Sunday, November 23, 2008

House update

Wow, this update is long overdue. But since tomorrow is a big day in our construction timeline, I suppose I’d better catch everyone up. The power was just the beginning and the last 6 or so weeks have been crazy full of changes to the property. I suppose I could go back and figure out exactly what day everything happened, but really, who cares that much about the details!? (Hopefully no one, cuz I ain’t lookin’ it up!) Anyway, here’s the catch up…

First, the nice men came out and put in our septic tanks and field. (Note: I chose this picture because the dirt pile hides the ginormous piece of Deere equipment they brought in to do the job. Maybe they don’t know how it works in this family.)

Then, they dug us a giant hole:
Which, of course, Ryan had to climb into:
Then there were wall footings, rocks, and drainage stuff.

And while all that was going on, the nice men in the big red truck came and dug us a well. They hit water within 2 feet of where they thought they would, it is quality water and the pressure is great. Yeehaw!


And then, the wall frames appeared.
And were put in place a short time later
And the walls were poured

While those dried, the plumber came in and roughed in the basement plumbing, and when he was done, the concrete man was back to pour the floors

Hey, it looks like a real basement now! Ok, so the only way in and out is walking across 2X8s and then taking a ladder down, but who cares.

Here is the view from the top of one of the giant dirt piles:

Ryan looks very proud with what he has coordinated so far, as well he should be.

I think that’s about it for now. Over the weekend, the supplies were delivered for the framer, who is scheduled to start tomorrow. I'd have pictures, but they're still in the camera. And the camera is in the truck. And the truck is with Ryan, out at the new house. Hopefully I'll have more to add tomorrow. There is some rain in the early morning forecast, but we’re crossing our fingers. More soon!

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Power

Nothing too exciting to note... 2 weekends ago Ryan and I put up the temporary power pole (a few hour project that turned into an all weekend project!). When we went back last Friday, we found it all hooked up. So, technically, we have power! If only we had something to plug in...
I have no pictures of the hooked up power yet (not that they'd be all that exciting), but I do have some from the process of putting up this crazy thing.

Quikrete is our friend.


Maybe this wasn't the safest place to stand...but it worked!




With any luck, they'll be breaking ground this week. Imagine, if the weather holds, we'll have a hole in the ground before this weekend! More later!

Friday, October 3, 2008

Closing Complete

Quick update: Done! We closed on the construction loan this afternoon. Tomorrow we head out to the property to set up the temporary power pole, and then as soon as the permits go through, excavation can begin. Cue the Jeopardy music as we wait...

Wednesday, October 1, 2008

End of Summer Recap and House News

Wow. This summer just disappeared. August was a busy month, which probably had a lot to do with how it flew by. So, before we go on, a recap, with some pictures.

In August:

  • We attended a baby shower for our friends Brad and Meagin. Their beautiful baby girl Molly was born 2 weeks ago.
  • We met with the drilling people to choose the location of the well. Much to our disappointment, there was no divining rod involved. We were really hoping, but alas, there is definitely water anywhere we go on our property, so we just picked a spot.
  • Meghan attended the Illinois State Fair with her dad. They had so much fun – saw more food “on a stick” than you could ever imagine. (Cheesecake, pizza, alligator – you name it!) At Andy's suggestion, they watched the society horse show, which sounds weird, but is fascinating. Plus, no trip to the fair is complete without a visit to the Dairy Barn to see the butter cow and indulge in fresh cream puffs.
  • Delicious!!

  • We had a great weekend in Peoria – the West Coast contingent came to town, the men went golfing, the whole family gathered for 'formal' pictures, and we capped off the weekend with Gabriella’s baptism and party. It was so wonderful to get to see and spend time with the whole family and to see beautiful Gabby baptized into the Catholic Church. Dan, Sue, Daniel, Emily, Kevin, Ela, Gabriella – we miss you all and can’t wait to see you again!
  • We joined Mama, Papa, Mia, and Madison for the Obama-Biden rally in Springfield. Despite the oppressive heat, crazy crowds, lack of water, and Meghan spending most of the time in the medical area after nearly passing out, it was an amazing experience. It was a historic moment at a historic location, and we were there. So cool.

Obama watches as Biden speaks.

