THE END IS IN SIGHT!!

Kim Fotheringham tells me that I should be in the house in no more than six weeks. The front door comes in 10 days, the interior doors should be here by then. Stucco is starting, as is insulation. Then there is drywall, texturing, and painting. Then wood floors, tile and carpet. And cabinets and appliances. And light fixtures inside and out. And sidewalks and a driveway. And landscaping. But that can wait a smidge.  Life is busy.

Least you think all I ever do is think about the house, here is my phenomenal score of -4 on a recent "golf" game. Notice the TWO JOKERS!!! And a KING!!! That was a happy hand. 

Most of the exterior doors and windows were installed. Hallelujah! This is the  view of the back patio with its french doors, and on the right is the master bedroom window and door. Anderson Doors and Windows---fantastic.

This view looking up the very substantial stairs up to the window is delightful.

The family room has three 3'6" x 6' windows. I didn't want a big huge window because they are difficult to do window treatments on. But these three will be easier. Notice the FIREPLACE to the right of the windows!!

The living room. Notice the coffered ceiling, which will have rope lighting in it
THAT  HAS THE OPTION OF CHANGING COLORS!!! Very cool.
The big window (which will need to be treated---help!!) and the stairs are cool in this pic.

This is what a fireplace looks like in the 21st century before it is  fancied up. Gas lines, emergency shut -off valve, electronic lighting switch, and a heat blower. The pioneers would be amazed. I'm amazed. Imagine some hearth-stone on the hearth to sit on, and the antique bricks on the face of the fireplace. Then imagine a mantel supported by two corbels. Then imagine two drawers under the hearth which will hold pillows to sit on and blankets to cozy up in. Ahhh.

These are the bricks that are going on the face of the fireplace.  They are 1/2" thick.

Adorable Kaitlyn! She found a frog jumping around over at the new house and even caught it. It peed on her. She dropped it. Little sucker holds a lot of urine! But I love it's Kermit eyes in this picture. She re-caught it and showed her family. Then she released it "back to the wild" in our front yard! And she washed her hands really well!

             NATURE PHOTOS THAT I TOOK WHILE WALKING AROUND THE "BIG LOOP."

The symmetry is remarkable. I love desert plants in the Spring! 

This is the first of this type of bird that I have seen this season. I love that random species will migrate through our area. Isn't the reflection serene of the bird and trees? And notice our mountains in the background. Ahhh.

Here are the Primary kids in our Alta Vista branch! There are SO CUTE...and mostly well-behaved!

Sierra got to bring "Honey Bear" home for the weekend from Tiny Tots. The three of us made cheesy biscuits for dinner last week. Sierra got to pour in flour, stir dough, and snitch cheese. Very cute.
NEW IDEA: Instead of rolling out the biscuit dough and cutting it in circles,
re-rolling out dough and cutting more circles, etc.,
I just divided the dough into two sections and rolled each one into a 3" diameter "snake" and cut it in 1/2" pieces.
Voila! round, perfect biscuits without all the fuss and muss.
And I LOVE my Silpat baking sheet!!

                    WELL, THAT IS ALL FOR NOW!! HOPE YOU ENJOYED THE SHOW!!

REMODELING TAKES A LOT OF TIME AND EFFORT

Hawaii was a wonderful break that we really needed. Even though I don't pound in any nails or pull any wires, I sure do spend a lot of time over at the house and doing house stuff. The process is exciting and exhausting, and I'll be so thrilled to be in it!  

Here's a review:  New garage being framed in.

The back of the house with all the stucco removed. Original windows still in tact.

The family room and patio are framed in. Those two windows in the patio area will soon be history.

Framing begins for the family room off the back of the house. Notice that the master bedroom window is still in the picture, so to speak, on the right side of the photo.

Here's what all the cars on Buchanan see. Quite the change.

The back of the house has a face-lift. None of the original doors or windows are still there. You're looking at the family room addition, with a covered patio (closest to us) and a bonus room over parts of both of them. You can see the bonus room window above the family room. This is one of my favorite features. Currently you get into it with a tall ladder!

This is taken in the bonus room looking through the window and wall toward the golf course across Buchanan Blvd.

Still in the bonus room, looking across the floor to the storage room under the eaves. This is mirrored on the side I'm standing in to take the photo. There will be lots of insulation to keep this room and storage area temperate.

Roofer guys! The paper is going down. And you can see the absence of a master window. There is now an added  alcove to the master bedroom, making it three feet larger. Hallelujah. And it makes the back of the house so inviting!

