Wreck this House

So I had this great vision of updating progress on this old house every day. But....nahhh. Not being able to find the battery charger for the camera helps me not feel bad about keeping a better journal as we "Wreck this House", and then lovingly re-beautify it. Now that all the days are blurred together, I don't know what happened when, but here's what's been done so far.

David continued to chip away at the rock wall downstairs, while I worked upstairs scraping the popcorn ceilings off. yuck! I ran back and forth from scraping ceilings and unloading buckets of rocks. David would fill 5-gal buckets with the broken-up lava rock, hoist it through the basement window where I stood waiting to grab the bucket from him and dump it on the trailer.

I think we had 3 trips to the dump to get rid of all the rock. So, we hauled rock up and out of the basement, onto the trailer, to the dump, and then had to unload everything ourselves at the dump....yes, this was tiring. and dusty.

my dew rag kept the nasty popcorn ceiling out of hair...

   

You guys, just look at all that rock, and be glad that you weren't here to move it. We made our own little mountain at the dump.

The basement bathroom wall got punched out, and then we had to skeedaddle on up to higher country for work before we could get the rest of the bathroom knocked out.

It is hard to work right next to one of the world's premier fishing lakes and see boat after boat come through and hear about the catches....and not get to do any fishing yourself! It's been driving David kind of bonkers. ;) What's keeping him sane is that he has a beautiful mountainside to glass all day long where we see lots of antelope, deer, elk, and we also saw our first black bear Wednesday morning!!!! Wowza.

Wednesday as soon as our shift was over at 7, we skeedaddled back to camp, got fishing gear loaded up and ready to go and David took to the water....in his waders and float tube- his first time using his tube etc. for years! He was so excited! I didn't get a fish license yet, so I watched him for a bit and then went on a run back to our "home" and cooked dinner. On the way back, a mama moose and her baby tramped through camp and down to the lake. Awesome!
It doesn't start to slowly get dark up here until 9 or later....so David was able to get in a solid 2 hours of fishing. He was in heaven. And he caught one! Nothing trophy worthy for this lake, but by far much bigger than anything we've caught in Nevada. ;) ...besides a striper or a catfish....

On the camera I have some better pictures...  And then I cooked it and ate it. yum!
 


Hard at work. (David took this one through his scope and then sent it to me. harhar. ) For the record, I was under the shade canopy, with the kindle hooked up above me while watching something on Netflix and waiting for boats to come in...wait, that doesn't sound any better....but at least I wasn't snoozing! Man, our job is tough. ;)


We left for work Tuesday night and got back Friday night to Dad, Chris, and Daniel busily working on re-plumbing, re-wiring, and putting up sheet rock in the basement.
While the men worked downstairs (going bonkers and cussing the stupidity of previous owners...) Spencer and I hung out upstairs and put primer on the lovely wood panels on the master bedroom walls. Spence was seriously loving it, and his enjoyment made me giggle. (Logan came up too, but preferred to just play at Jean and Colin's the entire time. Spencer wanted to hang out at the house with all of us.)
 
After we finished the room, to keep Spencer busy I showed him how to use the pump sprayer. He thought that was awesome! He walked around spraying water on just about everything and everyone the rest of the night, and took cues from David who was power-washing the exterior at the time. In the pic you see David pressure-washing, and then Spencer working washing off the old furnace that the guys hauled up from the basement.
 
Mixing texture for the ceiling...about 10 or 11ish Saturday night.
 (he claimed he wanted to get one of these for Shelly to mix dough...)


Dad seriously is SuperMan. He textured ALL of the upstairs ceilings Saturday night in an hour or so, and wasn't quiting until it was done! Good thing too, because we textured the closets by ourselves after he left, and let's just say there's a big difference between what our work looks like and what SuperMan did. Serious upper arm work-out just doing a closet, and he did the whole upstairs. yeesh.
Dad and the rest of the boys headed back south Sunday morning, and then it was back to just David and me. We masking off windows and doors, David figured out how to use the fancy paint sprayer Dad brought up, primed all of the upstairs, picked out paint colors and grabbed some floor samples....and then I think it was time to head back to work.
Oh yah! Before we left, I unburied my sewing machine from the pile of our stuff in Jean and Colin's garage and whipped out this awesome poolside caddy for Ch's birthday. It turned out so cute, I love it!
 
