Looking more and more like a home...

Here are a few pictures to tide everyone over until tomorrow. There's been a lot going on around the homestead so I'll try to take some more pictures tonight and share them tomorrow. Our goal is to be in the house by July 4th weekend!

One of the "Jack and Jill" guest rooms- ceiling fan courtsey of Laura, Bobby and CW
Master bathroom cabinets...there's also a wall cabinet I actually installed!

The NEW exterior of the house..more pics tomorrow as it's now finished, but this is close!

We've had a fun couple of weekends away, but are looking forward to some time in town to finish up the house and actually move in! We'll need some volunteers to help us clean it and get it liveable so if anyone is interested... :)

Today

I drove one of these...

AND

... one of these

The skid steer was cool but the excavator was incredible.

I feel like a little kid who just spent the day playing with the toy(s) he always wanted.

I may not sleep thinking about it.

B

WE PASSED!!!

Here's one more reason (as if we need more reasons) to PRAISE GOD...
The plumbing inspector came back out this morning and we PASSED for both water and gas. We will be able to call the gas company next week and have them come set a meter. Batch also called our plumber and let them know we passed and that we'll be ready to install the water heater next week.

Buddy is here today working with Batch to get the final pieces of the electrical complete so we can call for an inspection on Tuesday. That means A/C and FLOORS!!!

We are taking a break this weekend and heading to Chattanooga, TN and Birmingham, AL to visit some friends. Have a safe and happy Memorial Day!

Time to do the tiling...

...we did the tiling! For those of you who remember the old Dunkin' Donuts commercial, that will make sense. For others, sorry for the random reference.

Well, thanks to lots of help from my mom over the past week and a VERY long work day on Saturday, all the floor tile in the house has been laid. Depending on what is happening in the rest of the house this week, we will likely grout the new tile later this week or early next week. We've also put the first coat of paint on most of the trim (baseboards, crown and door molding) T.S. left behind for us to use.

Batch spoke to our local plumber late last week and he said that, legally, the city can not make us replace the washing machine drain since it was existing but that it would likely cause us problems down the road so we're better off replacing it now. Hopefully his crew will be able to replace the drain this morning and get the inspector back out to sign off on the project.

Bobby and Laura have been coming over in the evenings to help with the finish electrical work. They have all the ceiling fans installed and most of the electrical boxes wired up. There are some more ceiling fixtures to install and an outlet or 2 to find (they were accidentally covered by sheetrock) then we should be ready for final electrical inspection!! That means sweet A/C AND installation of our hardwood floors.

The neighborhood handyman is making quick work of our siding project. Almost all the "boards" of the board and batten siding are installed, and he should be able to start putting up the battens this week. We might be ready for house paint by the weekend.

Thank you for your prayers during our rebuilding. Please continue to pray for smooth building and passed inspections. So many things are just sitting on ready waiting for a small trigger to let the progress continue.

We will post pictures as soon as we remember the camera!

Progress Pics

We are installing board-and-batten siding. This is a picture of our house with the boards (no battens yet) but it looks much better than before.

Again from different angles.

Yesterday, we also installed cabinets, a light fixture and the shower head in one bathroom. The camera angles are bad (really bad, but I think you can make out the progress), but it looks a little more like a house every day.

A Brief Progress Report

I know Batch took some pictures yesterday that he wanted to upload to show everyone, but the internet was done at the Leavengoods last night. Maybe this weekend we'll get some more pictures posted. Here's what's been going on this week:
- Siding: As of last night, the cedar siding was complete along the driveway side of the house and people were stopping by to compliment Batch on how good it looks.
- Electrical: Buddy is back!!! He and Batch have been installing outlets and switches all day and have most of the "back" (really the north side) of the house complete. Batch and I will pick out some light fixtures this evening or tomorrow morning and those will be installed. We hope to be ready for the electrical inspection next week so we can get the A/C turned on and begin acclimating the hardwood flooring.
- Painting: You can basically call this complete. There is some touch up to do and the trim still has to be painted and installed, but it looks awesome! Mom will be here to help next week and I think that will be her project- finish the painting throughout the house.
- Plumbing: We had a little hiccup with the plumbing inspection, but our plumber is on the case and will hopefully have this worked out early next week.
- Cabinets: The rest of the cabinets arrived yesterday in a HUGE Bertch truck. I've taken a tiny peak and they are beautiful. If we get the electricity turned on, we might be able to begin installing the next week!

Thanks to everyone for your continued prayers and support. We continued to be amazed by God's provision for us.

Does Birth Order Determine Success?

A very interesting article I stumbled across this morning (and the topic of one of my gradeschool science projects).

I am the youngest of three:

Youngest: The youngest child tends to be the most creative and can be very
charming -- even manipulative. Because they often identify with the underdog,
they tend to champion egalitarian causes. (Youngest siblings were the earliest
backers of the Protestant Reformation and the Enlightenment.) Successful in
journalism, advertising, sales and the arts, famous youngest children include
Cameron Diaz, Jim Carrey, Drew Carey, Rosie O'Donnell, Eddie Murphy and Billy
Crystal.

