Hey all, here are a few more pix.

Here is the island wall with the sheer wall added:
Here is the dining/living room will all the stuff in it ... it all got piled in here a day early when the contractor called and said he could come early.
Here are the can lights over the island (with space for the hood to fit into).
And here is the first cut at drywall ... they hung it today and will tape and mud it tomorrow (as well as texturing it).

That's all for today!

Weekend Summary

Hey all,

Here is the summary of the weekend accomplishments and general happenings.
The kitchen progressed nicely ... so well, in fact, that we didn't even work on it last night! We got all the electrical done including splitting the 220V into 2 110V lines. All the circuits work. The only snag there was that one of the recessed lights has a bad transformer, so I had to pull that one out. The sheer wall is up. All the cabinets are gone (including the sink, stove, and dishwasher). It's pretty bare in there! There was a little bit of mold behind the sink cabinet, so we removed that drywall. I think tonight will be patching the drywall and just doing miscellaneous things to get ready for drywalling (Wednesday), painting (Thursday), and hanging cabinets (Friday). I'll try to take a few pix to capture the latest progress.

Family wise, it was a pretty low key weekend. The kids hung around the house for most of Saturday with a few trips to the park. Sunday was church (I played the bass which was a lot of fun) and then Lee was down for the afternoon to help with the demolition. He joined us for dinner at KidWorld, but left before the show.

So that was the week in review. Other than construction, I don't think we have a lot of big events coming up this week.

Neal

A few pix

Hey all, here are a few pix ...

The cabinets (dark on the bottom of the island, white everywhere else)The beach when Mom and Dad were here.
Dad patching some drywall.
Emma and Timmy with Lightning McQueen and Mater.

Getting Closer!

Wel, we're getting closer to dry wall in the kitchen. Cyndie has been working on cleaning out the cabinets (the old ones) and I'm finishing up the wiring. I'm almost there, I just have to split the 220V line into 2 110V lines (a friend is coming over this morning to help with that) and then position a few of the under cabinet feeding lines to come through the drywall in the right place. The friend (Jim's dad Stan) is also going to make a final check of all my wiring to make sure it looks good (he's a retired electrician and inspector). Then I just need to get up the sheer wall. I think we'll wait until Monday night to pull the counters out so that we have the sink a little longer. The drywall guys are not coming until Wednesday now due to a scheduling conflict. Although they are coming today to start the stucco (it takes 3 or 4 applications). We're planning on the first round of cabinet installation for March 2. I've enlisted Paul and Dan to help! Unfortunately, I may not be as productive this weekend as my help has backed out. (Sorry Lee, I just had to get a little dig in -- Lee was going to come, but then got a free ticket to the races!)

Yesterday Cyndie and the kids went to Disneyland. They brought Coco, and ended up coming home with a new outfit for Coco and for Spot (Timmy's leopard). Coco now has a fairy outfit and Spot is Buzz Lightyear. Timmy slept in his big boy bed again, so that is exciting. Hopefully he's almost fully adjusted there.

Paul should be here anytime for the Liverpool game, so so long for now, and have a great weekend.

Quick Friday Note ...

Hey all,

Just a quick note today ...

Yesterday was pretty much a downer. The kids were crabby all day for Cyndie (including a trip to the doctor for Cyndie and Emma for Emma's ear infection) which made for a long day for her. I had to stay late at work for a lame meeting! Needless to say, Cyndie was in bed by 8pm and I wasn't much later.

Today and through the weekend is the big push to get the kitchen done for drywalling on Monday. I think the kids and Cyndie are going to Disneyland.

Neal

Thursday Update

Hey all,

There is not a whole lot different happening around here than normal.

There is progress happening all the time in the kitchen ... the window is in, and the drywallers are coming next Monday so the pressure is on to tie up the loose ends before then. I've also scheduled some friends to come over on Friday to start putting up the cabinets!

Yesterday Cyndie and I went on a date ... after dinner we looked for rugs for the family room to no success. We also decided to go with a single basin sink and ordered one online. We still need to pick out a hood.

Emma brought home a stuffed bear with a bunch of different outfits from school yesterday. The bear ("Coco") has a journal that the kids are supposed to write in and put pictures in. Emma is really excited about that and is making all kinds of plans to take Coco different places.

Last night Miss Ashlee, the babysitter, finally got Timmy to fall asleep in his big boy bed, so that is exciting.

That's about it on our end!

Monday Happenings

Good morning all,

Here's a quick update from yesterday ...

