This morning we flew to West Plam Beach, FL to visit Jeanine’s lifelong friend, Kris, and her husband Rob. Jeanine and Kris grew up together in Lebanon, IN and have remained close for nearly half a century. We enjoyed lunch at the Restoration Hardware rooftop restaurant and then did a car tour of Palm Beach. The Gulfstream Park in Briny Breezes was our destination for a barbecue dinner, where we discovered a very holiday-appropriate message constructed of seaweed on the beach.

All that remains of the old River House is the small pile of rubble pictured above. The rest of the site is now a blank slate for our new house. We will be building on the exact same footprint necessitating a return visit of our surveyor to stake out the house corners. These stakes will guide excavation for the footings and walls of the new basement. Once the footings are poured we will have the surveyor return again to precisely locate the foundation wall corners on the footings. Jeanine and I travel to southern Florida tomorrow and will enjoy a nice respite from work and house.

Demolition of the River House has been completed. Tomorrow the two remaining dumpsters will be pulled and a small load of concrete will be hauled away. The old garage will remain in place providing storage until the end of the project at which time it will also be demolished. After a family dinner this evening, everyone met at the site to check out the progress and to spend some time enjoying the serenity of the river. Next week, excavation for the footings will commence and we will finally be in build mode.