A lot has happened since my last post and I feel like I’m behind since you haven’t seen any pics of our progress in awhile, but I guess it really doesn’t matter. It’s better to see them all at once and just know that we will move in at the end of July (hopefully). I have been trying to record a day-to-day journal of the construction just for us to look back at what happened when and how, but that can get tedious so I’ll zip through the last 14 weeks focusing on the installation timeline and any problems that might have come up. On the next post when the house is completed, I’ll mention the decor selections.

Here’s a little news update about what is going on other than the construction because it feels like we have been running non-stop since February. Neither of our houses in Pampa have sold … yet. There is no rush to sell for Don and Marilyn and it will be nice for them to gradually move at their convenience. Randy and I have leased our house as of July 31st, but will put it back on the market new spring. We didn’t want to be landlords and manage two houses, but we appreciate this opportunity since the housing market is so poor now.

Randy has installed all of the electrical while working full time and officiating a few football scrimmages. He’s gotten a lot of help from Brother Ed, Uncle Steve, Uncle Jerry and Friend Jason and he couldn’t have done it without them. We bought a new hive of bees at the end of April. They have already adjusted to collecting nectar and pollen off of County Road D and they are thriving. At the first of June, Randy’s boss, Aaron, plowed an area for clover and wildflowers near the bees and a garden spot near the house and we’ve planted both. We’ve drilled for water and installed the pump, but the plumber has not prepared it to pump water to the house yet so we haul water and pray for rain. We’re leasing the land to our neighbor, Lance, where he has been rotating sheep and recently added several cow/calf pairs.

Marilyn and I have both had surgery since April AND we went on a week-long trip to New England to visit her brother and sisters. Mine was just gall bladder surgery with a quick recovery, but her’s was a much more serious brain surgery with a longer recovery. She is doing very well and will be back on the mower in no time! We had so much fun in New England, but with no rest and then she had surgery two days after we came home. She is getting lots of care and attention from her daughter, Suzann (who is now living in Canada). She also went on the New England trip, helped her daughter move to Utah and then back to Texas to help Marilyn … whew!

Sometime during all of that Marilyn and I had … excuse me … a big-ass garage sale that kicked both our butts … thankfully we hauled in a lot of cash for our hard work that we spent it in New England!

Okay, I think you are up-to-date so back to the house. Just to recap: it’s a 2,900 square foot ranch-style home on 40 acres east of the loop in Pampa, Texas with a design plan to fit two couples. It is a 4-bedroom, 2.5 bath with an open floor plan for the kitchen, dining and living rooms. One of the bedrooms will be used as an office and another one will be Marilyn’s sewing room. We’ll have to plant some trees, but we are enjoying the view from all directions so much now that it may not be a priority.

Our design, floor plan and decor are natural to the landscape because it fits us and that’s the way we like to live … simply and part of the land. With Jimmy and Amy’s help in design, we think it became a beautiful home and hope you feel welcomed. We’ll have the Lord above us, family and friends around us and good food in the kitchen … we have all we need.

April was a productive month: the framers finished, the exterior doors and windows were installed and the soffit was put on and painted black to match the black composition roof. Randy wired the porches for lighting and fans, the roof, insulation, sheet rock and brick was installed, and concrete for the porches and sidewalks was poured. The water well service drilled, hit water at less than 600 feet in the Ogallala Aquifer and installed the pump.

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May was a little less busy, but a lot of work was done on the inside of the house. The sheet rock, tape & bedding, crown & base and texture was completed to get ready for the painters at the end of the month.
Randy installed lighting fixtures and the bathroom and utility room cabinets were installed. The kitchen cabinets also arrived and were ready to be installed, but they were the wrong stain color and we would have to wait another month to get the right cabinets installed in the kitchen. The cultured marble countertops in the bathrooms, the showers and tub enclosure were also completed. The interior doors were delivered, ready for the painters.

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JUNE brought more installations that made the house feel more like a home: hardware, interior doors, a garage door ( the single door was the wrong size and had to be re-ordered), more lighting including all recessed lights, exterior lights and pendant lights and more ceiling fans were installed by the owner ;-), the cedar porch posts and A/C was installed, and the LVP flooring arrived and the exterior doors were painted. We’ve had a terrible fly problem and we think it comes from the neighboring sheep herd, but once the A/C was installed we were able to close up the house and that helped a lot. Randy registered us at the post office and put up the mailbox so we’re making the new address official: 12160 CR D, Pampa, TX 79065.

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UPCOMING in July:

kitchen cabinets * lvp flooring * carpet* more lighting and plumbing fixtures * appliances * countertops * backsplash * septic * running water (finally) * the missing garage door so we can lock up!

We’ll be closing on July 26 … almost one year from when we bought the land and we hope to be completely moved-in by July 28. It will be tight schedule because there is quite a bit of plumbing, septic and clean-up to be done in a week … and we have company coming to Pampa for a wedding in Amarillo on July 27. I’m not through packing, but hell or high water, we’ll make it to the wedding!

Congratulations Haley and Brandon!!!

By Monday, March 18 (one month after construction started with laying the foundation for the pad), the repairs were made on the fallen walls and we were back in business. Jimmy Chaney had worried about the wind on Wednesday, March 13th and kept an eye on the house, but there was nothing to be done. We discussed with him whether to file an insurance claim, and after talking to the framer, Jimmy offered to share the cost of repairs so we wouldn’t have to file a claim. Jimmy and Amy have been so easy to work with, and they communicate frequently. They offer their expertise without being overbearing and have a construction system that keeps the job flowing without much delay. We are always informed about what is going on and what to expect next.

