>>I don't understand - it was in time for the 1st but not for the 2nd?
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>When we started digging the basement, the first daughter was 7, and the second was three. So we figured we'd move in in a couple of years and the girls will have fun in the winter. But then it took us ten years to make the house habitable, and when we moved in the girls were 14, 10 and 1 year old. We lived there only six years, and then moved here.

Ah I see. Almost the Moses of the house builders, aren't you :-)

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>The basement is not under the house - it's behind it, so its roof is actually a terrace, and a huge one (9 by 4 meters), so when I shovel all the snow off it, it makes a nice igloo :).

We can only dream of such snow. This year, if we'd been up early enough (before the sun) we could have built an igloo - for the hamster!