back to watch the broadcast, and no it is Saturday, a day off. So we all went out and it kind of caught everyone by surprise as to how much work has been done.


This is inside the garage. There are support boards all around in case a strong wind blows through and knocks everything down before all of the support in the house has been built. The kids thought it looked like an artful mess and wanted a picture of it.

Conner parked Todd here and he sat there in the hallway as we toured the house. Then Conner wanted me to take a picture of Todd and I invited Conner to be in the picture. We can actually walk through now and identify rooms and closets and such, so it is kind of fun.

Trusses

We went over Wednesday after swimming lessons and lunch and watched the trusses being put up. The kids were kind of bored. Zach took a nap in the back seat after reading his book for a while. Kylee, Kaitlin, and Conner walked down to the river and explored. Then we had a hard time finding them as Road 76 doesn't exactly go all the way to the river. We thought they might have walked to Chiawana Park as that is what Conner wanted to do, but we didn't find them there so we finally returned to our land and the kids were waiting for us there. They had walked back while we had driven to the park. Oh well. So here are some pictures I took that day.

All of the trusses come pre-built on a truck. The truck has a crane attachment that it uses to load a bundle of trusses to the top of the house. The construction workers then put them in place standing and walking along the top of the house as you will see in the next picture. I would be a nervous wreck walking up there on the beams and then hammer and saw while up there as well.


There goes the first truss.

The whole house is all trussed up. It goes a lot faster than you would imagine. I could stay all day every day and watch our house being built as I think it is fascinating. I wouldn't get anything done all day. When the sewer was being put in at the house we live in right now, the street was all dug up and pipes were laid, and we canceled our normal school day and sat in the front yard and watched. The workers would come over and visit with us periodically and tell us what was going on and we shared our ice cold lemonade with them. It was really a fun school day.

Not Much Time

I thought I would at least put out the latest pictures. We are busy getting ready for the 24th of July ward activity. This year we are BOO-HOO-ING as we once again aren't going to Memorial Pool. Last year we just skipped the ward activity and just went swimming anyway, but this year the activity committee assigned different groups to be in charge of a booth. High Priests have to create a forge and show how to blacksmith, so dad has gone and learned a few basics, but not many other high priests have volunteered to help him, so he may be stuck there the entire time. The Relief Society was asked to tie quilts so I am not sure how many sisters will be there to help, so I will need to check in and see how much I am needed after setting up stuff beforehand. So I may or may not be there the entire time, but I have made two quilt tops in the past two days, cutting the squares, figuring out a pattern, and then sewing them up. One even has a border. Zach and Kylee are supposed to help with the Mutual booth. Most of the mutual kids probably won't help, so they will probably be stuck there almost the whole time. Their booth is where people can put on old-fashioned clothes and have their pictures taken. Then Kaitlin was asked to help with the Primary booth, which is fishing, where you throw the fishing pole over a wall and get a prize. So... Dad was going to invite someone, but decided it would be hard to hang out with your guest if you are having to work a booth the whole time - so there goes that missionary opportunity.


This is the back of the house.

This is a side view of the house, from the Moon's side.

This is the front of the house, with the garage all cemented in and inside walls beginning to be built.

Ken just called and said they are putting the trusses on this afternoon, so we will go over and watch that and then I will have to post some more pictures.

One Wall

We have one wall. Granted it is only a garage wall, but one wall nevertheless.

We Are Above Ground!

Kylee, Kaitlin, Conner and I went out to the land on Thursday afternoon. We invited Zach to join us and he declined saying he didn't want to go out very often so that each time he goes out he is surprised at the changes. So here are a few pictures.

The framing has just begun. Only the front has been framed as you can see from this inside shot.
The kids looking through a front bedroom window. They wanted to climb in through the windows but I didn't want them banging anything around so I made them go through the front door.

Floors

When we went out to the house yesterday, one of the workers was out there with his two grandson's. He says he has them help him every summer so they will know how important it is to do well in high school and go on to college. The boys agreed that construction work is hard and hot work.

I guess the basement is nice and cool now, with the floor above it all in. The stair well frame is in but no stairs yet.

Hopefully more pictures tomorrow. We wanted to go out tonight, but Brad is fixing someone's roof tonight, Erin is in charge of the Young Adult book group, and Zach and Kylee are at Mutual. So we will wait until tomorrow to go take a look. We are all real excited!

Walls But No Ceiling

I was talking to Michael the other day and he said that Conner had told him via this that our house had walls but no ceiling. So Michael was a bit confused thinking that the house was farther along than the blog shows. Conner just meant basement walls and there wasn't anything overhead so of course there isn't a ceiling. While Erin was climbing out of the basement, she said that it sure "seems weird to climb up to get out." Our builder chastised us this past week when he asked if we had been out to see what was going on and we had told him we hadn't been out the entire week. He said they have done tons of stuff and that we should be out there every day taking pictures as it is at this point that the changes are noticeable, whereas later, it will seem like nothing is getting done as the little pieces that complete the house are time consuming. So I guess we will do better.
Do you remember the last of our mountains that I showed last time? Well here is the same picture with Conner on top and then one with Conner and Zach playing King of the Hill. Zach told Conner that he was the king since he is the tallest and closer to to the top of the hill, so Conner would have to be queen. That didn't make him happy. Conner isn't happy about that role when we play the card game Scum either. He always wants to be King.


This first picture is taken from the front of the house. The next few pictures are from down inside the basement.






This is the family standing in the stairwell down in the basement. Zach informed us that everyone must stand in height order - note that he is standing the farthest back.

So the framing of the basement is done. They also are working on the ceiling of the basement, or the floor of the house, whichever you prefer to call it. The far right corner of the picture shows where the floor is and we can look over it into the basement.


The family sitting on the edge of the front of the house, about where the front porch will be, and Conner, under the sawhorse. I guess I will have to go out more often since soon we will be able to see something above ground level I would imagine. Sorry this was so long.