The day has come and gone, but the house is still not ours.

June 20th, 2010. The date the our new home is to be substantially complete.  Well as of 6:30 this evening, there is still work left to do.  I guess some may call this substantially complete, but I believe the city of Herriman may not think so.  We have no steps from the sliding glass doors down to the ground.  It is not a big deal, other than it is an eleven foot drop.  Ginny and I have joked for a long time that we were going to ask the builder to replace the deck and stairs with a slide, rope and fireman's pole, because we thought the grand kids would love it.

If not having any stairs is not an issue, then how about the fact that the stove have not been installed and there are still electrical fixtures missing, of the fact that we have not hot water because the shutoff value to the water heater runs like a facet if the water into the house is turn on.  I do not believe the home is yet able to be occupied.

Oh, there are still lots of minor things to still be completed, but they were not required by the substantial completion date.  Hopefully things will get wrapped up by the end of business tomorrow.  Then the city can inspect things and grant an occupancy permit.  Our loan office is working to get an appraisal done this week and then we can sign on the dotted line.

It is looking more and more like we will be moving over the July 4th weekend.  I thought that was Independence day, but I am thinking it is more like Labor day.  If we do not get things squared away soon the fireworks may be seen at the builders office before Independence Day.

A break from the house to thank and honor our returning Marine

We feel it very appropriate to take a break for our reporting on the progress on our home to pay a tribute to our nephew and cousin who has spent the past 8 and a half months in Afghanistan performing responsibilities to defend our freedom and our great nation as a Marine. 

Jacob Chesley you make more than your mother proud.  As a family we are extremely grateful for you and your service to us and our nation.

This is Jake's second tour of duty.  The first was in Iraq and this time was in Afghanistan and we are happy to have him home safe and sound.  Several of his unit did not have the opportunity of returning to see their family and loved one.  They paid the ultimate sacrifice in performing their duties.  These we wish all to know that while we did not know them personally we grateful for they service.  We will always reflect on the courage, honor and dignity with which they carried out they responsibilities.  For them any every one of those who have contributed to our freedom we can't not express of deepest gratitude and our sincere thanks.  For you see we know that FREEDOM IS NOT FREE.  We also recognize the not only are we living in a free nation because of the efforts of our military personnel, but many others of this world are also obtaining and establishing freedom in their nations.

To all who serve and especially Jake we as a family say THANK YOU and may GOD BLESS.

I'm Floored

Its getting closer by the day, but progress has been slow this past week.  The weather prevented much progress on the exterior of the house and not much happen on the interior, but we have seen a few things move along.  The exterior doors have been finished and the flooring in the kitchen, dining, entry way and both baths has been completed, and most of the light fixtures had been installed.

I think the contractor was hoping to have the exterior completed before the end of the week, but the entire week through Thursday had rain in the forecast.  As a result they were only able to complete the initial coat for the stucco and stone.

While it is only 2 weeks before the planned completion date and their is still much to do, we have the utmost confidence in our builder, and feel that things will come together before the completion date.  This next week we should see the cabinets be installed, the exterior reach completion, maybe even the driveways and walk ways being put in place.

While there are still some big things to be completed (deck and stairs at the back of the house, master shower, and the remaining floor covering to name a few) most of the remaining work can occur in parallel with each other.  This includes things like the remaining light fixtures, hanging the doors, rain gutters, sewer hookup, plumbing fixtures, electrical outlets, etc.

David is also planning to return this next week to finish the HVAC installation.  He will need to install the condensing unit for the A/C, the unit heater for the garage and the registers and return air vents and a few other minor finishing touches.  Then there will be the paint touch-up and minor damage repairs that will need to be completed before the next two weeks come to an end.

Once we have possession of the house, we will need a little time to install shelves in the basement for storage and then there is the 3 day job of painting the garage floor.  For the most part this is a case of hurry up and wait for the epoxy to dry before the next step.  I want to get this all done before we attempt to move in so that we do not have to deal with the paint fumes once we are moved in.

For the first time we also attended out new ward for church today.  That was exciting.  As many may know it was in December when we had came across the lot and builder for our home and Thomas was dating a beautiful little gal that he works with and I happened to ask Thomas if he was coming ice fishing with us. Well Megan (the little gal that Thomas had been dating) was there and she said that both her dad and her Bishop loved to ice fish, so I invited them to come along, and so they did.  We have a great time.  Then about a month and a half  latter we were talking about where our new home was going to be located and Megan says that she thinks we will be living in the same ward.   We it is true, we will be in the same ward.  To make a long story short,  Thomas and Megan are officially engaged as of yesterday and so we went to her ward today.  We were only guests there today, but it will be our home ward in less than a month.

Congratulation Megan and Thomas.

We look forward to having Megan as a part of our family.  Thomas and Megan will be renting our existing home in Kearns.

And so the excitement of another week builds. The excitement of a new home is being followed by the excitement of having another beautiful daughter-in-law in our family.  When, you ask will she be our daughter-in-law.  Well I will let Thomas and Megan share that, but just suffice it to say that the big day is less than 3 months away.

Honey I'm Home

A week ago the builder told a mortgage lender that he was planning on completing our home by the end of this week.  Well it is the end of the week and they have finished one thing.  The honey bucket and thus the saying "Honey I'm Home!"  And on that note may I say that I think we are still about 3 weeks away from completing the project.  It is looking like we will be moving at the end of June. 

