5 Days...

It's been very rainy here for the past week, it seems. But still, work is going on at the house. I stopped by on my lunch break today because I hadn't been down there to talk with the contractors since Tuesday, my last day off. After work, I managed to take a few pictures.

Walking in, I customarily turned to my right to see the back yard more clearly. Nothing has really been done here, but the contractors gently encouraged the back door on what was the screened-in porch to give up the fight. And this gave a more cohesive view out of the back of the house.
Also see how the wall on the left bumps out about two feet? Then bumps out again? That's the original layout of this wall, I chose to use it to my advantage in moving the bedroom wall out in the kitchen, where this will not be noticeable, once its all sheet-rocked.

This picture seems a little dark, but the flash was on. A weird play of natural light verses the flash happens in the great room, as it is now. You can make out the outline (the dark wood) of the doorway into the kitchen, where through it, you can see the outline of the back door (new wood) in the kitchen. See how this will beckon you outside?

Just to the right of the doorways, you can see the side profile of the wall they moved out into the kitchen from the bedroom. This wall is fully in the kitchen--- it is behind the bump out I mentioned earlier. The other new wall you see to the right is the one with the doorways to the bathroom and utility rooms off of the dining area, the first bump out.

I had to squirrel across the exposed floor joists again in the kitchen to get this shot. It's a front on view of the moved bedroom wall, the old one behind it having been removed today.

Looking down, you can see the joists reattached to what was the bowed out wall, but I was trying to show just how much they jacked up the house and leveled it here...

I didn't have a measuring tape but found one of the contractor's cups to place on the 4x4 along the bottom. This was the P.O.'s previous attempt to acknowledge the problem of the unattached joists and bowed out wall. But this angle still isn't right.

Knowing how big the cup is, you can maybe better estimate the difference in where the floor was and where it is now. But maybe not. The cup is sitting on the level where the joists use to rest. And now they have been lifted almost an entire Styrofoam cup. Not the best tool to use, but I had to use what I had and I'm not MacGyver.

Back to the walls, then. This is the other side of the bedroom wall. These are small rooms with high ceilings, but its hard to capture them in pictures. The space in person seems bigger.

They did a lot of smaller things today, in addition to jacking up and leveling the opposite side of the house, too. For instance, they replaced the 4x4 that was in this corner with an old one, taken from another wall that was removed.

They also began rebuilding this wall in the bathroom/laundry area. Not big exciting changes to most, but a small succession of big deals to me.

I stayed there in the quiet house for a long time after I took these pictures, contemplating the new spaces, what they would look like finished, and what my life would be like living here. I spent a lot of time looking out back into the yard, watching it rain and just as much time imagining the bathroom, utility room, closet, and kitchen areas. I kind of figured out where appliances would go and along what walls the furniture would fit in other rooms. I envisioned a new back porch on the house and a fence in the backyard. I played around with where I wanted light fixtures...

It was very peaceful today, to me. I was able to touch the progress, to stand in the spaces that I had only imagined two years ago when the house was two apartments. It was all so real to me, so tangible, so within reach and nearer to completion. It was all very satisfying and I felt like everything so far, all the waiting and worrying and budgeting, has been worth it. Today, for the first time, standing in the sawdust, I saw not my house, but my home.

Day 4 brings Doorways

Walking up to the front porch today after work, I immediately saw proof of the work being done.

The contractors had made a makeshift sawhorse/workbench. Look at all that progress on the floor!

When I walked in, I immediately looked up and saw that the contractors had replaced the ceiling rafter where the chimney for the fireplace was. This particular section of rafter had been pieced together all sorts of ways when the house was built, and was stable, but once the chimney came down, the pieces kind of scissored apart.

When I looked down, I noticed the glow of daylight from outside. I decided to go back in the yard to investigate this.

I passed this pile the way; obviously the sill here had failed, too. This is the same wall that was bowed out in the kitchen and had been rebuilt.

They did a good job of it, though. It looks like they came down this wall until they found good wood, and then kept going just for good measure. This was a happy find. I'm glad the contractors are as thorough as they are.

Back inside I found DOORWAYS! for the bathroom and the utility room. I think this wall is almost finished, if not already.

Straight ahead, we find the back doorway framed up. It lines up nicely with the kitchen doorway from the great room, and once the back porch is finished being demoed, it will be a really nice view.

