Gjeldsslave

There have been people working on paving our street for weeks and weeks now. It turns out it's not just a question of throwing down some asphalt. They have had to dig up (and by that I mean pound out huge amounts of bedrock) and lay an entirely new road bed and drainage. They're working right in front of our house, so the other night the three of us went out to inspect. Here's some of what we saw:

Yes, that rubble is actually the street. And here's what our house looks like from the road. Notice that we never finished painting the trim (boo!). This is at about 8 o'clock in the evening, and it was quite chilly. We can also really tell that the days are starting to get shorter (hence the headlamp on E).

Today I had a visit at home from a contractor to talk about remodeling our house. KE and I have been making plans ever since my Mom visited us this summer to bump up the roof (the "middle" section above) and add a second floor. The house used to be a duplex with two small units (both under 800 sq ft). When we moved back, we (well, KE) knocked a hole in the common wall and we took over both units. Now, with the prospect of my Mom moving to Norway in the not-too-distant future, we are hoping to convert the smaller unit back into a separate apartment for her and add living space upstairs on our side for the three of us.

The contractor thought our plans sounded totally do-able, but insisted that we really need an architect for the project. Fair enough. He also gave us a ball park estimate of about 1.2 million NOK (a little over $200,000 US). Ouch! But amazingly, that's still way below what it would cost to buy an apartment for her. Like about half as much! This housing market is totally insane.

We're not entirely frightened off by the price though (especially since KE is really happy in his new job), so I guess we'll be moving ahead with the plans. First step is talking to the architects that the contractor recommends.

Since our budget is going to be tight, I am celebrating by making this Lima bean soup. It's still simmering, but smells divine. We'll be eating a lot of rice and beans over the next few years, I suspect, but given my love of legumes, that shouldn't be a problem!