In the last week nothing was completed but a long of tasks have been started.  As of today the molding, the interior has been primed and the molding, doors and walls have been painted.  On the exterior we are starting to also see work progressing.  The contractor has been preparing for the rock, stucco and hardy board.  We also put in a couple of 3 inch pipe across the drive way area.  These will be used to get sprinkles in on the west side of the property.  

We also have locked our interest rate at 4.5 percent.  This is fantastic.  We were originally expecting to have a rate of right around 5 percent.  We cannot complaint about this rate and it will save us thousands of dollars over the life of the loan.

Is there any Progress being make at 6742 Temecula Drive?

You may be asking why I haven't posted a blog update on the progress of our house in a why?  Well the answer to that question is that I have been very business at work and there is very little change to the appearance of the exterior of the house (as you can see in the picture, looks just like it did a week ago).  That said, progress is being made, but it has slowed down a bit.  This past week they that installed all the insulation in the walls, including the garage, the sheet rock is on the walls and the perf-a-tape has been completed on main part of the house, so there is a bit left in the house and all the garage left to be done.

The best part of this week was the fact that we are now within 30 days of the scheduled completion date.  By contract the work is to be completed on or before June 20th.  There is a lot of work left to be done, but we have started shopping for a mortgage lender.  Thus far we have three lenders competing for our business and the interest rates are definitely looking good.  4.5% is the current rate and we are hoping that they may fall a little more.  In order to obtain a 30 day lock on the rate that will still be good at the time of closing we need the rates to hold for another 5 or 6 days.

So here is the entertainment of the week.  One of the mortgage lenders call the builder to get the contract so they could start putting the documentation together and the real estate agent told the lender that the home would be completed this next week.  I just have to ask if the general contractor is aware of this change to the schedule.  I am thinking that they will not make this new schedule considering all that must still be done, which includes all the exterior finishes (stucco, rock, hardy board), all the concrete flat work, the final grading of the lot, and garage doors and openers.  On the interior they have to call the framer and dry waller back out to frame a wall in the kitchen that they totally missed, all the painting (3 tone), build the master bath shower, install all the cabinets, shelves and closet rods, all the doors, floor coverings, the water heater and run the sewer line to the street.  Plus all the fixtures, electrical outlets, TV and phone jacks, and all the appliances.

As they say on Pinky and the Brain, "are you thinking what I'm thinking?"  I am thinking they are more than a week from completing.  I will post more photo's when there is a noticeable change.

6742 Temecula Lane - Its looking more and more like home everyday

This has been a busy two weeks.  Two Saturday's ago David started installing the heating and air conditioning in our new home.  This was no small project.  He worked for about five hours.   Thomas and Michael and Drew were out helping much of the time too in the following days. We wanted to get in and start before the plumber.  David has found that most plumbers pay little attention to the fact that the HVAC system installation must be coordinated with the plumbing.  At this point we had not had the best of luck with the plumber.  He apparently can't read a tape measure or floor plans or both as he had to re-plumb two of the drain pipes because they were not in the proper place, so we were not about to let him run his pipes before we had installed most of the heating ducts.  As it turns out, even with David on site this guy, still managed to ignore the request to coordinate the layout for the two systems and we had to put some strange twists into the heat runs to get around his plumbing.  I don't mean to be rude, but this guy needs some serious people skills and a little less attitude.

In the end we did not finish the HVAC until this past Saturday because the plumber missed the original schedule by at least two days.  Thus the electrician was delayed until this past Monday.  The general contractor had scheduled a four way inspection for Monday at noon and we had been asked to be there for the inspection.  As it turned out the general contractor, builder and ourselves met to review the progress and the four way was postponed until Tuesday and it was a good thing.  This gave us a chance to point out that there were things that were not right.  First off, the framers had not contacted us to discuss the placement of plant ledges as had been promised.  Thus there we were with no plant ledges.  The very day the frames had put in the walls without the plant ledges we contacted our realtor who notified the builder.  Our efforts were for not.  We never heard on thing from the builder.   Second, we were told that we could work with the electrical contractor to determine the placement of the outlets.  When we arrive on Monday the boxes were all installed and cabled.  Then to top it off there were only half as many outlets as we were told that there would be.  Third on the list of errors was that $250 extra drain that I had asked for was plumbed straight to the main level kitchen sink.  We had paid for this extra drain to provide the option of putting a kitchenette in the basement in the future, but how that "plumber" had it done, there was no way to tie into the pipes!

With all this the general contractor was very pleasant but you could tell that he was getting a little irritated with the builder, he hadn't been told all that had been agreed upon.  It appears that the builder's communications with the general contractor was as good as his communications with us.  The general contractor was rightfully concerned with having to bring the sub contractors back to rework things and that was going to cost money and time.  In the end we worked everything out to our satisfaction, and the general contractor and the builder had and intense discussion about how this process was suppose to work.  I refer to this meeting as the boxing match which I paid a large sum of money to watch.  If it were not for the fact that things worked out to our satisfaction I would believe that I had way over paid for the right to see the match.

On Tuesday the four way inspection went pretty well, but the inspector found things in all four subcontractors work that had to be addressed and we were left with just two days to pull all the low voltage cables through the house.  We put in 1500 feet of Cat 6 and 500 feet of coaxial cable so now we're wired to our teeth! We finish it Tuesday evening with the help of all the family. Dan and Katie even brought us dinner Monday night, and when David and Shannon and the kids came Tuesday night so David could finish up his work, Ella helped Ginny feeding wires thru the gang boxes. Her little fingers were just right for the job! Coleman was the foreman--he wore the David's hardhat, and when asked to do something he explained that he couldn't because "I have breath in my tummy, and I'm growing, Grandma!"

