Decking Done

We’re having fun now! We started putting the decking down Monday (I am so sore!). Our house building had come to a standstill while waiting on the air condition/heater man, but that was okay, because the weather was not cooperating either. The weather finally warmed up. Toby ordered the decking last week, and we were able to start work Monday afternoon. We would have started sooner, but he had to work a half-day. The lumberyard delivered the plywood around 11:00 AM. The delivery boys were not the sharpest knives in the drawer, and they stacked the sheets of plywood in one big pile on the floor joists causing serious sag. With just me and Toby, we spread out the pile of lumber before we started the decking. It went pretty well after that. Jesse joined us when she got off work, and we were able to get half the addition done. We do make a good team, and we laugh a lot. At one point, Toby was giving Jesse a hard time over something – saying what part of …(something work oriented) do you not understand? She answered quickly, "What part of FREE help do you not understand?"
Five years ago when we built our existing house, the neighbor across the fence had several miniature donkeys. They were cute, but they would often bray very loudly. Jesse and I often mistook their braying for Toby’s yelling. I don’t remember how many times I ran to find Toby – to see if he was okay or if he needed me. He was incredulous asking, "You mean I sound like a braying donkey?" Well, yeah, but it was the wind, building noises, donkey and your hollering that was confusing. So now then, when he needs us, he will purposefully make a donkey noise to get our attention.

Yesterday I had art with my big girls. Toby teased them about not wearing overalls so they could help out with the decking. One father that dropped his daughter off for art had planned to do some fishing in our pond, but he helped Toby instead. Also a big brother stayed to help Toby. By the time I was finished with art, Toby was finished with the decking – yeha! I only had to do a little to help Toby finish the job. Of course it started raining as soon as we were done – like clockwork. We ended up spreading plastic over the deck. Here is a pic of the girls and the fish they caught in our pond.

Jesse said that I was "over the top" with my last post on reasons she would make a good wife. Hey, it is my plan! Something else that cracked me up while we had the GGs over the weekend was their playing with Toby’s walkie-talkies. Jesse was helping me fix breakfast Sunday morning, when GBN1 handed her a walkie-talkie. GBN1 ran off into the bedroom to talk to Jes. I heard Jesse say, "Hey little buddy, this is Big Bird! We have a situation here!" GBN1 was so excited. She didn’t miss a beat replying, "I’ll be right there!" Jesse gave the usual, "Ten-four, little buddy. Big Bird, over and out!"