We started!

Yesterday morning I awoke to my cell phone singing and a rumbling clanking noise coming up my driveway.

"Hello?" Staring out the window at a BIG back hoe with sleep still in my eyes and no glasses.

"Hi, uh Randy Gushaw (excavator) is coming today."

"He's here. That's big machine."

"Can you show him where we want the stumps buried?"

"Can I get dressed first?"

"That'd be a good idea."

As this conversation between Todd and I continued my mom came into the barn with a puzzled expression. She brought Natalie home the night before. Natalie's welcome to us was "Wow, there is carpet in the barn." No hugs or anything. Mom was staying in the camper so the back hoe was right outside her front door as she woke up.

Craig, the "digger guy" was great. He was friendly although a bit perplexed as the children showed up one by one. I could see him starting to count in his head. He was very nice to let Daniel and Natalie sit in the cab for pictures. He just seemed like he really likes his job. His machine was amazing. It looked kind of like a big elephant using its trunk to move things around. It plucked up stumps like picking pebbles on the beach. The bigger stumps made it work a little bit at pulling but the effort made more of a show for the children. Daniel watched with more attention than he watches Thomas movies.

Randy W. came right before we had to leave and the whole idea that we had actually started our new home made me very excited and nervous. Had I not many other things to think about I would have done a happy dance and spent the day with butterflies in my tummy.

We came home from errands and the children all screamed as we pulled into the property. We were greeted by 3 ten foot plus piles of sandy topsoil and a flattened rectangle where the house will go. New toys, how I am going to keep them presentable to get anywhere now?

Daniel took this one, tilt your head

Craig was finishing up burying the stumps with another guy. I warned him that children were back, but had been warned to stay out of the way. They finished soon. I can't imagine how many weeks or months it would take of working by hand with axes and shovels to do the same amount of work he did in one short day.