See ya 2011

Erik and I ended our 2011 with a walk at Crescent Beach with Bartlett. When Erik and I first got Bartlett, almost 9 years ago, we would drive from Portland where Erik lived on May Street to bring her for a walk on the beach. Serendipitous, now this walk is literally down the street from our house. Amazing that we have been together for almost 10 years now. I just teared up. And only married for almost 3... where does the time go? It's moments like today and the ones when we would bring Bartlett to "the beach with the purple sand", that I remember fondly. I guess I don't remember most of the mundane and the trouble, which is why this blog is helpful. I can look back and see all the work we did in the past 2 years

That's Bartlett in the water, after this shot she lost her beloved ball and cried. Literally, she cried for it. She also body surfed a wave in, according to Erik it was amazing. We all were sad about the ball, mostly because she cried.

Last days of 2011, have seen some progress in the mudroom. This fall the sheetrock went up easy when Brian King came to visit. And then it was duck season. Friday night, Erik put up the first coats of mud over the seams and screws. Today, in 5 hours Erik finished the first round. All the tape is on, and in some places 2 coats were applied. Maybe we'll be ready to lay flooring ?

While Erik was putting mud up, I lugged from the basement all the wood on an 8ft rack for our fireplace.

In the New Year, I look forward to finishing phase 2 of the house renovation. When asked what I wanted most for Christmas, I said "for the house to be done". I am getting tired of everything coated in dust, vacuuming 3x a week, living in one room (although it is spectacular), I would like to unpack ( I just found a bin with jackets & hats I was looking for last year), getting back to things we love to do, skiing, biking, hiking, I am anxious to get the upstairs done so we can have our life back. Things I am looking forward to the most; having people over, having a christmas tree, having a place for friends & family to stay over, and being able to do something else other than fill trashbags with dirty insulation, 2 years is a long time to be living like this, and we are looking at another year at least to finish the upstairs.

What we accomplished this year, has been amazing; we finished the great room & kitchen, we gutted the downstairs of the existing portion of the house, we built a mudroom addition, we replaced all the windows on the first floor and 1 window upstairs, we sided and put a roof on the addition, shored up the Sh-arn for another year, and got new electric and insulation in the addition and the existing portion of the house. Erik rebuilt a tractor. And in that year I passed 2 of my architectural registration exams. I know, it's exhausting!

Well, we look forward to 2012 and Hope you all have a Happy, Healthy, Prosperous New Year!

Fall Wrap-up-Part 3.2

From this view it almost looks finished. *sigh* The new mudroom/entry. Which now has radiant heat in the floors, insulation, lights, and drywall up. Still needs flooring, doors, and to be mudded, sanded, mudded....

View from the kitchen- to the mudroom and entry. Bartlett doesn't love the open stairs. She would not like to see through, it makes her nervous.

We desperately need to put down a walkway, we track sand inside and it isn't good for our floors. Erik made a temporary gang plank, so only 1/2 the dirt comes inside now.

Fall Wrap-up-Part 3

That's the inside of the foam truck. Yah. I guess, we were lucky, it wasn't too cold this Fall. Although, the last weekend of October was bitter cold with that freak snow storm. It was awefully cold actually, since the electricians were here that Saturday wrapping up the job, the power was shut off for most of the day, and I was trying to study.Luckily, we didn't get too much snow either, since most people were without power on Sunday and Monday and we had it. Brand new wiring in fact. Finally, on Wednesday we got insulation.

Since the older 1/2 of the house, has nominal 2 x 4 construction we had a closed cell foam sprayed in there. Which gives us an R-21 at the wall. The closed cell also is a bit more rigid and stiffens the walls up a bit. Which also helps. The new construction, roof and 2nd floor got the open cell foam, since it expands more, this fills the entire 2 x 6 cavity and doesn't allow air & moisture to convect or condense in the wall. We are already seeing a difference with the boiler in the older section of the house, not continuously running all day either. Already, we are feeling like the house is more efficient.

Fall Wrap-up-Part 2

So after 2nd floor was reframed, we needed strapping on the ceiling- to accept the drywall, which in an old house all needs to be shimmed- cause this house hasn't been square...uh.... ever! So that took a while. New walls in the mudroom for a closet and powder room were framed. Pocket door for the powder room, which was tricky, needs special framing. But not a big deal, cause you just get a kit at the hardware store. New walls for the laundry room and Oh, I nearly forgot, new windows on the front of the house. Not to mention, Erik had planned on a hunting trip to the NEK with cousin Bob and his friends. A ton to do and not a lot of time to do it.

