Real Life Goes On

Besides spending every moment we can on The Bedroom Project, there are other other things happening in our lives. 

For Example:

1. Valentines Day happened. Now, normally, this is not a big deal at our house. Sometimes I think I might actually do something to celebrate, but as the day gets nearer my ideas get smaller until they usually fizzle out completely. We're just not celebrators of Valentines Day. Only....Romney has a boyfriend. And she knew he was going to do something for her, and she really wanted to do something for him as well. And I figured that as long as I was going to help her go to the effort of doing something for him, I'd send something to my Elder Chase as well. Side note - I'm really going to miss putting together packages for him. It's really fun.

So Romney and I looked on instagram or whatever, and found this cute thing where you glue candy to the inside walls of boxes and slit the sides apart so when you take off the lid the walls of the box drop open, dramatically revealing the treats inside. The one in the photo below was the one I sent to Chase - it has a giant hershey's kiss inside. The one we made for Nick had a gift from Romney inside. We had fun creating them.

2. One of the most important events of the year happened on the first of March. We had been waiting and waiting - even Expectuating, as Amy March would say. Dune II finally arrived! Dune I was a favorite movie for everyone in our family, and we looked forward to the sequel with tremendous anticipation. It was supposed to come out in the fall of 2023, but there was a writer's strike which postponed everything, including Dune. The delay in the release was a major bummer. 

Getting ready for the release was super fun - Nicholas had never seen the first one, so we invited him over the week before and watched it together. Then we felt bad for not inviting his parents, so just a couple of days later on a Sunday afternoon we went to their house for some dinner and we watched it AGAIN. And we weren't sick of it at all. 

Then on Friday, March 1, Nicholas and his family and of course our family all headed to an IMAX theater, only to discover that seated directly behind us were our beloved Moores. That was a delightful surprise.

And what did we think? Well, it was AWESOME. Can't wait to see it again. But I'll bring earplugs next time because it was also awesomely loud.

3. That same weekend, on Sunday in fact, we celebrated Troy's 54th birthday. He had just gotten an exciting and very wonderful new laser-level that has been super helpful on The Bedroom Project, so he didn't really want anything big, but I picked out a couple little things for him, including a new bread knife since the last ones no longer actually cut bread. They just smooshed it. Also, a Dune t-shirt and small poster. Nothing big, but fun I hope. 

Actually, I think Troy got exactly what he wanted for his birthday, which was to have a long quiet day in his home with his family. We didn't have any company, we didn't have any engagements, we just had a day together. What could be better? Nothing, that's what. 

4. All my hopes and dreams came true. That is to say, we bought a pellet-ice maker. This did not happen without effort and some missteps. We had talked about getting one forever, due to my absolute adoration for a diet coke with pellet ice. But dang, those ice-makers are expensive. Like upwards of $500. Then I had a friend post a picture on instagram of some discount store in Fort Union that had ice makers for under $200. She was joking about how she "didn't get" people's "thing" for pellet ice. Yeah, haha you're right, I said, as I immediately got in my car and drove to the discount store and bought the ice maker. 

I was so excited. I got home, unpackaged the massive beast, plugged it in and....nothing happened. 

So THAT's why they were so cheap. They didn't actually work. I had to repackage the thing, drive clear back to Fort Union and return it. And then cry my way home.

Never fear, this story has a happy ending. Troy and I were talking about biting the bullet and just buying a nice one, since we were both so disappointed that we were so close to heaven and then it got taken away. By the way, I can't actually explain my love for pellet ice. I'm not an ice-chewer. I just like it, ok? Drinks are just better with it. I can tell. Anyway, we were thinking about it when - miracle of miracles - there was a pellet ice maker at Costco for a very reasonable price. 

I'm so happy. I now do not go to Thirst or Swig or Jolley's - I have my own soda shop right here and it's delightful. 

 

5. I look even older than I feel. I was doing some laundry for the high school theater department. A young friend saw this dress hanging up to dry and asked me if it was my prom dress. I spent the next three days laughing every time I thought about it. No. No that was not my prom dress. 

5. The girls and I (and of course Nicholas) went to see The Secret Garden way clear the heck out in DayBreak, where their beloved old choir teacher was playing the role of Archibald Craven. It was actually such a great production. We all love this musical, except Nicholas, who had never seen it. I think he's also a fan now. One fun moment was when Romney spotted, way across the lobby, an old buddy of Chase's from Aspen Grove, Spencer. It was fun to see his smiling face and catch up a little bit. 

6. Molly gets a Mission Call. Our cute friends we tree-hunt with every year seem to be growing up just as fast as our kids are. Molly and Romney are the same age - Molly's been doing school at USU and has been pretty set on going on a mission for quite some time. 

She spent all of elementary school and I think jr. high as well in a Chinese immersion program so she's basically fluent in Chinese. We've been joking that she'd either be going straight to Taiwan and if not, then definitely like Oklahoma or something just totally the opposite. Troy made a reasonable guess that Molly would get called to serve at a temple visitor's center someplace where her Chinese could maybe come in handy.

Her family invited us to the mission call reading. Troy wasn't available, but the girls and I drove up to Layton where we should not have been surprised to enter a house absolutely teeming with people. So. Many. People. Maybe 100? It was mayhem! Beautiful, exciting mayhem. After we all took a moment to pin our best guess onto the map on the wall, Molly read her call. She did not get called to Taiwan. She did not get called to a visitor's center. She got called to....MONGOLIA. 

Holy cow, that gal is in for an adventure. She leaves just one month before Chase gets home.

We were lucky enough to fight through the crowds to give her a hug. She told us she felt like she was going to puke. Romney added, "Yeah, but in a good way!" Molly said, "Yes! That's exactly how I feel! Like I need to puke, but in a good way!" So exciting and so crazy.

So yes, life continues on and around all of our construction craziness. In a good way. 

Well, At Least it's Better Than it Was

In all likelihood, I'm going to be putting way more photos in this post than will be interesting to look at. But how can I communicate the magnitude of what it's been like to pour footings and foundations under these walls? The process took us weeks. I mean, once we had the entire floor dug down to where we wanted it, we then had to take one unsupported wall at a time, dig a trench under the wall deep enough and wide enough to pour first a footing and then a foundation. And those things took so many steps - the building of the forms, cutting and placing rebar, mixing and pouring the concrete - a new adventure for me that I'm not sure I need to repeat ever again. Ok I take that back. It was kind of thrilling to see the work we did. I know it isn't perfect - there are many things Troy feels could have been done better, but when you look at where we started, it's such a vast improvement that we are just happy. And actually, we've decided that the theme of this construction project is "Well, at least it's better than it was."

To prove it, here's a photo of part of the "foundation" that we removed:

So comforting to know that those crumbling toothpicks were what the back of our house was resting on. 

We, once again, put our good old minivan Jarvis to the test, and he did not disappoint. We have made several trips for lumber that had to slide in all the way up to the windshield. 

 

We renamed the corner of the room behind the door "Rachel's Corner of Tears." Getting that all dug out and trenched as well as the other areas was about 50 times as hard, and if you look carefully at the photos you'll see how I came to feel about this special corner. 

So getting that horrid area fitted with all the concrete it needed was especially happy.

 

Troy and I got a lot of laughs as we stood UNDERNEATH the window that is normally about waist-high.

I'm so happy to report that our footings and foundations are all in, the old studs are supported with bottom plates, shims, with screws and epoxy connecting the plates to the concrete. It's so satisfying to look at, if you can see anything around our massive collection of tools and spare bits of wood and piles of screws.