This picture makes me giggle because it looks like miniature roofer guys are pouring out of the fork lift, like little ants in a row going about their business. Be careful, roofer guys!! They had an assembly line going as they placed tons of tiles on the roof.

Master bedroom with its additional 3' of alcove space. Ahhh. You can see a door and a window framed in.

The front of the house starts to get it's face-lift.  If you look back at earlier photos, you can see that this framing is making the front of the house go up higher instead of angling back in the former "apron" style. Notice the two windows. Soon there will be three.

In what used to be the garage, there is now this framed food storage room. The door opening on the left will be the coat closet next to the door going outside to the new garage. I am standing in the craft portion of the room.

I am in the front of the new garage looking toward the back yard. On the right on the back garage door opening, you can see a two-story structure. This is a closet that originates off of the master bedroom. Cool!!!

You can see the framing dividing the living room from the kitchen and family room areas. You'll notice boards over all of the window and door openings. This is for security. We also park the RV there every night and remove it every morning for the same reason.

We're pulling the stucco off the front so that the new stucco will not have weird patchwork  places. Notice the big tall white wall above the entry. It will be gone soon.

Here are the framed in soffetts in the front room. They will hold rope lighting. There will also be canned lights, and two chandeliers in here. I like light. (C'mon, you can hear it...."I like light; light likes me; light and I fairly fully agree....") :-)

Here's the existing entry way with major changes occurring. Still the big white face above the door.

See where this wall, under the window, angles backwards to the ground? We are going to make it go straight down. The cement forms are sitting there.

Now see the lack of a big white wall above the entry way. There will be an 8' wide window there, that  is curved at the top. Kim created a little room up in there complete with a very sturdy floor, and easy access from the bathroom "attic access" opening. He'll put drywall in it to look like a regular room (it won't be air-conditioned or heated), so that I can easily decorate up in there and it'll look like a real room. Very, very fun!! It's also one of my favorite features of this house!

The front of the house looks like this now. The new windows  in the front are covered with boards , but they are framed in, too. The existing windows are gone. All the exterior windows and doors are being installed on Monday!!! Hallelujah! Then we'll be able to start enclosing this thing officially by putting on the stucco.

Here is the view from my fun little room above the entry way. This is strictly for decoration purposes; the window in here will not open, and there will be no official ventilation. But it's still very fun.

Here is Jaime bringing in one of the sides of the staircase framing.  Heavy.

Sorry for the dark picture. I took this just tonight because I was so excited to see the stairs installed! No more climbing up big, tall ladders to get to the bonus room!

TIME TO THINK ABOUT THE DECORATIVE STUFF!!

I really like these Lamps Plus coach lights. We'll see if the gal will give us a deal on them for buying 12. In the diamond center, there is a piece of amber-colored glass. Very pretty.

Also at Lamps Plus, we found this chandelier that we really liked. Hopefully we'll get a deal on these, too, since we need two with another smaller version of it.

I also really like these coach lights with the tree motif.

Fanco has these nice fans that are buy-one-get-one-free! Hooray!

At RC Wiley's we found some nice carpet to make another rug out of to put under the dining table.
 Here are some options....

...as are these. You can buy carpet and they will finish off the edges for you to be a rug . A rug that never wrinkles!

                                                                  GRANITE TIME!

We've narrowed our selections of granite down. Granite is so beautiful, some of the pieces are like gorgeous landscape paintings. However, since this is going on my island counter in my kitchen and on the counters, I want something a little more subdued so as not to over-power the entire kitchen. So we looked for something that would contrast with the cabinets (either lighter or darker) and that would not have too busy of a pattern.  These pictures do not do these beautiful pieces justice, but here they are. This one is Baltic Brown. 

Another crewman. Guy.

This one is called "Cinderella Blue." Really. And it is absolutely gorgeous, probably our favorite.
We'll see what the cost turns out being. 

This is Juparana Sinatra, and is our very close second choice. It is a lighter color (duh). We also found a beautiful marble for the counter tops in the master bathroom and the hall bathroom.

This is a fruitless pear tree and it has the most beautiful blossoms. But they literally smell like putrified flesh. So nasty!!! 

Grandma and I attended a bridal shower for a girl in our ward, and we got this photo. I actually like it, so I'll share it with you. Cute grandma Peterson!! She's very sweet with grandpa, and I know it is hard at times.

HAWAII PART II. THE REVENGE OF MAUI

I hope you all had a nice intermission... 

...because this is our equivalent of home movies and you really have to love us to look through all of these!

On our way out to the blow hole on the northwest side of Maui, we stopped for this photo op. These are silly people, proving that you may get older, but you don't necessarily grow up.  Love you, Barb and Terry!!