Bird Camp

After work & the weekends that were available, Erik managed to do it all. New framing, new windows, and the electricians were able to come in the last week in October and pull out all the old wiring, which was called "2 tube" newer than Knob & tube, but encased in a fabric sleeve that screamed "fire" everytime you turned on the switch. It also made a very loud noise, which I was always wondering if that was a spark and if I just turned the house on fire? It was very unsettling, to say the least. Now, all the basement lights come on when you hit one switch, instead of the one light that was on, when you turned off all the other lights. Bowdler Electric also ran wiring for the 2nd floor, so when we get to Phase 3, we'll be wired in and ready!

New wall at mudroom & wiring for outside lights and mudroom overheads.

New framing & wiring, strapping beyond.

Fall Wrap-up-Part 1

It's been a busy few weeks here at 528. In order to get ready for insulation, we needed to re-wire the electric, which needed to have all the walls ready, which meant we had to re-frame and build new walls. Brian King came up one weekend to help Erik reframe the living room. It was a little sponge-y when you walked up stairs in the bigger bedroom, turns out the 2nd floor joists ran the lenght of the existing part of the house. That's why it felt like walking on a trampolene. Erik & Brian ran new LVLs in the 2nd floor framing and cutback and hung the existing framing off of the LVLs to stiffen up the framing. It was a ton of running into the basement, jacking up from below, building walls to hold up some of the framing, cutting back the joists, running down into the basement, jacking up below, then moving the LVL into place, tiring just trying to remember everything that was done.

Brian contemplating where the post can be located.

Brian & Erik framing in a new header between the Living & Dining rooms.

Looking down to where the posts are going.

This was a HUGE push, and we couldn't have gotten ready for the electrical portion of Phase 2 without Brian. Thank you for spending your weekend with us. It is greatly appreciated.

Going Postal

Evidently our mailbox wasn't up to the US postal service standards. The postwoman left us a diagram showing us that the mailbox wasn't at the proper height (45") and the box was not secured to the base. The repairs to the mailbox clearly was not a priority for us, but the alternative of not getting our mail was a swift kick to get this done.

Here is the new mailbox, Erik re-used the post for our light at the end of the driveway, and some leftover decking from the back deck.

Peggy the Postwoman was very pleased with the new mailbox, she even pulled into the driveway one morning to find out what colors we have used for the siding & trim. She loves the progress on the house so much, I think she just wanted to see what we would do with the mailbox.

Stink Fest

As you can see by Erik's mask, this weekend stunk. We got the majority of the stink out of the way on Saturday by demolishing the remaining walls in the living room. While Erik was going "ape shit" crazy tearing the room apart, I was bagging up squirrel shit ridden insulation, bringing 6 loads of various shit loaded wall board to the dump. On my 2nd trip to the dump as I was backed up to the hopper for what was supposed to be a quick unload, as I went to pull forward....I couldn't get the volvo to shift into drive.

(As many of you know, we have a truck. What you may not realize is that most of the time I don't get charged for dumping materials at the dump, because typically there is no charge for car loads, truck loads are another story- for instance, 10$ a load for wood waste)

The car was stuck, it was running and I couldn't move the gear into drive. I was starting to panic. As it was Saturday morning at the Cape dump and I could see by the look on the guy's face in the truck staring at me, that I had taken too long already in prime dump real estate. I turned the car off, swore, and turned the key hoping my nightmare would move into gear. Luckily, that tricked the volvo and I hauled ass home- Bartlett slid off the seat as we peeled out of the access road. She gave me the stink eye, wondering why all the rush. I tried to explain that if the volvo died for good at the dump, we'd certainly be the talk of the town. We came into the driveway sideways, where I tried to get it into park and yet again, it wouldn't budge. Long story short- the volvo was all sorts of messed up and 1 hr and a half later, I had it towed for it's later fate. The truck took the final 4 dump trips. Those last 4 loads cost me $20. The volvo would cost me much more when I got the bill from John's Mechanical Service, for the burned out relay & gear selector.

Bill Lee stopped by just as things were starting to get going and took some action photos of the living room and the tow truck carting the volvo off to the shop.

I am thinking at this point, I just dropped the transmission and that I might have to dust off the bike for awhile.

Erik has a glimmer of "hope" still in his eyes. After seeing what was inside the walls or better yet the lack of structure in the room, the car isn't a big deal.

