Another view

rock wall
Originally uploaded by malama2006.

Retaining wall progress

rock wall
Originally uploaded by malama2006.

Yesterday I went out to the land and was surprised to see such progress on the retaining wall. so far it looks great, which is a good thing since we'll be looking at this for a long time.

More mud

Jan15
Originally uploaded by malama2006.

This is one of the shots of Luka playing in the mud.

I think from now on I've got to do small photo posts instead of tons. Will work better, no?

Family Day at the land

Family day at the land!
Despite some major snafus to getting out of the house... (Ra'am not feeling well and Noam having shoe "issues"), we took to the truck to do a little bit of planting- 2 giant bamboos.

Here's the start of our journey. Luka looking... something.... in the truck





Everyone got to work right away. Ra'am wheelbarrowed stuff down to the planting sites.


weird formatting here.....---- those palms are near the scenic route entrance. So little now!























Ra'am also macheted (is that a real word?). Luka got a free ride.


Karen shoveled (so did GB, of course). Noam pulled weeds (tons of those)














We broke for lunch.













Karen took in some pretty flowers. They're small, but the colors!!!

And the end result?? This little bamboo. I know it looks like nothing. But when we compare this picture to what will be there in a few years we'll be thrilled we have it. change happens!



Before leaving we went up to the upper part of the property where the house will go. Luka found a puddle and just went insane. He had so much fun... and got so MUDDY!
a couple more pics of that here.

The day ends with Luka sound asleep in the car seat. Note the stick in his right hand.... what IS it about little ones and sticks???

sorry for the weird formatting. I can't figure this thing out!

Showing off the land to Lena

Jan13.jpg
Originally uploaded by malama2006.

A lazy afternoon and we decided to head on over and visit the land. We picked up Lena on the way as she hadn't been there yet.

No disappointments that day. There was a double rainbow that just spanned the WHOLE sky. This is just a small piece of it.

In "moving forward" news, I met with Val (draftswoman) at the land the other day. It was great to be able to physically show her the location and discuss where things were going to go. I was worried she'd be looking at us like we were a little crazy, but she only had really positive things to say about our plans.
So the plans are now in her hands..... she'll be working on drawing them up in the next month and this is the time for us to make any changes. ACK!

working on house plans

GB has been working hard on house plans. We decided to have a draftswoman draw them up for us. So far this is what we've got. We've altered a few things this am already... it's a fluid process, apparently.

Click for bigger images.

This is the upstairs and main floor. The view is best from up here. Since this is where we will be spending much of our time (i.e. kitchen!), it's important to get some good views. Main floor upstairs designs are very HI.This is the downstairs . The bedrooms have been changed a teeny bit since this.... but essentially it's the same. And the bedrooms are a "separate" structure from the main house, with a covered walkway between them.
This view shows the downstairs with the pool. Under the front of the upstairs there's a deck, which opens up right to the pool.
And here are the side views of the house.

We think the design will work well for what we want. Personally I'd like to see some more closets though ; )

oh, and if you were wondering where we are gonna put all 3 kids..... we figure that Luka will likely be in our room still when we build this. We'd like to put another structure back from this one- a bedroom/ bathroom cottage. Ra'am can sleep there and then we'll have that for guests when he moves out :( (yes we're planning that "far" in advance).

BTW, I don't know why some of the text shows up as a link. Can't figure it out. Sorry!