New Back Entry

We decided to move the back door to the house over to where the window used to be.  This will allow a straight path into the kitchen when you come in, and more space to hang up coats.

Before

Before

After

After

Cozy Warm

Insulation was completed this week!  We are no longer heating the world!  We were wasting about $30+ dollars a day to heat an un-insulated house (well not quite this was figured out once the third floor was insulated).  I don't even want to think about how much it cost a day to heat it prior to this, I just know filling 2, 500 gallon tanks of propane is not cheap, I hope to never have to fill it up on a monthly basis again over a winter!  With the house insulated we are using about 2 percent a day.  Warm weather needs to get here so the heating bills can drop off!

Sheetrock was delivered today and is getting installed tomorrow!

Kitchen

Kitchen

Family room

Eli's Room

Master bedroom

Master bathroom and closet

Guest bedroom

Ryan's room

Third floor from Ryan's room looking over to Mackenzie's room

Mackenzie's room

Oh Honey.....Bee

When we looked at the farm we noticed a lot of bees flying around the front pillar on the porch.  We made a mental note to check it out while the weather is cold and the bees are cold and not moving (hibernating?, not sure what bees actually do over the winter)  Last week was the day that Jason decided to take on the bees, it was cold, but not terribly cold to be working outside.

We had no idea what to expect inside the pillar, and really didn't expect to see what we found inside!  The entire pillar was a big honey comb!  Jason said it was really light and no honey.  It all went into a garbage bag and put into the dumpster. Hopefully any future bees that come around get the hint to stay away!

The bees swarmed around this pillar, going in and out near the bottom.

This is what was found inside

All of the bees doing whatever bees do during the winter and many dead ones also.

Kitchen is ordered

Two weekends ago we finalized the plans for the kitchen and ordered the cabinets and counter top.  Jason's parents came to babysit the kids so we could have a date night.  The date night ended up as a work evening ordering the kitchen cabinets, but not having the three kids along really did make this task easier.  We ended up ordering the cabinets from Home Depot, Morgan the kitchen designer was awesome.  We felt horrible making him stay late that night since he had been there since 6am that morning (and it was 8:30pm when we left, and we would be back the next day).  I liked the style of the cabinet from Thomasville and they had a great special going on that saved us a lot of money.  We got a free sink base, knife storage drawer insert, hardware and the more you buy the more you save along with 10% off.  We were able to come under budget and get granite counter tops, something we both really wanted and didn't think we were going to be able to get.  Home Depot was able to price match a granite stores price which was awesome also, since the place that was cheaper seemed a little scary!  If it wasn't for all of the discounts that were being offered at Home Depot we probably wouldn't of gotten the granite.

Now we just need to be patient and wait the 4-6 weeks until they will be finished, and hope all the measurements are correct!

3D rendering of what the kitchen will kind of look like, some things have changed slightly since this.  The counter top is obviously missing, and the wall at the back of the below picture will be a doorway.

A sample of the granite we picked out.

This past Saturday we bought our kitchen appliances as well!  We went to Appliance Smart in Eden Prairie.  They sell discount appliances, some are scratch and dent some are new.  A few weeks earlier my mom and I stopped by there and found a good deal on a Electrolux double oven that I ended up buying.  This time we bought all GE appliances, everything is stainless steal so it will all still match.  Again we got a great deal, this time on our refrigerator and we didn't even really know it till we got home and did a little more research on it.  The fridge will auto fill a container with water, so we can put the cup under the water nozzle and push the auto fill button and walk away and it will fill it up without over flowing!  It will also do exact measurements of water, and can display photos as well.  I almost overlooked the fridge but couldn't pass up that it was on sale.  We ended up coming in under budget on our appliances as well, I was really worried we wouldn't since we didn't really know if we could do it or not.  This week the washer and dryer is on sale, so we will probably be buying those as well.

Windows

The windows came in and now the house in pretty much weather proof and sealed up!

The contractors have only installed the 3rd floor windows since those were already removed and letting the cold in.  The new windows look nice, can't wait for the rest of them to go in.

All the windows for the house

Shower time

Just a couple fun pictures.  We were told we needed to get the shower and bathtub for the master bathroom and kids bathroom.  My parents were leaving for Texas on Monday and it was Friday (my dad gets a veteran's discount at Home Depot so we want to take him shopping with us as much as possible!).  Luckily they were able to come up that night and go shopping.  Jason got home from work and away we went to Home Depot at about 6 pm.  The Home Depot right by us only had Right tub and showers, we needed left.  Luckily Shakopee supposedly had each in stock. We quickly drove over there, waited for them to get them down from way up high in the shelves and loaded them up in the Home Depot Rental truck.  It's now 8pm, Home Depot closes at 9 and we had about a 20 minute drive to get to the farm, then unload the showers and drive the 20 minutes back to Home Depot before they closed so we wouldn't have to pay the overnight fee on the rental truck.  Amazingly we made it!

New Shingles

I'm a little behind at posting what has happened at the house.  Before the deep freeze hit Minnesota the house got new shingles.  The roofers finished the day before the temps dropped below into the negative degrees.  They were out finishing up in 30 mile per hour winds, needless to say we now have shingles all over our yard!  The new shingles make the house look much better, even with the old green siding.

Before the new roof:

After:

Before and After