Ominous, indeed. Little did we know the revenge of Maui! Beware the Blow Hole!!

The sea was especially turbulent that fateful day...

Gregg feared not to venture close to the big, main blow hole, the only one we had thought existed. I knew enough to stay clear of that one on such a rough day.

But what is this? Another blow hole is discovered that calmer seas never revealed before. Gregg goes over to investigate further. The standing water should have been a huge clue.

Wowza! There are two more blow holes spurting water whenever a big wave pushes in. "Come on down," Gregg encouraged. "Nah, I don't think so....well, OK." So down I go to get some pics of the blow hole.
As I turn away, I hear the sputtering hiss as air is forced powerfully through the opening, then the roar as the huge wave breaks up and over the embankment wall and up through the holes!
We cling to each other to keep our balance as water engulfs us.
Alas, my cell phone didn't survive. Salt water and technology don't coexist at all.
But being one with the wave for just two seconds was such an amazing experience!
The water was temperate, and the back surge was indeed powerful. Neat experience. Expensive, but cool.

If you stand in the right place, you get this really neat image  through the lava rock. Awwww.

We purchased pineapples at the "honor system" road-side fruit stand!  Fun!

At the church we attended, there was this beautiful big Monkey Pod tree---a.k.a. the Go, Dog, Go tree. I didn't see any party going on in the tree tops, but these trees are all over. There's got to be a party in one of them.


THE ROAD TO HANA

We stopped at a Rest Stop on our drive towards Hana. We see Hawaiian words all over in Hawaii (go figure) and I wondered what in the world this particular one meant in the old language. What deep message were they trying to impart to future generations??

Then I cracked up when I saw the next stall over. The letters were in better shape, and not very Hawaiian after all.

We ate at a shrimp place along the way. Not nearly as good as Giovanni's on the North Shore of Oahu. Not even close. But cute, nonetheless.

The name of this state park is just plain fun to say. Try it. You'll like it!!

Waianapanapa had this absolutely beautiful black sand beach tucked away. The sea had such glorious colors that day!

A big wave caught us off-guard as we were having our picture taken. Can you hear dad going "Whoaaaaa!"? 

I really loved these smooth, black stones all over. I'll put it in my "background photo" collection.

This lava tube/cave was carpeted in those beautiful black rocks. When the waves crashed upon them, they actually tinkled like glass pieces being pushed around. Fascinating!

This is not Oak Alley. 

Deep thoughts from the Green People, Hawaiian Hippies, or Laid-back Philosophers. 

We came across an LDS church on the road to Hana!

Poinsiettas are plentiful here. Beautiful contrast.

I took some pics of the wondrous landscape. This was evening, so the clouds had some really pretty colors in them.

This scene was very peaceful and pastoral. If it wasn't for the big volcano in the  background, it would feel like the rolling hills of the west.

This place even has deep canyons.

Here's our fun condo in Maui...the Maui Sunset.

And here is the only sunset we actually got to see while we were there. This beach is right outside the Maui Sunset. I love the little girl running. What you don't see are her siblings also playing with her, laughing as they try to avoid getting wet from the waves rolling in.

We happened to be there for the annual Whale parade. I liked this float because the gals made their mermaid fins out of decorated paper plates! Clever, easy, and catchy.

Banana grow on trees. And they have a really big blossom that accompanies them!

I like this one of Barb and Terry.

On top of the world at the Haleakala Visitors Center , we saw these silvery yucca-type plants. Pretty.

It was FREEZING up here!! And very barren.

We huddled in this comparatively protected wall space from the FREEZING wind that blew ferociously!

View from the top of the world. You look over the clouds. It's raining down below in spots, but sunny and FREEZING above  the clouds. Spectacular vistas. Did I mention that it was freezing?

This is on the east side of the island. Very jungle-ish. Since it had been raining, any former little stream was a raging torrent. This made for spectacular waterfalls and rivers. 

This is my favorite picture of the entire trip. These massive trees appear to glow. And they smell faintly of lemon. They are Eucalyptus trees and look like they belong in the magical forests of "The Lord of the Rings" saga. 

This gives you an idea of the size of these trees. Mmmm. Nice smell.

And dad and I in front of the wondrous trees.

OK, OK! Enough of the cool shots of the Eucalyptus trees! Sheesh!

Wouldn't that be nice as a view outside of your home?

We are standing at the top of a ravine. At the bottom are two cars that met their demise. 

Rainfall causes greater waterfalls. Beautiful!

And here is my parting shot. I enjoyed immensely our retreat to this beautiful place with wonderful friends!
Surely friendships, not just families, are forever.