Remodeling Continued......

After a much needed break to National FFA Convention in October, the remodeling continued.
November 2 - Put up plywood wall across the front porch to close in the addition which is a 10 ft by 50 ft area. Took down ceiling tile.





















November 6 - It was election day and Acadia had no school so we worked on putting up walls on the north side of the house. Took down ceiling tile.

November 10 and 11 - We rented a man lift and finished walling in the north and south side of the house. Also pulled out 90% of the old insulation in the attic. (Blue section of house is the original house with the roof removed.)

November 16 - Put in front windows and one window on the south side addition. Put up porch beams to tie house to porch. Took down ceiling tile.
November 17 - Todd put in our new front door made out of old cypress. Began putting hardy plank on the front.
November 19 - Nate and Slade helped David put in a beam under the house to support the new middle of the house which now sits at 17 ft instead of 12 ft. Took down more ceiling tile.
November 20 - Put up interior beam and two old columns to support the beam. The columns are from the porch of a house from the late 1800's. Put up more hardy plank on the front.
November 21- Chad helped David tear out the original front wall of the house and the old ceiling in the front part of the house and we put up hardy plank to the beams on the front porch and put hardy plank on 3/4 of the north wall. 


 

November 22 - Took a break for Thanksgiving....thank goodness!!!
November 23 - Moved a window on the south side wall to the new center. Put hardy plank 3/4 of the way up the south wall. Hauled a full stock trailer of demolition scraps and trash to the landfill.

November 24 - Up and at the house at 7:30 on a cold, windy, Saturday......We must be crazy!!! Planked within 5 ft on the north wall peak. Todd started framing in the new back door which is also made of old cypress.



















November 25 - Finished planking the north wall and put additional bracing up on the south wall to get it ready to be planked.
















 

Mini Vacation - 85th National FFA Convention

This post is in reference to a digression from the remodeling project and from homeschooling. Every other year David takes his Midland juniors, seniors and officers to the FFA National Convention. Sara has been looking forward to this trip for many years and when I decided to home school we started planning to go as a family.
So, on Monday, October 28th FFA students and advisors from Midland High, Crowley High, Church Point High, and Rayne High along with Lenore, Allie, Wyatt, and myself cruised down the road on a comfy chartered bus and ended up in Nashville, Tennessee about 12 hours later. We spend the night in Nashville and on Tuesday toured the Nashville Auto Diesel College, an Agricultural Museum, the Opryland Hotel and the Opryland Mall. Then we were treated to singing and comedy at the Grand Ole Opry with entertainment from Vince Gill, Amy Grant, Mel Tillis, Pam Tillis, Riders in the Sky, Anita Renfroe, Bubba, and Henry Cho.
On Wednesday morning, bright and early, we were traveling again to our convention destination,  Indianapolis, Indiana. Tickets for the opening session on Wednesday were already taken so we opted to tour the beautiful city of Indianapolis around the convention area and enjoy a nice supper.
We attended the opening session of the 85th National FFA Convention on Thursday morning. It was a celebration of FFA and motivated over 12,000 students, dressed in Blue Jackets, advisors, and parents to "Grow". Grow in FFA, Grow in who you are, Grow in agriculture especially in the area of food production and giving to those in need.
One of the first motivational speakers was Scott Hamilton, yes the Scott Hamilton, Olympic gold medalist, founder of Stars on Ice, cancer survivor....he gave an amazing testimony about overcoming and growing into the person he is today. One of the things he said was "The only true disability is a bad attitude".
The FFA students were given an assignment in which they were to try to obtain a signature from one person from each state. This was a fairly easy assignment since there were around 55,000 FFA students in attendance at the convention from all 50 states and Puerto Rico. The career show was the best place to achieve this task because it was buzzing with activity and exhibits geared toward students.
Thursday night brought rain and cooler temperatures so Friday was cloudy and cold. We enjoyed another day at the convention with entertainment from the national FFA band and choir, singing and musical talent from other FFA members from various parts of the US including a blue grass band consisting of teen agers. We also heard more motivational speaking from retiring officers and Walter Bond, former NBA player.
We said goodbye to Indianapolis Saturday morning and began traveling southward. We toured the Jim Beam Factory in Clermont, Kentucky and had plans to take a 2 hour cave tour at Mammoth Cave in Cave City, Kentucky. Due to an major accident on the interstate we detoured onto a parallel side rode. The detour and the interstate route took about 4 hours to travel about 20 to 30 miles. We were thankful to be traveling in a big comfy bus equipped with satellite and a DVD player and an excellent driver, Mrs. Gloria. We missed our cave tour but it was no big deal. We were all tired but still in good humor when we finally arrived back in Nashville for the night.
At 6:00 AM we were on the road again traveling south toward our final destination.....good ole Louisiana. We lost an hour somewhere in Kentucky on our way north Wednesday but we gained it back on our way south on Sunday so we made it back to Crowley around 5:30 Sunday evening.
It was a great trip and was enjoyable to get away for a little while but it was more enjoyable to be back home.