Today has been a full tiring day for me, may it;s because of my yesterday’s never ending activity from Jatinangor-bandung-Jatinangor again.

I was sleeping this morning until 10 am and decided to wake up to finish my undone thesis for sure.

I was helping my mentor cleaning our house by washing the  dishes, massive dishes for-ever

then we’re talking at home with my young-active brother, Yudo for like an hour.

I drank my soy milk and an apple, taking a shower afterward,so refreshing )

Then i was planning to finish all of them today,my 3-5th chapter.

But then i end my self up in the comfy but thin seat in the cozzy net chatting and waiting for the reply of my interviewees.

some have replied,and some don’t.

And here i am, still typing and writing in my blog )  and feel so desperate suddenly

Oh Lord, please help me again for I don’t know how many times. But I know you’ll be there waiting for me so say:”Well-done,my daughter”

Two days ago I suddenly got an astonishing verse, it was taken from proverbs 23:18 ,and this afternoon I got from 2 samuel 18:14 saying not to waste the time God has given for each of us today and that hope exists to every one )

God, please let me run into your arms ),

thanks for holding my hands everywhere iam going :__)

So I finally got some more done on the playroom today. All of the support boards for the floor joists are up and I put in the floor joists in front of the door so that Candace can get to the laundry room a little easier. Hopefully I will have all of the floor joists up before next weekend so that I can start insulating the floor.

Soooo a big pull of Elon for me was that it was located in North Carolina, one of the prettiest and best states location wise for weather and perfect days. It still has seasons but is always just warmer than DC so I’m happy and not cold (don’t even mention the difference between NC and MN…). I figured I would have the perfect crisp fall weather and the not so cold winter. I still want a difference in seasons, just not that drastic…In reality the fall weather was sunny during the week and POURING rain on the weekends, enough rain to keep me inside (I’m one of those people that when it rains I become extremely tired and sitting in bed curled up with a movie, watching the raindrops race on the window and believe that is the most productive I can be). So I have for the most part gotten over my aggravation of the fall weather failure. BUT ALAS! Currently there is about three inches of snow on the ground. Three inches, you say, but that is nothing! Correct, that would be child’s play in Minnesota and not that big of a deal in Maryland but the whole state of North Carolina, collectively, does not own a shovel, snow blower, road salt, and I’m guessing snow plow either. So we have a received an email that almost everything on campus is shut down today. I guess I understand the “danger” of it all but that even means recruitment is postponed which is bumming everyone out. Obviously all this complaining on my part is not the end of the world in the least but it might lead to obsessive cleaning of my room, loads of laundry, and continual online shopping browsing all day long. I just don’t understand A. how last week it was 70 degrees; B. how it is actually snowing in North Carolina; C. what I should do with my life for the next 24 hours. Knowing me, I’ll figure something out and then blog all about it but still… oh well

Greek Update: I’m down to four houses on my list and the next day it will narrow down to two. I love two of the choices and am not so sure about the other two so I really hope it all ends well. Once I visit the two once more I rank them, they rank me, and on Bid Day I find out!! EEEEK

So after mostly avoiding my garage all week, I finally got some more work done on it today. My Father-In-Law Ron came over and gave me a hand with framing in the two mud room walls. One is all the way framed in, the other we built up to the level of the floor and I will finish framing it in when I decide where I want the door. In the mean time, I scribed the level that the floor will be at on all the studs around the room so that I can start hanging the floor joists. Hopefully I can pick up the materials tomorrow afternoon and work on it over the course of the week so that I can insulate the floor next weekend and put down the sub-flooring. We are donating the fridge to the food kitchen that our church sponsors. I can’t take any more time trying to sell it, I just need to get it out of my way. So the project is moving along, slower than I hoped but quicker than I expected.

I am starting to use flickr, or perhaps another site to host my pictures so I thought I would do a test post of it using this picture I took of Lucy on a hike a few months back.

I am starting to use flickr, or perhaps another site to host my pictures so I thought I would do a test post of it using this picture I took of Lucy on a hike a few months back.

So here is an update on how the project has gone so far.

The first job was to clean out the garage and pull down some of the loft style shelves that were hanging from the ceiling. You can see that it is pretty much done in the first two pictures, except for the shelves over the refrigerator. I also had to pull a couple of peg boards off the walls, you can see those still up on either side of the garage door. There were also a ton of random nails in the studs that I had to pull out.

Garage door before starting.

Laundry room before starting.

The next job was getting the garage door out. Ron, my father-in-law came over and gave me a hand with that. Anyone else ever taken a garage door off? It’s not easy! I had put it up for sale on craigslist for $55, which was most likely WAY too little since I was including the door and the lift for it, but it will help with the cost of the project (it’s $55 more than I thought I would have.) It sold the day I posted it and the guy picked it up about an hour after Ron and I got it dismounted. Taking the springs off correctly was the trickiest part and by the grace of God neither of us was hurt when we took the first one off wrong and it went flying. There was also a brand new coleman camping stove in the garage when we bought the house. I sold that on craigslist for another $50, and we have a the fridge that you can see in the pictures, that will no longer fit in the garage, which I hope to get at least $50 for.

