Wednesday, May 25, 2016

Mid-Week Exhaustion

Here it is Wednesday already and I have only shared one post from our stay-at-home-and-work-on-on-the-house vacation. I can explain. It is called “EXHAUSTION”. I found muscles I forgot I had, and some I never knew existed.

The goal for Monday morning was to remove the old roof and lay the insulation. The roofers were to be here Tuesday so we had no time to waste. I had already alerted Jim that I would do my best on the roof but even the 12 foot roof above the deck gave me the willies. Jim, oh my courageous Jim, diligently climbed the ladder to the roof. I heard him shuffle across to the other side, and then …nothing. After seeing him remove the chimney the day before I was  only concerned with my own fear of heights. The loose stone from the chimney mortar caused him to pause a moment, then, with a wavering voice, he called me to the bottom of the ladder and said “I don’t think I can do this”. To which I replied, “Thank goodness you have come to your senses. Now get down here, there is no shortage of work to be done.” 


I heard Jim’s phone ring while he was up very high on a ladder. First delivery of the day was just around the corner. A box truck carrying our four new doors pulled up and quickly place the doors neatly against the wall. One down, one to go.




It is good to have someone tall in the family when trying to paint the exterior of the house. If you didn’t notice in the photos from Part 1, the very peak of the house was not painted. We had to wait till Ethan was available to reach the spots us people of average height cannot. Luckily he showed up Monday morning. Ethan and Jim wasted no time slapping a coat of primer on nearly the whole house. Oh darn. Both ladders were occupied and there was none for little ole me. I figured I would just have to find something to do where I could keep both feet on the ground. 

Donning a face mask, gloves, and steel toed shoes I set to work clearing out drywall and debris we had demoed on the second floor.
As I was tossing debris out the window from the top floor I witnessed a very large truck trying to make a very sharp turn at the end of the street. Second delivery had found its way. This time Ethan had to come down from the porch roof to move his car. The truck went from corner to corner of our driveway. The driver was very intrigued and impressed with our little cottage. After placing the insulation in the garage he wished us well and went on to his next delivery.
 

 Just as we were rapping up I got an email from Rock Bottom Brewery, “$10 Beer and Burger Special”. I didn’t have to ask the guys twice. After cleaning up and securing everything we enjoyed our sweet reward.

Tuesday was more of the same. Scraping. Priming. Painting. Tossing. Cleaning. Jim did get kudos from the Duke Electric Project Manager. He came to give Jim a preliminary inspection of the new electric service Jim installed. He said it was better than a lot of contractors and we would have no problem passing the city inspection scheduled for later in the week.

The roofing company called to let us know they would be out in a day or two to get a signature on the new Statement of Work so that they could remove the old roof before installing the new one. $2,800 is a lot, but definitely worth it to avoid any injuries or visits to the ER.


We had intended to participate in a fund raiser for Queen City Bike that was taking place at Rhinegeist Brewery on Tuesday night and felt we should not disappoint those counting on our contribution. So, after cleaning up we drove downtown once again for a little well-deserved refreshment.









Wednesday, May 25th and all is well. Jim and I did more scraping, priming, …you get the idea. I believe Jim would have made the Hofmann’s proud.


We had a lot of discussion about what type of ceiling we want in the bedrooms, now that the insulation will be on the inside of the house, as opposed to the exterior of the roof. I think we settled on planking or bead board to stick with cottage theme.

I felt I should avoid any libations the third night in a row. We decided a good German meal at Ron’s Roost was in order.


We made it past the middle of the week. Here’s hoping we can endure another several days of physical exertion. With all the back-and-forth getting rid of debris and up-and-down on ladders we both achieved nearly 15,000 steps, according to Garmin.

Sunday, May 22, 2016

Time for the Heavy Lifting

Starting Friday, May 20th Jim and I are both on “vacation”. Honestly, we will be pulling off a roof and ripping out drywall. If anyone has any pent-up anxiety and needs a release, message me. I will give you the address and put a sledgehammer in your hands.

Saturday and Sunday was mostly prep work for the new roof. The insulation that we are laying beneath the steel roof was to be delivered first thing Monday morning. We wanted to get a few particular spots painted before the new roof was on. But, before we could paint we had to scrape. And scrape. And scrape.


Jim scaled the old ladder and slapped on the paint like a regular Hofmann.



                                 
Next Jim climbed up to check out the old roof and decided to go ahead and remove the chimney. There wasn’t much holding it in place so the bricks came tumbling down, one after another. Luckily no animals were hurt in the filming of this episode. The only fatality was a can of bright red paint that Jill was using next door. The plastic lid of the sample jar was no match for the weight of a falling brick. Thank goodness we weren’t planning on keeping that deck.

We managed to salvage about 75% of the bricks and two of the flues. We had said we wanted an outdoor brick oven on the patio. I guess we know where the brick will be coming from…
 


Stay tuned for updates this week.