A pretty normal day. Emma was off from school, so Cyndie and the kids ended up spending much of the rainy day over at Monique's. Timmy really enjoyed getting rides from Mavric on Mav's big train that runs throughout the house. Emma and Macy always have a good time playing together. In the evening we had Bible study. This time was more of a social gathering to say "good bye" to Stu. He's going to a different church to work as a counselor, so that's a bummer! The kids had a fun time there playing with new toys and, of course, didn't want to leave!

After Bible study and getting the kids to bed (Timmy didn't want to sleep in his new bed again!), Cyndie worked some on the Easter service announcement for church, and I more on electrical. Today the new window should go in between 1 and 3 pm!

The big news of the morning is that Timmy again had a dry diaper and again asked to go pee-pee on the big boy potty, with success! We're not there yet, but hopefully we'll have a fully potty trainied kid by summer!

That's it for now,
Neal

Weekend in Review

Things didn't go exactly as planned over the weekend, but hey, that's life.

Saturday was beautiful. I think it finally ended up being in the 80s!

The main movement on the kitchen was that Stan (Jim Zone's dad) came over and gave me some advice on the electrical. He is a retired electrical contractor and inspector, so I value his advice a lot, especially given how much electrical we're doing. So the bottom line with that is that he pointed out one thing I had done wrong in wiring all the recessed lights (I needed essentially a cushion so that the wires wouldn't wear out on the metal boxes). He also gave me some very helpful advice to use in understanding how my circuits should be powered. As of last night, I've almost fixed all the recessed lights. I have the lights in the family room and over the fireplace working, and I'm just waiting for Stan's help to change some things in the breaker box (to split the 220V line to 2 110V lines) to complete the rest of the electrical. The window is installed tomorrow, and then the drywall will most likely be the week after (to give me a little more time to ensure that I have all the electrical done like I want it).

Cyndie and the kids played outside a lot on Saturday. Sunday was church. In the afternoon a friend from church came over with her kids, and we also babysat a different little boy from church while his parents were at a church class. We had the bounce house up both afternoons to enjoy the beautiful weather. Dad, your roof "patches" have not leake yet, and I also installed the outdoor light in "your" electrical box ... it worked great! It rained both Saturday evening a bit, and then last night again. It was really windy yesterday afternoon, which was causing the plastic over the window holes to rip, so Cyndie spent some time stapling cardboard over the holes. Now it looks like we live in an alley!

Last night Cyndie and I were both pretty tired, so we took the night off from the kitchen work and Cyndie cut my hair. I think I'm too used to the desk job because I was beat! I had a pretty sore neck from working over my head all day.

Timmy is beginning to really resist taking naps (and didn't take one on either Saturday or Sunday), so I think that's pretty much the end of that. He tends to be a little crankier as a result at night, but not too much so. The big challenge will be in teaching him to stay in his room during quiet time (so that Mom and Dad can still take a nap)! We finally got a mattress up into his tree fort bed. He really enjoyed laying on it a lot, but when it came time for bedtime and I put him up there he asked to go in his crib. We'll see where that ends up going!.

Emma has been very cute recently, spending a lot of time "reading" books to Timmy. They've been playing pretty well for the most part. Emma is also wanting to try to spell a lot of words and sound out words to figure out what letters are in them, etc. So that's exciting. I'm sure she's going to love kindergarten next year!

We're working a lot this week on helping the kids understand that their actions have consequences, which is interesting because Timmy has started doing two things that he learned from Emma, slamming doors in her face, and hitting her! Too back she has selective memory and doesn't really recall or acknowledge that she may have contributed to this development!

Well, that's it for now. Have a warm week everyone, especially those of you in the midwest!

Back with Progress

Up bright and early today ...

The kids and I are watching Franklyn while Cyndie sleeps in a bit. We're planning to walk over and get some donuts after this. I was already out this morning to put some trash in the garbage and it was already in the 60s ... it looks like we're heading for a beautiful day.

Yesterday lead to some productivity on the kitchen. I got home from work early. Cyndie and the kids went to the park, and I worked on hanging more lights. Now all of the light fixtures are up! Cyndie and the kids brought our friends Sheryl and Samantha and Ben home from the park for dinner/pizza. After dinner and playing a bit, it was bedtime.

The plan for today is for Cyndie and the kids to go looking for a rug for in the family room, and for me to keep working in the kitchen!

Thursday

Good morning people.

A quick update about yesterday. Cyndie and the kids went to California Adventure. Timmy and Emma have been very into the movie Cars lately, and were very excited to run into Lightning McQueen and Mater. Timmy especially couldn't get over his excitement enough to pay attention to his mommy who was trying to get his picture! Cyndie said that Emma is really starting to enjoy the rides a lot (and wants to only go on those) which is difficult because Timmy isn't big enough to go on all the rides. Emma asked me if I could go with next time because she wants to go on the lady bugs (the CA Adventure version of the teacups which spin around in circles) and mommy won't take her (Cyndie doesn't like to spin in circles)!

