Scary demo work!
We are lucky the house didn't burn down while we were living in it!
Between the extremely unsafe chimney (that the brick guy pulled down by hand) and the old fabric wrapped wiring running through the whole old part of the house we were living in a veritable death trap!
For example take a look at this frightening electrical box - it is loaded with 10amp fuses, has a mix of new and fabric wrapped wiring and a boatload of wire nuts that were splitting a number of wires off to who knows where.
I discovered that one 10am circuit was serving my entire basement, living room, porch, entry way, and outside light. All of it in fabric wrapped wire running through ancient BX flexible conduit, and spliced with electrical tape through at least 8 junction boxes nailed to the wood with no grounding.
Safety First Folks!
60yds of Demolition
Unfortunately the kid who was doing the majority of shlepping stuff around decided he wanted an education and went back to college - now I don't know too many schools open between Christmas & New Years, but apparently his was because he didn't come back.
That left this gigantic pile of $HI+ for us to move.
So instead of paying the talented guys a bunch of money to move it, Carrie and I spent two days moving it. What a mess...
But! That left the talented guys to do actual building and they were able to get the "bump out" for our dining room and master bath completed so that they can get started on the framing for the dormers for my attic office affectionately known as "Rich-land." Ironically enough, for those of you that don't know it, I grew up in Richland and went to school there - life comes full circle.
From the lake you can also see the windows for the master bedroom as well as the windows & doors for the living room to our deck.
Oh, and her is a picture of the truck I bought our builder. At least it's quieter. Maybe one day he will let me ride in it!
New roof on the old house
We had a couple of days of heavy rain on Thursday and Friday and that slowed the progress a little. At the end of the day on Wednesday we had the framing up on the new roof over the old section of the house, but not sheathed. We probably got about 6" of rain through the end of the day on Friday and the wind blew the tarp off the rafters. I am a little worried about the rain that infiltrated the bathrooms we weren't going to touch, but we will have to check it out and decide what to do. As they say, into each life a little rain must fall.
The weather cleared up and they got the sheathing on Saturday morning, but with Christmas Eve on Sunday and today being Christmas there isn't any more real progress.
The weather looks good all the rest of this week and through the weekend so some real progress should be made to get the thing under roof by the end of this year. Then the trades can get started.
This is a good view of our Master Bedroom and lake view. The whole thing isn't going to be room, our walk in closed is taking a good chunk out, but the room will still be as deep as the old master, but wider and with a sitting area and fireplace.
One piece of bad news, the young kid that was doing the schlep work of hauling all the debris away decided to go back to college (during break?) so Carrie and I are going to be hauling all the debris away next week. It's tough to see, but under that tarp is probably about 60
yds of roof, walls, ceilings and drywall that we have to haul to the dumpster. I am guessing we will fill the one we have, and one and half more before that pile is gone. The good news is that demo should be done and that pile won't get any bigger...
The skylight got bigger...
The last couple of weeks have shown quite a bit more progress. Carrie and I were both off last week and were able to "help" move the project forward, mainly by demolishing a bunch o' stuff. I also spent a lot of time just standing around trying to "help", but our builder doesn't trust us with tape measures, saws or hammers - so I did a lot of this:
While it didn't feel like we accomplished much construction, it really gave us a boost in opening up the area that will become our dining room, guest bath, and guest room. Right now the entire middle portion of the house is one giant skylight - we wanted an open airy feeling, and right now we sure have it...
We have a Master Bedroom
This morning they finished the sheathing on the room over the Master Bedroom and we are getting a good idea 0f what it is going to look like when it's complete:
This will be the view from our bed - minus the hairy guy (Mark the builder) and the supports
The "bump out" for the dining room and Master Bath has it's foundation and they are opening up the walls there too
This is gross, the original first floor bathroom had a leaky shower in it that was so bad it actually rotted out the studs that were holding up the second floor. The entire floor is going to have to be replaced there, but luckily that wall is coming out to make room for the peninsula bar between the dining room and kitchen.
We also have a new skylight in the hallway:
Actually that is the attic access with no roof over it...
Roofing Montage
The snow finally melted after a week of temps around zero, but then it started raining, combining for an almost 10-day delay in the project. But, that's all cleared up now and they made some serious progress TODAY!:
This was taken 4 days after the snow:
This was taken at 10AM today
This was taken at 12:30pm today:
And this was taken at 4pm today
Talk about progress...
Living Room Montage
We had a pretty decent week this week that let Mark make some real progress, but it ended with a dump of over a foot of snow that really put the brakes on the building.
Yes, that is snow in the living room...
