Doug enters the Mission Field

In the middle of our busy life, we stopped long enough to send Doug off to the MTC on June 25.
He is now serving in the Florida Orlando Mission and is loving it so far. The humidity is killing him but he trudges on each and every day, sweating it out like a real trooper. He rides his bike about 20 miles a day and is getting into the best shape he has ever been in.
His first baptism was on Sunday August 17th and he could not be a happier missionary!
Although his mission is an English speaking mission, he has found that almost everyone he meets speaks something other than English! He has learned to introduce himself in French, Creole, Spanish, Cuban , and Portuguese. His first teaching lesson on the day he arrived in the field was to a Hatian man who only spoke Creole! Now that would be a challenge. But, God willing, he was able to communicate and this man is the one he just baptized on the 17th of August! With God, anything can happen and miracles happen each day.
He is happy and working hard. We miss him but cannot think of anywhere else we would rather have him at this time in his life. I'll post some pictures that he has sent us in the next day or two.

We have moved in!

I know that it has been several months since I posted anything on this site and for that I can only say......we've been too busy finishing up the house and moving in to sit down to the computer to post!
On our 29th Wedding Anniversary which was July 12th, we spent our first night in the house. Camille came up from Vegas and worked like a pack mule for three days. She would haul load after load from the garage to the new house. Up and down stairs for hours on end. Before that, she spent a day just cleaning all of the dust from the new home so we could move in. We are truly grateful for her help.
It is exhausting to say the least, to move anywhere let alone build and then move.
We are beginning to feel at home here finally and although every room has little things that need patching or touching up, we can relax a bit for now. Each day we try to do just one or two things on our "still to do" list.
I'll try to post pictures of the finished rooms very soon.

The Cabinets are HERE!

Siding almost complete!

Our big yellow house is just about finished with it's siding. It's just what we wanted.

Now, the yard work is another thing that will take some time and of course, money!

The Man on Stilts / April 3rd

After the sheetrock hanging crew was finished, the man on stilts showed up to begin mudding and taping the seams and nail heads. He was very skilled on these stilts.

Icyene Insulation March 17,18th, 2008

After searching for a better way to insulate our home, we decided to try the Icyene foam insulation. Gale Construction in St. George was our choice of contractors for installing this type of insulation. It is sprayed in wet like paint, but swells and fills the cavity between the 2x6's on the inside of the outer walls. An amazing thing to watch indeed! This type of insulation fills all of the holes in the outer walls around pipes, electrical outlets, windows etc.

The Sheetrock Work Crew Arrives! March 27th, 2008

This was the most amazing day in the construction of our home so far to date! Ten Mexican men arrived to hang the sheetrock. The pieces were 5/8" thick, and 8'x12' long. They arrived at 7am and pulled out at 5:30pm with the whole house fully sheetrocked! They were just like bees in a beehive in full action! They really knew what they were doing, with each one knowing what his job was.

The sheetrock arrives!

Now is the exciting part! The day we have waited for...... the Sheetrock arrives.

Date of arrival : March 25th, 2008

Goodbye!

On Friday, March 14th we signed the papers to finalize the sale of our old home to Elisha Baker and her two kids, Ben and Allison.
They have been living in it since we moved out last October but were just renting until we
could get the home and land converted to
"real property" on paper.
It took us longer than we had hoped, but it is final now and the Bakers are great neighbors. They are just over the back fence!
Lucky for us, they love the chickens..........
and the roosters.
(Our new home is behind and to the left in this picture so you cannot see it)

More local craftsmen to thank

This is Dave Carlson and his son Beau (squatting) as they install foam insulation before attaching the beautiful yellow siding to the house.

Pete and Piete

Here are Pete and Piete Florence working on the miles and miles of wire!

When you are hooking up phone, TV, internet, lightning and speakers you cannot believe the maze of wires!

Also in the picture is pex water pipe, central vac pipe line and gas lines.

It's amazing what goes into the walls and ceiling joists before the insulation and sheetrock!

We are truly thankful

I would be very ungrateful if I did not give credit to the men who have helped us make this new home a reality. First of all, we asked Ariel Escobedo to use his architectual skills that he is learning at BYU to help us take the plans from my head and drawings I had made, to making them real blue prints for the builder to build from. He is to be commended for his patience and long suffering on his computer. Second, James Bleak for the dirt and concrete work. Third, Paul Steed for being our #1 framer and giving our house it's shape. He truly can build anything that we ask him to and he is very, very patient with us and our daily plan changes. To him, we are truly grateful. Also, I need to thank the Weiderman brothers Kenny and Richie for working along side Paul and doing whatever he asked. (see picture) Then, there is Piete Florence who is the most talented electrician that we know. He has more lighting ideas that we could ever dream of. After watching him hook up the main electrical panel, he might as well be a surgeon! With my Pete helping pull thousands of feet of wire, the job of rough wiring is finally done. Next week we will get insulation and sheet rock.

Expect more pictures!

Fresh from the nest

This is what we get in an average day. Our grandkids love to gather the eggs when they are here to visit. We love the different colored eggs that our chickens hatch!

Our beautiful rooster

This rooster is my favorite one.

Down on the farm

When we bought our piece of land to build on, it had an old chicken coop on it. Pete decided that it would be cool to have chickens, so with donations from generous chicken owners in the county we began raising our own home grown eggs. We now have added some exotic hens and colorful roosters and we wake each morning to the sound of the roosters crowing!

It's turning yellow!

For over 20 years, I have dreamed of having a big yellow house with white trim and a wrap around porch. Well, it is finally coming true for me. And, of course, Pete likes it too!

Here is a view of the home from an airplane that Cliff was in while flying over Panaca with one of his roommates who is taking flight lessons. Pic taken Jan 15th 2008

I apologize to Jonathan Christensen for not taking pictures while he, his dad, brother and brother-in-law came and worked on our home Feb. 16th. They installed all of our gas line throughout the whole house. We are truly grateful for their generosity. It takes lots of people to make this dream a reality and it is not over yet. Pete and I are trying to do some of the work ourselves but mostly we hire out our own sub-contractors. We are what they call "Owner Builders" and we do the work of getting our own help. More pics to come......

Doug and Jonathan Brunjes working on the back deck. Shingles being put on the roof.

Still more pics of the house. It's getting bigger each day!