Without further ado, here is the latest on our new kitchen.
Below is the view coming up our back steps. You can see down to the basement, now. This is something we kind of like. We're considering keeping them open and putting a piece of plexiglass behind them to keep dirt from falling below.
Here is our lovely chimney that was hidden behind plaster. With a little scrubbing and a bit of touching-up, it will look nice in our new space.
This is the view looking at the basement door from the middle of where the kitchen will be. There's a big "cubby" above the steps that's behind our bedroom wall. We're tossing around all kinds of ideas for what to turn that into. We could knock out a hole in the closet wall for access...But for now it will be insulated and closed up, because we've got enough to do now!
This is the window that will soon go bye-bye. It's the wall that our stove and vent hood will be on. It's also one of 2 outside walls that we're building thicker and re-insulating.
Here's the other half of that wall. This window stays--our dining room table will be in front of it.
Standing where the kitchen sink will be, here's the view from the back to the front of the house. The majority of the space you see will be the dining room.
My dad, Grandpa Kenny ("PA" according to Fischer) showed up Wednesday afternoon and left Sunday afternoon. The majority of this progress is thanks to his hard work and guidance. THANKS SO MUCH, DAD!!!!Below, he's beginning to cut the hole for the window we're adding, looking out on the backyard (we had only the door and 2 basement windows looking out back before).
The hole is complete. The wall is thickened, insulated, and electrified!! Below you see Grandpa Kenny supervising while our buddy Steve's using a drill outside and Joe's using a drill inside.
The window hole as seen from our backyard.
The window's IN!!!!
NOW, looking from the front of the house (standing in the living room) to the back. See our new window!?
Here's a closer view of the new window and the completed wall. One down, many more to go. We'll keep you updated!
The hole is complete. The wall is thickened, insulated, and electrified!! Below you see Grandpa Kenny supervising while our buddy Steve's using a drill outside and Joe's using a drill inside.
The window hole as seen from our backyard.
The window's IN!!!!
NOW, looking from the front of the house (standing in the living room) to the back. See our new window!?
Here's a closer view of the new window and the completed wall. One down, many more to go. We'll keep you updated!
Our kitchen demolition is in full swing. I know, I know. What else have we been doing?! Demo is taking longer than we first thought--seems to be a pattern with any home project. Budget lots of time! With demo it's a matter of trying to save $ and not get a dumpster.
This means a little at a time, because that plaster is HEAVY stuff! But thanks to Joe's hard work during the weekdays, and our combined efforts during Fischer's weekend naps (he naps in the spare bedroom in the basement with the radio on, so he can't hear us upstairs), the end is in sight. Remember we're doing 2 rooms and the back stairwell AND the ceilings. 
Some of those walls have 2 sides to strip down! Not to mention the outside walls have blown-in insulation to vacuum out! We're cleaning up as we go so as not to live in a perpetual cloud of dust, tripping over debris. 
To view the pre-renovation walk-through, check this out: 
Fischer's mostly content to wait while meals are made in his little kid corral area. I change out the toys and books after a couple weeks, and though he usually complains when I set him down in there, he can watch me making our dinner and we can still talk and sing back and forth. There are lots of "don't touch" areas in the basement, so when Fischer's outside of his corral, one of us is always his shadow.
On August 2, Fischer and I met Kristy, Flora and Leo at our house to walk down to Kavarna and the Broadway farmer's market. It was a great walk and the weather was superb. On the way we stopped to appreciate some flowers in our neighborhood. Fischer was a little ornery in the stroller. When we got to an area on Broadway where there were benches to take a break on, I got Fischer out of the stroller, and he was OFF! He was trying to charm people out of their cheese curds, grabbing at random people's cups, and in all other ways exploring like a little boy should. It was exhausting for me! He didn't seem too concerned about branching away from Mom! He and Flora played a bit in the dirt and were nice and filthy by the time we set out to finish walking the market. Fischer pretty much had a meltdown just before we got to Kavarna at the tail-end of our tour of the market. He was good during dinner, but it was a feat trying to fit all of our grown up food and drink on the table with Fischer and now Leo reaching for things. We'll just have to be sure to secure our 'usual' front table from now on!
The whole week of August 3-7, my co-worker Holly was on vacation so I was working some longer days at daycare. Fischer's appetite decided to go a bit south, he got a random few hives, and he even had a slight temp one day. He was sad every afternoon watching all of his friends' parents come and go, wondering why I wasn't there yet. Poor guy! Well, late in the week, we were rewarded with the discovery of Fischer's 9th tooth! His eyetooth on the upper right side. He hasn't had a new tooth since March, so it's no wonder he had an off few days!
On Saturday, August 8th, Joe discovered that Fischer likes tomatoes. It's not that he hasn't been offered them before. He's just never eaten them straight from the vine before! Joe made a good point when he said Fischer might associate the cherry and roma tomatoes with the home-grown strawberries he enjoyed from our yard earlier in the summer. Those red things sure taste good!
Now for the latest vocab update for Fischer. Trying to keep track of how many words and signs he uses is proving to get pretty difficult, as he'll try to say most familiar things, and you never know which ones will stick. Then he'll pull a fast-one on ya and bust out a word you didn't know he knew! This guy is slick! Here are the newest words he can say with his (version) and/or an * to indicate that he does the sign language for it, too.