Rain Delay

No work today. They didn't want to take the plastic off the roof since it's supposed to rain later this afternoon. Looks like it will be clear tomorrow so they should make some headway with the trusses and roof sheathing.

Rain came, but hasn't washed us away.... Yet

Trusses are sitting out front. Maybe they'll go up tomorrow if the rain stops early in the day which it looks like it will. They framed our master bedroom so all we need are the trusses and we have the shell almost complete. It was hard to get decent pictures upstairs over the new addition with all the plastic. Tomorrow I'll post some good pics. So far the rain has stayed out of our living space. We'll be on hourly bucket patrol to make sure all the little drips don't make it down to our heads!

It's coming together

View towards the master bedroom, you can see the kitchen below right now.

View towards the master bathroom in the corner.

View coming up the stairs towards one of the bedrooms.

2nd floor outer walls are framed. They're working on the joists over the addition this morning. Hopefully that will allow them to frame up the walls over there today. Trusses should get delivered today so that should mean we'll have a roof again before the weekend is here.

Subfloor almost done

They're making good progress today. All the outer walls should be complete by the end of the day.

Roof is gone

Roof is completely gone. Tomorrow they're going to be framing the upstairs. The trusses should be coming Wednesday, but so is some rain. Hopefully it won't be too wet in the house.

I finished trimming the outside of the replacement window. Eventually we will put 1x6 trim picture framed around the replacement windows just like the new ones will have.

No turning back now

Roof is coming off!

First replacement window complete

Frame dry fitted in place before we foamed up the air gaps and tacked it to the inside.

Close up of our 1/2 inch plywood frames.

Old window with the old trim.

New window and new trim. All our windows are 4 over 1 panes.

Old basement window that will be covered by the porch soon.

We finished the trim around the first replacement window. It was a little slow as we had to make the inside frame out of a 4x8 sheet of 1/2 inch plywood. Then we had to finagle the trim surround to get it to look good because the wall is a bit uneven. But it turned out great! Must have tools are a nail gun and quality miter saw for "tighter than bark on a tree" joints as they say.

After a bunch of back and forth about options yesterday we ended up going with plain 4x1 trim for the smaller windows and.... wait for it.... plain 6x1 for the doors and other windows (and maybe the baseboards). I know, crazy elaborate. All the new windows will have 6 inch frames so there's no need for a window sill. We created a 4.5 inch frame on the replacement by pushing the window outside more. It looks so much more modern and clean looking than the old window, don't you think? We also ripped out 2 of the old (and gross) small basement windows and boarded up the holes. They'll be under the new front porch so no need for windows there anymore.

All we have to do next is trim up the outside, prime, paint, finish the other 7 replacements, start the electrical, plumbing, insulation, drywall.... hmmmm.... maybe next weekend!

Windows

We replaced one of our old windows today. I was hoping to be able to reuse the old frames, but ended up having to take everything out and build a new smaller frame outside where the original frame was. The brick opening wasn't the same on the outside as the inside so we ended up pushing the window 4 inches further out than where the old ones were to make the new window fit. But it looks a lot better with more depth on the inside. We're going to spray foam around the opening and then build new trim to finish it. I think we're going to do something more arts and crafts style for the trim, but haven't decided just yet. So it's staying untrimmed for now.

Windows arrived

We are quickly running out of livable space here. We'll get started on putting in the replacement windows this weekend. Oscar needs to get the framing done and inspected before the new windows can go in. Hopefully in 2 weeks we will have the shell constructed and windows/doors in place so we can gain back some more living area.

False alarm

Roof stayed on today and probably won't come off until monday weather permitting. No contractors here tomorrow or this weekend. We're getting all of our new windows so we'll hopefully replace some of the old windows over the next few days.

Roof coming off tomorrow

The attic insulation and remaining walls were demo'd today. The floors were taken down to what looks like the original 1x6 boards. I might try to save that and use it for trim around the house. We'll see how straight they are.

Dominion finished their work so the electric line is gone. It looks so much nicer on the side of the house now. Unfortunately it won't mean less power outages, but oh well. This will probably be the first and last time I say 'good job Dominion'.

Goodbye overhead power

Dominion is running our electric line underground this morning. Verizon should be coming in the next couple of days to run theirs underground as well so the right side of the house should look pretty spiffy! And we'll cut Dominion Power some slack and we won't count this as the fifth time the electricity went out since we moved.

We have walls

openings for french doors leading outside

No new windows on this side since its the back of the kitchen

The 3 windows below will be here eventually

with these 3 windows and the 2 french doors to the left the kitchen/dining room should get a ton of light

Unfortunately it's going to rain tomorrow so the roof will probably stay on this week. The shell of the new kitchen and dining room is framed up. You can see the spots for the two french doors and bank of windows in the dining room. Our back steps now have a roof.

Lots of progress

The new stairs were poured and look great.

 The LVL's were set on the far side and some joists were hung. Another 8 months and we'll be cooking in there!

The new joists are 2x8 so they had to lift them up to match the height of the existing floor.

Anatomy of a 1950's floor. You can see the original 2x10 joist, then the sill plate, then I think it's 1x6 boards laid on the diagonal, and finally the original oak floor. The floor is going to be ripped up the whole way to the living room. We're still undecided on what type of wood we're putting in its place.

Anatomy of a 1950's wall. We have a 4" brick exterior layer joined to a 4" concrete masonry block followed up with 3/4" fir strips that the wire mesh plaster wall board was attached to. No idea how they ran electrical in there, but I assume it's going to a pain to change anything that's in there right now! Hopefully when we replace the windows the house will be a lot warmer because there's no way to add more insulation without building all new walls on the inside. 

Framing starting

They're starting to frame the new addition today and pour the concrete for the back stairs. Should be a lot of progress today!

Chimney done, stairs framed

Not too much happened today. They cleaned up the scaffolding from extending the chimney and framed out the stairs for the rear walk out. Not sure how we're going to paint that chimney, though! Its a little high up there.