Keeping Up With The Us's

No, seriously, you can't keep up with us. Don't even try. We're in a time warp mach 7 warp speed 10 black hole cheetah jet plane race car rocket ship... thing. It's fast.

Yesterday, while Mike and I were working, the guys were back at our house... well, working. (Strange to leave people at our house working while we're not there. I know normal people do this all the time.)

By the time we got home, there was a ton accomplished.

Stripping at the tippidy top of the house was completed. The right side upstairs window was removed. Plywood was installed. TyVek was stapled. The window was re-installed. And shingling continued - now up to the half-way point of the upstairs window.

On the side of the house, the mess is gone! Unfortunately, Mike forgot that the dump is closed on Tuesday. But our guy went there anyway with a truckload to get rid of... and paid $40 to dump it. Gulp. Our dump sticker is only $30 for the year and that covers all construction debris free of charge. Ugh! What's done was done and the good news is, it's all gone now at least.

Inside, the octagonal window is in! And oh my god do I love it! I look out of it and I see the beautiful japanese maple we planted a few short years ago and I can imagine what it will be to look out and see the tree, large and beautiful over the side yard. I love love love love it.

Today, the guys were due back over to finish off that tippidy top portion of shingling. And then we're done with the guys. Mike is going to do the siding on the right side of the house himself over the weekend. If I can manage to escape outside, I may try and do some of the trim painting.

Manic Monday

The insane plan that I outlined yesterday worked only partially. (What do you expect? It was insane.) Kudos to the guys for putting forth a great effort and accomplishing all that they did!

Here's the wide shot - as you can see, that living room window is back in place and shingles are up all the way past the top of that window.

The very tippidy top near the roof has yet to be completed. 

The other side is where things get interesting. As you can see, the entire thing has been stripped. What you can't see? We avoided a HUGE step in the process... The plywood! We assumed that like the rest of the house, this side's original barn board exterior (that had been covered first by shingles and then blue cement board siding over that) would be in such poor condition that it would need to be re-covered with plywood. Like the house's back side, adding plywood would mean removing the two windows you see pictured and re-installing them post-plywood. Pain-in-the-butt.

Removing and re-installing those two windows would also have screwed up the interior window trim, which would have to be thrown out and re-done as well to accommodate a new plus-plywood depth.

Luckily, this is the one and only side that the barn board was in good enough condition not to require plywood. The guys stripped it down and stapled up the Tyvek.

Also what you can't see, the octagonal window hole has been cut on the outside side. The guys had to move a stud and make several pain-in-the-butt changes to get it to fit where we wanted it to fit. Inside, the drywall is the only thing left that needs to be cut before the window can be actually installed.

Before Shot - Window to go above that table

 

Window Ready to Go

Mike is at work today, but his guys are back at our house to work on that tippidy top portion. Mike picked up some more shingles at the DeepHo last night... gulp. I know this little spending spree is almost over - and we'll be able to return a heck of a lot of plywood that was meant for that other side. I'm looking forward to having it done and taking a much-deserved break to catch up financially, mentally, physically.... I know Mike is too.

Wow, Wall

Mike is impressing me with his aggressive exterior schedule thus far. In the past couple days, he purchased all the plywood and trim boards, plywooded the area on one stripped side, and then completed trim and shingling on that same side!

There's all the wood.

Newly shingled.

And he also brought home scaffolding from work tonight in preparation for a big working weekend. Monday, he's enlisted some friends to come over. They're going to try and bang out the entire thing in one days time. 12-7pm. Wow just doesn't say enough,

The Continuation...

Friday night, the stomach bug hit me and I suffered, hard, for the next 10 or so hours. Saturday morning, I awoke in absolute agony and exhaustion. Cats meowing. Kid crying. I could barely do anything without sitting down to rest for a few minutes in between each small action. Despite my mom, who came over to let me rest for a while, it was a difficult and trying day. Mike was late coming home, buying a guitar. I was spent.

Sunday morning I felt much better, rested, and hungry. Good sign. I ate a normal breakfast. Suddenly, it was back to business as usual. Our neighbor was over around 10am and he and Mike completed the painting in the kitchen. Then, Mike was on his own. He put the window trim back on. He nailed down some plywood to match the thickness of the tile where there had previously not been tile. He was mauled by a falling cactus. (Don’t try and catch your cactus.) And Sunday ended.