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By March 19th all the exterior and interior walls were in place ready for the trusses to be installed on the 20th. Randy had a friend from work, Jason Sutherland, come out that day to help pull the electrical lines through the conduit that had been laid underground. It was a hard job because they had to pull lines about 200 feet from the road to the house. It was a good thing his brother, Ed, showed up to help even though Marilyn was willing to pitch in when she saw any slack. Those three grown men were exhausted by the end of the pull. Meanwhile, I stayed home to meet with Century 21 about listing our house … we decided the “sale by owner” wasn’t going to do the trick as quickly as we needed. The construction finished date may be moving up to June instead of August so we’re feeling the pressure to get our house in town sold.

On Thursday the porches were up and on Friday half of the decking was down on the roof. Randy and I met the Chaney’s at Floors and More to select the LVP (luxury vinyl plank) for the majority of the house and carpet for the bedrooms. We also chose a charcoal for the roof color and black for the exterior trim and gutters. That night we got about 1/2 inch of rain and there was no work on the house on Saturday. That day, we met the Chaney’s in Amarillo to choose cabinet styles, granite for the kitchen and cultured marble for the bathroom. We also chose the color for the cultured granite kitchen sink. It was a good day and the choices were easy for us with the help of the Chaney’s. When we got home, I realized that the granite choice was almost just like the one we already have. At first, I chose lighter slabs of granite, but the lighter the granite, the higher the price. We’ll just have to get the cabinet stain as close to the natural color as possible to keep the kitchen from being too dark even though we have a lot of windows for natural light. I’m trying to stay with a palette of colors from nature in the interior of the house … creams, greens, gold in wheat and grasses … true Harvester.

Beginning on Sunday the 24th, Randy and his Uncle Steve started wiring the house. They worked on a few Sundays, each time taking a break to eat lunch at Don and Marilyn’s … can’t miss Sunday lunch! It’s too good! Ed came out several times during the next couple of weeks when he wasn’t working to help wire the house. We appreciate the family’s interest, labor and willingness to help more than we can say. Building the home and memories wouldn’t be the same without their support … thanks from our whole hearts.

We also met with Katherine Jeffcoat about listing our house with Berkshire Hathaway and decided to go with her because she was more positive about our house selling. Monday was another busy day. The windows were delivered, Randy, Ed and Steve came out in the evening to set light switch boxes throughout the house, and a photographer came out from Amarillo to take listing pictures for the house we’re selling. We had our first showing appointment on Tuesday the 26th, Ed and Steve came out to wire some more and then the family met at the new house for a pizza supper – it was chilly in the house, but the pizza was good and we’re making good memories.

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Randy took a break on Wednesday, but was back at it by himself on Thursday getting the porches wired for lights and ceiling fans so the framers can finish up and trim the soffit and porches. It was a hot day in the high 80’s with storm clouds building up in Oklahoma in the eastern evening sky. Don and Marilyn came out to watch Randy work and we had a nice dinner later at the Texas Rose. We didn’t get any rain, but it cooled off by Friday – thank goodness – I’m not ready for summer yet.

It was a cool, calm day on Sunday, March 10th and the framers came out to set the walls. It was fun to see standing walls as we were driving up the road, and we’re still pretty shocked that this will be our home in just a few short months.

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On Monday, more interior walls were up with temporary braces causing us to weave in and out of a maze of lumber, but it didn’t stop us from touring the layout … pointing out each window, closet and room size. Suzann came in that day after her visit in Oklahoma so Don and Marilyn brought her out to see the house before we all went to their house for supper. We gave her the tour, then Randy had to check the gas line to make sure it would hold air … and it did! The framers put up two walls of green board before they left for the day … by the middle of the week we would realize that was a mistake.

Tuesday, was a much needed rainy day in the panhandle. Most of the area received over an inch which is something we haven’t seen in awhile. I love the smell and look of a fresh wash after a rain. Randy and I made a day trip to Hillsboro so we missed the rain at home, but it rained on us coming and going, and we drove in a lot of soupy fog. While we were gone, the trusses were delivered and the tank that was dug to make a dirt pad for the house caught some water. That was a good sight to see when we finally made it out to the new house on Wednesday afternoon. The other sight we saw was not as good.

Actually, the winds were out of the west/southwest, and some old-timers in the panhandle say they don’t ever remember a wind that bad! The record wind here is 84 mph, but I didn’t catch what year that was. The weather forecasters predicted high winds … 30 mph with gusts from 60-75 mph, but some of those gusts must have been straight-line winds because there was a lot of damage across the panhandle and we were very lucky. We drove around town to see the damage and a lot of trees, signs and fences were blown down. Many houses had shingles missing and parts of some roofs and porches were blown off. Suzann, Don and Marilyn went to Amarillo that day and actually saw a semi-trailer truck blown over near the grain elevators on the loop. On the news they said three more went over after that one. It was a pretty crazy day and many people were unnerved over the unrelenting, howling wind … the next day was much more peaceful.

The windy bad wolf huffed and puffed and blew the house down … well, just the east wall and it made the west garage wall lean some. The green board attached to the frame just two days before acted like a sail for the walls without the trusses on top to hold the frame down. The framers were able to make the repairs the following Monday and it didn’t put us too far off of schedule. We didn’t even file an insurance claim so good news … and just an interesting side note to our story.

There was a book written in 1925 by Dorothy Scarborough called The Wind and it was about a woman left alone on a farm in west Texas and how the wind drove her crazy day by day. It’s a haunting tale about how harsh the weather and terrain can be during a drought. I love the rain. It’s healing.