Back on track

Progress! The copper is back, insulation is in, walls are complete, and we now have stonework and trim done.

Next week the cabinets should go in, the exterior should get painted, and the tile work should start.

Copper thieves and hot neighbors

By yesterday, we were supposed to have all the insulation and drywall up, and the cabinets would be almost ready to be installed. When we visited, however, nothing had happened. It seems that while waiting for the City of Dallas to inspect our electrical and plumbing systems, some enterprising citizens drove up in the middle of the night and stripped all of the copper out of our house. They also stole 36 windows from another house. So, we're actually delayed a little bit. All of the electrical has to be re-done, and re-inspected, THEN we'll get walls.

In happier news, we have various new neighbors moving in. Most interestingly, a college women's soccer team will be living about a block away. Some nice parents bought a house for their daughter and teammates to move into. Should be interesting....

Not too many changes this weekend. The roof is on, and we picked the color blue we want the siding to be painted. The rock is on order, so it might be up by next weekend.

In more interesting news, while we were outside, a GORGEOUS flock of birds flew in formation into our neighborhood and landed in the yard of the house across the street from us. They were just stunning - we watched them for a while. They looked kind of coastal, maybe like a crane?

Ideas?

Technology of the Future (Robin is easily impressed)

Today we got a roof and the rest of our windows. Also, some siding. Pretty much all that's left to do on the outside is paint the siding and put on the rock, which I think is happening next week. Everywhere that doesn't have siding on it is going to be rock (both chimneys and the bottom couple of feet of the house).


The front still needs a little siding and some shingles - I forgive them for stopping work because there was some serious lightning this afternoon in Dallas. I would not want to be the guy on top of a house on top of a hill holding a hammer and nails in a lightning storm.

Notice all of these pictures are taken drive-by style from our car? J thought we would freak out the workers if we walked up and took pictures. I think they were more freaked out by the weirdos in the SUV who kept driving by with a paparazzo camera hanging out the window.

We also met with the guy who handles our wiring for security, speakers, internet, cable, etc, etc. I'm very impressed with how fancy our house's wiring will be. The neighborhood gets Verizon Fios, which is apparently some super swanky cable and internet. And somehow I have the ability to choose on a whim if I want our phone jacks to be internet jacks, and vice versa. I don't understand how they can be both and can switch back and forth, but whatever. I am technologically slow, so I'm hoping J caught all the details of this. There's a big master wiring center and I can control which switches do what and what speakers are connected to what TV and whatnot from the box. Again, hoping J caught the details of all that....it seemed very futuristic. OH! And the best part - we can record a show in one room and watch it from any of the other rooms, or pause a show in one room, and pick it up on any other TV. What smart person invented this?