It seems there are an awful lot of folks out there crying out for jobs but getting good and responsive customer service is still in short supply!  Since the last post, we are STILL awaiting the pouring of the foundation walls.  He was supposed to be here last week.  He called 3 days later and said he was behind on another job.  Ok-but 4 more days passed.  Now it has been 3 weeks. He has no voice mail nor email and won’t pick up Jack’s calls.  We had sought another estimate.  It never came in.  Apparently this is the norm for contract workers.  It’s not as if we are just sitting still though!

Jack completed the tool shed and potting bench.  He made shelves inside the shed for his tools and we are set to entertain this Saturday with the appetizer course of a progressive dinner at the airport.

For the past few months, I have been receiving registrations for my 40th high school reunion.  That was last weekend (Aug 17-18) in Blacksburg and we had a blast.  Well, at least I did!  Jack even schmoozed with the spouses and they all gathered at a “spouse table” to share stories and drinks.  The reunion happened concurrently with the time that my mom’s assisted living facility decided she needed to be moved to a geriatric center to have her meds adjusted to stabilize her moods (reading between the lines, she had been misbehaving-feels like a child in day care when I get the incident calls).  She has been there about 10 days and they are due to release her today.  I will need to go get her (north of Roanoke) since her insurance doesn’t provide for transportation.  It’s a weird time as an adult child.  Besides Jack,  I do have my sister (in FL) and brother in Floyd, VA to lean on and am so thankful for that!

And what do the pilot codgers do when they gather at the airport?  Last week, an airplane was getting an engine replaced.  They all gathered around to supervise the mechanic, tell stories and oversee the test flight!  It was sorta like a coffee clutch if you ask me…I just had to laugh when they decided they would rate the pilot’s landing!

Until next time, cross your fingers, we will get walls soon!!

My sweet (7-year old grand daughter), Destiny was here all last week and we completed the footers, removed the footer forms and are ready for the foundation walls to be poured next week. From the air, you can see that we had to bend the house to fit it on this small lot (.81 acres). The shape to me either looks like a big Gingerbread Man (as in Shreck the movie) or an arrow pointing us in the right direction!

We had to order 50 tons of gravel to place around all these footers. Thats a bunch of rock! Here is a little 1 minute you tube movie of the gravel delivery.

I have been having fun with consulting with kitchen designers and flooring consultants. I have no estimates from them yet but it sure is fun to look! I have no clue (and will probably be shocked) what their bottom line will be.

I have gotten window estimates. We have 50 windows and some are a set glass (large ones next to the fireplace). All of the estimates are all pretty similar but I have had to read up on the reviews between Anderson, Pella, Lincoln and Jeld-wen windows.

We continue to enjoy this beautiful lake! This photo is our cove from the air showing the airstrip. You can see our property about in the middle of this photo right on the runway.

Today we harvest honey and Monday we pour walls.

Last week’s rain gave way to sun as we hoped and prayed for a few dry days to complete the footers for inspection.  This is  the mucky mess last Saturday morning (just 4 days ago).  But we pumped the water out and began working.

 

While Jack and hearty neighbor, Steve, started framing the footers, I went to Raleigh to pick up our seven-year old grand daughter Destiny to come spend a week with us. She has been a great help.  At seven, kids want to be helpful and she loves to hang with us!

 

She learned new construction terms like rebar, chairs, stakes, and support.  She learned to stay away from power saws and pneumatic nailers. OH!! My aching back from wiring the rebar to the chairs!

This photo shows today’s completed work — AND WE PASSED our first INSPECTION!!

These frames show where the concrete support footers will be poured (hopefully tomorrow).

In the meantime, we have both gotten our Virginia Driver’s Licenses and new Virginia plates.  While getting inspections done, we EACH ended up getting $450 worth of repairs on our vehicles.  The auto shop has a deal that they reject you, then they tell you how much it will cost to fix said rejected items, then they pass you, and take your money!

Check out our personalized tags.  Jack’s is the Pietenpol “N” number and mine is a bit of pre-marketing.

If there is a lull, we gotta harvest some honey. We have the labels but now we gotta rob the bees!

It has rained five straight days since we dug the foundation.  Since the dig, we haven’t been able to do much more on the house.

We sure are enjoying our porch as we watch the evening showers, wondering when our mud hole will dry up!  Check out this one-minute video of our view!

But we aren’t sitting still; on to other things. Jack finished wiring the workshop complete with six electrical outlets (four plugs each), one light switch, and an overhead ceiling fan.  I painted the doors and trim work.  Our little patio shed is almost complete.  We are planning an airport progressive porch dinner for August so this will be perfect!  More photos once my potting bench is done!

I have been working on a children’s book and found an artist finally in June just before we moved.  She has been producing some amazing art!  Here is the cover that she just finished.  Note my name is Karen Phillips when I am a writer!

The other thing we are doing is getting at least three estimates for each job and there are a lot of jobs in building a house!  I am trying to keep track of them all!

Life goes on in out hangar home!  Let us know when you are coming to visit!

 

Bedford County approved the Building Permit so we just had to celebrate (again)!

As soon as we walked out of the county office building, we called Jared Jones, the excavator.  So now we are really committed to this project; and I must say, it is exciting!  We couldn’t wait, so Jack and I started digging and got most of it done with just a shovel.

Just kidding!!!  Jared arrived at 7 am this morning ready to dig.  Beating the heat is the name of the game these days!  Note the temperature midday in the photo!

Jared says that this dig should take a day and a half but he has been working diligently on it for 5 hours so far.  After that, setting the footers will come next!

Thanks for celebrating with us!