Houses, houses, houses

On Wednesday, the Sorianos closed on the house they sold.  They have been living with us since May while they tried to sell their house.  Having to pick up after 4 kids every time before a showing seemed like too much to do so they moved in with us.  Having 6 or 7 (sometimes Bing, the father in law is here also) extra people around the house has mostly been enjoyable.  We have all gotten along quite well. 

They have an offer in on a house (a short sale) in West St. Paul.  That would be closer to where both of them work.  Their offer was accepted by the couple so now it is a matter of waiting for the bank to approve the sale and that could take anywhere from a week or two to several months. 

In the meantime, we have begun work on Park House in earnest.  A crew of 9 friends came over on Saturday and we pulled down the ceiling in Daniel's old bedroom, repaired the hole in the kitchen floor, dug up and removed the jungle gym that had been competing with the Leaning Tower of Pisa for most acute angle while still standing, removed the (for 15 years) non-working dishwasher, removed several old screen doors,  pulled down the wallpaper in the kitchen, primed the front entryway and hauled 21 contractor bags of debris and old insulation out to the back yard.  The metal from the screen doors and the jungle gym disappeared rather quickly as it sat by the alley in the backyard. 

Tina lost her cellphone and it took quite a while to locate it in one of the bags of insulation.  The insulation muffled the ring tone.  We had almost given up when we tried one last time to hear it.

We still have a TON of work to do.  A carpenter friend came over yesterday and gave us some advice about what we need to do to prepare Daniel's ceiling to put in a suspended ceiling.  A stone mason stopped by in the afternoon and gave us some advice about repairing the crumbling foundation in the laundry room for a lot less than what we had thought it would cost.  He said stone masons are a dying breed as houses are no longer built with limestone foundations.

Monday night some other friends came over and helped paint the entry way and did more work on the kitchen walls. 

We are blessed to have such good friends.