Wednesday the insulation contractor installed  insulation in the upstairs of the house. We also have the windows and exterior doors installed.

Yes! everyday we are one day closer to being able to move in.

Moving right along - I better get moving.

It has been just over a week since the framing work was started on our home and the end of this phase is approaching quickly.  The contractor feels all the basic framing will have been completed by Monday evening.

While there is still much to be done before the house is complete we are pretty excited to see things moving so fast.  If all goes as planned we will be moving in less than two months.  Then all the work will really begin.  We will have to get a fence in pretty quickly or our dog will be hating live because she will need to be put on a chain when she goes outside (The deer that frequent the property will has be hating life because the dog is going to go crazy.)  Then there is the landscaping.  Yes, a big task all in its self.  This yard is much larger than our current yard and we have a lot of opportunities as we lay thing out.

In any case we will have to have the basic landscaping in before winter sets in.  The builder has negotiated with the city to give us six months after we close on the house to have the front side yards landscaped.  (I know where my time is going to be spent for most of the summer.)  In the top left photo you can see that the back yard is large ( For this picture I am standing on the back corner of the property.)  We will most likely have to get some fill dirt hauled in to raise the back corner up. Other than that the back yard has a very gentle slope to it as seem in the photo on the bottom left.

Wow - Look what can get done in a day if you get to it.

With a full days work on the house it is progressing very well.  Last evening the framers had 9 of the 21 exterior wall units in place.  Today all 21 are in place and all the interior walls have been framed.  With all the major rough in put in place, the HVAC guy (thanks for family with skills, David is awesome) and I spend the evening planning out the duct work.  The general contractor is thinking that the plumbing, electrical and HVAC work will happen starting next Tuesday.  David will have just 3 days to complete all the HVAC. Then a week from tomorrow we are suppose to have an inspection. 

If all goes well we can install the CAT-5 and coaxial cabling a week from Saturday and the insulation and sheet rocking will start the following Tuesday.

It is totally awesome how homes are built these days. The wall and trusses are mostly manufactured off site and then installed as units that are engineered to the specs on the floor plan.  This is how you can have a home 90 days from the day that the hole is put in the ground.  While our home is not a custom home, we have had some customization of the stock plans to include a full walkout in the basement, enlarged pantry, and modified master bath and changes to some of the exterior doors and windows.  With a 95% efficient furnace, 17 seer A/C unit and 6 inch exterior walls we are hoping to stay toasty warm in the winter and cool in the summer.  I may not be as cheap as heating and cooling our current home, we figure it will not be to much more expensive.  Our current home only has a 80% efficient furnace and a 12 seer A/C unit but it is only 2000 square feet and our new home is 3600.  And to top it all off we have a three car garage.  Hurray! no more scraping the windows on the vehicles in the winter or hopping into the baking heat in the summer.  (Yes the garage is also fully insulated.)

Welcome - we have walls around the front door.

Welcome to our humble abode.

Progress is coming along fast and while you may not want to live in the home at the moment we do have a set of walls around the front door.  One minor problem.  The large hole where the front porch goes.  The hole is 8 feet deep and entry via this opening will land you in the cold storage room of the basement.  Give it a few days and this will improve.  You will notice that the walls are going up fast. By the end of the day tomorrow, I would suspect that all the exterior walls will be in place and the interior walls will be taking shape.

As you can see, at eleven o'clock this morning the basement framing was coming together nicely.

And thanks to yesterdays windstorm we have a great start on the landscaping.  We figured that the best landscape is one that fits well with its surrounding, so we will be using a lot of tumble weeds in the yard.  With the piles that the contractor had to take out of the basement we figure that we have a good start on.

 Anyone got any ideas on arrangement and placement of these fine specimens?

Is it a home or a swimming pool

This past week our home has been progressing well.  With the foundation in place and the hole back filled it was time to pouring the floor in the basement.  But wait!  Is that sink drain in the middle of the room?  It sure looks like it. The second mess up in two weeks and the builder has been working on the site for just 3 weeks.  So the phone calls started.  (I hate this phone game. I call our realtor, he calls the builders realtor, who calls the general contractor.  Then the call comes back to our realtor, then back to me.)   After a second visit to the site later in the day to convince myself that I was not making things up, I called the general contractor directly.  When he called back I was not at home, so he spoke with Ginny.  What a blessing.  She has a way of getting her point across that I don't seem to have and as the saying goes, "If momma not happy, ain't nobody happy",  so also goes the process of building a home because we all know it is momma's house.  Before the end of the call the drain was promised to be moved before the basement floor was poured.

Wednesday I drove to the house on my lunch hour to find the drain had been moved and the concrete was starting to be poured for the basement floor.  In a matter of an hour the complete floor had been put down, but before I could get back to the office (10 minutes away) the rain started to come down by the bucket full.  Needless to say the concrete was not able to be finished for more than 6 hours.  In fact when I arrive at 5:30 pm the contractor was still waiting for the concrete to set enough to put the finish on.

Thursday I drove by to find that anywhere they could not use the power trowel to put the finish there was on a real disaster and I thought to myself  "well here goes another call to the builder".  Much to my surprise the builder called me to tell me that they would be re-pouring some of the areas because of the rain damage.

