Happy Birthday!

It's hard to believe, but Annabel is a year old. Where does the time go? We celebrated with a small party for family yesterday afternoon.

One thing that Annabel enjoyed was her cake.


This is actually the same cake that Jordan had for his first birthday. (Being the decidedly un-metrosexual male that he is, however, he would like me to point out that his cake was a manly brown - NOT lavender).


Annabel received lots of books, constructive toys and clothes. Here is a picture of her new doll, who we have named Helga, in reference to Annabel's cranky alter-ego. Happy Birthday, Annabel! We love you very much.

Time Out

As many of you know, my sister Kim and her husband Jon have joined us out here in Colville. They bought land next to us, and they are planning to build their dream home in a couple years. In the interim, they have decided to build a small cottage in which to live. When I say small, I mean small (as in 320 sq. ft tiny). As Jordan's Dad says, "That ain't a cottage, that's a cot!"

Jordan took a break from the construction work at our house to help Jon & Kim build their cottage. It's amazing - they went from this:

to this, in just 6 days:

This photo doesn't really do the cottage justice, either. It's absolutely adorable, and I know that my sister will have the most beautiful cottage in the west by the time she is done fixing it up inside and out.

Jordan very much enjoyed getting a break from the construction of our home. He was even able to stop and enjoy the views from time to time. The sunset reflecting off the nearby mountains is just beautiful!

Getting Plastered

Don't get too excited, we mean getting plastered walls, not getting plastered!

We have decided to put several layers of plaster and lime over most of the interior walls at the house. Here is a photo of the first layer, which is quite ugly and messy. Next week, we'll be applying a second coat of a finely textured sand & plaster. We'll have one final, tinted lime layer after that.

Jordan was even able to make me a nice arch in the wall of our bathroom. I think it looks very cool - thanks honey!

Jordan continues to work like a dog. In fact, he often comes home at the end of a long day and curls up on the chairs to get some rest - just like our dogs! Poor guy - we are wearing him out!

Thanksgiving

We are truly thankful for our many blessings this past year, especially our families. While at times the year has been quite challenging, we are tremendously in debt to our families who have helped us get through each and every hardship. We couldn't even begin to recount all they have done, let alone repay them in any meaningful manner. (So why bother? - just kidding, Dad!)

Yesterday, we celebrated Thanksgiving together for the first time in 4 years (Jordan's family) and 15 years (my family). Everyone pitched in to make delicious food, and we had a nice time being together. This year, especially, we were grateful for our ability to be together, and we pray that God will comfort our friends, the Hadleys, who lost their youngest daughter in a tragic car accident last weekend. We will miss you, Cristina, and we look forward to the day when we will see you again.

Step by Step

Jordan is still working himself to the bone trying to get things ready for us to move into the house. It seems like things are happening very quickly now that we have walls. Our families have been such a huge support to us. My Dad has been working with Jordan almost daily, and Jordan's Dad, Jon & Kim come each weekend, despite the fact that they all work hard at their jobs during the week.

Even our neighbor, Marianne, has gotten involved. She makes us hot tea (which feels great in this cold weather), cookies, and even soup and bread a few weeks ago. We LOVE Marianne!

Annabel is taking steps as well. I mean, literally, she's starting to take steps! She can stand on her own for quite awhile now, and she has started taking 2-3 steps at a time. I'm happy (or afraid?) to report that she'll be walking soon. Where did my baby go?

The Great Pumpkin

Annabel was a pumpkin for Halloween. Actually, Jordan wanted her to be a little demon, but that's another story... She seemed to enjoy Halloween, although she seemed a little bewildered by the bright orange thing that we insisted she wear. We just went to a few friend's houses, where Annabel got organic teething treats, pears, bananas and cheerios. (Yes, I am aware that she will one day need to pay for expensive therapy sessions because her mom screwed up her life by refusing to let her have candy when she was young). We had a great time visiting family and friends, and Annabel (who hates having anything on her head) insisted that we leave the pumpkin hat on for the remainder of the evening.

Progress!