  • We completed the paperwork for our construction loan and began the month long jeopardy-music-finger-tapping wait.
  • Meghan's mom came down to Decatur for a visit and they had a great day of shopping in Clinton and Bloomington – always a good time.
  • We built a small shed on our new property with the assistance of Andy and James. Needless to say, the boys did most of the labor, but Meghan held her own, took lots of pictures and did the first aid run. First aid, you ask? Yes. In true do-it-yourself tradition, we had an injury. We’ll spare the details, but Ryan gave himself a really nasty cut on his ankle. Instead of going to the hospital, we chose to clean it with bottled water, bandage it, wrap it in tape, cover it with a sock and out Ryan back to work. The next day we did go to the doctor where we were told that he should have had stitches but it was too late. Doh. Hey, Ryan has a pretty scar to remember the weekend by.

Wrapping the ankle. Note the most important First Aid kit item: Miller Lite.

A job well done!



  • We attended one of Michael Aaron's JFL games. So much fun - for the players and the spectators.

Running for a touchdown!

September was a little more calm…

  • We celebrated Ryan’s birthday with a trip back to Peoria. (Who can resist Papa’s homemade pizza?)

  • We attended a wedding shower for our friends James and Andrea, after which Ryan celebrated James’ dwindling bachelorhood with the guys at the bachelor party. They saw Donnie Baker and then…it was a bachelor party, let’s leave it at that.

  • On the 25th, we found out that our loan was approved and the wheels were set in motion. Wheeee!!!!

  • Last weekend we headed to Mundelein to visit Mom and Dad P and to window shop and make decisions on housing materials.

  • Yesterday, James assisted us with picking the location of the new house. For most people, this would be a simple task. But for silly ol’ Meghan and her lack of vision, it required measurements, flags, paint, and Ryan pacing things out saying “Now, I’m in front of the bedroom.” “Ok, you’re in the kitchen” “This is the back porch.” Our neighbors probably think we’re bonkers.

And so we enter October.
This morning, Ryan met with the excavator and made a trip over to the county building. The septic and building permits are in process and the house is all staked out. Take a look.

I think that's our front door....

Friday we meet with the title company to close on the loan – very exciting. On Monday, we get our well.
The rest of the month will be exciting as well. Between both our baseball teams in the postseason, house stuff, a couple of milestone birthday parties and a wedding thrown in for good measure, this month will probably fly by.

Thanks for you patience on such a long entry. We'll work on keeping them more frequent and shorter. And hopefully before long we’ll have some house pictures with something in them!!!

Thursday, September 25, 2008

It's Happening!!!

OK, we know. It has been 2 months of no updates. We've done so much over the last 8 weeks and have a bunch of pictures to share. And we will, soon. But today's update is brief and exciting; we have happy news. This morning we received word that our file was approved. All we have to do now is the closing. Things are finally in motion! We anticipate the excavator will visit the property on Wednesday to map out the house and do some measurements. Real house-building activity! We're on our way!

Oh, and we have a culvert now. Wanna see? Thought so. Here it is:


More to come...

Friday, July 25, 2008

I promised prints, so here ya go!

You've all been so patient listening to us talk about the land and the new house, either in person or in the blog, that I thought it was time that those of you who haven't seen the prints be subjected to the torture that those of you who have met with us in person have been through. Wait, did I say that? Shame on me!

Anyway, here are the prints of this dream house that Ryan and I have created. And of course, by "us" I mean Ryan did all the drawing and I scrunched my face up when I didn't like something. If you're like me, these prints will mean very little to you - I have no vision whatsoever and cannot see how this flat page translates to a real, 3 dimensional house. If you're like Ryan and so many of the people that have seen these, enjoy - you'll be able to picture this all in glorious 3-D. Tell me how it is, will ya?

Here is the front and back of the house. Well, technically the back and the front of the house. Can anyone guess how much it bugs someone in my line of work that he put the back of the house above the front of the house? Alas, the house: (Note: you can click on any of these pics for a larger view.)

Here are the sides of the house:
As you can tell, we have a problem with giant cats at the new house. Giant cats are very common out in the country. We'll learn to live with it.

(Special note to Poppa P - I had to rewrite that multiple times to get around the "miniature horse" phenomenon!)

Here is the first floor:
AAK! The giant cat got in the new house! SCRAM, giant cat!!

There, that's better:
No, that post near the entrance to the kitchen will not be there. (Whew!) Note the rockin' walk-in pantry, wrap-around porch and covered deck. Who is coming over for BBQ?