So with the door gone I needed to close up the opening. I wanted it to look consistent with the rest of the structure, so I went back to my Teen Missions Training and laid a row of block. I dry fit it first. I figured I would need to cut at least one block. The tricky part here was the temperature. You can’t let concrete or mortar freeze for at least a couple days and Alabama was just starting out on an unusually long cold spell. It was a whole week and a bit of highs in the low 30’s – low 40’s and lows well below freezing, so I closed the opening with a tarp and cranked up the wood stove in the kitchen and put a fan at the door to blow the hot air into the garage. I later put plywood up on the outside of the tarp to help keep more heat in and thieves and curious neighbors out. In addition to mortar, I also poured concrete in the blocks to help give them strength and to hold threaded bar that I used to tie in a 2×8 to attach the stud wall to. I let the concrete and mortar cure for 5 days before putting up the stud wall.

Dry fitting the blocks.

Block laid.

While I was waiting for the concrete to set up I started working on the other end of the room. We are raising the floor in the garage 18 inches to get it level with the rest of the house. The problem with that was that I didn’t want to raise the laundry room floor because that would add plumbing costs to raise the washer and hot water heater. Plus, the hot water heater uses natural gas and I was not going to mess with those pipes. I also didn’t want to have to raise the side entry door that you can see to the left of the picture below. My solution was to move the laundry room entrance to the left and frame in a little sunken mud room in that corner. So as you can see, I framed in the old entrance and tore out a new one, which I have yet to frame in properly. I also still have to frame in the two stud walls for the mud room, one of which will need a doorway. You can also see in the picture below that I took out the shelving that was near the door to the kitchen.

Laundry room door framed in and new door opening started.

The last thing that I have finished is framing in and closing up the old garage door opening. We will be putting a window in that wall, so I framed it to fit the window, but left it covered with plywood until I’m ready to install the windows. We got the windows from Candace’s uncle Mark and he said that he would come over and help me install them. Hopefully I will be ready for that soon. I’m not too sure how strong my stud walls are, but thankfully only one of them will be bearing the weight of the floor and that will only be a little of the weight as it will be on one side of the short hallway created by the mud room. Look for another update in a week or two.

Framing in the garage door.

Working on framing in the garage door.

Framed up and closed in.

So here is an update on how the project has gone so far.

The first job was to clean out the garage and pull down some of the loft style shelves that were hanging from the ceiling. You can see that it is pretty much done in the first two pictures, except for the shelves over the refrigerator. I also had to pull a couple of peg boards off the walls, you can see those still up on either side of the garage door. There were also a ton of random nails in the studs that I had to pull out.

Garage door before starting.

Laundry room before starting.

The next job was getting the garage door out. Ron, my father-in-law came over and gave me a hand with that. Anyone else ever taken a garage door off? It’s not easy! I had put it up for sale on craigslist for $55, which was most likely WAY too little since I was including the door and the lift for it, but it will help with the cost of the project (it’s $55 more than I thought I would have.) It sold the day I posted it and the guy picked it up about an hour after Ron and I got it dismounted. Taking the springs off correctly was the trickiest part and by the grace of God neither of us was hurt when we took the first one off wrong and it went flying. There was also a brand new coleman camping stove in the garage when we bought the house. I sold that on craigslist for another $50, and we have a the fridge that you can see in the pictures, that will no longer fit in the garage, which I hope to get at least $50 for.

So with the door gone I needed to close up the opening. I wanted it to look consistent with the rest of the structure, so I went back to my Teen Missions Training and laid a row of block. I dry fit it first. I figured I would need to cut at least one block. The tricky part here was the temperature. You can’t let concrete or mortar freeze for at least a couple days and Alabama was just starting out on an unusually long cold spell. It was a whole week and a bit of highs in the low 30’s – low 40’s and lows well below freezing, so I closed the opening with a tarp and cranked up the wood stove in the kitchen and put a fan at the door to blow the hot air into the garage. I later put plywood up on the outside of the tarp to help keep more heat in and thieves and curious neighbors out. In addition to mortar, I also poured concrete in the blocks to help give them strength and to hold threaded bar that I used to tie in a 2×8 to attach the stud wall to. I let the concrete and mortar cure for 5 days before putting up the stud wall.

Dry fitting the blocks.

Block laid.

While I was waiting for the concrete to set up I started working on the other end of the room. We are raising the floor in the garage 18 inches to get it level with the rest of the house. The problem with that was that I didn’t want to raise the laundry room floor because that would add plumbing costs to raise the washer and hot water heater. Plus, the hot water heater uses natural gas and I was not going to mess with those pipes. I also didn’t want to have to raise the side entry door that you can see to the left of the picture below. My solution was to move the laundry room entrance to the left and frame in a little sunken mud room in that corner. So as you can see, I framed in the old entrance and tore out a new one, which I have yet to frame in properly. I also still have to frame in the two stud walls for the mud room, one of which will need a doorway. You can also see in the picture below that I took out the shelving that was near the door to the kitchen.