Jordan has really been working hard over the past few weeks. For instance, the exterior is done! Actually, it isn't quite finished, but it's as finished as it's going to get until the spring. Jordan is going to build french style doors and windows later this winter, and then install them in the spring. In the meantime, we are going to be living in a house with makeshift used doors and mismatched (not to mention some plastic) windows. Hey - whatever it takes to keep warm! The roof on the addition proved to be a challenge, but I think that it came out really well (note the cool curve on the bottom of the roof).

All of the interior walls have been framed, and we now have stairs to get to the second floor (no more rickety ladders). Jordan and his Dad will be working on the well this weekend, and the electrical work will be done next week. We are still hoping to celebrate Thanksgiving in the house - we'll keep you posted!

Three Little Pigs

It would have taken too long to continue building stone walls up to the roof of the house, so we decided to build the second floor and library walls with straw bales. Don't worry - once the bales are placed and the walls prepared, we'll cover the walls (inside and out) with plaster. We'll cover the stone with plaster as well, so the outside will be uniform. I know what you're thinking - straw will attract rodents & bugs, it's a fire hazard, what about insulation, etc. Not to worry. The plaster cover keeps out any critters, and the bales are packed so tightly in the walls there is no oxygen present to fuel a fire. Wood homes are much more flammable. Lastly, straw is very dense and consequently has an insulation value of 42 (the standard home's insulation value is 18-22). Building with straw bales is actually not a new technology - there are homes made of straw in Europe that are several hundred years old. Since the straw is dead and covered from the elements, it won't deteriorate. So, now we are officially the three little pigs, living in a house made of straw, wood, and stone.

Food! Glorious Food!

Annabel loves food. In fact, eating seems to have become one of her favorite pasttimes. I don't mind because she likes healthly food, and she eats pretty much everything that we do (ground up, of course). Speaking of "ground" food, Annabel recently acquired a tase for dirt and rocks. YUM! (Notice in the photo above how Dad and Uncle Jon are diligently watching over her as she tries this newly discovered delicacy). Her favorite food, by far, is the pear. The bigger, the better. She prefers her pears whole, and she has learned to gingerly clasp her pear under her chin where she manages to gnaw away all of the flesh, spitting out only the seed pod in the middle.


Thanks to her healthy appetite, Annabel is growing like a weed and is almost 10 months old now - YIKES! She mastered crawling, but only rested on her laurels for 5 days before she decided it would be much more fun to try to walk. Now she stands, cruises around holding onto furniture and consequently falls down all day long. She has also gotten more teeth - 3 on the top of her mouth, and she "talks" from the time she gets up until the time she goes to sleep at night. (I can't imagine where she got that from!)


She is a real goof ball, and we are enjoying her immensely.

Better Late than Never

I apologize for the delay in updating all of you on our progress, but I have been a bit busy over the past month. In addition to building the house, working part time and raising a 9 month old, I've been busy canning. Yes, it's true. I am officially a country girl now. So far, I've canned 52 quarts and 137 pints of fruit, jams, chutneys, pickles, pie filling, relishes, sauces, etc. And we still have to can tomatoes, apples, beets, pumpkin, picallili and beef stew. We have been given a lot of fruits and veggies (in addition to things we have harvested from my in-law's abundant garden), and we felt like we should do something with these gifts instead of letting good food go to waste. Just call me Suzie Homemaker.







While I've been busy in the kitchen, Jordan and my brother-in-law, Jonathan, have completed quite a bit of work at the house. Jonathan was able to fly out here for 3 weeks to work with Jordan, which was a great blessing. Together they finished shingling the roof, framed the roof on the addition, installed radiant heat, poured all of the cement floors, and installed windows, the electric framework and plumbing. The men worked very hard and had no problems sleeping at night, that's for sure!

China Doll

Caleb left us last week to continue studying in China. Annabel really misses Uncle Caleb. She very much enjoyed having him here with us, and she can't wait to see him again. Thanks for the help, your friendship and the laughs. Lentzylvania just isn't the same!




Sumo Annabel!

Water Baby

Annabel seems to have gotten over her initial distaste & fear of the water, although she still doesn't like to get her hair wet (see the last picture below). All in all, she very much enjoyed swimming in her pool on hot days this past summer.

