I just want to make sure everyone is aware that the last post was placed by a guest poster...my beautiful wife, Cheri. Thank you for finally posting the pic of the finished porch!

Christmas In The Country...Harper

We finally have some more pictues to show you of the Harper home improvement projects. This is the completed front porch! As you can see, the porch is open for lounging in this pic. We enjoyed some beautiful fall evenings 'rockin' on the front porch and watching the 'goins on' of the neighborhood. Of course, it's a little chilly now, but we our lovin a great place to display the Christmas lights...

The biggest thing these days is getting ready for the Christmas House Walk on Dec. 6. It's been a lot of work, but WOW, we're our loving having the 'to do' list almost completed!!

We'll pass along some more pictures next week of the inside home improvements. We've done a lot of cleaning throughout the house, plus some painting and repairs.

Thank you to Dad for the fantastic Thanksgiving meal at the Claremont!! We really enjoyed our visit with Dad, Bonnie, Mary Beth and Terry. Then, we had a wonderful visit with Mom in the hospital. She was in good spirits despite of the circumstances! Keep praying for her!

Some earlier work

First two pictures that show the before and after of some cement work we completed earlier this year.

I had promised that I would follow up later with some pictures of some earlier work we had done this summer. The area between our driveway and the house was a small patch of grass that was never very usable and not very easy to mow. We decided to make this area a bit more presentable. Without a lot of comment, I'll just include a series of pictures that show the progression and final result.

What a coat of paint can do...

Just some quick pictures to show how much a coat of paint can do. The first pictures below are the "before" pics which show the progress up to Friday night.

Then a few pics after the posts have been primed. This made such a big difference, I thought I would try to document it. I also included a picture of our assembly line for painting the spindles. Believe it or not, it took over 5 hours to paint all these posts and spindles yesterday. Well worth the effort, but much longer than I expected.

Getting close...

The pictures will tell the story today. Things are moving along very well. These were the pictures from Friday morning. The progress as of tonight (Friday) includes finishing the decking, the aluminum wrapping, and soffits. Cheri and I will paint the posts and spindles over the weekend with the first primer coat. This will make it easier to do the final coat later. Next week should be the final work. All that's left is the railings, vinyl siding, steps and lattice. This should all be done by the end of next week.

This final picture is of our contractor guy. Actually, this is a picture of our contractor, Guy. That is...his name is Guy. Since I know he's reading my blog, I will say nothing but wonderful comments about him. Actually, I would say that anyway. He's doing a great job, and is wonderful to work with. He does a great job of listening to us and being very flexible to our "slight changes". He also works with another guy named Jim. I'll have to add a picture of him next week.

We're very excited about getting this project completed.

2 days of progress

Some pictures from the last two days. It seems to move slow, but they actually get a lot done each day. I never knew there was so much involved in building a porch. We were supposed to have the roof done today, but the roofer did not show up. Now it rained tonight (which you can see in the last pic), and the roof will be wet for them tomorrow. Not sure if that makes a difference when you put on a new roof. You can also see in the last picture that the posts are in! They are installed and the contractor is working on the decking now. We've been told that this should be complete by the end of next week, and that will be great!

I'll get some better pictures tomorrow when the rains stop.

Now it looks like a porch...

Quick update to provide some new pictures. In the first picture, you can see our contractor in the background. Posts did not come in over the weekend as they were supposed to. They did some more work today but I did not get the pictures before it got dark. This is the progress as of the end of Friday.

The last picture is a of a new cat that has made himself a part of our family. This cat showed up in our backyard...mal-nourished and very lonely. He is very friendly and hungry. Trevor immediately named him "Buster" and I think it will stick.