Laundry room door framed in and new door opening started.

The last thing that I have finished is framing in and closing up the old garage door opening. We will be putting a window in that wall, so I framed it to fit the window, but left it covered with plywood until I’m ready to install the windows. We got the windows from Candace’s uncle Mark and he said that he would come over and help me install them. Hopefully I will be ready for that soon. I’m not too sure how strong my stud walls are, but thankfully only one of them will be bearing the weight of the floor and that will only be a little of the weight as it will be on one side of the short hallway created by the mud room. Look for another update in a week or two.

Framing in the garage door.

Working on framing in the garage door.

Framed up and closed in.

They say when you start something that you should always expect it to take twice as long as you plan and cost twice as much. So my first project of the new year is a home renovation. With a new baby on the way we need a little more room. Candace said that either we move or we turn the garage into a playroom/office. She said playroom, I added office. So assuming my first statement was correct, this should cost about $1600 and take me a little over two months to complete. Since the first of the year we have cleaned out the garage, ripped almost everything off of the walls and ceiling and removed the garage door. I have the next two days off and hope to make a good start on closing in where the garage door was, and putting up a couple of other walls. Once that is done, we are raising the floor by 18 inches. Should go pretty quickly once that is done. Pictures to follow as the project progresses.

They say when you start something that you should always expect it to take twice as long as you plan and cost twice as much. So my first project of the new year is a home renovation. With a new baby on the way we need a little more room. Candace said that either we move or we turn the garage into a playroom/office. She said playroom, I added office. So assuming my first statement was correct, this should cost about $1600 and take me a little over two months to complete. Since the first of the year we have cleaned out the garage, ripped almost everything off of the walls and ceiling and removed the garage door. I have the next two days off and hope to make a good start on closing in where the garage door was, and putting up a couple of other walls. Once that is done, we are raising the floor by 18 inches. Should go pretty quickly once that is done. Pictures to follow as the project progresses.

I have a brand new addiction for 2010.  It’s an amazon kindle.  Absolutely fabulous.  I could go on and on and on, but it’s easy enough to look up.  Google kindle.  Reading has become a whole new exciting experience.  I want to down load everything! 

We had a lovely Christmas, btw.  Family makes Christmas.  We are truly blessed.  It takes being on the verge of ancient to really appreciate that.  When you’re young and healthy and busy you spend way too much time obsessing about stuff that in the long run doesn’t really matter.  Wanting everything to be perfect and then it turns out that the imperfections are what you remember and cherish.

Our five gorgeous grandchildren.  Kind of scary how fast they’re growing up. 

Kale

Omayja

Corey

Madison

Kenzie

And baby M. makes six.  She won’t remember this Christmas, but that little face will be unforgetable for all of us, no matter what the future brings.

I’m on book number three since Christmas.  Not that I didn’t read before, but now it’s just such electronic FUN!  I’ll have to start book blogging again!  You have been warned!  And that’s not just another idle threat, I swear. 

“And it’s not because I’m lonely, and it’s not because it’s New Year’s Eve. I came here tonight because when you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible.”

When Harry Met Sally is hands down one of my favorite movies (honestly, how can you possibly pick and order that, 10 Things I Hate About You, and How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days???). I watch it without fail every New Years Eve too. It’s just so perfect!! I don’t even know why I love it so much (I once used it for writing a movie review for journalism class and got a C-. Ouch). Maybe it’s the best friend aspect. I always fall for my good/close guy friends and get that feeling and connectiong? Idk. My mom has always teased me that I’m going to end up marrying one of them 10 years down the roll, followed by an eye roll from moi. Anyways I wanted to wish everyone a HAPPY NEW YEAR! Hope your New Years kisses, resolutions, and party plans are amazing and the best way to ring in the new year!! I’m off to transform Peter’s basement for our/his party.  Wanna see a homeade balloon drop either be a success or failure, you’re invited!!

xoxo Hannah B

I’m so proud of my addicted little self!  I have been playing Evony – Free Forever for the past month or so, and wasting SO much time on a game that makes me nervous and crazy.  Why, why, WHY??  I can only shrug and roll my eyes, because that’s what the inexplicable makes me do.  Last night I decided to pack it in.  I started transporting all my resources, including millions in gold,  to a fellow alliance member who happened to be close by – when he logs in he’ll think he hit some kind of mysterious jack pot.  I stopped all training of troops, raised taxes in both cities to 100 percent, watched the populations drop and the happiness levels plumet.  Did some big tax levy things to further deteriorate morale.  Dropped out of the alliance, abandoned my second city, and finally sent all my troops on a suicide mission to a level ten barbarian city.  I didn’t even wait around to witness the casualties.  Deleted my links and shortcuts and unsubscribed to Evony.  Forever.  So now I am Evony Free.  Forever.  What a flaming relief.