On to the second floor. Plenty of room for family and friends to come stay. See the "Bonus Room"? It's all mine. It's a little known fact (since I just made it up) that "Bonus" is a home building term that means "Meghan's." Look it up, I dare ya. Unless you've got better things to do. And I really hope you do.

(Don't worry, men. Ryan will have a barn all to himself.)

So that's the house. Oh, wait, I should probably give you a little color in this post, huh?? Ok, here are some of the views from the house. This picture was taken from the future location of our driveway, facing the nearest human neighbors. That's their barn.

This is the view to the other side:

Out the front of the house:

And off the back of our property:

MOOOOOOOOO!

Friday, July 18, 2008

And then it was July...

I swear, it was like I woke up this morning and June was gone. And half of July. What happened? This summer is slipping away so quickly!

Quick recap: June was a quiet month. It included a trip to Arizona for Ryan:


a Kenny Loggins concert for me, and a serious sense of "old" for both of us as we celebrated our nephew Matthew’s 16th birthday.

July has been somewhat quiet so far as well. July 4th weekend included a visit from Mom and Dad P, and since then, its just been mostly new house stuff. Well, actually, we did have some excitement in the form of a basement slowly filling with water coming from the fireplace. It was a sight to see, water from a fireplace – very yin/yang. We were lucky – there was no damage to anything and only had to throw out a few little things that got in the path of the water. Ryan did some investigating, found the cause of the flood, fixed it, and we’ve been dry ever since.

Speaking of house stuff, here’s the story on the new house: We’re very close to having the prints completed – just a few small changes left to go. We’re gathering estimates and quotes like crazy, and although it’s a lot of work, it is also a lot of fun.

Anyway, here are some pics from the past month:

Mama, Liz, Annabelle and I stumbled upon this scene in the backyard and decided it was the Lamest Parade Ever. Really cute guys, but no music. No horses or elephants either. They could have at least thrown candy!


In all seriousness, the boys were trying to tow one tractor/lawnmower with another. All went well - until the rope broke. Don't worry boys, Annabelle knows when her assistance is needed.


Last weekend, we sat down with Walter and Papa before dinner at Mama and Papa’s to go over the prints.


Note: when planning a house, it is important to:

Talk to people who have done it before.
Hire trusted sub-contractors
Be flexible.
Drink beer.


If beer isn’t available, wine will do. Right, Walter?



After dinner, Walter's daughter (and Elzbieta's sister! Shoutout to our Seattle siblings!) Danuta brought her son Tomasz over to play with Annabelle. Annabelle knows a cute boy when she sees one and wastes no time grabbing his hand.




Ok, thats it for now. I have some images of the prints that I'm going to post later this weekend, for those of you that have heard about this house but would like to see what the beast may someday look like. Stay tuned!

Saturday, May 24, 2008

Fun on "the land"

Happy Memorial Day weekend!! A long weekend seems like a perfect time to get caught up on all the blog posts I've been neglecting.

The last 2 weeks have been mostly fun but not overwhelmingly eventful. Since the last post, we've made 2 trips to Peoria - one to celebrate Mother's day and one to visit the kitchen design place and then bug Walter for information/advice, and 2 trips to the "chicagoland area" - one for a Welcome Baby open house for my best friend Sammi's little guy Cooper and one for a wake. But that's not fun, so moving on...
The house stuff is going well. Ryan has been working hard to design/customize a beautiful home for us and it looks amazing on paper (computer monitor). He has also been making calls and appointments getting all the first steps out of the way. So far we (and by "we" I mostly mean "he") have met with the power people to discuss where all the stuff will go, have discussed all the details with the propane people, have met with the excavation guy (side note to the ladies: CUTIE!), have had soil samples taken (not once, but twice) and picked up the neverending forms from CEFCU for the new construction loan.
During all this, we also got a great new camera so that we can document the process of building our first home. Unfortunately, with nothing happening on the land just yet, our pets and family members have been the guinea pigs for us figuring out the camera settings. Oh, and thanks to an extremely generous friend, we now have photoshop, and have been having a ton of fun with that. (I am actually thinking about creating a second blogger site dedicated to photos, just so that family and friends who dont want to see 500 pictures of cows dont have to.)
Until next time, here are some random photos from the last couple of weeks:
"I hear what you're saying Uncle Ryan, I'm just not sure I agree."


Ryan, I know its called a "fainting couch," but I'm pretty sure they'll let you just sit on it.



