Those pictures are freaking awesome. That backhoe is the perfect machine. Looks like you guys went all out at the same time? New siding and windows? It's cool to see the diagonal sheathing, my whole career has taken place since sheet goods became the norm but I'm guessing this was before that or wasn't typical wherever this is?
Our kids are 2 and 4 and I don't take them to site but we practice hammering, sweeping and driving screws during my projects at home. My dad had a construction company and is a great carpenter (in terms of knowledge, not speed because he was managing for majority of career) but I barely learned a thing. Wasn't interested until 24. Missed out on alot of knowledge but at the same time he wasn't dying to teach me either so, it's a give and take. Making up for it now.
The photos are out of order, so we dug the end out, and built that wall before the photo with the backhoe.
I grew up in rural Alaska in the 80s and 90s. Things were a bit different there, my father designed the original house the maximize space with the material he could afford on the drive back from the nearest lumber yard (100 miles). I think he had a bundle of sixteen foot 2x6s, two of 8 foot 2x4s, and one of plywood. There was almost no scrap. The diagonal boards were locally sourced and structural, as well as the outer siding. We spray foamed it from the inside after the siding was on. For years I thought my father had planned the gaps you can see between them, then he told me they were green when they went up and shrank that much. The windows were homemade out of glass my uncle scored free because it was slightly foggy. They don't really show up in the old grainy photo though. The original house was built in a couple of weeks by my father, a very motivated 35 year old carpenter with some "help" from my mother, my brother (2), and myself (almost 4). We moved in three days before it snowed. Thirty-eight years later it still wasn't "finished" when he passed away though it was much larger. I don't think he ever financed any construction on it, but he did have to borrow against the property after my parents divorced.
It makes me happy to hear some other 4 year old is getting to know the joy of hammering in nails. When he was putting the plywood down on the roof, dad would nail down the corners of a sheet, snap chalk lines and tell us to nail it down. My brother couldn't swing a hammer one handed yet, so i started the nails and he hammered them home. There are extra nails in that part of the roof and a number of places we missed the rafters. :)
Thinking about it, I should probably post a longer story and more photos to my journal. It's a pretty epic story of debt free over comfort and convenience despite our poverty at the time.