The wall between the kitchen and master bedroom was also moved today, out about a foot. This may not seem like much, but in a small room it will make a big difference. Otherwise this space would just have been wasted 'walk-by' space in the kitchen, due to all the doorways.

Same wall, opposite view. You can see the old wall more clearly here, still in place. They had to build the new wall before taking down the old. They also moved the door from the center of the wall to one corner, to allow more wall space in the room for furniture.

A top-down picture, here. My foot is on the old wall, the new one is in front of me. It's a solid foot gained, maybe a few inches more. I'm glad we could do this.

Here is a view of the wall and doorway going into the master closet. It's a little room, but it will be a big closet. I don't have much storage space in the house, and the attic will be taken up by duct work, so this will be overflow storage as well as a huge closet.

This is a random shot of a piece of dead wood I found on the floor. I wish you could have seen it in person, it literally feathers out like bad 80's hair. It was more air than anything. It's scary to think this was somewhere in my house, supporting something.

So much difference a day makes! Already I'm awaiting tomorrow's work.

Day 3

Today was Day THREE with the Flu Contractor, and I could hardly keep myself from the house in anticipation of what might be going on and getting done. I stayed away, though, and out of the contractors' way, until I knew they'd be done for the day. Plus we'd scheduled a meeting with an electrician down at the house in the afternoon, so I waited semi-patiently. After the electrician left, I began taking pictures...

This is the corner of the closet of the master bedroom, where they replaced the sills. The contractors also began sister-ing the old studs to new ones.

Now we've turned around to face the opposite corner and here you see the previously finished floor substructure and sills running between the closet and master bedroom and, in the distance, the rebuilt back wall in the kitchen.

Same new wall in the kitchen, with its new sill. To the right is what is left of the back porch and a pile of debris. Straight ahead is the bowed out wall in the kitchen.

This corner looks like a mess, and it is, but it's where the wall we were just on and the bowed out wall meet, but there's something different from yesterday--- the wall has been jacked up and leveled...

And the studs here have been sister-ed, too. But the bowed out wall...

Has been reattached to the house! And the sill has been repaired! I kind of wish I had stopped in today just to see how they accomplished this feat.

You might remember this picture angle from yesterday, but today the joists are definitely attached and the wall is flush with the house and level and perfect. You may see some odd lumber here and there and supports, but that's what's left from their maneuvering today.

This is a shot from farther away of the back wall of the kitchen, the one in the process of being rebuilt, and Daddy checking out the workmanship. The right corner has been brought up, as has the left, but the middle still sags a bit, but the pier here had deteriorated and the contractors haven't built a new one back yet.

All in all, an extremely productive day. I had a very good bid from the electrician, and I'm pretty sure I'll go with him. I'd gotten another bid a while back, and this new guy came in much lower, mainly because the extent of the demo has left the house open and exposed, as it would be in a new home, so he's giving me the 'new build' price.


I also bought my first piece of furniture for the house today, but I'll save that for another post.

Day 2 with the Flu Contractor

Since the weather was beautiful outside today, and no chance of rain in sight, I hardly expected to see the guys working on my house. I thought that last Friday was just because they had been rained out of their other jobs. And they would start, for real, in another week as the Flu Contractor stated. It turns out, I was happily mistaken.

After running a few errands downtown (and spotting some simple antique stained glass windows for sale in my price range--- mental note, mind you), I drove by my house to see if any any work was going on. I stopped in, met two of the guys I didn't meet Friday, and we discussed the placement of doors and the layout of the bathroom and utility room. But more on that, later. First, pictures!

Some of these came out dark. I'm not sure if my camera settings are wonky or if it was just that bright in the house, because there was a lot of daylight coming in with, what, the back wall of the house being open. This is the view from my front door. You can click it to make the picture more easily viewable.

A picture of the bathroom and its new floor substructure. A closet for the little bedroom will go in here, as well as the utility room. The space in the hallway behind will go into these rooms as well.

We're standing at the kitchen doorway, looking out into the backyard. The kitchen doorway and the backdoor of the house will be lined up sort of like this, so that when you walk into the Great Room, you can see straight out to the backyard. It's a visual trick to make the space seem larger. This has been a plan of mine all along, but not until today could you really see it. Of course, in the future, the backyard will beckon you outside, but that's a project for later.

I'm out on the gangplank over the floor joists admiring the new sill and beginnings of the new back wall in the kitchen. The Contractors will bulk up this wall once they build in the doorways, right now the studs are for weight support, only. Also, you may notice the slant in the wall. The whole back of the house will be jacked up and leveled once they reattach the bowed wall and finish the sill repair and replacement.

