IT'S A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD!

Thank you, Mr. Rogers, for providing the perfect words to describe how we felt today. In just a few short weeks, we're hoping that we will hear our neighbors singing, "I have always wanted to have a neighbor just like you. I've always wanted to live in a neighborhood with you." If our neighbors don't sing it to us, then I'll run up and down our street serenading them. Good times are coming, just you wait, Ballast Lane!

Welcome to our home...

complete with a sidewalk...

real steps to the front door...

a muddy driveway that is still in need of cement...

and a lamp post that I firmly believe was taken right out of Narnia. We do have a "spare-oom" in the house, so all we need now is a wardrobe. :-) Kasey's side note: One of my favorite memories from my younger years is of my Mom reading THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA to us. When my little sister had a stomach ache, she would point to her stomach and tell my parents that, "Mr. Tumnus hurt." Yup, we loved those books!

Here is the new and improved front entry, complete with a chandelier.

We were in for a sweet surprise when we found that the hardwood floors had been put in on the first floor. Since there are still so many people in and out of the house each day, they're keeping everything covered up. I made Skyler hold up the floor covering so we could at least get a picture.

Once again, after pulling back a piece of cardboard, our kitchen counters were revealed. I know that it's hard to tell exactly what the color is from the picture, but there are specs of brown throughout the counter top that are the same color as the cabinets. Very cool.

The kitchen appliances were also delivered this week. Seeing the kitchen come together is definitely helping us know that we did just fine selecting colors. Phew!

Here is the dining room with its pretty chandelier.

Here is the completed tile in the master bathroom.

And the completed tile in the second bathroom.

The closets are filled with shelves...

The surround sound speakers are in place...

And the lights are shining brightly. Soon, these friendly faces are going to be part of the neighborhood.

THE RAINS CAME DOWN & THE CABINETS WENT UP!

Its been a lonely week in Alexandria! Skyler left on Monday for a training in Kansas City, MO, and I am home alone trying to get organized enough to start work next week. [Sigh.] Going down to the house today broke up the monotony of organizing hundreds of pieces of music, as well as all the worksheets/lessons/projects I've accumulated over the last 4+ years. It was wonderful!!

Beautiful, isn't it?? We had some torrential downpours the last few nights and this is what our front yard looks like. That muddy area will soon be transformed into a wonderful sidewalk. Not all of the yard looked like this, thankfully, but it did make for a nice little adventure trying to get to the garage. Any time I took a step, my poor little feet just sunk into the ground. When I did finally make it into the garage I took a piece of bubble wrap that was laying on the ground and spent at least 10 minutes trying to clean off my shoes. I hope the workers who traipse through our house clean their shoes as thoroughly as I did!!

Our walkway is ready to be filled with cement. No more mud for us!

Hooray for shutters and siding!

This picture is not quite accurate. We learned this week that shutters arrive in a standard gray color, and that they repaint each of them after they've been hung. So, the gray will exist for only a short while, and then they will be painted black. Thank goodness.

Here's the west side of the house with brand new sparkling white siding!

The back of the house received the same treatment. Now all we need is a deck so we can actually use our kitchen door. That's not going to happen for awhile, though. Anyone who wants to use that door will either have to jump or propel down on a rope. Personally, I'd recommend the rope.

The kitchen is coming together beautifully, and we are thrilled with the cabinet color. It's a little scary when you're choosing the cabinets, flooring, carpet, counter tops, etc. in the design center. You just have a little sample to look at, and you keep praying that what you think looks good actually will look good together. So far so good.

These are the cabinets you couldn't see in the last picture. The refrigerator will go in the big empty space.

I never thought I would get so excited about shelves that pull out in the island. Since I won't be digging through all of my pots and pans just to get the one stupid thing I need, maybe I'll actually want to cook more. (I can hear Skyler laughing now) Also, my dentist kindly informed me a few months ago that I'm not as young as I used to be, so maybe being free from all the bending (to search through the pots and pans) will add some years to my life. As a side note: I still haven't decided if I'm going back to that dentist again. Grrr.