Today (Friday), I went by at lunch again to find that the concrete had been cut and removed and the plumber was there working.  Apparently our frequent calls to make things right have not gone unheard, because the general contractor had the plumbing there correcting yet another miss placed drain.  This one I did not catch, but rather the general contractor had discovered.  The fortune thing was the area that the plumber was working happened to be the same area that had to be cut out do to the rain damage.  The concrete had not been able to be power troweled due to the location of the drain pipes.

Also as you can see the lumber was being delivered while I was there on Thursday evening.

To sum it up, the builder has been on site for 3 weeks this coming Monday and we had have 3 mistakes that have had to be corrected, plus the rain pelleted concrete that needed to be re-poured.  Hopefully the builder is starting to realize that the Terry's expect quality workmanship, so problems can be fixed early when it is less costly or they will be fixed when the cost is much higher.  They get to choose.

I have always heard that building a house could be an adventure.  I am just curious when the adventure really begins?  Please don't tell me,  "It will be in a few more weeks."

Stay tuned to this same BAT (Big Adventure Thrills) station for more bat adventures in the future.

Our home starts on a solid foundation

We are now starting to see significant progress on your home, but not without a hiccup along the way.  On Monday April 5th, I took a drive to our property after work to find that the hole for our home have been dug.  It was about 10-12 feet deep, which I was surprised to see considering the fact that the ground level at the back of the house was to be at the same level as the basement floor.  In talking to the excavating contractor, he explained that they had to go this deep to get down to solid earth.  Everything above that was fill dirt.  I new there was fill on the property but I figured it was probably 6 feet deep.  With a very deep hole the contract would be filling it back in a layer at a time. Packing each layer to ensure that the home was on good stable ground.

At this point that I noticed that the garage was located on the wrong side of the house.  We had asked for the floor plan be flipped over, putting the garage on the east side of the house.  Well, the engineer did not flip the plans and I was not shown the plans after the engineers had made the requested changes.  The builder realized that the mistake was going to cost valuable time and money to correct, but this was not the home that we had asked to have built, so we worked out a compromise between us.  The builder is compensating us financially for their mistake and as of today we have a foundation in place, and the basement sewer lines have been laid out.  If progress continues as it has in the past 2 weeks we should see the framing of the home completed in the next 2 weeks.

Beautiful British Columbia - a chance to bond with family

This has been a great week.  It started off with Ginny, my mother and father and I flying to Seattle and then driving to beautiful British Columbia. According to Ginny no trip to the northwest is worth anything without fresh crab, so on our way north we stopped in Everett Washington for a crab. Between Ginny and mom they put down an entire crab, while dad and I enjoyed some fresh cod and chips.  Then it was on the road to the Ginny's friends Dave and Wendy Gorner in Abbotsford, BC.  We have to thank them for their hospitality and kindness, as they not only welcomed us into their home but they also invited us to have all of Ginny's family to come and visit.

For those unfamiliar with the Vancouver area, Abbotsford is about  60 miles east of Vancouver and only a couple of miles north of the US /Canada border.  For this trip we had bought a new navigation system that includes Canada.  This helped make the trip so enjoyable and we did not have to figure out what roads we needed to take to get where we were going. While the trip is very straight forward from Seattle to Vancouver the shortest route to Abbotsford involves taking several lesser known highways once you get to Bellingham, Washington.

While we had been invited to have Ginny's family over to the Gorner's for dinner we were not about to allow them to provide all the food for the tribe, so we stopped at Costco and loaded up on stuff for a BBQ and arrived at Dave and Wendy's at about 6:00 pm just minutes before Wendy arrived home from work.  It was great to visit that evening.  It was the first time I had ever met Dave, and he is a wonderful guy.

Saturday morning we started preparations for the BBQ and headed off for one of the main reasons for us to have traveled to this neck of the woods.  We were on our way to the Vancouver temple open house.  We had arranged to met some of Ginny's family at the chapel in Langley (which is only 2 blocks from the temple) and then to go on a tour of the new temple.

While our faith is centered in Jesus Christ and his sacrifice for our sins and his resurrection, we feel that the family is an eternal unit that continues in the life hereafter and it is within the temple that that eternal bond is formed.  So this trip was more that an opportunity to see the temple, or just an chance to visit with family, but rather an experience that helps us appreciate and draw closers to the ones that we love and care about, our extended family, in hopes that by sharing a small measure of what we believe we can one day we can all be reunited as an eternal family.

While not all of those that we would have liked to come to the open house were able to come, we are grateful for those that did come.  For those that were not able to come, we understand and wished that you had been able to join us.   In any case,  we want each of you to know that we love and appreciated you.

After the open house we drove back to Dave and Wendy's for our BBQ dinner and when we arrived, Dave and Wendy had put the final preparation on our meal.  We just had to BBQ the chicken and a few things of that nature.  It was so nice to be able to relax and visit with everyone and the Gorner's preparation made this possible.  We can not thanks them enough for all that they did and we will always be grateful.

On Sunday we attended church and visited with other family that were not able to come to the temple open house. Once again out hosts where fantastic about opening their home and making everyone feel welcome.

Monday we drove to Stanley Park and to see the ocean. It was fantastic weather with a breeze coming in off the ocean as usual, but in the park the breeze was nothing to dampen ones spirits.  After visiting the park and the beach we drove down to Steveston, which is a docking point for the fishing vessels in the area.  We arrived in hopes of obtaining a couple of crab and some pawns. We found the pawns but no crab.  Ginny was pretty disappointed because she wanted to have a seafood feast for dinner.   With only pawns in hand we headed in to Richmond for a Chinese lunch.

