We have a road!

Yesterday my brother-in-law made us a road. ☺ Hubby posted pictures on Facebook, so I was able to grab a few.  Here's one of the road itself.  We'll be about half a mile back from the existing road that runs along the east side of the property.  This road heads west from there to the house location.  It still needs scoria (and I'm not sure I'm spelling that right), which is a red gravel they use in this part of the country for the roads.

 And here's a shot from the house location, looking east down the road. 

I know it isn't a big thing, but it's a first tangible step towards our new house.

And Hubby gave the builder (hereafter known as Royd) the down payment, so they can get started on the building...once the blueprints are complete.

I have a new computer!

I've been wanting a new computer for a while, but hadn't planned on buying one anytime soon.  My old computer changed my mind about that yesterday.  Actually it started Wednesday afternoon.  The girls and I were listening to music on it, and it kept overheating and shutting itself down after about ten minutes of use.  Thursday morning when I got online, the exhaust fan didn't start up, which it had been doing right away every time I opened the computer.  And there was something wrong with the screen.  Anywhere it should have been white, it was fuschia.  And anywhere it should have been black, it was bright green. 

So the girls and I took it to Best Buy.  As soon as we walked in the door, Kitty said, "Mommy needs a geek!" which made the guys standing around the door laugh.  One of them directed me to the Geek Squad desk, and the very helpful geek took a look at my machine and told me it would cost over $800 to fix it.  So I called up Hubby and let him know that it would be cheaper to buy a new one, and he gave me the go-ahead.

I picked out a Toshiba Satellite laptop.  It has Windows 7, which I'm liking much better than Vista.  It has more memory and processing power than my old one, and it has a built-in webcam, which I like because Hubby took my webcam with him to North Dakota.  We're planning on Skype-ing with him tonight when he goes to visit his dad.

So now I'm working on transferring all my files and photos and stuff from the old computer to the new one.  It's a long, arduous process, since the old computer keeps shutting down while I'm moving files to the flash drive.  And I only have small flash drives; the "bigger" one holds only 125mb.  And I have three years of photos and files to transfer. 

Anyway, I like my new computer.  It's very nice.  And I got a "Lap-Chill" thing that goes under the laptop and has fans in it to keep the computer cool.  I wish I'd gotten one of them a couple years ago; it might have extended the life of my old machine.

Oh, hello there...

It's been a week.  Oops.  But in fairness to me, it's been a crazy busy week.  I've been organizing(a lot) and packing(a little) and cleaning and cleaning and cleaning.  Hubby left on Thursday.  He should be at his new office at this very moment, starting his new job. 

And I'm stuck with all the real work.  Oh, and my air conditioner died.  In Texas.  In July.  With three kids.  And a buttload of work to do.  At this moment, I am sitting in front of a giant fan that I bought yesterday on the way to church, and trying not to sweat too much.  My neighbor's air conditioner guy is on his way, and I don't want to greet him at the door drenched in sweat...even though it might make him sympathetic so that he'll charge me less...

Anyway, back to the update on what I've been doing(besides sweating).  On Saturday, some guys from the local thrift shop(love that thrift shop, and really really going to miss it) came by to pick up some large furniture that I couldn't bring to them.  They left with a large dresser with a mirror, a chest of drawers, three bedside tables, a queen-size mattress set, an entertainment center, a glider-rocker and a wingback chair.  Whew. 

After that, I was able to get one room upstairs completely emptied, vacuumed, shampooed, and the walls touched up.  And now I'm organizing stuff in that nice clean room.  Anything that we're going to need right away when we move(and that isn't enormous furniture) is going in there.  Most of our stuff is going to be stored in South Dakota until the house is finished.  We're not going to need much while we stay with Hubby's dad.  Or at least that's what I thought...that room is getting filled up quickly.  Anyway, I'm putting that stuff in there so it won't get packed in with the to-be-stored stuff.  In theory, it sounds like it'll work.  We'll see how well it works in reality. 

Counting today, there are 12 days before the movers arrive.  Damn.  I better get back to work.

Editing to add: The AC guy came, saw and conquered.  $165 later, I have a working air conditioner!  It's cooled down to 80 in my house, and it feels much better!

We've got the floorplan!

I got the floorplan today!  There might be a few small adjustments, but since I drew the original myself and they just interpreted it, it's pretty much how I want it! ☺

BB Meetup!

I had an awesome day today!  I got to meetup with some BunkerBabes!  We went to a LYS and bought lots and lots of yarn.  Hey, it was on sale!

Left to right: Whimzee, Fiberotter, me and Skully

We had so much fun together!  After yarn shopping, we had a delicious lunch.  Then Whimzee had to go, but the rest of us wandered around the little shops nearby.  I didn't buy much, but it was lots of fun.

Thanks, ladies!  Y'all rock!  I'll miss you, but fortunately we'll still get to chat online all the time!

