House Progress & More

Super cold weather and snow don't make for much house progress, but there's a tiny bit of progress to show and some other random stuff too! :-)

It's a good thing we all have mud boots around here because there is lots and lots of mud around our new house.

 The last update I gave about the house was that sand was being delivered....at the end of that work day the guys tarped most of the sand in preparation for the cold weather that was coming our way.

 They got the roof of the safe room/bathroom framed to hold concrete forms, too.

 Then the polar vortex reached us and it got downright gross outside. Snow and cold weather is what we woke up to on Sunday morning. That afternoon the boys actually spent some time outside - and for the first time I can remember I was genuinely worried about their safety because it was so cold.

(I took this photo through the screen door, it was too cold for me to open the door and take a proper photo.)

 

 This is how he looked at me when I asked him if was doing OK. He has no idea why I'm asking. He'd only been outside playing football for fifteen minutes in near zero degree weather.....hmmmmm....he's always surprising me.
But, they had a great time, and thankfully it was short lived and then they came inside to warm up.
I went for a walk on Sunday afternoon - got all bundled up, thought I'd go walk through the pasture - but only made it out to the cattle before I decided the wind was simply too cold for my face (the only part that wasn't protected from the wind) to handle.
The weather's changed, warmer rainy weather is here now so Levi and I put our boots on today and went to see what the house looked like. We found out that the safe room/bathroom has a concrete top and pipes for the toilet and shower!

 We found a few more pipes out in the sand, too.

 I still feel surprised by the concrete rectangle built up in the middle of our house, even standing in it feels exciting and odd, all at the same time.

 Harold loves to explore the new house with us. This crazy dog went up into the hayloft of the big red barn today and could not/would not come down. Maybe he and Otto (dog cousin) have more in common than we thought.  Although in all fairness, Otto has worked through his fear of stairs and it seems Harold has room for improvement.

 Mr. Levi instructed me not take his picture, but I surprised him and managed to get him in one photo.

 In other totally random, but still significant here on the farm, we had a tree taken down this week. It was a huge American Elm tree, but it was unfortunately sick and very close to our house. The saw dust from cutting it down is just about all that remains of it.

 My feet are skis, yet they look pretty small compared to this big tree trunk. I love the trees on this yard, and while we've been working to trim up and thin out as many as we can, it was sad to see this one go. It's shaded my basketball "court" my whole life and now it's just gone.

The weather looks more cooperative for this next week, so we're hopeful that we take a few more steps forward than we did this past week.