What a week!

Whew.  What a week.  Each day threw us a new curveball, but made us realize that we are making the right decision in building our home.  Here's a quick recap of our week:

** Dan and his dad got all of the conduit in the trench and Dan got some back filled before MPE was scheduled to come back to pick up the excavator.  As a side note, MPE is HORRIBLE with delivering and picking things up on time.  We now know not to depend on their time schedules if we need to rent equipment again. 

** Our road is f i n i s h e d!  It is pretty nice and we are thrilled we can drive the CR-V to the top without getting whiplash.  We spend today spreading 29 bales of hay along the edge of the road across the meadow so that rains don't start to wash away all of the precious work that we waited so long for!

** A pretty nice buck hangs out with his girlfriends near the house.  We spotted him first on Thursday in the middle of the road and I saw him again this afternoon in the meadow.  We haven't been close enough for long enough to see if he is an 8 or a 10 point.

** We apparently have a nice sized helicopter landing pad on top of the hill.  While out there on Thursday, a WV stated owned copter touched down briefly to check transmission fluid.  Of course, Thursday is the day we didn't have our camera, so we don't have photographic evidence :-)

** Any work that needs done on the truck generally takes 2 1/2 times as long as expected.  Dan changed the control arms this weekend and it ended up taking almost 2 days due to some rusted bolts.  Kole enjoyed spending so much time at Gramps and Grammy's house!

** We ordered our front door, siding, and roofing from 84 Lumber.  It is looking as though we will be framing the house up the first full week of December!  It will be awesome to see it under roof!

** The well driller we called to see if he was willing to drill our well finally called Dan back.  He came out today to check things out.  As it turns out, he doesn't like drilling over a strip mined property.  That isn't our case, so he felt more comfortable.  He told Dan he found a spot where there was definitely water, but how deep or how fast of flow will be determined when the well is drilled.  When Dan asked him how he could tell there was water, he replied it was a "trade secret."  He's considered a master driller, so we'll see how skilled he is in a few weeks!

** Kole is growing more and more every day.  He tries to repeat everything we do now and is starting to say 2 syllable words, as well as small sentences.  His imagination is amazing - he found a stick this week and decided it was a saw.  He spent 20 minutes sawing on a log.  He also took a pair of pliers and "worked" on a tree.  It is hard to believe in a little over 2 months, he will be 2 years old!  He is quite proud to show you his one finger now when asked how old he is!

I will be posting pictures soon.  I'm working on my netbook right now and trying to load pictures makes it go all kinds of crazy!  We had the camera nearly every day, so we are going to have quite the collection of construction pictures!

Next up (hopefully this week): excavation and foundation work!

Road, electric, and water - oh my!

Boy are we ever enjoying the beautiful weather we are having this week!  Kole and I drove out this afternoon to check on the progress of the road.  Unfortunately, for the second day in a row, there were no men working.  I was a big upset at first, but seeing how happy Kole was to just play in the field, on the pile of dirt took away any anger I felt.  When we got home, I called our road contractor to chat about the status of things.  As it turns out, the gas companies hoard the stone from the quarries for the new gas wells they are installing.  So, trucks can't just pull up to the quarry whenever they need stone.  This has been putting a little hold on things, but he claims it will be done  by next Wednesday.  They will be working tomorrow and early next week, so I am sure Kole will be one happy little boy watching all that stone being laid out.

Dan received a call from our well driller last night - apparently the engine in his drill rig blew up and he is out of commission for at least a few weeks.  He gave Dan another number to call.  He heard back from the other driller today - well, from his wife.  She indicated that since our land has been mined under, her husband probably will need to be convinced to try to drill.  He has apparently had some bad experience in the past with wells running into mines and it creates a lot more work and is more expensive to drill.  Our initial reaction was to slightly freak out, but Dan did some digging and found that where our house sits and where we were hoping to drill the weather have in fact not been mined under.  Even if they have, the mine lies 800 feet below the surface.  I don't think it will be an issue, but we have to wait and see.

We can already tell that we only want to go through this process once!  We know it will be worth it in the end, but man this year is going to be a test of patience!

New Beginnings

Welcome to the house on the hill!  Sit back, relax, and enjoy the tales of this crazy family trying to live out their dream by building a home and starting the journey toward self-sufficiency!


The view, which is the background image for this new-fangled blog, is what sold us on the site of our future home.  Each morning we will welcome the day with uninterrupted 360 degree views of beautiful mountains :-)  While meeting with our road contractor today, he told us that he thought we were close to the highest elevation in Harrison County!  And boy, oh boy, can you tell when you're hiking up our road!

Speaking of our road, progress is finally being made almost 4 weeks after closing on our mortgage.  I will post photos of the road when it is finished, but let me tell you it is a radical change from the jungle it was before.  Our road contractor has been really patient with us.  We have some large trucks that need to make their way up that half mile drive in a few short weeks and we need to make sure things are in the best shape they can be!  Kole thoroughly enjoyed himself today watching the big trucks emptying their loads of rock!  This kid is going to be in hog heaven once things really get rolling!

My father in law is coming into town next week to help Dan put conduit across the field so we can have underground electric.  Don't want those big ugly electric poles to detract from the view we've been waiting for.  The REA staking engineers were out today to mark for poles and we hope to have temporary electric in by the time we start framing. 

Stay tuned for progress shots, shots of a curious almost two year old, and random musings on starting our homestead!