Christmas Cheer

We even let the old overlords (who kindly let us occupy their basement for 8 months and 9 days) come for stockings and brunch! What fun

09 Nov 08 Alex and the S.A.D. Light

Seasonal Affective Disorder – when you feel the winter blues coming on!

09 Nov 08 Brian is a HERO

The outside looks SO good now! The front with the cedar shingles gave us pause when the warm earthy colour was against the pink styrofoam, but now the pink is GONE and we are really pleased (as you can see we keep putting up photos of what we are so happy about!)

And for the back photo, doesn’t the pond look great in the foreground?

Brian is back at work and travelling to central or east Canada at least 3 times before Christmas so I don’t know how “finished” we shall be before then.

31 Oct 08 East gable is shingled

We feel good about these choices! Our neighbour says that the original owner of the property would approve, so that’s a nice affirmation.

21 Oct 08 One layer at a time

A lot of the phases of house construction kind of disappear when they are completed whereas they scream "UNFINISHED" till they are. Siding is sort of like that. Prior to siding the basic shape of the house is there but usually there is Tyvek flapping in the wind or exposed framing elements. Once siding is done... it all just looks done but not so glaringly done as it was undone. So I have decided to leave strategic portions incomplete to highlight what is done.

This is much as I saw in India once where the ditch diggers would leave columns of soil in the middle of the ditch to confirm the amount of material extracted so there would be a ditch with little columns of dirt. This would be rather interesting for soil scientists who could examine the various soil horizons.

But I digress.

So here are a couple pictures of the siding partially and then completely done on the S and W sides but the soffits remain unfinished. Perhaps they will for a while just to emphasize the doneness..

19 Oct 08 Siding progresses.. with a few diversions

The plan for October was to get the exterior cladding completed prior to hard core winter. This is mostly getting siding hanging on the sides of the house. Alex got a good start during summer but we put that on hold prepping the interior. So I have jumped in and tackled the rest... the higher parts generally. Some MUCH higher.

I started with the south side of the house as this is the highest portions, the furthest from tools, has the most obstructions and worst underlying terrain... all in all the hardest to side by far. I have also taken a couple side projects to run electricity out to the garage (and gas too while I am at it) and needed to stain the cedar where we are siding parts of the upper house in cedar shingles.

So the photos appearing in order are the south side sided almost to the belly board (band of trim that runs around the house), a couple photos of the cedar staining operations and closing with a trench picture.

17 Oct 08 Up to date LR and Kitchen

The house looks great these days. We are so lucky!

06 Oct 08 The first test

We always like to be able to have a whole lot of people over at one time, and so the inaugural big bash was Oct 5 when Jocelyn’s choir, Kokopelli, had their first get together potluck at our home. They sang too, and when I get that figured out we’ll put up a link to that as well! October 4 was J’s 20th birthday, much of which she spent studying for midterms...

05 Oct 08 October...year 2

I have taken October as leave from my day job to work on the house full time again. A year ago it was mainly demolition; this year all construction. Well a bit of clean up too, just so we can find tools and materials for the construction part.

To judge progress we need a baseline. Since my emphasis is the exterior, I have included a few photos of the current exterior status. Hopefully the changes will be noticeable soon. Photos are from the E (front), W (back), N (driveway side) and SW (W and S side of house).

The plan is to finish off the siding and then proceed on with a few other minor tasks. The neighbors will be sorely disappointed to see the pink disappear and in particular will miss the vicious flapping sound of loose tyvek in the wind. I am guessing they will get used to it.

18 Sep 08 Living in the house

It feels like home and sometimes we don’t even notice that it’s not done! One can be very grateful for small things (towel bars and shelving in closets).

The kitchen is (thank heavens) functional and we have had 12 guests for dinner, and more than 8 for supper a few times now. Our first guests have come to enjoy the guestroom (with all the windows!) and the first railings are up to protect us from a 9 ft drop. Bliss!

Brian is taking October to finish the exterior (and hopefully a few interior things too).

12 Aug 08 Update

We are all fascinated by the new washer and dryer!

26 Jul 08 Camping at the house

Well we ARE sleeping at the house – the first time was last night (July 26 since we couldn’t make it for our 26th anniversary on July 17).

We are finding it a little weird to be living there – or camping as we call it. I’m including photos of the “kitchen” (Brian is working on the sink counter today), Amelia fixing up her closet with the great Ikea closet gadgets, and the current set up in the living room.

It is strangely peaceful to wake up with the view of trees outside the window – it really feels like a long distance from “town” when we are in reality more in the centre than ever. I’m looking forward to screens though – moths love the light and it was hot last night so we had the windows wide open. I’d forgotten to call the supplier for screens and handles (we have one handle in the house!).

06 Jul 08 Inching forward

Flooring is proceeding apace... Cutting tile, choosing the wood, and we’ve started staining the front door – quite different from painting!

23 jun 08 Painting begins

Well more correctly began the weekend of the 14th with Brian and Alex applying about 40 gals (160 litres) of paint. We used a sprayer to apply the primer and the white ceiling paint and the drywall taping disappeared into a sterile white. Once the primer was done we started applying colours and when the paint was dry putting some tile in. All in all progress is inexorably moving forward.

The whole issue of colour warrants another post but I will close with a lesson I learned while mixing tile adhesive. Rubber gloves, no matter how good they are will not keep your hands dry if you put them too deep into water or run the hose in the opening. My mother tells me this is a lesson I repeatedly failed to learn as a child with rubber boots and puddles.

The photos are after the walls were primed and ceilings painted, another as colour began to find its way back onto the walls and the third of the tiling process. More later...

12 Jun 08 An update to the front

Siding is slowly going up and now we can begin to see what the front of the house will look like with less and less pink foam showing. Inside the taping is pretty well done and painting has commenced.... Stay tuned for more photos soon.

Oh and the second photo is one I took in Flin Flon Tuesday afternoon. If I could
stay home more this might go faster. but in the meantime Alex labours on. Kept me company till 2330 tonight.

cheers

07 Jun 08 Progress Report

01 Jun 08 Drywall up

17 Mar 08 More helpers

Well the roofing is all done now and progress seems to slow down as we fill in the bits and pieces that really make a house work. One of those things is of course the plumbing which is all roughed in now and the heating ducts that are almost finished. The processing of putting in those pieces involves cutting out a lot of the framing that was just put in. The great challenge of the general contractor is to keep the plumbers and tinsmiths from cutting out significant structural members and the like. As this process goes on there are a few new holes to cut so we once again get to use the preferred tool of demolition the reciprocating saw (or in the vernacular... the sawzall). We even managed to recruit some new helpers in this phase.

Occasionally a hole gets cut where it ought not to be and then a patch gets put in but mostly we are mainly cutting holes for pipes of one sort or another and generating a large amount of small irregularly shaped wood and sawdust...

26 May 08 Consider

Consider the view from the Living Room window... I was unable to capture the ballerina grace of the apple tree in full blossom...

And consider the complicated heating system of our Folly.