Not a whole lot of progress to report on the kitchen. I only hung a few lights after running into some problems. Cyndie, however, was productive in getting some bills paid!

Valentines Recap

Hola everyone,

I hope that you all had a delightful Valentines Day. It was fun for us. It was a fairly normal day during the day ... school for Emma (she loved her pajama party at school, got lots of Valentines from her classmates, and her teacher was back after a week in London, so she was excited by that) work for me, and work around the house for Timmy and Cyndie. Cyndie was able to get rid of a lot of our trash from the kitchen that has been sitting in the side yard and garage because our neighbors across the street had a full sized (semi-truck size) dumpster that they didn't fill up, so that is nice. We also had the appliances delivered, so that was fun to see them in person. I got home from work early, so joined Timmy and Cyndie at the park to play for a while (Emma was at Neve's house).

The church youth group offered babysitting from 5:30 - 8:30. The kids had a fun time there (Emma was a very good big sister and helped Timmy be comfortable when he was sad that I left them). Cyndie and I decided to have dinner in rather than deal with the crowds out, so we grilled steaks and had a nice (but too big) meal at home. Then we watched a movie ... The Devil Wears Prada.

So that is the extent of it!

Neal

Happy Valentines

Hey all,

Just a quick Valentines Day note here.

Yesterday was gymnastics for the kids and a pretty regular day. We had a really nice meal as a family with the kids being great and happy and Emma even taking the inititive (without any prompting) to clear all the dinner dishes by herself!

Unfortunately, Cyndie wasn't feeling too well (sore throat/energy), so she went to bed right after the kids did. I spent the evening hanging more lights and we now have all the recessed lights up and wired except for the ones that are where the existing cabinets are (against the wall).

Today Emma has a pajama Valentines party at school. Then, tonight, the youth group is doing babysitting from 5:30 to 8:30 so Cyndie and I get to have a date!

That's all for now,
Neal

General Update

I've missed a few days in posting, so here goes ...

Saturday was indeed a big work day. Dad and I got down the upper row of cabinets that were over the stove and the fridge. We also removed the soffit that was over them. Then I spent the rest of the day trying to stretch the cables that used to run through the soffit so that they are now in the wall. That was a pain! Dad rerouted the sewer/sink exhaust pipe so that it was in the wall and did some work patching the various holes that we've had to make.

That night we went out for Indian food (the kids were baby-sat), so that was fun. We also showed Mom and Dad the new appliances we're getting (delivered on Wednesday I believe) since the appliance store shares a parking lot with the Buhkara. I think that Cyndie get's more excited about the fridge and freezer every time she sees them!

Sunday was church, then some rest and relaxation, and a little more work on the kitchen (hung a few lights and some more cleanup work on the walls/ceiling). Emma ended up staying up late (10-ish) since it was Grandma and Grandpa's last night.

Monday was a regular work day for me, and Dad and Mom flew out in the late morning (to be welcomed by the cold of Wisconsin!). Emma didn't have school (holiday), so the fam spent some time making Valentines cookies for Emma's classmates. In the evening, Cyndie and I hung some more lights, while also discovering that we'll need to move one of the beams that the contractors added to support the ceiling drywall since it did not leave enough space to hang the needed lights.

Well, that's it for now.

Neal

Most Important Thing ...

I forgot the most important part of yesterday ... my victory in Bible trivia. Despite Mom's efforts to hijack the game, I was victorious. All hail the victor, Neal!

Quick Post ...

It's (early) Saturday morning and I'm sitting with the kids watching Little Bear. I'm expecting Paul at any moment to watch the Liverpool/Newcastle game. Yesterday Mom and Dad spent some time with Alice and LD Thomas, and I worked from home. Mom and Dad did a lot of painting (priming the orange paint) and I moved the thermostat. Today is shaping up to be a big work day with the first of the old cabinets coming down and a lot more wiring including (probably) starting to install some of the lights.

More later ...

Neal

They're Here!

It was a full evening last night. We spent most of the evening unpacking all the boxes. There are a lot of cabinets now sitting in our living room. Alot of the time was spent just trying to figure out what we have and what goes where, etc. We were slightly disappointed in what we got since there were a few problems ... some doors not put on, none of the decorative doors put on (the covering for the side of the cabinets whose sides are exposed), a couple of fairly minor dings, but biggest problem was that quite a few of the joints in the doors shows "cracks" through the paint where the joint wasn't totally tight. So now we're going to have to work with the distributor and the manufacturer to get that sorted out. Fortunately, we have only paid half so far!

