The Home Stretch - We Hope

There are a lot of problems: finding people to work, getting people to show up to work, getting the work done satisfactorily, days lost with nothing done. We do have a deadline and now must push everyone harder to meet it. The problems are reasonable as well as sometimes sad. Nevertheless, time is still lost and we have very little time left. There is a moving truck coming from Houston sometime around the 15th.

For instance, the sheetrock repairers, a husband and wife team, have a daughter who was going into the hospital for a C-section the next day as well as a gall bladder surgery. The husband's kidneys quit working earlier in the year and he is on dialysis so has good days and bad days. Their work lacks one morning of being done. Until they are done the painters can't finish theirs.

The plumbers can't finish their installation until the sump pump is installed. It has been hard to get hold of the man who does this so the builder has been unable to talk with him. And there has been a shortage of supplies due to the large amount of construction going on in Hattiesburg right now. We hope he shows up Monday install it. But many of the contractors are not working on Monday because of the holiday on Tuesday. So there is another week almost gone.

Our builder's partner, who has been helping us get on track again, had a kidney stone this week so he has been unwell.

One of the bright spots has been the quartet of Tim, Keith, Matt, and Louis. They are young men who work for our builder doing the finish work and a LOT of the grunt work involved in construction. They work very hard and long and in the hot Mississippi sun. They have been willing to do whatever is asked of them and with a smile. They are pleasant to be around and have had a big part of getting our house going again.

We have been going to the house early every morning and staying until the last worker leaves. Consequently, there have been no posts lately. Until now.

The framework for the driveway. It can't be poured until the sump pump line and tank are buried.
And here is the sidewalk. These are the work of the quartet.

Floors, faucets, and sinks

Here is the crew installing the floor in our bedroom. They finished the 3 bedrooms and our closet. They were supposed to be back today to do the hallways. But we didn't see them. Neither did we see the cultured marble guys doing our shower. They lack two pieces of trim and were supposed to run by our house and finish up before they went to the other job today. And the shower fixture will be installed when they are finished.....

The front bedroom floor finished. Except for the quarter round that is going around the edges. That bright glare is because I spent the day cleaning the windows. They sure do look good. The ones I cleaned, that is. We plan to go back on Monday to finish the other ones. I'm only doing the inside. The cleaning crew can do the outside. They will have to be cleaned again anyway after all the construction is finished.

Dishwasher, kitchen sink, faucets, and newly installed tile backsplash (not yet grouted).

And the bathroom sinks and faucets. The lights are down until the sheetrock is repaired and repainted.

New Hairstyle

In response to overwhelming requests, here is the photo of the new, summer haircut, a joint effort by T&B.

Railings, Tile, Lights

Today, more progress yet. The lights are almost all in. The deck railing is finished. All that is lacking there are the handrails on the steps down into the yard. The front door looks good with the lights installed. The tile is done in all the bathrooms and laundry room. Next up, is the plumber to install sinks and toilets. Hopefully all will continue to go smoothly.

This is the tile in the guest bath. It was the one with the best light to see the color.

This is the screened porch and the fans out there.
And the front door with the lights installed. It will look very good once the painters clean up the glass. You look all the way through the house to the porch and deck outside.
These next two shots are of the back. I am so excited about this part of the house. I think it will be the most used and one I will enjoy very much.


We are looking at a late June - early July move-in date. Things are happening faster now and we are excited about soon having all our things under one roof. It has been over 8 years now since we had that. And to finish living out of a bedroom at Mom and Dad's, much as we appreciate their hospitality. We have enjoyed the time to have a relaxing visit again and not be rushing to run errands or to catch a plane. But, it is time for this household to become two separate ones again.

Fans, Lights, & Locks

Well, after visiting with the builders on Thursday and conveying our displeasure with the way things have been going, today all the crews from all their other houses were present at our house and working. We will be driving to Hattiesburg every day from now on to monitor progress and be sure they continue working on OUR house. And Tom says 'to play golf'. At the bottom of this photo is the footer for the steps. The brick mason should be there tomorrow to do the steps.
This is in the master bedroom. Every bedroom will have a ceiling fan with a light fixture.
This is the guest bathroom. The holes will be filled and painted over when the painters return. The white papers are where the mirrors will be.
And finally, locks on the doors. This is the only way it was safe to install fixtures. We heard that the cabinets were stolen from some houses being built at the entrance to the area. So far, thank God, we've had no problem with theft or vandalism.

Timberrrr!

Our front door. It looks better when you can see the color of the brick, which the paint color picks up. Things are not moving very fast indoors so this is the only new thing there.
We had a landscape guy come and take out some trees and clean out the brush on the sides and back of the house. Here are photos of some of the trees he took out. This was the largest tree but the easiest to get out. There was more room for it to fall and not injure anything else.

This one was dead - thanks to Katrina. As it was falling over, because of the bend in the tree, it fell...
...very close to the house. It did not hit it although it came close. Being as rotten as it was, even had it hit the house it wouldn't have done much damage.
This was the last one. He was so worried about hitting the concrete bricks that we moved them. (Compare the two photos. They are moved from the yard to the edge of the sawhorses as you can see in the bottom righthand corner of the lower photo.) But he never came close and almost missed and went into the neighbor's yard! And those blocks are heavy to carry - especially under the Mississippi summer sun.
Hopefully, there will be lots more to see in the coming days. We are counting down and pushing the contractors to finish so we can move in before we have to pay another month of storage fees.