Crisis Averted!

So, Jacob from Quick Quality Plumbing is a ROCK STAR! He was able to call a plumbing company with a special "air jet" hose and get our pipe blown out enough to thread another line through it! We don't have to dig up the driveway after all! That is such a relief to us.

A 'Minor' Setback

Well, it would have been too easy to go through this whole project without running into a glitch of some sort, right? As many of you know, we replaced nearly all of the plumbing in the home. With the sub-floors up, the crawl space was exposed so it is so much easier to do it now rather than later. We didn't replace the pipe that runs from the boiler room in the garage, under the driveway and into the house and as soon as they turned all of the water back on to run through the brand new lines in the house, that pipe burst and collapsed....4 feet under the driveway! So today we will dig...and dig...and dig and write a check for an extra $5,000. :(  maybe I should put a PayPal link on this blog and start asking for donations. :D

Bright side: At least it burst now rather than after I had floors and walls and carpet and paint. Right?

 This is the spot in the driveway that runs between the house and garage.

 This is the area in the garage that the pipe goes underground.

And this is the area under the floor in the house that the water bubbles up.

4 New Members of the Family!

We added 4 new members to our family today. Aren't they pretty? They were left abandoned at a house I just sold and the buyers don't want them so we adopted them. They hadn't had water in a while so it was a good thing we stopped by when we did. They were so happy to see us and I never knew that chickens could beg, but they were begging for water. Poor things! They are laying hens so I'm sad to say we won't be buying eggs down the street at Ken's farm anymore :( We will think of some fun names for our new girls and let you know.

Baby Birds

We let a mama Barn Swallow build a nest on our front porch so we could watch the whole process and it's been fun. There are 5 babies and they are getting big so fast! I wish all of the neighborhood Barn Swallows didn't feel the need to dive at my head when I'm taking pictures, but so far they haven't hit me.  Here is their progress over the past few weeks....

 "Mama" rarely lets me get close enough to get a picture of her, but I snuck one in one day while she was sitting on her eggs.

I was able to get a few good pictures of her FIVE eggs! Isn't that a lot?

 

One day, about 17 days or so after we saw that she had laid her eggs, I found a piece of broken shell on the ground and knew that they had hatched...

This was our first glimpse of a baby...it was at least a week after they had hatched.

They were pretty hungry at first...

Now they are quiet when I take pictures. They hunker down and don't move even a little. This pic was taken today. They are getting so big!

I HAVE SUB-FLOOR IN MY KITCHEN!!

I never would have thought that particle board could look so beautiful and so level! So far, its just the kitchen and the hall, but it is GLORIOUS!

 

Now they are working on "sistering" up the floor joists in the family room so they are level.

The Birth of a New Floor

This is just the very beginning, but it was nice to see some new, strong floor joists going in!

These are the temporary support beams, holding up the 1st and 2nd floors. YIKES!

Spray Foam Insulation!

We are another step closer to drywall, as insulation is being sprayed this morning!