"So, how long until they get tired of taking pictures of us?"

Hello from the land!

Ryan, stop laughing! What's wrong with my boots?


Monday, May 5, 2008

Landowners at last!

Well, we've done it. Ryan and I are officially the owners of 2 acres of land in Clinton, IL. Nothing much to tell, the closing went smoothly, lots of papers to sign, you know the deal. We got to meet Merle's wife Helen (Merle is our real estate agent & new neighbor) and she seems like a really great lady. While Ryan and Merle talked farming and well digging, Helen gave Meghan the scoop on all the neighbors. Here are some pictures of the land from yesterday and today.


Mom and Dad P came down to visit yesterday with Seamus. Here's dad and Seamus standing in what will be our front yard (poor little Seamus almost gets lost in the grass!):

This is the view from the back corner of the land (that small orange spot out there is the Mustang):

After the closing, Merle was kind enough to indulge Meghan's request for a "SOLD" sign. Here he is wrestling with the sign:

Ryan steps in to help Merle attach the "SOLD" sign:

And here we are, the proud landowners (YAY!):

Saturday, May 3, 2008

May already?

Somehow I can hardly believe its May already. Time seems to be flying by, but at least spring is finally here.

The kittens are very happy that it is finally spring!!



Not a whole lot has happened since our last post. Aunt Pat is back in the hospital dealing with a bacterial thing. She's in fairly good spirits and keeping her sense of humor up. They hope to send her home in the next couple of days and we hope this will be the last of it. Your continued good thoughts and prayers, as always, are appreciated.

The babies Logan and Cooper are both doing wonderful, growing like weeds and keeping their mommies busy. Baby Gabriella will be joining the family any day now - she's due on May 11th, Mother's Day! Kevin and Elzbieta are very excited, and the rest of the family is anxiously awaiting her arrival.

It looks like Mom and Dad Pokryfke are finally going to get the "old" house sold here soon. As hard as it is to see my childhood home sold, I'm excited to see this finally happening with the housing market as it is. The closing is scheduled for mid-May, and even though there have been a few bumps in the road, everything appears to be on schedule. What a relief that will be to them.

As for us, things are going well. Ryan and I close on our land Monday afternoon. He's cool as a cucumber, but I'm a little nervous. Mama and Papa Morge came down last weekend and took a tour of the land with us. Mom and Big Poppa P are coming to visit tomorrow and get their tour of our lovely 2 acres.


Oh, and for your enjoyment...Mama Morge was kind enough to give us a preview of what Ryan and I are going to look like living on the "farm":


More soon!

Friday, April 11, 2008

April Showers...of blessings

So, yeah, I've missed updating about a month. With any luck I'll have some time yet this weekend to update and add some pics, but in the meantime, here's a quick update on some of the bigger things that have happened.
  • My dear friend Rachel welcomed a baby boy (Logan Thomas) on March 21st. Both mommy and baby are doing wonderful.
  • I ran/walked my first official 5K race on March 29th, and even got a very cool medal for finishing. Next race: Race for the Cure Decatur, June 28th. Gonna run that one!
  • Yesterday (4/10) my bestest friend Sammi and her husband Brett welcomed their first child, a son, Cooper Dean. Mommy, daddy, and baby Cooper are all doing well, and "Aunt" Meghan can't wait to see them all!
  • My Aunt Pat had her surgery this morning, and the results were as good as they could be. The doctors removed her gall bladder and found the largest gallstone they've ever seen. When it came time to remove the other growth, much to the surgeon's shock, it simply peeled off!! It had it irritated, but not invaded the other organs. He said the other organs look like they were skinned, like when you skin your knee, but they should heal on their own. And they did mutiple frozen section pathology tests and found nothing malignant. They will be doing a full work up, but at this point, the news is very, very good. The doctor did comment of the outcome: "All I can say is someone must have been praying for this lady." Thank you to everyone for your thoughts, prayers and support during this completely insane time.
  • Ryan and I are nearly proud landowners. We put an offer on 2 acres of land today and it was accepted. (Thanks, Merle!) Pending financing, we will be living next to a cornfield and in front of a cow pasture before long. MOOOOOOOOOOOO!

More later....

Friday, March 7, 2008

March Madness

Couple of things today...