Holly is an only:

Only Children: Only children have similar characteristics to first borns and are
frequently burdened with high parental expectations. Research shows they are
more confident, articulate and likely to use their imagination than other
children. They also expect a lot from others, hate criticism, can be inflexible
and are likely to be perfectionists. Well-known only children include Rudy
Guiliani, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Alan Greenspan, Tiger Woods, tennis' teen
queen Maria Sharapova and Leonardo Da Vinci.

What are you? Do you think our profiles (Holly and I) fit? Does your profile fit?

B

A few pictures of the progress

Batch and our friend CW work on hanging the insulation board. The next step on the exterior work will be siding. Inspired by the beautiful homes of the Springhill and Fairhope, AL areas, we've decided to use cedar siding.

Moving inside the house, we find the first of our cabinet order...it's the vanity and linen cabinet for the "jack & jill" bathroom! The remainder of the order should arrive sometime next week!!

Here's the guest bathroom just off the "man room." The workers did a GREAT job with the paint in that room!

It's time for tile selection...below are our 3 options...let us know what you think. We have one in mind, but enjoy hearing from all of you!

Forward Progress

After months of being stuck in neutral, and sometimes even reverse, things at the house are racing forward. Batch has taken a leave of absence to spearhead the operation and so far it's been well worth it. We are so thankful for God's provision and blessing in our efforts to restart our lives. Here are just a few things to give thanks for:

• The sheetrock is DONE!
• Walls and ceilings are being painted as I type (I'm stuck in the office while others are working on the house).
• Our kitchen and bathroom cabinets will be delivered TOMORROW!
• Our flooring is on order (or almost on order) and will likely only take a few days to arrive.
• Mr. Buddy will be here later this week to begin the finish electrical.
• Volunteers, volunteers, volunteers...our friends have been VERY helpful throughout this process (especially CW- I'm glad you work so close!!).
• The soffits have been replaced and furring strips for the siding are being installed this week.

Please continue to pray for skilled laborers to assist in the cabinet and flooring installation and for continued forward progress. At this rate, we may actually move in this month!! I'll try to take and post some pictures of the house that is slowly but surely becoming a home soon.

Which MUPPET are you?

I'm Scooter...pretty funny if you ask me! :)

Brainy and knowledgable, you are the perfect sidekick.You're always willing to lend a helping hand.In any big event or party, you're the one who keeps things going."15 seconds to showtime!"

The Muppet Personality Test

A bunch of news (and some olds)

Electrical Inspection-
We got approval on our rough electrical inspection on the very first try a few weeks ago. This is a very big deal that I sense many of you had been praying for. I had intended to post a picture of the signed permit, but I'm a slacker and never did download the pics. Our good friend Buddy Hines did a great job getting us ready for that, so big thanks to him.

Plumbing Progress-
The plumbing effort continues.

Dad and Mr. Jerry have been here again since last Friday and left for home today. We worked through last weekend and got the remaining attic items pretty much wrapped up. The gas lines were tested earlier this week and withstood the pressure so that is very good news. The remaining rough plumbing will hopefully get wrapped up early next week so we can get to sheetrock. We still will need a permit and official inspection approval on this work as well, so please be praying that both would be provided. Also, please pray that the remaining work would proceed swiftly so that Dad and Jerry can get back to their normal lives. Also, big, big thanks to their families for allowing them to be away to help get us over this hurdle.

Mortgage payoff-
I wrote here last week that we had received the checks from the insurance company that would payoff our debt on our previous mortgage. We FedExed the checks and appropriate documentation on Friday. We got confirmation on Monday that Chase had received the package and got word yesterday that everything had been processed and that we no longer have debt on the old place. So, the deal is done. We own that piece of dirt, steps and debris outright now. WOO HOO! (that is real excitement, not sarcasm in case anyone is wondering)

Leave of Absence-
Next to the mortgage payoff, this is really some of the biggest news for us of late. We have been praying and thinking for a while now about me taking some time off from my consulting work with The Structure Group. The people at TSG are fantastic and everyone there has been beyond flexible, very understanding and remarkably generous with Holly and I as we seek to put our life back together. But with the renovation ongoing and all the challenges of life after Katrina, I have been sensing a need/calling to take some time off. This hopefully will allow us to make some significant progress on the house (i.e. get it liveable and us moved in) and to do some real soul-searching and reflection on what our vocational calling is and where that might take us (or leave us). My leave starts today (I am currently at the airport waiting for my last flight home for a while) and will continue for a few months (at least).

So please pray that we would be refreshed by this time off from weekly travel, that Holly and I would grow more and more unified to one another in Christ, that the renovations would be completed very quickly and that God would grant us clarity and wisdom as to what sort of work we will return to once this time is over. Despite how generously God has provided for us thus far, we still have some trepidations about the financial implications of me not working (well not having an income) for a while. So please pray that God would continue to provide and that He would extinguish our doubt and give us peace and confidence in His provision.

