OK Time has past and out of a hole in the ground our home has sprouted. For those like us how have never built a home it appears "almost done". Well that's a relative term. Now comes the real work, selecting the cabinet the room layouts the lighting the location of plugs the flooring the colors the trim the ceiling the ......

Ok now all the windows and doors are on the roofingis next what color shingles which type of siding , what siding color and shade. Yesterday we had a 3 hour meeting with the builder where we just looked at the kitchen walls and tried to come up with ideas , closer and closer it will be finished at some point but today I have my daughter her boyfriend , my son my brother his 8 Siberian huskies to entertain so other then a 9 am meeting with the cabinet people a free day

Wall UP !!! Jeese its starting to look like a house. Went To Denver for two days for Kathleen's Graduation and came back to find an actual structure.

And The Walls Came Tumbling Down

We finally decided to do it! Forget the fact that prices on homes have plummeted, the cost of building remaining astronomical, something just told us the time was now to move to White lake build our dream house and become a full time "Lake Person"

So we put the Bloomfield house up  for sale and to our surprise it sold and we had to move

This was all well and good but all we had was a dream and now it was too late to turn back. 25 years at Woodedge. 25 Christmases ,full of friends and family. 25 years of memories all of them good, but it was time to move from a big house that was now too often empty. Empty of children who had moved on to their own lives. Empty summers as we spend more time on White Lake. empty of friends and neighbors had left or had too little time from their own families. Still full of memories. Also full of old books, videos in formats no one uses, boxes of who knows what, clothing and furnishings that we could not bring ourselves to throw away. furniture that we were never going to use. Boxes upon boxes full of stuff that we now had the freedom if not the will to just let them go.
But we had no where to go but our little cottage until we had a plan. So off we moved to the "Cottage"

 But we needed and idea. We talked about many different looks. All we knew is we wanted something different than what was on the lake. We talked with our Builder Jim and tried to tell what we were looking for but in some abstract terms it seemed like we would never even be able to know what we wanted. then Jim called me to tell me he was looking at something that we would like. It had many of the ideas we had talked about. I asked him where did he find this place."Krogers"came his reply. Krogers? The grocery store? What was it in the frozen food department? No, he said I am standing in Krogers and there is a magazine that has a picture of a house in it that I think you would like. OK you think we might like a house you found in a magazine in the check out line of Krogers. This did not appear to be going well but he told me where it was and that I should take a look at it. So I go into Krogers and the helpful staff asked me what I was looking for and I said a house. They were less helpful after that and tended to stay away from me. But I found the house after searching through the rack and finding the only magazine without a Kardashian on it and sure enough it had a picture of a house that appeared perfect

The house seemed destine for us. In pictures of the kitchen was my stove, the exact same blue tea kettle we have . throughout other picture were other furnishings taken right out of our home, tables the master bed it looked almost as our destiny would be found in Krogers and how many people can say that.

But we needed plans, designs and most important of all the damn city to approve our variance so that we could stay facing the lake from the same location as the cottage. So we had to apply for a variance and despite some protest it was approved, This my friends is only the beginning of what you need when you decide against all reason to build a house. You need luck, you need lots of ready cash and you need a neighbor that is trying for sainthood who will let you dig up their lawn and move their perfectly good well. Well we had the latter in Tom & Sharon Keenan. Then we had to wait for utilities to show up and disconnect things, more governments to approve you septic and demolition plans , get your building permit , Oh yes you also need more money so you have to wait for the financing to go through (something you had just paid off on the other two properties. Than things start happening and you have plans.

The Trees, yes they are always the first to go

OK Two weeks at the most and then it starts for real. With the living things out of the way the next to go are the structures and all the happy memories associated with them. And like this Easter time from the end of the "cottage" The House on the Lake will emerge and new memories to make. Come back for the journey because: "If we build it they will come"

If you Build It They Will Come

And The Walls Came Tumbling Down- It was with excitement and sadness watching "the Cottage come Down. It was also a long job. The structure was built to withstand Judgement day. All of the walls on Both sides were solid concrete block cut up to the angle of the peaks

Then when we got the structure down we saw the foundation was solid concrete 5 feet deep and 2 feet thick or better

But through the rubble and brick and mortar the new house is beginning to take shape . today 5-9-12 We laid the footings.

And my neighbors dog Morgan Keenan decided he wanted to memorialize his presence

 And So it begins. The cottage had memory memories for everyone ,
Dogs

Friends

AND FAMILY

But now its time to say "Good Night " to the cottage and watch the Dawn Rising of the "House on White Lake"