No more make-shift railings for this house. Yeah, baby!

Cabinets and counter in the master bathroom.

There was only one worker at the house today (doing some more dry wall stuff) and he didn't speak very much English. For the life of me, I couldn't remember how to say, "can you please take a picture of me?" in Spanish. I should have called my brother, Joe, or my father-in-law. So, I had to improvise. This is me showing you the rest of the master bathroom and my very happy face.

This is the upstairs bathroom. The workers learned, from a previous bad experience, that they need to keep the counters and tubs covered while they work. They made a costly mistake after spilling some purple stuff (I don't remember what it was) all over our tub. Needless to say, they replaced it for us, but that sucker wasn't cheap. And, just to note, we did not decide to paint our walls pink. I am a HUGE fan of that color, but they're coming to cover that up tomorrow.

This concludes your guided tour for the day. Thank you for joining me.

DAY 41

After arriving home from the most fabulous trip to Wisconsin, Skyler and I drove to the house to see the drywall going up. While I was gone, Skyler took a day off to do the pre-drywall inspection. We hired a home inspector to walk through with Skyler before he actually met with our project manager. Everything went well, and there were just a few things that our project manager said he would have fixed before the drywall went up. Walking through the house with actual walls up was very different. We were used to looking through from one room to the next, so this makes everything much more real. We are absolutely stunned when we look at how much work has been done since ground breaking day early in July. I think you'll agree! 41 days into the building process and here's what we have...

The brick exterior is complete!

The back of the house is ready for the siding to go up.

The garage is now housing our doors, cabinets, railings, etc. You name it...it's probably there. We also have a fully functioning garage door!

This is the family room (from the kitchen). The first door on the left leads to the laundry room, which is just off the garage. The second door leads to the office.

This is a view of the kitchen from the family room. The huge doorway on the right leads to the front entry and down to the basement. The door straight ahead is to the dining room.

Here you're looking at the dining room from the living room.

View of the front entry way from above.

Here I'm standing in the master bedroom looking down the hallway (upstairs) to the other bedrooms. The first door on the right is for our closet.

This is the fabulous closet in the master bedroom. I can definitely get used to it!

Master bedroom

Master bathroom

"Water Closet" in master bathroom. The door to this "closet" will never be closed as I would surely die of severe claustrophobia.

This is at the other end of the hallway looking at the master bedroom. I'm standing in the entry to the guest room. The next door is the bathroom, followed by the baby room.

I'll spare you from posting every single room, as they do tend to look quite a bit alike. :) However, this is the guest room, where we're hoping our loved ones will stay when they visit us! Please note the closet in here. It will not be filled to the rafters like our current and former guest rooms. Our dear guests will actually be able to hang up their clothes. Yeah!!

And, finally, the basement. Beautiful, huh? It will remain almost exactly like this, until we can convince my Dad and brother-in-law to come and finish it for us! They are both pros since doing their own remodels, so it should only take them a few days!!! :-)

IT'S A BRICK . . HOUSE!

How cool is that?? Since I'm leaving for Wisconsin today, Skyler and I thought it would be a good idea to drive down to the house. So, we drove down last night and were stunned by what we saw. Beautiful!!

This is actually what we saw when we first arrived at 5:30 yesterday. We just stood there and watched while the brick work was being done. Those guys went so fast and were practically swinging from the scaffolding. We couldn't believe it. Since they were working we weren't allowed to go in, lest they drop a brick on us and we receive fatal injuries! We opted to go get dinner and come back later in the night once they had knocked off work for the day.

A close up of one of the workers that we thanked profusely!

Seeing the inside was great, too. This was proof to us that the electricians truly had been there.

And the plumbers!!

The bathtub in the hall bathroom was delivered.

And so was the tub in the master bathroom! I had to check it out and make sure it was suitable. It passed my inspection!

We decided not to get dessert at Red Robin, but apparently Skyler was still a little hungry. There's never a dull moment with the Bradbury's!