After a week of excavating to enlarge the pond and pile the rich soil in several places around the property, including the yard area, we went to Plants of the Wild in Tekoa, WA for a premium winter rye/bluegrass mix. Then we covered 6000 of the 12,000 square feet in plastic because, according to Plants of the Wild staff, October is hit-or-miss on freezing the vulnerable sprouts. On the 14th, after it all germinated, it froze hard, and the un-plasticed part did not make it, justifying the $130 in plastic for the 6000sqft.

With more than a little miscommunication with installer and permitting entities, $400 in permitting costs, and $4000 in payment to an installer, we are fully approved for a 6 bedroom residence! Not yet sure how much will be required for the milk processing facility, but it is wonderful to have the extra capacity officially permitted today more than a year before what we anticipated!

At $400 for 12 yards of rock and over $100 for fabric, we put in nearly a man hour per two dollars invested. It took a week for the whole family plus new friends Abel and Theresa for a day to get the rock spread, stumps dug out, ground leveled, drain tile installed, etc. We are thrilled to have 4" of rock around the house and planter box to the new facility entrance.

Breaking ground on June 23rd and working hard most extra time through early August, the family managed to erect 480sqft of covered space, less siding and roofing. Material prices jumped 30% in the middle of the project when materials for an extra 400sqft were purchased. Huge thanks to Eric for the help excavating. Scott, Chris, Jamen, and my dad all supported, but the kids have by far the most hours as they have learned and reinforced a bunch of skills. We still need to get the power installed and roofing on before pulling the RV in.
Note that this building style needs engineered since it is atypical....
We are looking forward to having access to the root cellar in the winter through an upright door!

After numerous gentle requests from Kyra for a door on the utility room, Scott asked, "do you need any help on some projects?" Reluctantly, I borrowed motivation and skill to get the installation completed for the 2nd time - the first time was not square, level, plumb or able to close.
Thank you Scott!

Crabapple trees provide food for birds, beauty, and best of all, jelly. But they make a terrible mess if the fruit is unharvestable. We have a love-hate relationship with our crabapple tree near the front door. Despite trimming the last two years, the main stem needed to come down about 15 feet!
After remarking to Kyra "I knew it was going to hit me," she said, "it wasn't that big a branch."

Occurred over the week of 10/27-11/2/19
Dad rented an excavator and for one busy week totally transformed the large (originally the stallion pasture) ground piece into a terraced and graveled place. Also, he leveled the front yard and behind the house and to the east of the house, over top of the septic tank. He also dug a sort of pond thing down at the bottom of the property. The top picture is a picture taken from the top of the road looking down, the house is to the right and unseen in the picture, the top right picture is a picture of the graveled drive way, the road is up on the left, the picture below this text is before the gravel and clearly shows some of the terracing, the picture to the right of it is a view from near the front door showing the front yard, and the big picture second to the bottom picture shows the east side, over top of the septic tank, and the very bottom is a view of the back of the house just before it was completely leveled.

At last, we decided on the fate of the big concrete steps that have been in the way for so long. We rented a jack hammer and it took Dad about 2 hours to break them up into movable pieces, and we loaded them into the white utility trailer and hauled them to the dump.

Painted early October with a very nice loaner paint gun (thank you Mills), deeply discounted paint (thank you Barndt's), motivation and help from Matt (Josh's dad), and a bunch of paint covered kiddos. Pictured after step removal and cleanup. The satisfaction and sense of completeness of this mortgage-readied home is bitter-sweetly-difficult to describe.