Thanks.

B

Schaeffer on the church and Armstrong on the PCA

A friend sent me this article tonight by John Armstrong in which he conveys his concern for the Presbyterian Church in America. It articulates well some concerns/sentiments that have been bouncing around in my own mind in recent months (maybe even years). Here is an excerpt from that article (emphasis mine):

I also have a growing concern for the PCA. This is a conflicted denomination. This conflict does not come from the Left at all, like it does in so many of the older fellowships in America. This denomination is not fighting about homosexual ordination or the adoption of anti-Semitic overtures with regard to the state of Israel. This conflict, and the spirit that energizes it, comes from the far Right. You see, the PCA has a very vocal minority of folks who just can’t stop arguing. They seem to thrive on polemics. Every controversy known to conservative Christianity seems to eventually find its way into the PCA. I have been reminded of this again over the last few weeks. One theological overture after another keeps surfacing and making its way into the bloodstream of the PCA, poisoning the missional good of this fellowship over and over again. I do not know how long this group can sustain this kind of hostility.

How long can we sustain this kind of hostility?

I'm not sure, but on a related note, I finished up Francis Schaeffer's True Spirituality last week. I was struck by the clarity of his thoughts on prayer and characteristics which the church ought to exhibit and how we as Christians are to work to make it so. On page 146, Schaeffer speaks of how we as the church (Christians) are to live in relationship with each other and the subsequent changes that are (or should be?) wrought in us as we are continually conformed more and more to the image of Christ.

Frankly, in many ways the church, or at least cultural-Christianity/American-evangelicalism (and I am afraid maybe even much of the PCA), has lost sight of the communal aspect of our calling. We have made church into a building or a denomination or a system of narrowly defined doctrines or a place you go on Sundays (and sometimes Wednesdays) and have forgotten that we are commanded to "Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another. "

In response to this lack of community and un-love we are tempted to respond just as unbiblically, often by using the world's methods or worse by completely disengaging, throwing up our hands and walking away. And sadly, by so doing, we engage in the very action we deplore; we don't want to love people who are hard to love. We want everybody to conform to our own wishes and do things our way. Schaeffer proposes that we pray and goes on to write:

The Armstrong article and the Schaeffer ideas intersect where the church has forgotten: that it is for Christ.

We have instead become hypnotized by what we are against. We pledge fierce loyalty to personalities and parties and organizations and doctrines and forget the centrality of Christ crucified. There must be a way to preserve Biblical fidelity without succumbing to this exponential fragmentation. The party spirit is alive and well.

What's your slogan?

Here's a little mindless entertainment for you...check out this link. Put in your name and it will give you some suggested advertising slogans using your name. Thanks for Virginia for the link.

Here are a couple of mine:

The Holly Effect.
A Day Without Holly is Like a Day Without Sunshine.

What about some for Batch?? I was pretty sure my husband would not appreciate my posting the ones it generated for him...not to mention they didn't make any sense. Oh well, Happy Saturday!

It has been 210 days...

... since the storm. Nearly seven months. 6.90411 to be exact.

It has been 187 days since Holly first met with our adjuster and he said "that our damage was entirely a 'water event' and that there was 'no wind involved'."

But it came today. The check. Made out to us and our mortgage compay for 100% of the value of our policy.

The real one, not a cancelled one.

That sound you hear? That is us breathing a very big sigh of relief.

We'll call Chase tomorrow and figure out how to get this thing paid off. And then we get back to work, taking the steps necessary to put life back together.

Please give thanks to God. Even when we worry, gripe, complain and generally doubt his goodness and provision and sovereignty, He can and will provide. He is good. He is merciful. He provides for His people. As Jean Larroux says, God's provision is often clear in the rearview mirror, but foggy looking in the windshield.

That has certainly been my experience again and again and again.

Give thanks.

B

13, 11, 7

That's approximately how many hours we (Dad, Mr. Josey and I) logged plumbing this weekend on Friday, Saturday and Sunday respectively (normally we try to rest and worship only on Sunday's, but since our ox has been in the ditch since August 29th, we are trying earnestly to get it out... see Exodus 20:9-11 and Luke 14: 1-6). Anyhow, 31 hours per man, for a total of 93 man hours.

We jack-hammered for drain pipes and repaired broken vent pipes and laid out and fastened new copper piping in the attic and walls. I have now returned to Houston for my weekly commute to work, but Dad and Mr. Josey are continuing this week with the remaining plumbing tasks. I think that, Lord willing, by the end of this week/early next week we may be able to proceed with the installation of drywall/sheetrock. That would be huge.

Please offer praise for God's provision of Mr. Josey (a licensed plumber) and using Dad to find and bring him to Biloxi. Dad is also providing his labor in this effort as well. So big thanks to both my heavenly and earthly fathers.