Same place on the gangplank, looking into the closet off the master bedroom. You can see daylight where they had to remove the siding in order to tear out the old sills and replace them.

Further back, standing in the Dining Area of the Great Room, looking at the kitchen wall that separates these areas. You see the doorway which will remain in place, open and cased. I'm contemplating having an opening in the wall to the left of the doorway as well, a little higher than counter height, and not a true bar. Just an open, cased window, with the sink below it on the opposite side... Just a thought. I don't want the space too open, and I want a break in room color that only walls can give, for the kitchen. But I want the two rooms to speak to one another and flow.

In the master bedroom now, looking at the replaced sills and new floor structure. That's going to be one big closet area. Again, the studs are just there to hold weight. We talked about door placement here, too. It will be cheated to the left, off center, with enough room left so that shelves can be on all walls, maximizing the storage space.

I'm out in the backyard, now, looking back towards the house. What is left of this whole screened-in porch will be demoed. It was an add-on, anyway. I want to put one back eventually, but won't have the money right away. But look at the view. See the double windows at the front of the house? The front door is just to the left of them, on a side wall. This is what I was talking about earlier, with having clean and clear sight lines.

This is part of the junk pile. Since I don't have a dumpster at the moment, I'm having them pile up debris. Click on this to see the extent of the rot and termite damage to the sills and other lumber that were the walls.

Here, I'm situated about where the back door will be in the kitchen. I guess this was my blog post theme of the day. Ignore the wire hanging down precariously. See the stud wall immediately in front of us? This is the wall I'm thinking about adding the open window pass through between the kitchen and Great Room, in addition to the open doorway.

I spoke with the contractors for a while about door placement, so from here they can finish the walls to where we talked about putting the doors. Also, with their expertise, we mapped out the layout of the bathroom and the utility room, and decided that these will in fact be two smaller rooms in the big bathroom area, both having doors in the dining area. The bathroom door will swing in and the utility room door will swing out. I'm thinking maybe frosted glass multi-paned french doors here, mimicking a set but opening into two different rooms. These will let in light, address privacy matters, and look a little dressier than standard doors. I saw some pine interior doors at Lowe's that I found to be reasonably priced, even if I have to frost the glass myself. The contractors are also going to leave enough space around all the doors in the house for wide trim, if it's in the budget down the road.

So that's the end of the second day. Much more will happen tomorrow. I'm very excited about the progress so far. Hopefully they'll be done by the end of this week. Next will be getting my demo contractor back in to finish work, clean up, and start framing the non-load bearing walls. Maybe even installing the new windows. Then I'll be setting up appointments with the air conditioner guy, the plumber, and the electrician.

I guess I'll have to schedule an inspection by City Hall, though, too.

But first I'll have to get the house secure again, by getting demo contractor in to replace siding and... oh. Hmm, I guess I need to buy a back door.

Work done! New lumber! Sawdust!

This is what greeted me when I came up the steps to the front porch. Sawdust!

The Flu Contractor started working on my house last Friday (03/27/09). Here are the pictures I took once I got off of work and they were done for the day and weekend. They work 8am-4pm, Monday through Friday, and chose to start on a Friday because the weather rained them out of their other projects.

I was very cheerful all day and beyond ecstatic because the work of putting back had begun. So far with the house, everything I'd done was taking away. All good, like taking away the two apartments, taking away the gross kitchens and bathrooms, taking away the storm damaged roof, taking away the jungle in the back yard, taking away the bamboo... But last Friday, I began putting back.

I don't think anyone has ever been as excited as I was to see scrap lumber last Friday...

And once I was inside the door, I found this, new lumber! So, being the dork about my house that I am, I took a picture. Apparently I have no shame when it comes to my house.

This is most definitely picture-worthy, though. New sills, a couple of new foundation piers, and the beginnings of new framing for a new floor in the bathroom. New, new, new!

Here we are at the kitchen door, looking at the complete absence of a back wall to the house. Unless you count the little section of three studs and exterior siding on the back porch.

I squirreled across the kitchen floor joists to get a closer look. This mesmerized me for some reason. I think it was a twist on reality. I knew what had been there, and what should be there, but nothing was there. Just air.

I'm about twelve feet over now, in the master bedroom, looking at another lack of wall and lack of floor. I knew this was all coming out, the rotten wood in order to fix it but, I just... some things you can't imagine.

