Ok, so the end of visualization is nearing and I couldn't be more excited. Look how huge that covered porch is gunna be! All I can think of is how cool it is going to be now to entertain and have people over and even if it is raining we can still hang out outside. Love it! The concrete continues around the corner around the side of the family room and connects to the door that will lead to the back hallway and into near the new 1/2 bath and media room. Room for the grill and plants and fun.

And, to really get things moving along this week, the gas line has finally been turned off so that they can excavate for the new garage. The existing line ran right underneath, so it took some time to get it shut off and coordination made to get the foundation started. I can see where they sliced the gas line and nothing seemed to blow up, which is nice.

I have totally moved out of the property now; the kitchen is empty (did I mention how gross it was to clean out nine years of stuff, which normally wouldn't be gross except I am a collector and maybe even a horder, so it was really taxing on me and my wonderful friends who helped me to sort through and purge and organize my stuff) and the family room is empty now so that they can start on taking off the back part of the existing house to open it up to the new space. I do need, now that I think of it, to go back and rescue some temperature-sensitive items from the hall closet like medicines and stuff like that. The bedrooms are filled with boxes because those rooms will remain virtually untouched in terms of structure. The back rooms will get new windows and all rooms will get new carpet eventually; but for now they are packed with stuff to make room for the facelift in the family room and kitchen.

It is really starting to come along, isn't it! You can see on the first shot the hip style roof line - which was a mistake, but a good mistake. The original plans showed a hip roof (flat angle) versus a gable (pointed top) but then over time it was modified to be a gable style. The framers worked off of a an old set and so I got the phone call that day that the roof had been framed incorrectly, but that I may not mind the way it looked. The framers were ready to re-do the roof when I gathered my "housing committee" - my awesome neighbors, who helped me to determine that this was a great mistake and that the gable style would work just fine with the overall design. So, no demo was necessary and work continued. Ok, part of me may have decided to stick with the gable just so that we didn't have to take steps backward! No really, it looks great!

The front foyer and porch are taking shape. The family room addition on the back is really starting to look big -- it has been looking small to me just standing on the concrete slad trying hard to visualize what it would look like with a roof and walls, furniture and life! I am so bad at visualizing and it can be very frustrating at times, so I am staying calm and really putting a lot of faith in the architect and the process, sometimes to the frustration of others. They are working on researching if the back cable and power lines that currently come in to the back of the property above ground and connect to the roof, if they can be relocated underground, and ultimately have that back pole removed because I am the last house on the street that it services. The neighbors would also like to see it removed; really there is no part of it that is pretty and its main function seems to be a fireworks display when squirrels and birds wander way too far into its components -- and BOOM!

9/14/08 -- Hurricane (something) brought his force all the way up to Ohio swinging hurricane force winds through our town and did not happen to miss Polley Road, either. Much of the Columbus area was without power for more than 5 days and some for much longer. Power was restored at the house within 2 days, and frankly the timing couldn't have been better. I was staying at a real estate convention downtown for three days, so I didn't have to live through the storm or suffer through the power outage at all during the event, though cleaning out the fridge was no party. How long is too long without power to your fridge? I decided to take the chance on some items, but many items were tossed siding with caution rather than sickness.

I love my neighbors! Many of them called me to let me know that insulation was flying out of my house and down the street and that parts of the construction project were flapping around and being moved about by the storm. Luckily, no real damage was done - there was a support beam shoring up some of the work at the back family room addition, which was knocked down. Wet insulation was strewn about the property and work scraps were tossed about. The biggest mess, as usual, was from the old large trees in the yard - large branches did fall creating a messy scene and much work to be done.

Okay, so the true posting of this data is 11/11/08 and I am trying feaverishly to catch everyone up to speed on what is happening on Polley Road -- in so many ways. It is with a heavy heart and optimistic spirit that I share that Sean and I are now divorced. It has been a difficult couple of months for us and for Madeleine, and I hope that time will heal us all. My thanks go out to Sean and his family for helping me get this project off the ground; kind of bittersweet in a way that it began in one way and will finish in another, but again, time will heal and I know the future holds great things for all of us. So, now that I am able to tackle all of this again, away we go!

I can't tell you the exact date the well was drilled, but it got done - loudly and messy, those things are for sure. It had been an amazingly dry end of summer gearing up for fall, and they day they showed up to drill the well it had already been raining for hours. So, as you can imagine the whole show was muddy and dirty -- I went over to the neighbors to survey the damage from their vantage point; not pretty from any angle! They completed it within one day and capped it off until they are ready to tap into it and shut down the existing well.

The next phase was adding the new trusses to raise the roof pitch, provide vaulted ceilings in the new spaces and get this project under roof! I didn't realize they would have to cut holes into the house in order to secure the new trusses to the structure, so needless to say I didn't cover anything up that day they came to begin the process. Though they did offer to clean up the mess, I was too shocked to even let them in to do it. There were chuncks of wood laying inside the house nestled into the piles of sawdust that also were laying inside the house, on the furniture, on the stove, and inside lots of nooks and crannies I didn't even know existed. It was a sight! One of those sights that you have to laugh at because crying would be a waste of time and you have to use your time wisely when you are cleaning up a mess of this magnitude. Yes, birds did find the time to explore their new "bird house", but I am happy to report that each time I heard one of my new friends enter the house, they did exit just as quickly and I didn't have to chase them around or clean up after them, either. Sigh....

Last week was the week of the plumber and this week we thought would bring the digging of the new well, but it was a surprise when we pulled up to the house on Monday night. They poured the floors of the front and rear additions and buried the plumbers work right into the slab.

The week of 8/18/08 was the week of the Plumber. We have had a very dry August, and this week was no exception - and it was hot, too. He worked almost every day onsite to get the bathroom roughed in, the laundry roughed in and the gas lines in place before they came out to pour the slab floors in the living room extension and back hallway addition. You can see the gas line sticking up from the back living room addition where the gas log fireplace will be located.

The well was going to be relocated during this week, but it was pushed back so that the concrete trucks could pour the floor with ease and not disturb the new well location. The existing well has to be moved b/c it needs to be further from the structure. We have never had a problem with our well over the past nine years, but getting a new one will be a nice addition to update the property. It will be located only about 10ft away from the existing well in the backyard.

We took a break from the action August 6-10, 2008. Sean, Madeleine and I visited Ontario Canada to continue our vacation tradition of renting a house on the water. This time we found a wonderful cottage in Amhurstburg along the Detriot River, where all we could hear was the movement of the water and the whisper of the willow tree -- needless to say, it was a welcomed change from the jackhammering and bulldozing!

When we arrived at dusk at home, I didn't notice any changes. Sean continued to point out that the huge piles of excavated earth had been backfilled back in and the landscape around the foundation was somewhat level. The ducts have all been laid in the new living spaces and the vents are installed and capped where they will lay.

This week they are getting bids for drilling a new well. Originally, the architect felt the existing well may be able to stay, but the health department wants it moved. So.....that is the first part of the project that is an "additional item", per say - not a part of the original plan. Ok, so we are hoping that everything else stays on track and that we don't rack up a bunch of additional items cuz you know they don't come free ;)