We had a bit of a delay as we tried to get back to work....
We stopped to get me a fishing license. I went inside to buy the license and David stayed in the car, I think he was on the phone. I come outside with my license, and David isn't in the Jeep, so I put my wallet away, locked the doors and headed back inside the store to find him (he was looking at boots). We go back out to get in the car, and I'm waiting patiently for David to unlock the doors..."it should be unlocked!" he says...not unlocked! Keys inside! ah! Small-town habits die hard- like just leaving your keys in the car all the time! argh! There have been more than several times where Mr. D has just left the keys in the car and it drives this girl [that has a habit of locking the car at all times and keeping the keys with her at all times] a little bonkers. Well this time, our two different habits collided miserably. If I'm leaving my wallet in the car, with other valuables like a laptop and other electronics, I don't care if I'm in a small-town Idaho- that car is getting locked on my way out! Since David wasn't in the car, I figured he had the keys and I didn't even think about looking for them inside the vehicle before I locked and wandered back inside.
An hour or so and some bailing wire later, we finally got back in and on the road north for work. That day was a, "Where's Uncle Lonney??" kind of day. Not only would it have been nice to have a slim jim around, but we also had to replace the Jeep's battery that morning and paid about $50+ more than what we're used to.


Hard at work! ;) I usually sit on the passenger side, but this particular day was fairly warm,  and my right side was getting burned. So we switched spots so I could get a reprieve from the sunshine. I guess the warmth lulled him right to sleep. But as soon as I said, "boat!", he would perk right up.We take turns taking little cat naps through the day....shhh! And when I say we take turned taking cat naps, I mean I'm the one who naps the most while David glasses the mountain with his scope.
 
Got some practice in with his fly rod

And then of course, we did some fishing after work!

Getting my monies' worth for that fishing license....

   

And then it was back to work work work on the house. At the end of our 3-day work shift, we look forward to getting back Rexburg for 6 days for a reprieve from boat inspections. But by our last day off we look forward to getting to work so we can get a break from workin' on this old house!

We got the exterior prepped and painted. Hip hip hooray! Well, most of it is done anyway...I still need to finish the trim. 

 
When you look at the house, it's sometimes hard to tell that we put a different color on it...but looking at this picture helps. The right side is the previous cream and the left is what David just finished spraying with a "Graceful Gray". The gables, shutters, and concrete foundation is now an "Intellectual" dark gray, and the trim will be a "Polished" taupe.
We were outside painting on the hottest day Rexburg has seen for a while! 90 degrees! It was hot, but we worked just fine in it. Lot better than 110 degrees!
And for some reason, I thought it was a good idea to wear shorts while painting....
Look at that ankle line! 
 
We got the ceilings and most of the walls and trim painted (upstairs. basement is on hold until Daddy-o/SuperMan gets back). We pulled out the upper cabinets in the kitchen and also got the floors scraped down, all of the carpet tacks and baseboards ripped out, and the two layers of linoleum in the kitchen teared out. Whew! That was a work-out right there. Then poured some waterproofing/sealer on all of the floors.

I'm excited to get back to the house after this shift is over and see how the interior colors dried and if it all came together...eek! It is stressful picking out paint! Especially for a house that isn't yours! Mom and Dad didn't care to pick out paint, so left it up to me. Ah! I loved it, but it hated it so much at the same time. What if it doesn't turn and we have to re-do it? What if the parents don't like it? It is their house, so I can't do something too crazy or bold that I would like but they wouldn't and would make the house difficult to sell later....
When we get back tomorrow night we'll finish painting the inside( still have bedroom #2 and the kitchen...oh and the bathroom, but the bathroom is kind of a disaster that we won't touch until Dad gets up here to look at it and decides what to do...), paint the exterior trim, and then probably start on flooring. yay! I really wanted to do all wood flooring upstairs and not deal with nasty carpet. And Dad said yes! hooray! I was seriously so excited when I brought it up and he said sure without me even needing to give my well planned list of pros for all wood and cons of carpet.

I leave you with this random thing!
 