Looking down to your right from the view above, at the cuts made and the new floor in progress. Again, this is the floor of what will be the master closet.

I'm back now to the center of the house, on the other side of the new bathroom floor. I'm in the hallway/old enclosed side porch which will donate its space to the bathroom.

It was getting dark at this point, so I locked up and came home, my imagination running wild with what it would look like in a week, or a month, or three months. Of how long would it actually take to get it looking like a house again...

the saga, revisited...

Another two weeks have gone by, but let's catch up again on the saga:

It turns out the contractor I interviewed and took on a walk through of the house had either the flu or walking pneumonia for a week and a half, which explains why he didn't get back in touch with me. I actually found this out when I called another potential contractor about the work... It turns out the second guy didn't get his license last summer when the big law changed in Georgia, but he recommended the first guy I talked to. I told second guy that I had already spoken with first guy, and the second guy told me that first guy had been sick.

Sorry if that was confusing.

Long story short (too late), walking pneumonia guy returned my call a day or two later and proposed a bid, or rather, a strategy. And after a week of contemplation and talking to my family, I accepted.

This was all two weeks ago, as is my updating fashion. But here's where my demo contractor left off, and a review (with images!) of the problems:

This is my kitchen floor. And the dirt below it. These are the floor joists that aren't attached to the wall. At all. Any of them. Bad angle, but this a recap, remember? The wall to your diagonal left is the bowed-out wall.

This is the view looking through the back wall of the kitchen onto the back porch area, which also at some point became the bathroom area for Apartment 1. Notice the lack of floor where the bathroom was- it was beyond rotten and terrible. To your left you see the screened-in porch floor.

Here I'm standing in what will be the master closet, looking out across what was the bathroom and onto the back porch. This was the the place where the hot water heaters lived, and there was no access out onto this porch from the house. You had to climb through the jungle to get here.

I'm standing on the dirt below where the bathroom was, with a close up of the sill here, just to show you how badly these needed to be replaced.

And here we have the sill in the bathroom for Apartment B, where the bathroom will go back.

I had to wedge myself against stacked lumber, two displaced mantels, and a set of scaffolding to get this picture, but it is of the bowed-out kitchen wall and the floating floor joists.

So, Flu Contractor is going to replace the sills around the master closet, the sills in the bathroom in the center of the house, and the sills of two walls in the kitchen. He will fix the bowed-out wall in the kitchen correctly, and entirely rebuild the back wall in the kitchen. He will also move the load-bearing wall that sits in-between the kitchen and master bath out about a foot to 18 inches, whatever the sister-ed rafters above allow without having to change the foundation below.

He estimates that this will take a week.

dumpster M.I.A.

Tuesday morning on my way to work, I noticed that the construction dumpster that usually resides outside my house was gone. I hadn't called to have them dump it, as it was only a quarter-ways full, if that.

I called the dumpster company and they tell me that there was a vehicle accident in front of my house (minor, I'm positive) and that the people involved blamed the line-of-sight and view blockage of my dumpster, since it was parked in the street. The police called the dumpster company and asked them to remove it.

Now, I have had a dumpster outside my house sometimes for weeks at a time, and never have there been any problems. If you use common sense while driving, there isn't an issue. The street is a pretty slow street anyway, and is kind of on a hill, so you can see far enough ahead of you to tell what traffic is like...

Anyway, no charge for the dumpster removal. For the actual dumping, I'm not sure. And no charge to bring a dumpster back, when I need it again. Since I have no driveway, I guess I'll have to start a yard pile of stuff to be hauled away, then when the pile gets big enough, rent a dumpster for the day and fill it and dump it ASAP.

Fun note of the day: someone (bad neighbors) threw an old-school, huge projection tv in my dumpster last week. And also some old broken children's toys in my backyard, which was clean. I know the tv was theirs because it was seen, by multiple people, outside their house. I wouldn't be surprised if the dumpster/car fiasco had something to do with them as well.

...

I took a potential licensed contractor on a walk through of the house about two weeks ago. Still haven't heard from him. Left him a voice mail yesterday morning, but he hasn't returned my call yet. I guess tomorrow I'll start calling other licensed contractors and setting up times to meet.

I am pretty good at staying optimistic but these setbacks lately have really taken a toll on me. It feels like every time I get excited about the house again, something else pops up and brings me back down.

Maybe timing is everything. And, like I've said many times before, I have more time than money at this point. But it sure is frustrating.