This proved to be most interesting.  You see the Chinese food that Ginny remembers from her growing up years is not the same are the Chinese food of today.  Today's Chinese is very authenticate (dishes like Duck tongue, etc).  She wanted fried rice, sweet and sour pork, etc).  After trying two different restaurants she decided that non of us needed to be super adventurous and we were all very hunger, so we popped in to the closest place which was an IHOP.

Ginny just could not bring herself to settle for no seafood so we jumped off the highway and headed into the grocery store for a couple of live crab, clams, etc, so the crab fest did actually happen. The day was quickly coming to a close and we would be leaving in the morning and we promised to take Dave and Wendy for a geocaching experience, since they had never been before.  It was interesting, because by the time we got out of the house it was dark and there was a light rain falling.  Never fear, with flashlights in hand we found two of the three caches that we went after. Our flashlights, however, proved to be too much for their dog Lucy, who has a crazy fettish for light (she chases shiny reflections from the door opening or sunny reflections on the floor or yard)---and moving flashlights just made her crazy! She was such a fun dog, we will miss her!

We finished out our trip on Tuesday by attending the Seattle temple before flying home Tuesday evening, arriving home at about 11:00 pm, exhausted, tired and happy to have spent the time that we did with family and friends.

Letter to Speaker Pelosi - a call for action.

Following is a letter that I just sent to Speaker Pelosi.  I could not go another day without having my voice heard.  I encourage all of you to make your voice heard.  I do not expect everyone to agree with all that I have stated in the letter and that is OK.  I do ask that you respect others opinions.

March 27, 2010

Honorable Speaker,

I am concerned with the direction that our nation is headed, and the recent developments around the health care legislation is most disturbing.  I can appreciate the fact that the bill was passed by a major of the congress, but now that it is time to work on reconciling the law I feel that we, the American people, desire to have full access to the discussions on the matter. I believe in the past you have referred to this as being open.

It is my understanding that CSPAN has made a request to cover these discussions and that it has not as yet been granted permission to do so.  As Speaker of the House you have the ability to influence others to make this happen.  Choosing to not have these materials discussed in public would be doing yourself and your party a great dis-service. 

I hope I am only one of many that will reminder everyone in Congress that you represent the people of this nation and we are not happy with your actions.  Be open, get the discussion in to the hands of the people and remember because we elect our representation in government each of you can be replaced.

On another note. Even though we elect congress to office, we do not feel that is license to give yourselves a pay increase. We, the people of this nation, are struggling and you are one of the few groups I know that can grant themselves a raise.  The rest of us get raises based on performance of our job function as determined by those we work for and the overall performance of the organizations for which we work.

Our nation has become very reluctant to get involved in the governance process because they feel that they have little or no influence of what happens in Washington. We need to get the people of this nation engaged. I feel that you should be as vigorous about introducing legislation to limit terms, and have elected official compensation determined by job performance, as you were to reform health care.  Congress's pay increases and compensation packages has create elitist with special privileges and compensation packages.

The majority of this nation's people must work for a living and most of them cannot grant themselves a pay raise.  Rather they are granted a raise by those for whom they work based on performance of their job function.  Why not do the same for our elected officials?  It would be refreshing to see laws put into place that allowed the people to evaluate their elected official and have that determine the compensation given.

I challenge you to push for such legislation. Remove the elitism that has been setup in our government bodies. Our constitution never intended that elected officials be elitist or given special privilege, but rather that they be given the resources to perform their job and to represent those that elect them.

I know such legislation this does not set well, which just re-enforces the very points I have made. If you are truly honest with yourself, you would have to agree that I am not off base.

Move to put our nation on a firmer foundation. 

I respect the value of your time but your person acknowledgment of this letter would be greatly appreciated.

Respectfully
Drew Terry

Lets see if we can engage the people of this great nation.  Get involved in what our nation is and where it is headed.

If you would like to have your voice hear by Speaker Pelosi, click here.  To have your voice hear by your Congressional representative click here.  Remember be respectful, but firm.  If you are seen as a fanatic you will not get very far.

If you want a little background on what caused me to write to the Speaker watch this video clip.

Will our nation remain strong?

More that 250 years ago men with a desire for freedom left their native lands to come to this continent. Why would people do such a thing?  Some may have come here out of a desire to experience an adventure, but the majority came seeking a freedom and peace that they did not have in their former lands.  Once here they wanted to ensure that their freedoms would be protected and thus men with great wisdom and insight drafted a document outlining the freedoms and rights which they felt all who would reside here could expect.  From this a new form of government was established, and the United States of America was thus established.  We know these men as the writers of the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights.  We often pass over their names without reflecting on their work and their character.  For just a few moments reflect on what these men were like and the fact that it was individuals that formed the basis for our nation.  It was not a corporation, or a club, nor a university that defined the basis of our nation but rather individuals who were upright, and respectful, God fearing, and men of foresight with a desire for good.  They were not self centered, or out for personal gain.  They wanted the best for all men.  They also realized that to have the best for all required effort and a nation of individuals with good intentions. 

When I was a youth one would never have thought up some of the things that plague our nation today.  The strength of our nation comes from its people just as it did in the days of the origin of our constitution.  We will not find the strength in a body or organization for they get their strength from the individuals that make them up.  God set aside this land as a land of freedom and peace as long as its people were righteous.

