Family Update

As you can see from the roofing project we have been very busy at our house lately. I've uploaded a ton of photos from June and July to our flickr account. Feel free to browse them to see how the girls are growing and changing.

Some of the happenings... Addie finished Kindergarten and we celebrated by going taking pizza to the beach one night for dinner. She went to a couple summer camps and is enjoying a lot of time with friends. Both the girls enjoy our Wednesday routine of going to story hour and then the brown bag concert at the local band shell. We have made it to the beach a couple times as well.


Michael finished the chicken coop and it looks great! The chickens love it too. He has started working on the fence to go around the garden but that project will be on hold until his thumb heals (he got it with the saw a week ago).

I'm busy in the garden and preserving all the local fruits and veggies we can get. Margaret is growing up to fast for me! She is changing every day.


It's hard to believe that it is already mid July here because we have only hit the low 80's a couple days this year. For the most part we have been wearing long pants! I'm not complaining about the weather, but it just doesn't feel like summer when we are still having spring weather. That is all that is new that I can think of. Maybe now that the roof is done things will slow down a tad and I can keep the blog updated more often!

New Roof

Thanks to the help of many family and friends we have a new roof! It was NOT the easiest home improvement project that we have tackled to date, but it made doable by lots of help. We had several people help with the actual construction/ deconstruction of the roof, watch kids, make food, and take care of other odd end jobs that needed done.


As you can see we had to remove the two layers of shingles that were already on the roof. It was a full day's job.

Along with the normal roofing we also had to jack up sags in the roof line over the garage were the tresses were spaced a little to far apart of our heavy Michigan snows. We also had to demo the flat roof where it was completely rotted and build a new one.


Putting the paper and shingles on was mainly a two or three person job on the roof. The rest of us did what we could from the ground while the guys rotated turns on the roof.

As you can see roofing is not an easy job. Even watching the work going on can tire a guy out! Working from sunrise to sunset for 4+ days is not a job for the faint of heart.

Here is an upclose shot of the finished roof. The shingles are so beautiful and classic looking. The project turned out just perfect thanks to everyone's help and Derek Vanderwall's expertise. To see more photos of the project check out our flickr site.