Week 13 - Light At The End Of The Tunnel

December 13-17

With the early winter snow slowing things down on the outside siding work, we have made quick progress on getting things finished up on the inside of the house in the last week. Laundry/mud room, built-in shelving, lighting, wood floor finishing and painting were all on this week's list.

We are VERY excited to get the laundry/mud room finished first. The Marmoleum tiles we chose for the floor really brighten up the room and will make doing laundry a little more fun (yeah, right!). We will be able to move our washer and dryer back into the house this Monday. Dec. 20. and be able to do laundry at our own house for the first time since Sept. 7. We want to thank a number of our friends who have let us do our washing at their homes in the last three months. They can all look forward to us feeding them in our new dining room in the new year :o)

Laundry Room

The other big accomplishment this last week was the completion of the FABULOUS built in shelf/display unit between the new dining room and kitchen/entry. We have been really excited to see this element of the design take shape. Jim and Steve did a fantastic job with the building.

This is where we will display much of our art glass and pottery collection.

When the building was complete, Jenni worked late into the night filling the nail holes and preparing the shelves for finishing.

Meanwhile, Pat and Rob braved temperatures in the 20's to get the siding on the outside of the house started. It looks like our weather will continue to be very frigid with more snow and temps in the low teens to low 30's for the foreseeable future, so they fired up the propane heater and made a tent out of the front porch to give them a warm space to go thaw out every 30 minutes or so. They are real troopers. I also kept the coffee pot fired up for them.

Brrrrrrrrr!

The warm space where the boys go to thaw out

By weeks end we had the wood floor sanding guys in to sand the new dining room floor and blend in and re-polish the rest of the existing floors. This should be our last task that creates dust in the house. Hallelujah! There is some light at the end of the construction tunnel :o)

Over the weekend Rowan worked on installing some of the light fixtures while Jenni started painting the living room. Looks like we just may be sitting on the couch in front of a nice warm fire on Christmas day. Fingers crossed!

Rowan has gotten really good at the electrical thing. Thank goodness! Every time Jenni touches a wire, there is an explosion. Really! :o)

With the ceilings now 13 feet high in the living room and 15 feet in the kitchen, getting up there isn't easy for those that have a fear of heights. My ears nearly popped when I was up painting at the peak. We are setting our sights on a new free standing ladder to get us up that high once Jim leaves with all of his equipment. Or, maybe we should just get some climbing gear :o)

Let's hope we can show you all a photo of us in front of the fire place on the next post.

HO! HO! HO!

Week 11 & 12 - Transformations & The Arctic Freeze

November 29- December 10, 2010

We decided to take a well deserved break over the Thanksgiving holiday. No construction. No thinking about construction. No going out and buying anything for construction (especially on Black Frigging Friday!) We avoided all shopping for anything and just went for walks, spent time with friends and each other. (see photo of our friends 'the Finches' carving the turkey on Thanksgiving for the first Thanksgiving in their new home. We joined them for this special occasion).

We also spent time walking around the house and appreciating all the sacrifices we are making to create a really wonderful new home for ourselves. We are so very thankful for the home we have created together.

There is a lot to share with all of you from the last 2 weeks, so I wont get blah, blah, blah about it. We are trying to beat the winter freeze, so there has been no messing around with the construction schedule. It's go, go go! Here are some photos to help explain:

The sheetrock delivery arrived between the rain showers at 8am on Monday, Nov. 29 . The crew was ready to get right to the job of hanging the 4x12 & 4x14 ft long boards. Thank goodness I gave this up a few years ago. Especially since we now have 10-15ft high ceilings!!!!

Pat, Chris and Rob got right to hanging the ceiling rock in the new dining room. Don't they almost look like Roman pillars?

The joys of sheet rock dust in the house! AhhhhhhhhChoooooooo! Almost like London fog :o)

That's Mike, in the middle, doing an awesome quad press to hold that piece of sheet rock up while Josh & Steve secure it.