We each must stop and ask ourselves --

1. Are you doing all that you can to move this nation in the right direction?
2. What more can you do to be an active part of the bodies that governor our communities, states, and nation?  
3. Are you a good citizen? Respecting others and looking after the good of all?  Are your intents self centered?
4. Are you looking for others to take care of you or are you doing what you can to be self reliant?
5. Is your focus on "me" or are you helping others that are less fortunate or in need of help?
6. Do you hold a vision of what the future may be and are you actively doing things to make this vision a reality?
7. When situations arise, do you ask yourself what the real issue is and not just settle for the politically correct view of the problem?  Often those that pose a solution to a problem are off basis on what the actual situation really is and are only seeking for political gain not for a solution to the root problem.  Thus they try to lead us to believe that the view of the problem is the actual problem.

If you are not doing these things then you are probably not contribution to the strength of our nation.  In fact, you are doing just he opposite.  Whether or not you agree with me you may want to watch the video clip from the Red Skelton show recorded in 1969.  It is definitely food for thought. Click here and reflect on the things which he says.

Happy viewing and I hope it motives you like it did me.

So what is it like

This photo shows the lot on which our home will be built.  This was taken from the south east corner of the lot looking north.    It is located at 6742 W Temecula Lane in Herriman.

This is looking south from the lot.  As you can see we are very close to the mountains.  While there will be more homes developed in this area, the mountains will always feel close by.

This photo shows the lot from the culdesac located just to the north of our lot.  Our lot would be in between the two closest homes in the photo. The one on the left of the photo is on the same street as our home and the back of the lots in the culdesac share a property line with our lot.   You will also notice that the home on the left appears to be two stories, but in all reality it is a single story home with a walkout basement.  Our home will also have the walkout.   They should start building in the next week or two so we will keep things updated here on our blog with photos to show the progress.

Ginny is getting very excited.  In fact she is in the storage room packing a few things right now.

New home is in the builder hands. - Pray for us.

We have not said much about the details of our new home, until now. We did not want to get anyone's hopes up, especially the developer. We feel that it is time to share our thoughts, feelings and experience because as of last Friday we have finally settled on the terms for our new home. We feel that we have done very well in selecting the location and the builder. More about that latter. The lot for our new home is located in Herriman, Utah which is about 12 miles south of our current home here in Kearns and it is just 3.5 miles west of my office.

About Herriman
Herriman is on the very south end of the Salt Lake Valley and is an out-of-the-way community that is just coming into its prime, so if you look at the location in Google maps you will probably notice that the property appears to be farm land or at least a very rural location, but in fact since the aerial photos were taken for the map of this area it has been subdivided and the roads are paved and utilities have been brought in. That said we will be at the foot of the mountain and so there will not be very much more development south of us. I would think that at most they will development no more that another 8 to 12 blocks south of us.

Why are we moving
For many years I have teased Ginny about wanting to move.  My  idea was to move to Idaho, some place on the South Fork of the Snake river.  I love the area just north of Palisades Reservoir not only for the beauty, but  also for the fishing in the area.  I wanted a nice home overlooking the river and have a great view of the Teton mountains.  Ginny liked the idea of the beauty, being out of the city and all that, but she had one problem with my idea.  She could not come to grips with the location. No I do not mean Idaho or anything along those lines.  She had a problem with the fact that the children and grandchildren are all in the area around Salt Lake and we would be 200 miles away.

I had not mentioned the move idea for some time. Then in November of this past year, Ginny woke up one morning to inform me that she had a very strong feeling that we needed to move and we needed to move soon. For the previous year I to had wanted to move, but I did not feel it was the right time so I had not mentioned it to her.  The moment that Ginny mentioned this to me I knew that the time was right.  I had asked her where she thought we should move to and her only reply was closer to my work.

A little over a year ago my work announced that our entire department was being moving from downtown Salt Lake to a new location in Riverton (about 20 miles south of downtown).  The church had just purchased the Intel building and the land around it.  This building was built by Intel in the past 10 years as a research and development facility, but after the turn in the economy the facilities were just more than they wanted to carry. It was not until the middle of last year that we actually moved into the build because of the remodeling that had to be done to make it ready for us.

As it turns out our son Daniel and his wife, Katie, had just moved in November into a home that they had built in West Valley City.  Their experience and contacts turned out to be valuable assets in helping us to focus on what we were looking for and how best to proceed with our own home. 

Things had starting to fall into place (not without some work on our part and a lot of faith and prayers) letting us know that this was the right thing to be be doing and the right time to be doing it. We have never regretted moving into our current home.  We have always feel this was where the Lord wanted us to be.  Our neighborhood has been a major factor in how our children have turned out and allowed us to help others in their circumstances.  There are many good, honest and hard working people that have educated, loved, labored and just been there for us. We will always cherish those people and the experiences we had shared with them over the past 23 years and if it where not for knowing deep inside that the Lord's hand is in this move, we would not being moving because it will be hard to leave the friends we have made.

About the home
One of the criteria that we had for our home was that it be large enough to have the kids and their family over and not feel like we were walking on one another. However, we did not want a huge home since were are looking at the fact that our day to day living demands less and less living space. As we are getting older we did not what to live in a home that required a lot of going up and down stairs, so we wanted a rambler style home.

Early on in the process of locating a new home we had determined that our new home needed to face south (that will allow the sun to melt the snow off the driveway--therefore less shoveling) and that it need a garage for our vehicles, and would also provide a place where we could do some of our hobbies (gardening, woodworking, etc.)

