10 Years - Part 4

I'm concluding my 10 year series with a quick recap of the house progress the last 6.5 years. When we moved in moments before Elijah was born, the basement was just a shell and several things upstairs were not completed. The boys were designated to have the downstairs bedrooms, but every child other than Moriah, has moved bedrooms at least once since we moved in. Moriah is currently waiting to move down to Alei's room once Alei moves to the garage apartment that we are getting ready to break ground on. 

This was the pile of dirt that we had from digging the basement -

 It took 35 truckloads to have it all removed, in spite of the kids really enjoying "the dirt mountain".

  
JD kept up his work pace to get the downstairs bedrooms done. The bathroom did not follow for about three years however.

  
The remainder of the basement was finished slowly over the next several years. We honestly just finished the major building of it last winter and are still finishing the final touches this winter. Everything takes longer and costs more than one can ever dream!

A major part of the work was installing the Geothermal lines in the ceiling. 

Gabriel helping back in the day of long hair

 Shorty after Elijah was born, Aunt Deb moved back from overseas and came for a visit. Since Julia was a very high needs two year old and Elijah wanted me to hold him constantly, Debs decided to delay getting a job in America and stay for a while. Thankfully, that while lasted a full year!

Debra and Elijah 2008

 I was thrilled, thrilled, thrilled that we were able to grow some grass in 2009; mowing grass seemed like a glorious chore!

 
The pool and playground were now located in our front yard, but continued to draw a crowd.
 

Other than just finishing, we have done some other major projects. We installed a wood burning stove and chimney that I LOVE.

We have also built raised garden beds, put in a pasture fence and JD finished the "chicken mansion" this summer - 
 

We finally broke down and paid an excellent carpenter to finish the screened in porch and build built in shelves in the TV room and a TV cabinet in the playroom.

the new TV that JD waited patiently for for 6 years

the old TV in a new built in corner cabinet in the playroom

 I am currently working on the playroom reorganize and redecorate. I ditched the Kelley green carpet, painted the floor and bought a new rug. I also added another Ikea cube shelf to further organize the toys. My next job is to work on hanging pictures in the entire basement. I'm going hang the children's art in the playroom.

The upstairs living room and school room are always a work in progress, but I'm pleased with how life in running in those rooms at the moment -

living room - yes, toys seem to end up everywhere

school room

 I still have painting to do; there's always painting. There will be lots more painting when we move the three bedrooms again once the garage is built.

 And now we are nearing ground breaking on our next building project - our garage and Alei's apartment. She has been buying things for her new home and lining her hallway with them; it's practically a fire hazard at this point.