It will be interesting to see what the house looks like when I get home tonight, especially in regard to how the kids have used the empty boxes. Unfortunately for them, there is not a lot of extra floor space to go around, meaning less room to build!

Currently Arriving ...

I just got off the phone with Cyndie and the cabinets are in the process of being unloaded! It's all very exciting. Apparently the kids are very excited too. However their excitement stems from the large boxes that they see and are eager to play with!

Status Quo

Well, the mid-week is on, so life is pretty normal. Emma had school yesterday, Cyndie did her food pickup/dropoff for the charity she works with. Mom and Dad went down to Laguna to wander around a bit. We had Bible study last night, so the kids were a bit wound up after getting home from the babysitting associated with that (10+ kids, all between 1 and 5). Other than that, we were pretty low key.

Today the kids have gymnastics class, and tonight I need to buckle down (along with some help from my assistant) and do some more wiring.

A "Super" weekend

Hey all, we're back from the weekend and into the normal weekday mode.

The weather was great this weekend ... great for the beach, and great for football!

Saturday we had a big breakfast, then Paul and I and Dad watched the Liverpool game (an unfortunate 0 - 0 draw in a game that Liverpool should have won). The rest of the crew (Lee, Kim, Mom, Cyndie, kids) went to the beach around 10, and Dad and I joined them around 10:30. It was a little cold from the wind, but we had a great time. We had lunch at the beach, and then the CA DeVries went home for naps while the grandparents went for a walk on the beach. The rest of the day was pretty much spent getting ready for the Super Bowl party.

Sunday was church, then we hustled home to make the last few arrangements for the party. At 1:30, we played flag football in the park. I think we had around 15 or so guys, so that was fun. Then, of course, the game was on at 3. We had around 50 people (including lots of kids), so the house was full. We set up a projector and screen in what used to be the dining room (straight ahead from the entryway) and then had the TV in the family room and the theater going. Fun was had by all, especially the Colts rooters (who were by far in the majority).

Afterwards, we had lots of help cleaning up ... I think the house might actually be more clean now than it was before!

Visitors ...

I move from sitting listening to a teleconference, to sitting listening to Mom, Dad, Cyndie, Lee, and Kim talking. The day was good. Timmy felt better later in the afternoon, but we didn't end up getting to the beach. Dad and I ended up getting the pipe put into the wall, and then I did a little more work on the wiring, so that was nice to get some of that done. Dad and Timmy played a lot of cars today, and Emma had a friend over. Now we're eating dessert ... a Kathy DeVries cherry pie!

Working from home ...

Here I sit, working in the bedroom, listening to a teleconference with the customer. Mom and Dad are outside (downstairs) playing with Timmy, Cyndie is running errands, and Emma is at school. It should be a fairly quiet day. We're planning on going to the beach this afternoon, but some of that probably depends on how Timmy is feeling. He's thrown up three times today, and we're not exactly sure why. He doesn't have a fever or anything like that, and seems fairly normal in general, but who knows. He's had a nasal passage/sinus infection for a couple of weeks (he's on his second round of anti-biotics), so perhaps it is related to the new medicine (he's been on it for 2 or 3 days). So, we'll see.

After the telecon, I'm hoping to finally finish the pipe fitting that has been waiting around for the right pieces for a week!

Congrats on the good interview Jane, I'll pray that you get a call back!

Nearing week end

Here I sit with Cyndie, Mom, and Dad, contemplating the end of the week. Dad and I just returned from Lowe's where we purchased some more pipe and some seals for the toilet that has been leaking. Hopefully we'll be able to finish up those projects tomorrow.

The day at home was fairly status quo, or at least for having Grandma and Grandpa here. Emma went to a birthday party at the local Pump It Up (lots of different inflatable things to climb and play on). Timmy hung out with Grandpa and Grandma.

So that's life here now. Have a good weekend all.

Neal

Grandpa and Grandma Arrive

Grandma and Grandpa D arrived yesterday to the great excitement of Emma and Timmy. Cyndie and the kids picked them up at the airport at 2pm. Timmy was so exicted, he fell asleep on the way home! By the time I got home (early) at 4pm, Emma was still literally wiggling with joy. Emma and Timmy even got to show the first bit of their (current) favorite movie to Grandma and Grandpa ... Cars. It should be a fun week and a half. Emma and Timmy really love the extra attention that Grandma and Grandpa D give them!