We never intended to build a new home and so we started looking at homes in the Riverton and Herriman areas. In every case there was always something that we did not care for in the home (things like the yards being too small, the home was in very poor repair, it did not face south, etc). As we were looking for homes that we could walk-though, we happened onto an ad for Candlelight Homes and soon learned that they were a home builder. When we sat down with our builder we told them we have some very specific things that we were hoping to get in our new home, but at this point we did not share the exact details, not wanting to set ourselves up for walking into a builders sales trap. They explained what they were offering, and that they had just finalized the agreement to build the subdivision and as such they had not sold any properties yet. All of the lots were approximately 1/3 of an acre and they had many floor plans to choose from. Most all of the lots had a premium on them, some have a negative premium (meaning they would reduce the home price by the premium amount) and a few had a zero premium. We tested the waters with them to see how willing they were to work with us in modifying their plans to accommodate our wants and needs. Armed with the information we had gathered, we left and at the first chance we drove to the subdivision to see what things looked like. As we arrived at the subdivision we fell in love with the area. Both of us commented on how it did not feel like the city because of it's proximity to the mountains and it felt like the areas we had both grown up in. Even though it was December and there was snow on the ground it felt warm and inviting.

We were very interested in the only south facing lot that they had but we were not expecting much because it was one of the few zero premium lots. We drove through the subdivision to get to the lot and when we arrived we were pleasantly surprised. The lot has a gentle slope to the north, just enough slope that we feel that we could actually build a walkout basement (one of the things that we had hoped for in a new home.)

To top the whole thing off, the lot has a fantastic view of the Oquirrh Mountain Temple. This is a view we hope to be able to maintain as the homes that will be north of us will be about 20 feet lower that our property and our home floor plan has the majority of the living space on the north side of the house.

So when is the move
So you ask when are we actually going to move? Well we are very excited and wishing that we were on our way right away, but as with any new home that is being built it takes time. Several things have driven us to make sure we are in our new home before the end of June. We originally wrote the contact such that the home would be substantial completed by June 9. However, it took much longer to finalize the contract that we originally planned. For this reason the builder asked to have until June 25 to complete the home, but this was too close to the end of the month for us to feel comfortable with our deadline, so we have settled on the 20th of June. I know many of you may be saying, "we will believe it when we see it." but we feel good about the plan. Part of the reason is that the builder takes on additional financial obligations if they are late and that obligation is written into the contract. Considering how hard it was to get the builder to reduce the purchase price or include additional items for the original asking price, I do not believe they will be willing to fork over the cash for being late. Also the general contractor stated that the home they had just finish was larger than ours and they had completed in in 72 day.

So in answer to the big question. We plan to be in our home before the 1st of July. I know every one is asking because they want to help us move, right?? Well, help will not be turned down and would be appreciated, but we are not expecting the neighborhood to move us.  I fact if to may show up to help we may even feel thing that neighbors want us out and out quick so their property values can start to rise> ;)

What are we doing with our home in Kearns.
We are planning to keep our home in Kearns for a few years and we will be renting it. I hate to disappoint anyone, but it is not available to rent at the present time as our son Thomas will be renting it. By renting the home we will be able to maintain some of our ties to those we have grown to love and appreciate in our neighborhood over the past 23 years.  As I have reminded my wife on more than one occasion, we are only 25 minutes away and she can return to visit anytime she feels the need to.

In later blog we will describe some of the things we have learned and experiences we have had in putting together our new home. We also intend on posting photos of the new home as it progresses.

Vancouver - here we come

In December I posed a difficult question to Ginny, "how would you like to go to the Vancouver Temple open house in April?". Well, I thought it was a tough question, since we are trying to locate a new home, Ginny is going to school full time and a number of other items that have us running like wild men. I should have know that Ginny would do anything to be able to attend the open house since she is the only member of the church in her family, and this was a once in a lifetime chance to show them what our temples are like and to explain their purpose. It is a once in a lifetime opportunity because most all of her family live fairly close to Vancouver. Before I could finish the question, she was dancing around like a little girl waiting to open her Christmas presents.

There was only one detail that we had to get worked out before we could make arrangements to go. We needed to know if we were going to be required to have reservations for the open house (here in Utah every temple open house requires reservations to help control the number of people at the open house at one time). If tickets were needed we would have to make sure we had tickets for all that were planning to attend and that we could get away from the pursuit of a new home and school for the time needed to make the reservations. Well as it turns out, the husband of one of Ginny's friend in Vancouver is on the open house committee. Just a week ago we found out that there were no reservations required, but now we had a new dilemma. My parents are coming with us and my nephew (son of my youngest sister) goes into the Missionary Training Center on the last Wednesday of the open house. That meant that he would be speaking in church on the second or third Sunday in April. We did not want to missing his talk, so we had to ask what the plan was for his assignment to speak. All in all everything has worked out and we will be leaving Salt Lake on April 9 for Vancouver. This makes it very nice for my parents as they will be able to go to Canada with us and then just stay here in Salt Lake upon our return for a few extra days to be able to attend Tyler's missionary farewell. My parents are not getting any younger and I worry about them having to travel a lot without anyone to accompany them.

We feel that the Lord has richly blessed us, not only with the means and time to attend the open house and being able to take my parents along but also being able to have my parents only have to make one trip from Nevada.

If you are interested in seeing what an LDS Temple is like and you live close to Vancouver, I would encourage you to spend a little time and pay the temple a visit during the open house April 9 - 24, (we will be going April 10th). I promise you, it will be well worth your effort and to top it off you may even learn that many of the world's perceptions of the Mormon's just simply are not true. I promise the people at the open house will treat you like gold. There will be no pressure to make you feel that we are recruiting members. This is just a gesture of good will for all that want to know what our temples are like and why they are different from our standard chapels.

