An April Birthday

The birthday is April 20th, but let’s begin at the beginning.  Our home remodel project began on Tuesday, April 14th, as carpenters began ripping off the siding of our home.  The huge rolloff dumpster had arrived only one day earlier and was ready to receive the old material. 

The first guy I met on the job was Scott Lauwagie (right), who happens to be the son of Victoria friends, Gary and Sharon.  Sharon would tell us that their boys are “in construction.”  Now I know what she means.  Scott is top shelf and I’d recommend him without reservation. 

As they ripped off the brown cedar siding, our house appeared black, due to the black tarp paper that was revealed beneath it.

There were men crawling all the place.

Scaffolding was used, of course, to take off siding above ground level.

St. Francis kept an eye on everything.

We cleaned some things out of the detached garage, like those old metal bunk beds that we had used for the kids, for many years, as a backup for company and friends.

Larry cut and prepared new material for the soffits and facia.

Notice that the trees are not yet budding out and our hostas haven’t yet poked through to the surface.

It reminded me of peeling an orange, only the job wasn’t so sweet.

The ladder stands in my best hosta bed.

After the siding was off, it was time to replace some of the windows, including my favorite big windows in the living room and dining room areas.

Look who was eating his breakfast and watching all the activity at Grandma’s house.

Yes, it was Gunnar Norgaard.

It was a good time of year to replace windows since there were no bugs and mosquitoes yet.

Look who joined Gunnar for breakfast and the live construction movie.

Yes, it was Addie Norgaard.

And look who sitting nearby, working at his computer — Christopher Norgaard.

Jenny Norgaard crawled upstairs in Nick’s bedroom to escape some of the noise, and Addie soon joined her.  So did I.

We perched a little TV on a bedroom chest of drawers for additional entertainment.

The new windows would not go to the floor as they had before, so the carpenters had to build up the wall a couple feet.

They constructed an eyebrow above the garage doors that extends across the other side in the back yard.

And we all got to hold his little honey.

Construction noise continued.  This is the eyebrow as is turns the corner and goes to our back door.

Then Jen got home from work and hugged her little Sophie.

Soon they were fast asleep together, mother and child.

We celebrated Allan’s birthday on the weekend of April 18th and 19th and all of our family was together.  Gunnar and Addie know that Grandpa Al loves to hunt turkeys.

Son  Nick and his little Sophia drove over to see his sister and her family.

Sophie is a happy baby.

Love, Sue

Email:  Sue@PrintsPublishing.com

HomePage:  www.PrintsPublishing.com