I must say that I find a lot of enjoyment in doing things that the "typical" North American woman does not normally do.

I am officially an employee of New Lite Homes and I do manual labor. This week I insulated, vapor barrier-ed, and drywalled. I wore my steel toed boots, got accoustical sealant goop all over my hands, and used power tools. AND tired myself completely out! This body's not used to that type of work! My hands are falling asleep at night now as a result of my muscles growing too fast, cutting of circulation (or something like that - I don't know the technical thing that's happening, but it happened to me before when I worked at a sawmill too) And like I said, I really enjoy the fact that I do these things that most woment don't know how to do. I stick out on the job site. New Lite's house that we're building is in a new area in Stoney Plain where there's a dozen or so houses being built by different people. So there's a lot of construction people around. And I'm the only girl. The guys do double takes :) (not cause I'm so pretty, just cause I'm female!!!) So yeah, I'm liking it. Havn't got another job yet, but we'll see. Right now I've been full time with Nathan and Dad (and Mike). I'll have to take some pictures of the work we're doing, cause it's so exciting! The house we're building is so great, I'd love to live there. And not to brag, but there's some quality workmanship being put into it. No shortcuts for my brother, the engineer.
My basement suite is coming along as well. After a full day's work of construction, dad and I have been slaving away in the basement then too! Not every night, but some. We've had the plumbing inspection done now and just tonight we got it to the point of electrical inspection and general building inspection, and then we can cover everything up with drywall. Whoo hoo! It's all whoo hoo except for one thing we found out this week. It's illegal to do what we're doing... Yeah, Spruce Grove has a bylaw against suites in houses. And why did we not know this earlier? And why did the plans get approved by the city? Ha ha, we don't know. Except for the fact that they are trying to get the law changed so that it is legal, and are kinda letting it slide in the meantime. The know there's a housing shortage, so they want people to build and to provide places for people to live, but it's illegal as of now. So what they told us this week is that they will put in our file that it's not officially approved or something, but will inspect it and approve it anyways. The deciding factor that makes it illegal is the fact that there's wiring for a stove. That's what makes it a suite, another dwelling within the house. So what we decided to do was to put the wire there, but not hook it up, and when the bilaw changes (which they said they hoped it would be within the year) we'll hook it up. We want to stay within the law, of course, but it's so rediculous! I'll be ok without a stove I guess. I've got a convection microwave which acts as an oven, and I'll get a hot plate element thing till we can do the stove thing. And I can use mom and dad's if need be. Silly though, eh? And we even tried to get info about if the stove was an issue, but didn't find anything out. TILL NOW! Ah well, we'll survive!
Thanx for "listening" to my blabbering!!