When I ripped out the carpet in the linen closet, I found this little card for Shelly (Chris' wife) under the carpet and pad. hahaha! I was hoping it was something juicy, but alas it was some sort of visiting teaching assignment reminder, I think... Also that day, a junk mailer came in the mail addressed for Shelly. It cracked us up! Chris and Shelly bought and lived in this house when they were in school up here...5 years ago? My, how time flies!

Day 1

Saturday 6/01 Nasty smelling carpet ripped up and taken out. Lava rock wall/fireplace taken downnnn. Well, we got started on taking it down anyway. Hopefully we can get the rest of it down and out tomorrow.

Lot's of dust in the air, bat man! Oh and, Evan came to help. :)

That furnace was heavy!

Apparently, I'm not smart enough to stop talking to take a picture. I was hoping to capture how dusty dirty we were...can't really tell.

Idaho happened

We last left by announcing that we would be transferring to BYU-Idaho to start school in the fall, and that we were looking for housing and jobs for the summer. Well well well, a lot has happened since then and things seem to just keep magically falling into place- Idaho, we love you! 

Oh yahh, I had birthday

And shout hooray- that David got me a dang nice sewing machine!!!! I cried as I was opening it up, I had no idea he had something that big planned. 

Back in March, during Spring Break, we flew to SLC

  

where Ashley picked us up and then we took her car up to Rexburg. But not before we stopped in to see a special couple and to show off the sweet chunk of love.

We looked into a few job opportunities and we checked out pretty much every single married housing option. (...single married housing....hahaha! didn't even plan that one) After our full days of looking at housing, we were pretty discouraged with our options- 1) We couldn't get up here til' May due to school in NV still being in session, and May is mid semester up here so there was NO housing available, ugh! 2) It is more expensive than we cared for- talk about a monopoly on the housing market in a small college town. Double ugh! 3) If we got a job that started at the beginning of summer (end of Mayish), there would be no apts/etc available until July- the end of the semester up here.

We drove back down to Logan to return Ashley's car with our heads spinning, wondering how we were going to pull this off. Da da da dahhh! Parents to the rescue!

They have a house in Rexburg, but we didn't want to pay to rent out a whole house- 4 bedrooms, basement, a huge shop...that's just a lot of space for 'lil ole us. But Daddy-o said that he wanted to get those nasty boys out of his house anyway and that he wanted to put a kitchen in the basement so he could rent out the top and bottom. So we twisted their arms and offered our sweat and labor during the summer as we fixed up the house if they would let us be their new renters- they said yes! ;)
After Azalia'a blessing, we hopped in with KK&KJ...and Jenette to hang out in Utah County while Mom and Dad drove to Rexburg from Logan to check on the house etc. and tell the renters to be out by May 31st. Because we didn't have a ride south until they got back from Idaho, David and I just hung out at Keith and Keri's- played with kids and did yard work.
    

It seems we didn't get a picture of that other cute kid- but in our defense, he doesn't really slow down, so it makes it kind of difficult to snap something of him...  :) 

David finally shaved his beard off, and had fun doing it!

 

I have to admit, he's pulling the mustache off quite nicely. :) He shaved Easter morning, and all day I found myself just staring at him, more than usual- it was like I'd forgotten what he looked like! 

Easter!

    

We were informed that we both qualified for graduation. Look Mom, here's my card to hand to the reader. Had we been walking at our graduation ceremony here's where I would've been in the line-up. High honors, ooooo.ahhhh. pshh CSN, easiest 4.0 of my life.
 
This just in- Grades were finally posted for this last semester. David got straight A's!!!! hip hip hooray! Now we're waiting for that silly school to get our diplomas posted so we can get our credits settled up here. hmph. Like I've said, kids, if you can, avoid transferring schools at all cost! 

 And then we searched and searched and waited, and waited to hear back from possible work prospects. And we also pulled Youth Conference together. David was awesome and came and helped me out with everything. This is us when we got back- sweaty sweaty and worn out! We crashed and fell asleep right away on the love sac (did I mention we got a love sac- for crazy cheap, thank you FB Henderson yard sale; we also got a nice couch, hooray!). I woke up with David attacking my face in his sleep.