I got the samples for the house!

The samples arrived yesterday!  So many choices.....

 Fortunately, we already had a good idea of what we wanted.  First, here are the siding, shingles and trim...

 And the front door...

 And the carpet, linoleum for the bathrooms and inside trim...

 Here's the style of kitchen cabinets...

 ...which will be this color...

We haven't picked the kitchen floor yet; we want to use Dura-Ceramic, which looks like ceramic tile, and is installed in a similar manner.  Since it's installed that way, it won't be in place when the house arrives.  We'll have to either do it ourselves or hire someone to do it.  I'm leaning toward doing it ourselves...which means myself. ☺  I helped the contractor with installing the ceramic tile at our house here, so I have a little experience, and the Dura-Ceramic seems like it'll be simpler because it doesn't have to be cut with a wet saw.

More updates to come!  We're still waiting on the blueprints...

Am I a horrible, unreasonable person?

WARNING: Rant ahead.

Hubby wants to get a dog when we move.  I don't.  And neither do the kids. 

I have to admit to being a dog-hater.  Sorry, but it's the truth.  I just don't get the appeal; never have.  The drool (ick)...the sniffing people's arses (double ick)...the licking (eww)...the barking (gah, the barking!)...the poop (nasty)...the play-biting(so annoying)... yeah, I could live a perfectly happy life without ever owning a dog. 

Then there are the kids.  They are afraid of dogs.  And not just a little afraid.  I'm talking running-screaming-climbing-up-mommy-in-fear-for-their-lives afraid of dogs.  None of them want to have a dog.  Ever.  I used to be similarly afraid of dogs, so I sympathize with them and recognize that "forcing them to face their fear" is stupid and not helpful.  They may outgrow it someday, but not as long as people push them to.

Keeping this in mind, I am thoroughly convinced that if he gets a dog I will go completely insane.  Yeah, I know I'm already halfway there, but this would send me over the top.  One of the main selling points for moving as far as the kids are concerned is that we will have acres and acres in which to run and play.  But since they are afraid of dogs, they won't be able to use any of it.  They will refuse to go outside, and will drive me crazy with cabin fever in our little house in the middle of nowhere.  Which would mean I would have to chain the dog up to maintain my sanity.  Even though I hate dogs, I am fully aware that that is no life for a dog.  I would not want to have to do that.

And then there is the matter of who would end up taking care of the animal.  Because it sure as hell wouldn't be me or the kids.  Hubby will have a one-hour commute.  Which means he will have to leave very early in the morning, and arrive home late for dinner.  And if the past eleven years are any indication, when he finally gets home, he will plop down in front of the tv, remote in hand, and ask "someone" to get him a beer.  He won't have the time, energy or inclination to train a dog.  He won't want to spend that time cleaning up after it, or teaching it to carry a bird in its mouth without crushing it, or getting it to understand "sit", "stay" and "shut up".  And the dog would be terribly neglected.  The kids and I will not train it, love it, or clean up after it.

Now, I do understand that a family is not a republic, and we're not voting on it, but if we were it would be four to one against.  And the way I see it, the kids and I are sacrificing enough just by agreeing to move from the home we love to a house half the size, in the freezing cold middle of nowhere in North Dakota.  We should not be forced to live with a dog.

So...if you've made it through this entire rant, give me a little feedback.  Am I unreasonable? Am I a terrible, horrible, no-good, very-bad person because I hate dogs? (I hesitated to even post this, because I know many people will think that of me)  Or is Hubby the one being unreasonable?

I'm back from vacation!

Hello, dear readers!  I've missed you while I was on vacation.☺  But I'm back now, and I have an update!  This is the land where our new house will be built:

 It's a "quarter-section", which is farm-speak for roughly 160 acres.  It has tree-rows; you can see one of the rows there to the left.  I took the picture while standing precisely where the house will be.  So this will be the view out the back windows.  I designed the house myself.  I drew a rectangle, representing 28 feet by 60 feet, and filled it in with rooms.  When I showed it to the builder and asked if they might have any plans similar to what I'd drawn, he pointed to the drawing and said, "We can do that." ☺

♥

I intend to update with pictures as the project progresses, although since it will be a modular home, built in two pieces and trucked to the location, there won't be a lot of in-progress pictures.  And yes, I'm aware the the picture shows a planted wheat field.  Some of that wheat will be sacrificed, but there will still be plenty throughout the rest of the field.  There are seven or eight tree-rows, and we're building between the second and third to the south.

♥

This next picture shows the "treehouse tree", which is part of the row on the other side of the house site.

It's a big, old cottonwood with several trunks.  It has a few dead branches, and will need to be trimmed up, but the girls are very excited about the prospect of a treehouse, and swings.

♥

Last week, I had two more patterns published on Knit Picks.  Visit http://knitpicks.com/ to see them. ☺