Our house on stilts

We found a contractor to replace our garage wall and have been waiting patiently for him to have time to do it. It's a good sign that he's busy in this economy, isn't it?

Our garage is in the walk-out level, with our living room directly above it.



Wednesday they came and got started. They propped up the living room, then knocked out the old wall. They were able to leave most of the very bottom row of blocks in place but found they even had to replace a small portion of the footings at the front corner. I found out when I wandered through once and he wanted to talk to me. He shared those words every homeowner just loves to hear:

"It's gonna be a little more than the quote I gave you."

They finished the partial row they're working on in this picture before quitting for the day. They got the rest of the wall in today and will be back tomorrow to put in the drainage stuff and sealcoat the wall.

It's exciting to be getting a major job off the list. Of course, now we're talking about what to do with the hillside the garage is built into. We can't put all that clay back up against the wall so we have to build some sort of retaining wall so we can backfill with sand.

The joys of home repair...kind of like If You Give a Mouse a Cookie...

October Quiz

Last Saturday was the first quiz of the new season. This year they are studying the book of John. The kids seem to find it easier to keep things straight in the gospels than the epistles...it's more like telling a story so they retain it better.

The best news is that we have 10 kids quizzing this year, up from only three last year. This puts the girls on separate teams

Allison quizzed in the Young Teen Vet division. Her team took first place. She also made it to finals in individual competition, but didn't place.

Julianne's team quizzed in the Senior Teen Vet division, also taking home a first place trophy. She was knocked out of the individual competition in the preliminary round.

We are very excited to have such a nice group of kids quizzing this year. It presents new challenges, like transportation to the quizzes, but it is so wonderful to see so many kids interested in studying and quizzing on God's word.

Things I've never seen...

Julianne snapped this picture for me a couple weeks ago. We were waiting while Clarence was trying to get a part for the well and couldn't help noticing and discussing this sign.



Not being drinkers, we were wondering just how many cocktails it takes before you get to see a dancing sandwich?

Let's see...

where were we before that rather lengthy, unscheduled blog break?

Hmm...we celebrated our 22nd anniversary by going to Indiana. We wandered into an antique quilt shop that we haven't been in before and saw this gorgeous Grandma's Flower Garden quilt.



Grandma's Flower Garden is my absolute favorite quilt pattern-I'm sure you can see why. Isn't it just fantastic? I haven't seen one with the leaves before and am torn as to whether I prefer it with or without them. I think without leaves might be my preference but I still just love this one.

We are busy with our school year finally in full swing. The girls have started Latin this year and are really liking it so far. We also are enjoying our new co-op, although we've only made it once since it conflicted with our trip to Indiana. I got to choose which classes I volunteered to help in (I was assigned to classes in the other co-op) and I'm helping in a FIAR class and Allison's origami class. I don't seem to have much to do as a helper but at least both classes are fun.

We've got many, many projects we'd like to complete before the weather prevents working on them. Remember the garage wall job? Well, as I suppose we should have expected, it is a bigger job than we thought it'd be. Clarence got the moldy drywall off the inside and found blocks that have shifted significantly. He called a pro to take a look last weekend but we haven't gotten an estimate from him yet. Don't you hate spending money on stuff you can't even look at and enjoy? On the bright side though, it will be nice to know the living room above the garage is adequately supported.

I've been working on filling in the hole by the well, a few wheelbarrows of dirt every day that I can. Sometimes, like today, the wheelbarrow and I get in a little dispute (I always lose) and I wonder why I volunteered for this job. But, I think I'm a little stronger than I was when I started...after all, what doesn't kill you, makes you stronger, right?

I think that brings us up to date. I'll try to post sooner next time. Hey! I heard that "Yeah, right."