An unexpected visitor... and all that is left to do...

Yesterday afternoon, I received a phone call from according to Caller ID, my brother, and according to the voice on the other end, my niece who was here visiting from Missouri. I didn't even know she was in town! Nobody tells me anything. HA! But, I forgave her when she asked if she and her little girls could come visit me. Absolutely!

Now I hate to burst all your bubbles, but my family has cornered the market on cute little kids. I know you are all thinking, yeah right, whatever, have you seen MY kids? Seriously... my little great nieces and nephews cannot even be measured on a cute-o-meter.

Unfortunately... the middle child was in control of the camera and she accidentally turned the dial to some funky setting, so the pictures she took just didn't turn out perfect, and no amount of photoshopping could improve them. But... I still think you get the idea on just how cute they are.

If only I had video of Abbi (above) dancing in the hallway to the "Hairspray" CD, which was truly a classic...
Or of them running around the house yelling "Chase the cat! Chase the cat!" while the cat ran for her life giving me the evil stinkeye. I considered it payback for refusing to come out from under the porch last weekend!

It's just too bad that these little girls live so far away. We can only hope that someday when their daddy is done with school, they return back to the land of never ending snowdrifts and snowstorms so that we can continue to admire their cuteness.

Thanks for stopping by, Abbi and Loryn and Becca! It was a fun visit!

As far as "all that is left to do...", that happens to be referring to the house next door. Surprised? Well, guess what? It's almost done! WOOHOO! The inside anyway...

This past week they finished up the focal point eye sore, I mean, rock wall, in the living room. They (the father in law anyway, the mother in law would smite me to my death if I included her in this part of they statement) love it and that's all that matters. It looks nice enough, but "rustic" is not my style, and certainly not something I would want in my house. My cute husband built these shadow boxes for them. I just like the fact that it breaks up that rock wall a little bit. Then they framed in and installed the fireplace. Unfortunately, the fireplace installer did a sub par job and my father in law had to fix it, which required someone crawling in and under the fireplace. The boy tried, but he didn't know what he was doing once he got there.

If there is one thing we have learned in this whole house building experience, it has to be that sometimes using the cheapest guy is not always the best idea, and you can't trust the contractor friends word when he says "he's the best, you won't regret it!" Especially if you want it done right! Uh, yeah, whatever!
So the husband squeezed in... just barely. You can't see him, but trust me, he's under there! Right here....

I'm just impressed he could squeeze in there between those boards... note... I did not try for fear of being stuck in there for the rest of my existence. The boy enjoyed it a little too much and we threatened to nail the wall up around him and leave him there forever... just so I wouldn't have to hear him sing the Alvin and the chipmunks version of "Japanese Banana" ever again!

We came ------> this <------ close to making it come true!

Today, they are rocking this wall to match that other wall (minus the shadow boxes) and tiling the hearth. Once it is complete, the only last thing to do is carpet and the interior will be 99.9% finished.

There is still much to do outside before they can move in, however, the most important thing being: the old worn out barely standing leaky roofed trailer house has to vacate the property (it's going down the street a mile ... we hope it makes it that far).

The list of things to do to make this happen is long, and gets longer by the day.

It's so long, in fact, it makes my head spin just thinking about it. The only thing I have to look forward to is June 1st... that is the day my father in law has set as the "no later than" date for 100% completely done with this project, and sadly, they don't plan to move in until it is 150% finished, which also means that June 1st is quite an optimistic date. >deep breath<

It's a good thing my husband has a day job that requires him to wear a tie so I can at least say hello as he walks into to take it off and change into his grubbies. On a good day, we even get to set him a place for dinner.

It's going to be a busy six weeks...