Paul Jones in the Wall

Erik's dad came up to visit last week, and lend us some time helping out on the house. Thursday was going to be a hot one, so we decided we should stay out of the sun & heat and work inside. Demolition of the dining room was on the list of things to do. We started off with trying to salvage the wide pine boarding along the stairs. After about 15 minutes of good effort to pry the first board off, as it was on there pretty good, we needed a bite of that whiskey we found behind the board. Paul Jones whiskey, I hadn't heard of it, coming from a long line of whiskey drinkers myself. A little prying of my own into the history of the brand led to one of the advertisements, "Make a Change for the Better". That also seems to be the motto for us at 528!

Karl posing with the treasure he finds behind the wall. Take a good look as this is the last smile out of him for the rest of the day, I am pretty sure the squirrel nests and mouse poop was more than he bargained for in his idea of helping out. But it was a HUGE help. We gutted the entire room and cleaned up the crap. Literally.

That's me, I've been getting more brave with the reciprocating saw. It's hard to tell with my ventilation mask, but this is evidence that I wear it. See, Mom?!

Karl just took out the china cabinet, it wasn't pretty. It was stained pine shutter with black "little house on the prairie" hardware. And above it, was a very large squirrel nest, built onto the chimney so they could stay warm during the winter.

Before

the dining room with all it's "old world" charm.

During

With the wood paneling gone & the wall paper ready to get the 'ole heave ho.

Product Testing- Redwing Boots

I think Erik should be a product tester. These are his Redwing Steel toe boots. I don't think we'll be buying another pair of these, considering the boots didn't hold up as well as they advertised. When we brought them into the shop to discuss options for repairing the leather on the front of the boot, the woman told us we "should have bought the toe protector cap", little good that is going to do us now. If anyone has any suggestion for a hearty steel toe work boot, please comment.

New Windows & Reframing Existing Walls

This is the existing side door and old kitchen windows. Erik and I are planning on making the old kitchen into an office at some point. We are replacing the existing windows with similar high windows so we can furnish against that wall. We took out the old kitchen door and filled in the opening. As we opened up the interior to take out the windows and reframe for the new rough opening, we realized that there wasn't much framing to begin with. It appeared that the studs that were holding up the sill for the window were either rotten or not existent, it was a wonder that wall was even upright. I believe either the kitchen counters or the insulation had structural integrity at this point of the wall.

This wall made me sad. Thinking ahead to the other 4 exterior walls we are going to encounter before we are done, it just got me wondering what other surprises were lurking beneath the surface. I am lucky that Erik has seen just about everything at this point and we are motivated to keep moving ahead.

Also, as a sidenote, since the exterior of the house is pretty much open at this point and it was just a matter of time before the word was out to the flying squirrel crew. We heard the terrifying sounds of them moving back in! "Google" image flying squirrel and you'll see what made Erik panic and stay home on July 4th weekend to button up the exterior so that they couldn't get back in.

Framed & Roofing

We've been busy with the framing of the mudroom/entry addition. Trying to tie in the existing roofs to the new addition was tricky. We also needed to remedy the flat roof out back. There was a few sleepless nights where the roof over the NEW kitchen was open to the elements and we were concerned about thunderstorms ruining all our hard work. But someone above (my dad, perhaps) was looking out for us and the doppler radar showed the storm headed our way, splitting as it reached Cape Elizabeth and then re-forming after it passed. It was amazing. Amazing that we were saved from further destruction.

Above photo shows the wall and roof of the new kitchen being exposed to the elements, as the roof is being framed up over the new mudroom/entry.

New elevation for the mudroom entry. So exciting to see the progress.

Again, Carter brings his generosity to help Erik roof the new addition. It is amazing to have such a great friend, to take a day away from his family to help us out. We cannot thank him enough or his lovely wife Sarah. It makes the work go so much faster and easier to have the extra help.

The beautiful, blue bird day helped too. We have lucked out with the weather so far....

The Typar goes up before the grace ice & water shield, when water rolls off the roof it doesn't find it's way beneath the building wrap.

More updates to come- so stay tuned....

Got Grass

It's official...we've got grass growing in our front yard! Last year at this time, we had a pile of wood growing in our dust bowl of a front yard. Since we took down the oak trees that were preventing anything but moss from growing on the front yard, everything including the moss dried up. You can barely tell, but there is a septic under that fresh green grass.

Just in case you may have forgotten what last year looked like.