Finally seeing visible progress!!

This past weekend, it really started to get interesting.  I was actually on site for a little while that day, even though I really didn't have time to be....I could barely stand it!  So, I spent a little bit of time cleaning up the site, doing a few things the guys weren't doing, like cleaning up debris around the back.  There were piles of broken cement blocks that needed to be trashed.  Also, some bricks were strewn about the yard that I piled up a hundred yards away were the barn used to be, on a remote concrete pad. The bricks on the porch that are taking over will eventually need to be taken there as well.  Notice the plentiful brick soldiers on the front porch: 

Getting ready for the day

At least most of the work this weekend will be around the back of the house.  First, Gabe worked on removing the exterior wall between the stairwell and the bathroom on the east side of the house.  He eliminated rotten sheathing and floor joists from this area.  Let's take a look.

Here is the "door" opening to the bathroom and the exterior wood siding separating the (1980's) bathroom addition:

Next we see how Gabe has removed the exterior sheathing:

Even all the way across behind the stairwell:

And what it looks like from the other side:

This is what you can see when perched on the stairwell, looking down:

Gabe is cutting out some of the rotten sheathing behind the stucco before they build up the walls of the foundation:

Originally that was where the tub had been.

                                                                                           Remember this?                                     Now this.

The next step is to start in on building the walls up on the northeast corner, where the porch was.  They start by cutting holes in the wall through to the kitchen so they can work to level the floor first (the wall will be coming out anyways).  Here is the first hole; notice the red laser level line:

It took them a little while to figure everything out, but once they got moving the next day, they were cruising!  Here is another pic of Gabe hacking another hole on the other side:

One final surprise of the day, the cement foundation we got poured was level!!  Check it out:

Yay!!!  The next day, Saturday, Gabe and Dad made a lot of progress.  I missed a special visitor too!  I was working on a school assignment at Mom & Dad's that day, and when Gabe came home, he told me about someone that stopped by whose aunt used to live in the house!  Just a little bit of background--I am doing a historic research project on the house and the Historic District nearby, and in my findings, I came across an article about the woman that used to live in the house, his aunt.  She lives in an assisted living place in a nearby town now.  Her nephew that stopped by gave Gabe his email address so that we could contact him if we had any more questions.  Jackpot!  I also went and did a little research at the county court house a couple of weeks ago and discovered the owners of the house back to 1899.  We hit a snag around 1900, when there was a chancery suit, and no suit number to look it up with.  So, I went down to the archives and spent some time there looking into the situation.  So, I'm still trying to track down the nephew, since the email he gave Gabe is no good.  Too bad!!

So, Mom and I stopped by the house Saturday evening to check out progress and took a few pictures.  They are a bit dark, but you can get the gist:

Looking Northwest

Looking Southwest

And that's a wrap!

Old and New

Howdy folks!!!!

It has been a good three weeks, hasn't it?  Well, I am in good spirits today since I just found out I have been fully accepted into Marymount's Interior Design graduate program!!!  As of today!  I have already been taking grad classes there, but there was one last thing to do: Portfolio Review.  That was a beast, but is finally behind me.  One more week of classes and then one more week of finals/projects, and I am done for the semester and will be able to work on some other projects.  Namely, THIS ONE!!!!!

Ok, back to business.  This one will be relatively short, since I have a lot of school stuff goings on.  But, I did want to keep you in the loop of the exciting things going on our little site out in the country.  Gabe has been very excited lately with the visual progress that is being made.  We have now officially moved from the destruction phase to the construction phase.  Yippee!

A couple of weeks ago, we left with pictures of a concrete form constructed, ready to accept a "mud slab" (I learned this is not actually mud, but what they call a rough poured concrete pad, usually for crawl spaces).  In our case, the mud slab was being poured and leveled over the trenches that were filled with cement to be part of the foundation on the east side of the building.  Here's a good shot:

Notice the wood forms are still in place

We really felt like were making progress now!  As you can see, there is only one remaining existing pier.  The plan is to build a wall of wood around the perimeter of the whole space that has been layered with concrete.  The space on the right used to be a covered porch, but we are going to be extending the kitchen out to meet the wall and the concrete edge as seen.

Here are some pics of the crawl space opening from the original 1890's build:

From the outside, under the existing bathroom space

From the inside, through the floor joists of the existing main living room

They had some extra concrete, so they extended and smoothed it out into the main house crawl space.  Also, you might notice the raccoon trap moved from the crawl space in the previous picture...we never found him; he must have found a new habitat, thankfully.

And a complimentary picture of the happy couple, tools in hand:

In all honesty, I didn't work that day.  I did stay on site and work on one of my projects for school though!!  Gabe and Dad were the ones busy at work.  I must say I was a bit jealous, somehow.  I wanted to be in on the action!  Gabe was working inside on leveling and securing the transition of the dividing wall from the dining room to the main room:

Dad was working on getting the last of the bricks removed from the chimney stack.  We were originally going to leave it as part of the aesthetics of the main room, but when we tore out the floor, we found that it wasn't properly undergirded and was pulling the house off level.  So we are taking it out.  So sad.

                                                                   This is where the stack was

The next day, Saturday (April 14th), you can see Gabe got cement leveled off on top of the existing rubble foundation:

On the other side of the divider, after they removed the rotten wood supporting the studs, they replaced it with new boards.  See before and after below:

Before

After

I thought this next picture showed the old and the new together really well:

And Dad finished removing bricks:

He also carried them all out to the porch to be stacked.  Ei yei yeo, so many!  They are original to the house.  We plan to re-purpose them as pavers for a backdoor patio.  Dad says Gabe is gunna kill him with all the work, but I propose that Gabe is keeping him ALIVE!!!  :)

THEN, they started working on reinforcing and leveling floor joists in the main room.

