The Way We Live

A view of the temporary wall from inside our dining room.  I don't think we'll be hosting dinner parties anytime soon...

Delayed

We've been delayed this week as we need to amend our building permit for our replacement (previously unplanned) walkout basement stairs. We're hoping to get our plans submitted Monday and hopefully they won't take long to get approved. Once that gets done Oscar should be back at it and make some big progress in the next few weeks.

Hello my name is Genny

New generator! Since Dominion Power completely sucks we got ourselves into the power business. If you're in the neighborhood and in need of electricity we might have some to sell you.

Not much going on the last 2 days

Not much going on the last couple of days. They finished the demo of the back stairs and the supplies came in for the new foundation. We had a bit of a storm yesterday. Our power was out almost 24 hours. It just came back but we already bought a new generator for the next power outage. We've lost power 4 times since we moved in back in June. Dominion Power pretty much sucks! Next time we won't miss a beat and maybe charge the neighbors for ice and TV.

Rear wall demolished

The rear wall was partially taken out in preparation of a new load bearing beam so we can open up the space for the new kitchen and dining room. Also demolished was the back walkout steps and wall. They need to be moved 2 feet and the retaining walls need to be rebuilt to support the roof load of the new addition.

Kitchen demo

We moved half of the kitchen to the basement so the exterior wall can be demo'd this week. Kristin learned how to solder a pipe. The dishwasher will hopefully find a new home via craigslist so we don't have to move it. Later on the whole old kitchen will also hopefully find a new home as all the cabinets are still in great shape and I don't think they're more than a couple years old.

We will now be using paper plates and cups for a few months until we build the new kitchen. On the bright side I never really liked cleaning dishes or loading the dishwasher.

Busy day today....

Lots of progress today. Excavation for the new addition started. We also got our first bit of bad news... The basement walkout needs to be replaced. So there's a big hit to the budget we weren't expecting. Hopefully that's the only surprise for the shell construction.

We wanted to get the driveway ripped up in preparation for the power company to bury our lines underground. Eventually in the Spring we'll finish the driveway in pavers. It ended up being a lot more work than we thought with the asphalt being 2-3 layers thick in some spots. But Kristin learned how to swing the sledge hammer and we finished it all.

We also plumbed in a new utility sink in the basement since we're about to lose our kitchen for a few months. The old 1950's concrete sink was gross so we busted it up and hauled it out. The new plastic sink is all shiny and new so we (Kristin) won't mind cleaning our dishes in it.

We also had our first injury today... Kristin broke a nail. I had a hangnail, but I took care of it while Kristin was digging out the driveway.

In the background  you can see our new half bath... I know, pretty awesome. If you're in the neighborhood and need to go feel free to stop on by!