rebuild

This afternoon the two engineers we originally had inspected our home came over, looked around, and made their recommendations. Since their experience is based on (among other things) inspecting homes for many years (sometimes the same homes as they are sold again later), their advice carries a lot of weight, and it is advice in which you can have a degree of confidence. What it amounts to is that we may not have to do as much as we previously thought. Tearing out the carpet: yup, still doing that. Tearing out the forced-air furnace: might just be able to clean the ducts. Tearing off the walls: doesn't sound like we'll have to; might be able to seal them up. If budget allows, we would might replace the wood panels with sheet rock.

But the bottom line is that it sounds like we may be doing less than previously thought. Praise the Lord!

Thanks to Jon, Jackson, Izzy, and a bunch of heavy lifting, the furniture is out of the house. Yesterday, we moved a stove, refrigerator, dishwasher, a matress, box spring, a bedframe made out of 2x8's, three couches, a washer and dryer pair, an upright freezer, two (heavy) entertainment centers (long story), four book cases, a heavy filing cabinet, two computer desks, a dresser, two lamps, two night stands, and a partridge in a pair tree. I was sore at the end. Not sure about the others. But now we can pack up the rest of the house (books, miscellaneous stuff) and start tearing up the carpet. A productive day. Thanks to all that helped!

We are in our temporary living space. We started moving on Monday (the 15th) and spent our first night in the apartment on Tuesday. We are all less congested already, especially Jonathan, and Crystal can take deep breaths a whole lot easier. We have most of what we need to live (clothes, kitchen stuff, daily necessities) moved over. Some additional things will be moved in the coming days.

Things still needed while we're in the apartment:

Bean bag chairs
We don't really want to subject anyone to carrying a couch up three flights of stairs (unless they really want to), so we figure eight to ten bean bag chairs will serve nicely.

A recliner
We have one recliner (thanks Chaces!), and we've discovered that sometimes both little ones need to be rocked at the same time. So, another one would be nice, but not critical.

Thanks to everyone for their generous support and prayers. We've been without a computer for a couple days, so if I haven't responded to your e-mail yet, I'm not ignoring you. I'll get to it.

Tonight I went and looked at an apartment being rented by some friends of ours. 900 square feet, 2 bedroom. More than big enough for a temporary place to live. And the best part: it's about a five minute walk from our house, so will be very convenient for working on the house, doing once-a-month cooking, and doing laundry.

Praise the Lord!