If you are interested in attending you can find the information on the open house here.

As for our new home, I am purposely not detailing too much of what is going on as we are still negotiating with the builder on the home. Just let me say, yes, we are moving, its just a matter of getting every in place to have our new home built. Believe me I will blog about all that pertains to our new home when the time is right.

Holiday and Homes

This has been a week of adventure. For Martin Luther King Day, myself, Daniel, David and a friend of David's named Matt made a day of fishing on Mantua reservoir. We try to make at least one trip a year to the lake to see how the fishing is fairing. We were not disappointed. The four of us got a total of 25 fish for the day consisting of 1 perch, 9 trout and 15 bluegill. In the past it has been well noted that Matt was the least likely to put the most fish, but in my blog Something fishing is going on! Yes I mentioned the instruction manual Ginny gave Matt. Apparently he has been studying it and now have a eye for the Doink, Doink. He caught 14 of the twenty five. Way to go Matt.

It is always nice to fish this little lake because it is easy to get to (just 4 miles from Brigham City) and you can walk straight out onto the ice and back without the need to make the hike at East Canyon. This year was even better than most years. Because it was a holiday we decided to hit the hot springs on the way home. The girls had gone together at David and Shannon's to watch a movie and then we met them at the hot springs latter in the afternoon. I think everyone enjoyed the warm soak in the mineral waters. This was the first time for Daniel and Katie and their kids to view the hot springs and at first Addie and Xander were not to sure about the water, but within 15 minutes you would have thought the two of them had grown up at the place. Both of them had giant smiles on their face and Xander was so relaxed that he was almost a sleep in grandma's arms. Of course everyone else had a great time also. We spent a couple of hours at relaxing and enjoying one an others company before heading back to David's for dinner. This made for a long day, as us guys left at 6:00 that morning and we did not get home until after 9:30, but it was worth every minute. In fact I believe we will have to do this again next year.

On another note, we have also met with another builder to see what they had to offer. Both of the builders that we have been working with are building in the same subdivision and are offering comparable homes. At this point we are weighing our options and trying to decide which of the builders to use. In addition, the refinance on our existing home has been completed and we are just waiting for the loan to fund.

Hopefully things will come together for us quickly and we will be able to move forward on the new home soon.

Something fishy is going on. Yes!

It has been nice to have had a little time away from work and better than that, Ginny and I had been able to go fishing twice while I have been off. With the extreme cold temperatures that occurred late in November and early December the ice formed earlier than normal this year. East Canyon reservoir has had safe ice for almost 3 weeks and the fishing has been just as hot as the temperatures have been cold. The 26th of December we made our first trip to the lake with our son David and several friends to find 8 to 10 inches of good solid ice and the trout were hungry. Between the two of us we caught 6 nice trout.

We also went last Saturday, but this time we had invited the young men and the young women and their leaders to go with us. As it turned out, only John Brewer, Bert Stevenson and two of his sons actually went, as well as, David and 3 of his friends, for a total of 10 of us were fishing.

One of David's friends is a guy by the name of Matt. He has been ice fishing with us for the past year, but sometimes his success level was less than stellar and Ginny is always giving him a bad time about the number or the size of the fish he has caught. Likewise Matt is always ribbing Ginny about being the Midget and the fact that I had a fish finder for 28 years before I actually realized it. (If there are fish to be had Ginny will be all over them.) As we drove to East Canyon this last trip Ginny decided to write Matt a manual titled Matt's Ice Fishing Manual 101. ~written AND illustrated by Midget the Canadian. In the manual where five simple steps for catching fish. These included cutting a hole in the ice, baiting the hook, placing the line in the water and then waiting for the fishing to bite, which was described as waiting for the doink, doink. She even instructed Matt on the technique on setting the hook and getting the fish out of the hole. She gave this to him when we arrived at the lake.

I do not know if her instruction helped or hindered. Matt ended up catching 6 fish and Ginny only caught 2. This only set the whole ribbing to go to a new level with Matt giving Ginny a bad time about the size and number of fish she caught.He teased her last year about laying on the ice with her face hovering over the hole so she could watch for a fish to come and get her bait. This year she says even though she's Canadian, she's NOT swimming down to the point to check for fish. You'll know what I'm talking about if you've seen the youtube video Crazy Canadian Ice Fishing

Bert and his boys had brought some new gear for this trip and one of the things he had brought was a fishing rod holder. I had been looking for these very style rod holders for sometime and so I asked if I could use one for a pattern when we returned home. He had three of them with him--one for himself and one for each of his boys. Well by the time we left to come home that afternoon there was no rod holder to be used as a pattern. Bert in his excitement to set the hook flipped not one but two of those holders right down the fishing hole. Then his son left his rod on the third holder and left the jig in the water while he grabbed a bite to eat. Yes you guessed it he got a bite and turned around just in time to see the rod and the holder disappear down the hole.

All in all it was a great day. Between the 10 of us we caught 57 fishing. I even out fished Ginny for the first time in a long time. I caught 7 fish and she only caught 2. Catch and release is wonderful. If you release what you catch you can catch all day long. We did end up bringing home five nice trout (14-16 inches) because Ginny would have killed me if I had not kept some for her.

The weather was fantastic with temperatures in the mid 20's and only a very light breeze.

I just look forward to more trips to the ice this year.