The new french doors that go from the living room to the front porch

Here is Jim on his tape and mud stilts, no better way to reach those high places without a ladder. Ever since he brought these out, I keep calling him and his crew 'Jim Wright-Kaisers Flying Circus'. I have since realized that it is true! Watching them do what they do is like going to the circus. Don't try any of these moves at home without a net, or insurance or something :o)

Rob and Chris have been the chosen ones to go back up into the attic space to adjust a few light fixtures to the sheet rock. That space is now like a big cocoon womb since the foam insulation was blown in. It seemed like they were being shot out of the cocoon womb as they came in and out of the opening of the crawl space. It was HILARIOUS! They broke into a heat flash sweat after only 10 minutes up there. They were nearly born again!! :o)

December 3rd we woke up to this....

Suddenly we realized that things might not keep running as smoothly as usual for the project.

Temperatures in the low 20's and teens aren't great for working outside for sure, so the boys will be finishing the inside work in no time. The siding work will now be challenging. Lets hope we don't have to wait for spring to finish that! :o)

I have been keeping myself VERY busy priming all of the outside cedar trim boards for the windows, siding and porch ceiling. One good thing is that I have had the luxury of doing it inside of the house where we have the heating at 70 degrees to help the sheet rock mud dry in a timely manner. I worry about half of the boys still working outside on the trim in this 25 degree cold.

The temperatures kept diving as we went from week 11 into week 12, from the 20's to the low teens and finally single digits. Brrrrrrr! And, lots more snow too. The boys were able to finish lots of the window and corner trim on the outside of the house before the temps got to the low teens. I became more of a den mother as the days became colder, making afternoon coffee and running to get more propane tanks to drive the heaters the guys had on the porch to keep their sawing/work space warm so their hands could keep working. I was also the supplies runner for anything they needed to keep the job moving forward (something I have done from the beginning since I am the general contractor).

The icicles became dangerous as they hang precariously above the boys as they work on the outside window trim. They knock them down before they begin work in that area so they don't knock them down as they bang on the wall and get a ice spear through the brain! I just don't have enough first aid at home to deal with that!

I'm not quite sure how the guys can even feel their hands as they rip the cedar for the window trim. I guess it hurst less if you lose a finger and you can't feel it!!! :o)

The drawing of the exterior window trim measurements they guys made on an exterior wall. I love it! It will live on under the exterior trim forever :o)

The beautiful exterior trim

So, we had a very Wicked Witch of the West/Dorothy experience this last week. I came around the side of the house going for the front door and almost tripped over Chris as he was laying under the outside front of the window seat of the dining room. He was putting some blue foam insulation up under the framing. It was so perfect! Just like in The Wizard of Oz when the house fell on the Wicked Witch of the East (the Wicked Witch of the Wests' sister. All he needed was the striped socks and ruby slippers! IT WAS HILARIOUS!

The guys eventually made a blue tarp and Tyvec tent out of the new front porch area. They draped huge tarps around the openings of the porch and fired up a propane heater inside. This gave them enough warmth to proceed with the installation of the v-groove pine ceiling. Jenni was working hard the last 2 weeks on getting it all primed and stained and sealed. It is really going to look great.

Meanwhile, on the inside of the balmy 70 degree new addition, Steve was sanding away on the sheet rock portion of the job. He almost looked enough like a snowman that we could have put him in the front yard with a carrot up his nose and he would have passed for Frosty! He was so cute covered in all of that sheetrock dust (yeah, he really thought so too!) :o)

Steve did a stand out job sanding and priming the entire space.

Jim and Josh also worked inside on laying the new oak floor.

Jim was also able to start trimming the inside windows this last week. I have been following him around like a puppy, filling nail holes in the flooring and trim, caulking and installing hardware, painting and arranging for wood floor sanding and vinyl installation for week 13 and getting the electricians to start the finish work for the can lights, switches, outlets and automatic this and that. The details are endless.

Jim says he will be out of our way and we can have the inside of the house back by Christmas! YES! Our best present will be to have our washer/dryer back and our stove SO WE CAN COOK!

Cooking in the garage on a camp stove when it is 10 degrees outside aint fun, but it is funny having to wrap up in 3 pairs of pants and 3 coats just to go boil some pasta! :o)

Things could always be worse..............

We are thankful.

We are grateful.

Happy Holidaze!

Give Love. The real gift.

Jenni & Rowan