JeffKatieEmma.com

It has been awhile since we updated the blog.  Sorry.  I guess we’ve been busy with lots of different activities.  Summer is just around the corner and we have already started taking advantage of the warmer weather by being outside as much as possible.

We visited the Pacific Science Center a couple weeks ago and Emma had a great time seeing all the different things there.  We have been trying to spend as much time at the cabin as we can but haven’t been there in a couple weeks due to all the activities at home.  We did buy a used boat to keep up at the lake.  It’s nice to be able to get out on the water again.  We plan on using it as much as we can this summer, although with gas prices so high, maybe we’ll do some trolling and fishing.

Emma’s birthday is coming up in July and we are starting to organize a party for her.  It will most likely be small and she’ll just have a couple of her friends over for it.  Her actual birthday will be while we are on a road trip to Montana for Carolee’s wedding.  That’s coming up shortly and I know I’m looking forward to seeing all the family back there.  I can’t say I’m too excited for the long drive.  We have reserved a rental minivan for the trip along with Aunt Jean and Mom.  We’ll all ride together and caravan with Judy and Jessica.  We plan on driving straight through both ways so it will be a couple of very long days.  (13+ hours of driving).

Anyway, we just wanted to post a quick update.  Look for more updates as we start doing more activities through the summer.

It’s hard to believe how fast time is going by.  Last Friday we went to the elementary school near our house for "kindergarten  round up".  Amazingly Emma will be starting kindergarten in September.  Friday we went in and attended a two hour session where they threw a ton of information at us while Emma went with all the other kids to do a couple projects in her new classroom.  From what I understand they evaluated all the kids during that hour to see where they are at developmentally.  They did a few projects and performed simple tasks like writing their name and answering basic questions.  They also did an art project (they each made a paper hat).

While Emma was in with all the kids, Katie and I listened to all of the various information that was presented to us in the library.  We heard from the principal, school nurse, teachers, librarian, PTA president and on and on.  It was actually very interesting, but at the same time a little scary to think Emma is beginning her school journey.

Besides that, not too much is going on.  Katie and Emma attended a birthday party for Emma’s friend Jena and then visited Sarah’s for a little bit on Saturday.  While they were busy with those trips, I went to mom’s and hauled a couple loads of topsoil to spread on the grass and flower gardens at her house.  It actually went very quickly and we were done by about noon.  I picked up one more truckload and came home to our house to spread that.  It was nice and sunny and was a perfect temperature for working in the yard.

On Sunday we went down to the Earle’s and celebrated Jaden’s 4th birthday.  Lots of pictures are HERE: http://www.theearlefamily.com .

We have a couple trips planned over the next few months.  We’ll be heading back to Ellensburg for our 10 year anniversary.  Yeah, I know that sounds like kind of a funny place to go but we decided since it’s where we met, it might be fun to go back and see how things have changed at CWU.  While we’re there we’ll visit some of our old favorites downtown (The Tav is on the "definite list") and just have a nice relaxing time wandering around.  Later this summer we’ll also be driving back to Montana for Carolee’s wedding.  It’s shaping up to be a family reunion because just about everyone is going to be there.  Of course we are trying not to book too many weekends over the summer because we’d like to spend the majority of it at the lake.  Every time we go over there we get the goose bumps because it’s still hard to believe we can stay there now.  There will be lots of projects to work on there, but there will also be lots of time to relax.

Over the last 1.5 years I know we’ve probably overwhelmed you with cabin progress photos.  Well, since we passed our final this will be the last cabin progress post (until we do landscaping).  I thought I’d post a couple pics of the inside now that we are in the process of moving in.  Basically we are taking up one piece of furniture each time we go up there and now have a table, and also a couch.

Here are a couple shots:

On a completely separate note it hailed at our main house a couple evenings ago and was amazing.  Hail the diameter of dimes were landing all over the place.  I’d say we got about 2 inches of hail by the time it was done.  So much, in fact, that Emma and I made a couple "Hailmen".  Crazy weather!!

We finally had our final inspection and we PASSED!!  No more inspections and we can move in.  Over the next couple weeks we’ll be moving some furniture in and actually using the cabin.  It took nearly 1.5 years of weekends (off and on) but we pulled it off.  The best part is that now that we’ve done this once, we now have enough knowledge to never want to do it again.  :)

I uploaded 106 pictures of the cabin that cover the majority of the progress that we have made on it over the last 1.5 years.  As most of you know, the work was done on the weekends (not all of them but a bunch of them) by mostly Darren and I.  Ben came out a few times and also helped a bunch.  (Thanks Ben!!)

Anyway, I wanted to put a set of pictures up on the web in case someone was interested in seeing the chronological progress.  You can see them at:

http://www.jeffkatieemma.com/construction

Things are moving along.  Our hope is to be done with the cabin by the time spring starts.  We just have a few more loose ends to tie up and then we should be moving in.  Here are some pictures of the latest progress:

http://www.jeffkatieemma.com/almostdone

Happy Valentine’s Day!!

Just when I thought I couldn’t possibly do any more work on the cabin, Emma came to the rescue.  She showed up with all her gear on and was ready to do some heavy construction.  Emma received a "Lil Helper" tool set for Christmas from Sarah and Dan and was excited to put them to use at the cabin.  We took a few pictures and a cute video as she pounded away on nails.  I think she had a great time "helping" and we kept all the gear up at the cabin so that it’s there for her next time.

