July 4th

It's been awhile since my last post. Erik and I are about to begin phase 3. of the big phases to the house. We just moved our lives back downstairs and cleaned out upstairs in order to begin gutting the upstairs. We'll probably start ripping it apart tomorrow. It will feel so good to get this done. I can almost see the end! We've been at this house for over 3 years now. Seems like forever. Here are some pictures of what we've been living with. I cannot say I will miss too many of these fine features, but they've been apart of my daily life for 3 years that a thoughtful "send off" seems appropriate.  Here is a list some things that I will not miss; squeezing into the tiny space for the toilet (honestly you have sit sideways it is so tight),  the blue toilet seat which was only held on by one hinge, the blue painted floor, blue dust ridden shutter doors on the linen closet, blue tape on the ceiling to keep the mice in the attic, red rage wallpaper (WOW that color isn't a good one to wake up peacefully), wallpaper on the ceilings, the electrical socket on the ceiling ( I don't know why it was there?), having to use a painters light in the bathroom, the insulation pocking out  of the walls, and the smell of old insulation that probably was wet at one time. Oh, and how could I forget the linoleum floors.

Exterior Finale

The last window to be replaced! After Frankenstorm Sandy blew through. We had a leak come through the living room window. We thought we could ride it out, but we were overexposed. Erik got a fire under his skin to finish installing the last of the windows  and finish the siding the exterior. This section of the gable end is the last to be sided. Brian King, Erik's friend extraordinaire, came up for about 18 hours to help Erik prep, install the windows and get as much siding up as possible. Team King works like a well oiled machine, except for the bickering. At one point I was upstairs cleaning up the insulation and I just stopped to overhear them going back and forth on what was the best way to frame the new window opening.  After a good go around, it was framed and the windows were installed before I left to go to a batchelorette party that afternoon! Brian and Erik despite picking on each other, work so well together. I am so thankful Brian came up to help us make such a huge stride in our renovation.  

 Brian is a good "cut man" as well as "net man", once this is done, we will treat him to a trip down the river, where he can sit back and catch some fish rather than take cut orders from Erik!

 The new window opening- looking out to the pond. 

Windows installed!

New Windows in Back Dormer

Well, here's to some new windows in the back dormer. Sadly, the window that was being held together with moss is no longer. It has been replaced with an Andersen 400 series window that works unlike the one with the lichen problem. The window all the way to the right was replaced at the end of last summer, so it was already operable. Since we lost one window on the driveway side in that room from the addition of the mudroom, we needed another window and thought the dormer needed a center window. There will be a center window by the end of the weekend. 

 There's the rough opening, ready for the building wrap and then window will go into the opening and be secured. 

In order for the opening to be made in that red plaid room my closet ended up in the backyard. I was able to get my clothes out just in time, or I think they would have been in this pile of debris as well!!

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.

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.

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.

Foundation

Well, soon after the guys were finished excavating the hole for the addition... (Oh, did I mention we are adding a mudroom entry between the original house and the kitchen. This will house a mudroom, entry, a coat closet, a powder room, and a little linen closet. ) the guys ran off (they had to catch a ferry to their next job!), leaving a giant hole. Fred Prescott, the foundation guy, came in and built the forms for the footings.

And his son took it from here, this was to be his last foundation he poured with his dad before he was moving to Massachusetts to go to college.

Footings being poured.

Moving the wet concrete around doesn't look easy.

He smooths it out with a trowel.

The next day, in between torrential rain, they put up the wall forms.

Bartlett is thrilled to have a new dirty place to lay.

Septic 101- part 2

Part 2; Septic install.

As you can see from the photo above- this is the leaching bed. What happens is this- PVC piping is hooked into the concrete pre-cast tank and run on top of the black beds which are made out of a geotech fabric and some plastic thing that looks like an egg crate. Inside the tank bacteria eats away at the waste and pees out a cleanish waste and that gray water is carried through the pipes on the leaching bed and is distributed into the ground, which again gets cleaned through the leaching bed system.
Chappy is putting the bed to sleep with a sheet of fabric over the top of the leaching beds.

Then he buries it with another foot of sand.

The excavation for the addition. Ba BYE brick steps. Oh and I forgot to tell you, when they wrecked the front steps to put the connection into the tank- it was a slab of concrete that was reinforced with what looked like an old spring bed frame. The kind that my grandma had on the porch and was super squeaky.
That guy with the shovel just realized there was a huge tree stump/root ball and he is trying to uncover the edges of it....hee hee hee! And that other guy is Chappy the excavator operator and he is not laughing.

The front now has a layer of loam on top of where the septic was installed. It will be great if grass grows.

Large tree stump/root ball. This one came up easy, about 2 hours? The driveway got a bit smaller as the pressure from the machine cracked the driveway further back, yikes.

There it is. In it's glory.

That is the 2nd root. It wasn't as easy, and there were some not so nice words expressed about it.