Pictures as promised

The last couple of days have felt like weeks, but we have accomplished so much more than I would have imagined. Brian and I are so lucky to have some strong friends (thank you Andrew, Russ) and family (thank you Dad, Jereme and Dave) who have helped.

On Weds. I left to go pick up lunch and was floored when I came back (I wasn't gone too long), the siding was gone on the side I could see from the road and many of the interior walls were gone. We ended up calling it a night around 6:30 because the skies opened up on us with the most impressive thunder and lighting storms I have ever experienced in Washington. Go figure, sunny and hot with no rain until we start pulling down the house. Even though it was earlier than we intended on stopping, the guys were able to have the house 20-25% down.

Yesterday, they removed the porch awning and the metal roofing and much of the remaining siding. I took the boys to the store to get charcoal so we could have a BBQ and some other items we needed. We also picked up our revised building permit with NO "Fire Sprinklers Required" stamped on it. We had to submit a revision to have our driveway increased to 20ft wide to get that requirement removed. Yes, I did say 20ft wide...crazy uh. We knew we'd be able to meet the minimums so that we wouldn't have to install fire sprinklers in our house (they are expensive and have the potential to leak), but we were concerned because the lender wanted a copy of our building permit. We had not figured the sprinklers into our budget and knew that if she saw the original permit she'd have a heart attack (based on the fact that she has been a bit of a pain to deal with all along - so concerned about EVERYTHING). Thank God the new permit was ready for me yesterday, so I could give her the clean copy. ;)

I have a lot more pictures and some video to share, but I need to go wrangle the kiddos. So, back to work I go :)