I've moved

Please visit me at Smith Funny Farm

Site moving

This little blog is moving.

I tried to send the new location to everyone that I think might be visiting, if I've missed you and you are interested, please email me at bikingala@comcast.net and I'll send you to the new address.

The housebuilding is finally underway this week :-)

He's a Bold One

He doesn't even try to hide and do it anymore. When I pick, he picks.

A Chapter Ends, a Chapter Begins

It's a big day in the Smith household.

Over a year ago we finally found and purchased our property in the country after 3 or 4 years of searching. We planned for several months to build a log home, but in December made a big decision to switch gears and build a farmhouse instead. In February we hired a firm to create our blueprints, and thought that since we had the plans drawn except for fine details, that we would have finished plans in a month or so. We finally got the completed plans at the end of May. On June 4 we applied for the construction loan, after being pre-qualified. Again, thinking a few weeks and we'd be closing. If you read the previous post, you saw that we encountered problems with the property department at the mortgage company. FINALLY, yesterday, after our lender threatened her own institution that if they didn't close this loan, she'd take it elsewhere and get it closed, they set a closing for 3:00 this afternoon. It actually happened. We're still feeling a little disbelief. Disbelief that it actually happened finally.

So tonight we met with Daniel the Builder. He has been working deligently behind the scenes to get everything ready to go, even though he didn't have a signed contract. He's been awesome, hanging in there with us through all of the cancelled closings, all he frustration, just having faith. So tonight we met and signed the contract and started making immediate plans. One of the things he's done is get estimates for the excavation and concreting for the basement, and he told us tonight he already has a crew ready to start excavating ... this coming MONDAY!! We are going to actually see digging on our property on MONDAY!! Needless to say, we're on a bit of a cloud right now. I'm not sure how my boss is going to take it when I tell him I have to be out for a bit on Monday to go take pictures when they start to dig :-).

So, now the fun begins. I get to start shopping. I'm not usually much of a shopper, but I think this may be a bit different. I could actually get excited about it I think.

First order of business, find the perfect pot filler!

A Few of My Favorite Things

We have enjoyed the peppers, tomatoes and zucchini from our little backyard garden so much this year. We are really looking forward to having a huge garden next year at our new house and growing all of our vegetables that we can.

Every day lately is harvest day.

I love cooking with fresh herbs, so I usually plant plenty. I've always wanted to dry them, but haven't had the time. That's one of the things I want to start doing next year. But for this year, I did try something I've not done before - I put quarts of basil and rosemary in the freezer, following freezing instructions I found on the Internet. Supposedly they freeze well, we'll see.

We will hopefully have some good news on the house-building front tomorrow. We are supposed to close on the construction loan tomorrow afternoon, after many, many trials. There has been concern by the property department at our mortgage company, who looked at the property pictures the appraisers provided them and deduced that we are building in the middle of nowhere. And a house in the middle of nowhere doesn't appraise for a lot, so they couldn't agree with the appraisers on the appraised value, evidently. It took our loan officer driving out to our property and taking pictures of surrounding properties, measuring distances to Huntsville and to schools and other houses, etc. You get it. A lot of work. And a lot of postponed closing dates. FINALLY today all the new evidence was accepted and everything closed out. Our very patient builder has everything in order, ready to break ground as soon as we give him the go-ahead. Hopefully that will be tomorrow.

We did get a nice surprise last weekend when we made our usual trek to look at the property (yes, we look at it a lot. Just look at it.) When we turned off the main road we saw a beautiful site over the rise...utility power poles! Two of them, down the property line, ready for power to be turned on when we take the building permit to the utility company. They will later run underground cables from the property line to the house.

It doesn't take much to get us excited these days :-)

Summer Temptations

It really doesn't matter how well you try to control the diet during the summer, there's always something yummy lurking around the farmer's market, or growing on a tree in the yard, like at my lucky friend Dawn's. Things that really should turn into pies, muffins, jams...

We couldn't resist the temptation to buy lots of blackberries so that we could freeze them and have them all year. These didn't make it to the freezer.

They turned into this ... a delicious cobbler.


Yum. I love summer.

Correction on the Last Post

OOOPS...error on the zucchini bread recipe on the last post.

The oil ingredients should be 1 c. (or 1/2 c. applesauce and 1/2 c. oil).

I'm sorry, hope no one made this yet, without realizing 1 c. of each would be A LOT!

Happy Baking