Library

Our close friends and family (and anyone else who has ever visited us) know that we are both book fiends. Jordan, being a true Lentz, will scrape by on the barest of necessities, but we always manage to find money to buy books. This house is only one room deep, so we decided to build a nice big library on the back to store our book collection.

The library will have 18' cathedral ceilings with rough hewn beams, which is a little bigger than we could comfortably tackle if we wanted to move into the house before snow falls. So, we ordered roof trusses and had them placed by a large crane. The easy way out? Yes, but it sure saved us a lot of valuable time!













Voila! Instant library.

Eight Months

Bananabel is officially eight months old, and she is starting to make her wishes and desires known in a very, um, vocal way. She is also at that stage where she puts EVERYTHING in her mouth (the photo above was taken right before she grabbed the camera in a misguided attempt to eat it!)

Speaking of eating, Annabel prefers to feed herself, thank you very much. She loves feeding herself whole steamed carrots & broccoli spears, but she refuses to touch them if they are ground up and spoon fed to her. Sigh! We've compromised by leaving a few cheerio's on her high chair that she can munch on between spoonfuls of real food. Other than that, Annabel seems to like everything you give her, as long as it's warm and isn't sweet potatoe!

The photo above was taken on the morning of her eight month birthday. She may be going through the terrible 2's a bit early, but we think we'll keep her.

Fast Forward

I haven't been very good at keeping you all posted (no pun intended) on the status of the house, so I'll skip the boring stuff and go straight to the major projects that have been done since I last made some updates.












With the exception of the roof, the "addition" has been completed. The "addition" (located on the right side of the photo above) will hold the mudroom/pantry and a small play area for the kids. Upstairs, the addition will hold the master bedroom and bath. (We've done this mainly to monitor the comings and goings of any and all future teenagers we may have!)

The roof on the rest of the house has been completed, and the dormers have been added. Jordan has been busy shingling the roof, and he expects to be finished tomorrow. Here's a more recent view of the house.




If you look closely, you may notice a few installed windows. Jordan is going to build french style windows throughout the house, but this will have to wait until the spring. As it can get pretty chilly here in the mountains, we needed something to get us through the winter. We hit the jackpot at a second hand shop in Kettle Falls, where we were able to get over half of the windows for pennies on the dollar. The great news is that we'll be able to reuse all of the temporary windows in other outbuildings as the farm grows.

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

It's no secret that the wild northwest is still a refuge for many animals. On a daily basis we see deer, flocks of wild turkeys, eagles, and a wide variety of smaller animals. We hear coyotes howling almost every night, and we sometimes hear owls. Occasionally we even see more rare animals. For instance, we sighted this moose on the way home from Spokane.

There are also the not-quite-so-welcome animals, like the small pack of wolves that we spotted crossing the road on our way home one night last week. Oh yes, there was also the baby rattlesnake that almost bit us while we were walking around the house a few days ago. I've since been brushing up on my wilderness medicine (Tom Kirsch would be proud), and have been told that getting an electric shock is supposed to help slow down the effects of the poison. Some neighbors have happily volunteered their electric horse fence in case of an emergency, although we're not sure if this was offered in the spirit of community or if this would be their subtle way of getting back at us for all of the early morning construction noise! There is a small hospital in town, so help is only a short ride away. Don't worry though - it's not as bad as it sounds, really! Rattlesnakes are very rare in this area, and the neighbors are all on the hunt. Still, I've informed Jordan that I want to see a few dead snakes before we move in!! (Sorry - we don't have any photos of the elusive snake - we were too busy trying to beat it senseless with a shovel before it hid under the stone pile!) I'll be sure to let you all know when this repulsive reptile meets its demise.

Sights

Several of us took a much needed break and went to Spokane for the day to shop and unwind (we can shop in town, but we are pretty much limited to Walmart!) The Spokane River runs through the city, and there are waterfalls and a beautiful park. Even at the peak of the dry summer season, the view is still quite spectacular. It was nice to be in the "big" city again, but it sure was great to leave it all behind and head home to peace and quiet at the end of the day.

Addition

As you can see, Jordan and Caleb have been hard at work. Here are some photos of the addition being built using stone from our neighbors field.



Some of the interior walls will be exposed stone. This is the view of what will be the kitchen looking into the playroom and pantry.