Before we left (for Utah/Idaho in March), I think, David applied for this random job as a boat inspector that he stumbled upon on Fremont County's website. Finally, he was interviewed via telephone, and a week later he was told that they couldn't officially tell him he got the job, because they needed to extend the application date to see if they could get any more/different applicants. So, the Mr. asked if his super duper awesome wife could apply, and what they thought of a husband-wife team working together. They said that heck yah she should apply and that they love husband-wife teams. What the what what? Hot dang! So I applied, David was told he got the job, I was interviewed and then about an hour later got a call saying that I got the job as well and that David and I would have the same shift. Heavenly choirs singing!!!! Downside- a 10hr mandatory job training would be held on May 14th... Well, I guess not everything can be perfect all the time. We were planning on having me continue to substitute teach until the 17th, have my piano recital on the 20th, and then start packing. Instead we started packing every night after we got home from a quick trip to Panaca to gather up any gear David had stored there and to fish! We each caught over 20. It was nuts!
       


 I taught until the 10th, had my recital on the 10th, oh and just to make things interesting, I also put together a quilt for the YW auction, loaded Dad's truck and trailer on the 10th/11th, and then we busted out of town on Sunday after church. Madness, I tell you! Madness.
  

Our last night- bittersweet!

We also went to some baseball games that Saturday before we left, and I went to the future Mrs.Amanda's bridal shower.
 

Farewell to thee, basement walls; you will never be forgotten.
 
Seriously- are you impressed with how comfy and homey we had this place? It looks so much smaller with everything out. Weird!

Finally, the day came! Off on our great adventure!
 
We were slowed down for about an hour in the gorge due to an accident. While we were stopped in bumper to bumper, not moving, cars shut off and waiting traffic, we enjoyed marveling at the thousands of bees everywhere. Where did those things come from? And then we looked down to our left and laughed at the guy in his open convertible. haha!
These pictures do not do these bees justice; so many bees; they were everywhere.
 
We stopped in Provo for the night and got back on the road in the morning to stop in Rexburg at the Erickson's on Monday night. Tuesday morning we had to be in St. Anthony for our training. We got trained up a bit and got our schedules. It's a pretty sweet deal. We work 3, 13-hour days, and then have 6 days off. There's a trailer that we sleep at while we're up there so we don't have worry about setting up camp, and we don't have to drive to and from Island Park every day. With both of us working, we put in 78 hours within 3 days- yahoo for having money to pay for school! And with the 6 days off we have time to work on the house.

After training, we got banking shtuff transferred over to up here, and then headed back down to Utah county, because we didn't have anything else to do until our first shift on the 27th, we didn't want to go back to Henderson, and because Keri was due any time with baby #3, so we thought that we maybe could be a little bit helpful. :) We laid pavers, pushed a lot of sand, shoveled out a sand pit, shoveled sand into said pit, and then played and played with some cute kids as we waited for baby to come.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
   
 
Welcome to the world, baby Liv!
   

We then scurried up to West Valley to visit with David's Grandma and family for a few days. And didn't get one single picture! Argh! I'm slapping my forehead right.now! grr! But we loved just being able to relax and talk to Grandmama and see some of David's family. Thanks Grandmama and Aunt Bridgett and boys for making us feel welcome. We love you!
Saturday we met up with Chris and Shelly at temple square to watch over their little ones while they were in the temple for a friend's wedding.
 
   
Sighhh, we are definitely going to miss getting to play with these guys all the time.

The next day we headed back north, this time all the way to Island Park to start our first 3-day shift as boat inspectors. Welcome to our office:

Why must he always be so good lookin'? Look at that mugger he gets to hang out with for 13 hours a day! Beautiful!
 
This picture (found after browsing through David's phone) definitely shows my better side:
 
After our shift, waiting for all those boys to get out of the house, we've been hanging out at the Erickson's and taking care of all of those little things that come with moving- new bank, new address= changing all your billing/withdrawals/deposits/insurance + getting utilities set up. Fun, fun, fun!
Now that we're up to date, and David found the box that contained the chord to the camera so I could upload some pictures (bless him), I'll keep ya'll posted on our progress with sprucing up this old house. We got the keys on Saturday, yesterday, and we dove right in to tearing things up. :) T'will be an adventure, and we're looking forward to it!