Dad, what balance you have!!  That must be were I get my balance beam skills

They must have gotten 4 joists reinforced that day.


The next weekend, we made loads of progress.  When I say "we" I really mean Gabe and Dad, because I literally didn't help at all, minus taking a few pictures during breaks from my studies.

They hung more joists, continuing to reinforce the ones on the main floor, almost all the way to the stairs!!  They also took out the 2 risers in the way of the door as you see here:

Then they tackled the kitchen/dining room area, hanging a good lot of them, as well as blocking a few of them too:

At the beginning of the day

At the end: Look at all the joists!  We have a floor skeleton

The proposed dining room/kitchen area

Here is a detail of the joist hangers:

Detail of blocking work:

OH, and more good news!!!  We have an electrical box installed.  It's not hooked up yet, but at least it is there.  :D

And an exterior view of the electrical box

Here is a pic of the beautiful valley views just an eighth of a mile up the road:

Just gawjous!

Ok, now I've gotta run.  Class time!

More Cowbell....I mean Foundation

Ok, now we are finally current.  Today, Gabe went out to the house by himself (AGAIN).  I had some drafting to get done.  We have a wedding to go to tomorrow, so we didn't stay over at Mom and Dad's place tonight.

There were some hired guys setting the form for the mud slab on the east side.

The guys should be back next week to pour the concrete.  There will be one step going down a level.  These areas will be useful for heated storage as well as house the water tank.

Gabe's project was to mix some mortar:

And to level and shore up the foundation at the existing entry from the main area to the existing dining room/kitchen:

Nice and level!!

He also removed about 5 feet of brick from the top of the chimney stack on the 2nd floor.  We plan to save the bricks to re-purpose them in some way.  Here is a before and after:

Before

After

Lots of brick!!

Next step is to have the rest of the brick removed (one and half stories), replace the bottom plate above the newly placed mortar in the divide,  and finally start hanging floor joists.  We hope to have the mud slab be completed by next weekend as well.

And that is a wrap for this weekend.

All about the Foundation

It's time to write again...about the last couple of weekends!  I'm a bit behind, aren't I?  Well, we must consider the fact that I've been working really hard at my semester at school, and this one is a doozie!!

The only time I was on site working was Friday the when the cement truck came to fill up the trenches Gabe and Dad (mostly Gabe :0) dug underneath the east side addition as well as a few dining room interior underpinnings.  It arrived at 2:00, just after we did.  I chatted with a friendly neighbor while Dad and Gabe tried to figure out what would be the best way for the cement truck to back up into the right spot to pour.

They must work quickly!  The next shot Gabe is helping the chute to get directed into the opening for the underpinnings.

Here is a before and after of the underpinnings:

Before

After

It was a lot of work for the guys getting the concrete in the right places.  Gabe was carrying two 5 gallon buckets full of concrete all around!  Yowzers!  I came in handy when it came time to filling in the cinder blocks around the perimeter of the kitchen/dining room crawl space with leftover concrete.  Dad was placing anchor bolts into the wet concrete around the perimeter so as to attach boards for the joist support later.  Here I am, pitching in where I can:

  

It was our warmest day on the job too, getting up in the 80's, in the middle of March, how bizarre!!  Lovely though--lots of things are blooming early.

Gabe spent a good amount of time cleaning the concrete off the buckets and tools too.  What a renaissance man!  :)

I leveled out top of the concrete filled ditches such that about a 1/2" of rebar was sticking up:

Here's another picture from the next day, when it rained:

The next day, Saturday, Gabe went out to the house and I stayed home to work on a project.  He and Dad covered up the underpinnings with vapor barrier and gravel.

He also cleaned up the area in the other crawl space where the wood chuck had been digging around.  My aunt and uncle also stopped by the house, so Mom and I went out to meet them there for a half an hour over lunch.  It was a dreary, rainy day, but it was fun showing off our project!  Gabe finished up the day by making some sawhorses upstairs with some of our reclaimed wood with the fact in mind that we might be getting a good table saw from my uncle.

Last weekend, I didn't make it to the site at all!  On Friday, I went with my mom up to Delaware to a museum for school.  Gabe and Dad were on their own, ha ha.  They worked together to prepare the "outside" crawl space for the mud slab to be poured.  They dug down the grade a bit and laid vapor barrier and gravel.

Voila!

Looks good, eh?  If you are into that sort of thing.  When you are invested in the project, it takes on a whole new meaning :)

Gabe moved the conduit for the power line to the well so that it wouldn't be outside the wall:

We had lumber delivered from a local lumber yard and covered it with plastic in the yard.  Gabe also patched the roof where the was plastic covering the old chimney hole as it had become compromised.

Notice the patch in the upper left hand side

So the next day (Saturday) I was working on a project again and Gabe and Dad were back at it.  The next shot is of the boards having been attached to the perimeter with the anchor bolts.

Here is a wider shot of the crawl space and the lumber that was moved inside.  Also, more plywood is laid out on the joists to give us a little more room.

Gabe also removed some sections of the bottom plate of the dividing wall so he could add mortar to make it level. 

Gabey diligently taking pictures!

They finished up the day by adding some more gravel to the interior crawl space.  It doesn't look like a lot has changed in the last week, but we want to make sure the foundation is solid. So that was that for last weekend.