Aunt Pat update:
First of all, I want to thank everyone for their love, support, and prayers. I want to apologize for the lack of updated information, but as some of you know, this has been a roller coaster couple of weeks. The ups, downs and uncertainties have been difficult to take, but the outpouring of support and well-wishes has helped everyone get through.

We have learned a lot these past few weeks about the medical world and why its called a “practice.” Sometimes, even doctors get it wrong…

After Aunt Pat’s surgery, the initial determination was made that the tumor found in her body was metastasized gall bladder cancer. However, when the initial biopsy results came back, there was no sign of cancerous cells. Huh? This prompted the doctors to do a needle biopsy of the gallbladder. Those results also came back with no signs of cancerous cells. We were stunned. And confused. It wasn’t bad news, it wasn’t necessarily good news. Heck, it was practically no news. All we knew was that there was a tumor in this poor woman that looked and acted like cancer, but didn’t appear to be cancer on a cellular level. Were the doctors wrong? Were the tests wrong?

The surgeon at Good Shepherd determined that her gallbladder had calcified, but he could offer no explanation for something that looks like cancer, acts like cancer, but doesn’t biopsy like cancer. Aunt Pat was transferred to Rush to be seen by one of the area’s leading gastrointestinal surgeons. He and his partner ordered additional tests, and began to do research. After 2 different scans came back clean, he determined that what Aunt Pat most likely has is a very rare inflammatory gallbladder disease that mimics and is very frequently initially diagnosed as a gallbladder carcinoma. Due to the hardened gallbladder, he is unwilling to rule out cancer completely, but scans of the rest of her body are clear. That’s the good news. The less good news is that this growth will still have to be removed. Because it has invaded some of the neighboring organs, the surgery will not be an easy one.

Aunt Pat will be returning home sometime next week and will spend a few weeks at home regaining her health and strength. Sometime in April, she will return to the hospital for additional and at that point the doctors will come up with a plan and schedule for surgery.
Until then, we will continue to wait, hope, and pray.


Now, less serious news. What we've been up to:
The last few weeks have been hectic for more reasons than those mentioned above.

The weekend of Feb 23rd, Ryan, Mr. "i never get sick", was very sick on Friday and Saturday. On Sunday, I exhibited my superior gracefulness by falling in the kitchen, bruising my hip, hurting my wrist, and slamming my head against the floor. Kids, listen to mommy and daddy when they tell you not to run in the house.

The next weekend was no less eventful. Ryan came home sick again on Friday, but thankfully was feeling better by the time Saturday morning came around, since on Saturday, Mom and Dad Morge, Luke, Liz and Annabelle came to Decatur to celebrate Mom and Madison's birthday. The Peoria and Decatur Morges all attended Michael Aaron's basketball game (always very cute and much fun) and of course, Michael Aaron was a scoring machine! And he seemed to enjoy having a huge cheering section. After the game, we headed to Pastabilities for a really fun family dinner.

Sunday morning, I woke up with bad back pain - apparently i had hurt myself during my boot camp training on Saturday and had made things worse by picking up and carrying my sweet Annabelle around (worth it!) so i spent most of Sunday resting while Don and Ryan worked on the basement.

That's about it from us for now. I'll be heading to Indy on Saturday to visit Sammi and Brett, but beyond that, should be a low-key weekend. 'Bout time!!

Love y'all!

Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Prayers Needed

I know, I promised a more upbeat entry this time. I lied.

As some of you may know, my Aunt Pat has been experiencing some major medical problems. After a trip to the emergency room with severe jaunice and fever, a scope was done which showed a mass on her gall bladder that we feared might be a tumor of some sort. This morning, my Aunt had surgery to determine the cause of her symptoms and identify the mass. The news after surgery was the worst case scenario. My aunt pat has gallbladder cancer, which has spread to her small bowel and possibly her liver. The extent of this tumor means that removing it is not an option. Chemotherapy and radiation may help to shrink the tumor to an operable size, but it is unlikely that they will help much, if at all.

At this time, I am asking for your thoughts and especially your prayers. Please keep my Aunt Pat in your prayers, pray for strength and comfort for her. Pray for her family, her husband Charlie and her kids John, Peter and his wife Vicky and their son Nathan, and Katie and her husband Jamie, that they may have the strength to support each other and their wife/mother at this extremely difficult time. And pray for us, her extended family, especially my mom and Aunt Marianne. I know that watching their sister go through this is especially difficult and stressful for them.
If prayer is not your thing, please just keep us in your thoughts.

