A Light at the end of the tunnel...............

Here is a picture of our street all torn up. It isn't nearly as big of a mess as I had imagined it would be. It's just like living on a dirt road and it will sure be nice when it is finished in October.



As you can see our decks are really coming along. They look beautiful! And Jim has started the yard clean-up. He has been working soooooo hard.





In fact we had some old friends stop by for dinner Tuesday night (Stub and Grub). It was good to see them back, they are the raccoons who came all last summer with their two babies!

Jim and Woody did an awesome job on the plumbing and electrical. Tuesday the contractors come to start on the furnace and the tankless water heater. Then the real mess begins in the house.

Some of you have asked if we have been stressed about the construction. Here is what the yard looks like. NO WE HAVEN'T HAD AN EARTHQUAKE the yard is a disaster! It can only get better, well maybe not for awhile we just got notice from the city of Big Bear that starting Monday our entire street will be dug up down to the dirt and repaved. The only light I can see at the end of the tunnel is vacation. Well I'll let you know how it goes this week I'm sure you will see some progress.

Our newest update............

This is Jim and Woody working on the plumbing for the utility room. Notice the big hole in the floor, They cut that so they could fit under the house to move all the pipes. I'm not sure how fast they are coming along but I'm sure they have all the right tools!



This is the crew we hired to replace all the decks. We were a little worried when on the fiirst day only one person showed up to work. He worked all day tearing out all the old deck on the back of the house then the next day the whole crew arrived and they were incredible. They got all the concrete foundations in and the under structure. It will be done in two more weekends they said.





Oh, and by the way we found that under the back deck we have had some type of animal living there. When the old deck came off we found a large hole dug and several feet from it alot of crap. Big crap we are guessing either a litter of coyotes or the raccoons the visited the front door all last summer. It was a litter of two babies and a mama and papa. They would be grown now and the hole hadn't been visited recently. I hope they come back to raise more young.

Here is the first update, Jim and his brother Woody tore everything out. Tomorrow they will begin the plumbing.



Here is what I worked on today. The picture frames for Michel and Arayna. I hope they like them for Michael's room.

IT HAS BEGUN...........

For those of you who didn't know Jim and I had debated about moving to a new home in Big Bear because our home just wasn't quite as nice as we wanted for our primary residence. But both of us just love living just where we are. We have lots of hard work and memories here. Jim hadn't even been home one day before he started on the remodel of our home. Actually it's a good thing, I think it will be finished sooner than I thought.

The first pictures are of the utility room. We tore out the cupboards and cleaned everything out of the room. Today we went to Lowes and bought our new washer and dryer and all the other stuff for the room. Tomorrow they start ripping out the walls, floor and redoing all the plumbing. I am happy to see it go so fast.




These are the pictures of the old deck which will all be torn down on Saturday to make way for the new one. If you look you can see that the house right next to the front stairs has been chewed almost all the way through by the squirrels. This has been an interesting summer, we have caught over 100 mice in the garage, had the mice or chipmunks chew through the wiring on the truck and had the squirrels almost chew through the house.





I'll keep you updated on our progress.......

The whole family showed up Saturday to see the new arrival. I just couldn't resist the chance to get a family picture. (Jim had gone home the day before so he isn't in the picture we miss him)

Here is the new little guy. Isn't he adorable. We have all been very blessed to have this new addition to the family. Jim is sooooo happy, he is such an awesome grandpa!

Welcome to the world new little Micah Jeffrey Budd
Born July 30, 2006 at 00:34
7 pounds 2.4 ounces and 20.5 inches long.