Katie finished a quilt for Dan awhile back.  Dan had a ton of racing T-shirts that he’s received over the years when he was involved in racing.  Rather than throw them out, they decided a T-shirt quilt would be a great way to keep the memories without having a pile of shirts sitting around.  Katie chipped away at it during the last few months of the year and finished it in early December.  There is a picture of it below.  This is the second T-shirt quilt that Katie has made.  The first one was with a bunch of T-shirts that I had.  It has turned out to be our favorite cabin comforter.  :)

I’d say that work continues on the cabin, but you probably already knew that.  There are just a few more things to do before we call for the final inspection.  We are really looking forward to getting the place signed off so that we can finally rest when we go up there!

Not much else going on here.  Judy put up a New Years Eve picture from our evening at Mom’s.  We had a nice time and we all stayed up later than we have in quite awhile.  Emma was dying to go to bed at about 9:00 but she refused to go to bed unless the other kids also went to bed.  Since the other kids wanted nothing to do with bed, she ended up staying up until midnight.  Amazing.  That’s the latest she’s ever been up in her short life.

Anyway, Happy New Year.  We are all back at school and work now.  It’s already feeling like we are back to the grind…….

We made some great progress on the cabin before New Years.  The kitchen is pretty much put together now.  All the appliances are installed and working, the sink is done etc.  The only things left to do in there are to finish building a box above the microwave (to close in the vent pipe) and then do some trim work on the bottoms of the cabinets.

We also finished the deck railing and finished up the shower in the bathroom.

We are getting closer and closer to calling for a final inspection.  To say we can’t wait would be a major understatement!!

We hope you had a Happy New Year and have a great 2008!  We all spent the evening over at mom’s last night since it was the anniversary of dad passing away and New Years at the same time.  New Years Eve has forever changed for us, that’s for sure.  Judy’s family and our family all spent the night and the kids stayed up until midnight.  (That’s a first)

Here’s a link to the latest cabin pictures: http://www.jeffkatieemma.com/progress

We’ve been working on the kitchen at the cabin recently.  Our friend Ben came up and helped us set all the cabinets a couple weekends ago.  We have been trying to decide on whether to add a couple more cabinets next to the refrigerator to make a small island, but I think we decided not to for now.  It’s something that we could relatively easy once the final inspection is complete.  Right now we are trying to focus all the things needed to pass the final inspection.  The list is getting smaller, although we keep realizing there are additional things that have to be done prior to the inspection so it isn’t shrinking as fast as we’d like.

While Ben was out there, we also insulated the rest of the garage and then sheet rocked most of the walls.  As you can imagine, we are getting very tired of working on the place.  We are very ready to have it finished so that we can just go out there and enjoy it.  It’s been over a year since we started so you can imagine why we are ready to be done.

Besides working on the cabin, we’ve also finished up all of our Christmas shopping and are ready for all of our family get togethers.  Emma has been very interested in the calendar lately.  To say she has been anticipating Christmas is an understatement.  Her Christmas list pretty much looks like a promotional item for "High School Musical".  I think she’s just starting to lose her infatuation with the movie, but she’s definitely hoping for some High School Musical themed presents.  Since she isn’t a regular follower of our web site, I can tell you that she won’t be disappointed.

We are all planning on heading over to Mom’s this evening to spend Christmas eve together with Brian, Marcia, Aunt Jean and everyone else.  It should be a great time.  It will be fun to see all the kids excited about the evening.

Judy and Scott have created their own blog/web site.  You can see it at: http://theearlefamily.spaces.live.com/

I have also linked it up under the "links" area of our web site on the left.

We hope you have a MERRY CHRISTMAS and a HAPPY NEW YEAR!  (You too Dad.  We love you and miss you dearly!)

I know it seems like all we ever post about is the cabin progress, but I guess that’s because we are spending so much time working on it these days.  Last weekend we put the flooring in the bathroom, installed the toilet, vanity and granite countertop.  We also installed the interior doors and wrapped all the windows with wood trim.  On top of that, we installed the water heater and finished putting in the deck rail, although we still need to install the cedar 2X6 top on it.  Needless to say, it was a busy weekend.

We are hoping to have the kitchen cabinets delivered on Friday and might hang all of those this weekend.  Once that is done, we just need to wait for the appliances and get countertops installed and then we should be close to getting our final inspection.  We’ll get the flooring installed soon after that.

Besides that, not too much else is going on.  We had Thanksgiving at our house with Jeff’s family (We had Katie’s family Thanksgiving earlier in the month).  There was plenty of turkey and ham and all the food was delicious.

Darren was out at the lake last weekend helping work on the cabin.  We took time out to watch the Apple cup.  Unfortunately we didn’t have Fox Sports Northwest at mom’s cabin so we went next door to Steve and Theresa’s to watch the game.  They were actually at the game but Pam and Andrea were home.  We took soup and cake over and had a great time with them.  Darren was especially happy with the outcome of the game.  Since Katie and I are Wildcats, I can’t say I was too worried about who won.  I have plenty of family and friends that went to both schools, although if I had to pick, I’d go with the Husky’s just because my sister and brother in law are alumni!  :)

Anyway, that’s it for an update.  To see some pictures of the cabin, click here:

http://www.jeffkatieemma.com/cabintrim