Your love and prayers are greatly appreciated.
Love,
Meghan

Friday, February 1, 2008

A Decaturiffic Snow Day

Yesterday around 2:00, it started to snow. And kept snowing. And snowing. When it finally stopped around noon today, we were left with over 10 inches of the beautiful but messy white stuff. For those of you not living in Central Illinois, its pretty much shut down around here. It takes a lot to get them to shut down the State Farm corporate offices, but thousands of SF'ers got to go back to bed this morning.

Anyway, not the point of the story. While I don't work on Fridays and have been lucky enough to get to cuddle with my kittens while i curl up on the couch in my sweats, Ryan went to work. As we live on a non-essential roadway, we've yet to see a plow. And even with the sandbags in the F150, Ryan had trouble getting out of the driveway and up the street. I heard his tires spinning and peeked outside to check on him and saw our next door neighbor walking out to the truck. Without saying a word, he started pushing, and I watched as he pushed the truck up the worst part of the hill. Once Ryan got going and I settled back inside, I couldn't help but dwell for a little while on how lucky we are to live in such a friendly and wonderful neighborhood. Little did I know...

I confess, my morning included an indulgent little nap. When I woke up, I was still thinking about how great it was for our neighbor to do something nice for someone else, and I decided that it might be nice to shovel the driveway so that Ryan wouldn't have to do it when he got home. I bundled up in my adorable little cherry boots, winter coat and gloves and headed out to shovel. I watched car after car make their way along our snow covered street, each person waving a cheery hello. The snow was heavy and deep, but I was making progress. About half an hour into the shoveling, I saw a tan truck, one of the first that had driven by, pull up and park in front of the neighbor's house. I knew it wasnt the neighbor, but I had no clue who it was. Out of the truck emerged a tall man in tan coveralls. He grabbed a shovel out of his truck, walked over, and asked if he could help. Without waiting for an answer, he started to shovel. We talked as we worked - his name is John, he's currently unemployed, his mother lives in Waukegan and his sister lives down the street from us. She's a schoolteacher with two grown children. John had driven over to take his sister out to buy some salt, as his truck could handle the snow better than her car. He said that the first time he drove by, Jesus said to him of me "she might need some help". When he drove by the second time and I was still out working, he decided to listen and stop. When we had finished, I offered him a warm drink, to buy him lunch, anything I could think of. He refused. I begged him to let me do something for him, and he told me if I would have a wonderful day, that would be enough for him. When I thanked him for his help, he thanked me for letting him help, smiled, shook my hand, and was gone almost as fast as he had appeared.

I came back in the house to warm up and just haven't been able to stop thinking about the kindness of strangers in this town. True, Decatur lacks a lot. A decent mall and bookstore for example. But what it does have is wonderful people, generous and kind. The kind of people you can't find just anywhere. Sometimes I spend so much time wishing for the things that this part of Illinois doesn't have that I overlook the things it does. Maybe when Jesus told John that I "might need some help" he wasn't talking about the snow. Maybe he was talking about my perspective.

Decatur - it isn't all bad. :)



(Won't be so serious on the next one, I promise!)

Monday, January 28, 2008

Of Basements and Basketball

Another weekend, another bunch of work done. And again, I can't take much credit. This past weekend Mama and Papa Morge, and Liz, Luke and Annabelle came down for a visit, and Don came over to help with the house. Saturday morning was spent attacking the basement, dissasembling the pool table and cleaning away. In the afternoon, we all took a break and went to Michael Aaron's basketball game - what a blast!! Michael shows as much hustle in b-ball as he did in soccer, he's such a great athlete. Here are some pics from the game:
Michael knows how important it is to stay hydrated :)

The best looking cheering section ever.



Uncle Ryan cuddles his Annabelle.


Once the game was over, and the supplies were purchased, it was back to work. The rest of Saturday night (with the exception of a dinner break) and Sunday was spent working on the cabinets/wall. When all was said and done, we had beautiful cabinets installed, including the gorgeous blue tile top. Check it out:
Checking for level on the cabinets.


Installing the countertop.


Pibblet surveys the action to make sure things are looking how HE wants them to.

Tiles are in and grouted - beautiful!



Thanks again to Mom and Dad P, Mom and Dad M, Liz, Luke, Annabelle and especially Don for all their hard work!!! You guys are doing more for us and this house than you could ever imagine. We love you all so much!!!