The only small bit of work that remains in the kitchen is the relocation of two pipes – heat for the upstairs. It should not be a problem. Tomorrow, I’ve got to get on the phone with the kitchen guy and the production people to try and coordinate this installation. Apparently, it’s going to take longer then I imagined. I was thinking just a full day of work to get these things up and set… But maybe I’m the crazy one for thinking such a thing.

It’s been a full official week now and one of the worst I’ve had in a while. Here’s to good times ahead – I know they’re just on the horizon. Just have to get there.

Stairs, Windows, and Random Plywood

Mike was feeling much better this Sunday. And, with cabin fever setting in, and Timmy due over (haha due-over) to work on the stairs, Mike decided to get himself back to work on the kitchen window. I had some friends coming over at 2:30pm, so the guys were on a strict stop-everything a las 2:30 deadline.

Mike measured the wall and the window, allowing for new-fridge and future-corner-cabinet width. Then, we decided on the exact placement of the new window.

Next step was to create the window frame and insulate the sans-window area. Then came the difficult part. You see - our mudroom was an addition, tacked on to what used to be a cement porch. Unfortunately, when they joined the exterior mudroom wall to the exterior kitchen wall, they did not do a very good job. The two walls are at two different depths....

So... if we want to side that entire side with siding and make it look like a nice, one-piece, continuous house with no stoopid additions that weren't done correctly... We would need to build out the kitchen wall to match the depth of the mudroom wall. Build it out how? Plywood. Layers of plywood.

Lucky for us, we happened to have plywood. Plywood in the basement, plywood in the garage, plywood in the garage addition... plywood plywood everywhere! Leftover from this that or the other project.

 

You can see here the puzzle of plywood Mike and our neighbor Richard put together. Amazing that we just happened to have just enough to complete the job. Unfortunately, the hunt for plywood + cutting of the plywood + installation of the plywood = longer then expected. Mike was hoping to be able to install the window before the 2:30 deadline, but just couldn't make it. He papered the plywood and called it done for the day.

MEANWHILE! Timmy was hard at work on the side steps. To start, he had to pull up some of the decking to make room for the first post. The second post went down on top of the footing Mike poured last weekend.

From there, it was a simple matter of framing and decking the landing, then the first step. By the time my guests were arriving between 2:30 and 3:00, they had a step to enter on. And by the time they left around 5:30, they had a second step to exit on.

Mike will need to pour some additional concrete for the final groundish-level landing step, but all in all, I'm totally psyched about how the steps came out. Mike decided to make them nice and big - key for bringing up large items, large amounts of people, large people, and holding hands with kids down the stairs.

To finish off the kitchen wall for temporary, Mike put up tar paper. This weekend, the window goes in, do or die. And Timmy will be back on Sunday as well. It's a whole new look for the holidays!

We're so happy to be wrapping up our summer/fall projects. Winter once again will take us indoors, where the basement bathroom will be taking shape soon.

PS - Guess who couldn't resist the Home Depot black Friday appliance sale? I GOT MY FRIDGE! It's the LG model lfx28978ST.... and I saved over $800. The MSRP is $2700 .... I bought for $1899. WITH 18 months of 0% financing and a 4 year extended warranty for only $80 extra!!! Boo-Yah! Only problem is I'll have to wait until Feb 5th for delivery. Backorder.

Second Time These Windows Sent Somebody to the Hospital

An explanation for that title is certainly due. Several years ago - pre-baby, pre-prego, for sure, I had a TRIP at my house. (TRIP = Totally Random Incredible Party) This TRIP was in honor of my bday, a small affair that turned a little crazay thanks to a little green fairie.

We were all in the kitchen when Mike tripped (literally this time) and his hand landed on one of the old windows... and when right through the glass. And me? I was so excited about the window breaking. "I hate these windows!" I think I yelled, and started punching out the remaining glass panes. I may have destroyed the neighborhood had the guys not pulled me away to the sink, where they washed my now bloody hand and bandaided me up. Then I ran off and started dancin' but that's another story.

Mike and I post-accident at the TRIP with Wigs!

The next morning, Mike and I woke up with swollen, painful wounds on our punching hands and had a nifty story to tell the morning crew at the ER.


That was the FIRST time the old kitchen windows sent someone to the hospital. Now let me set you up for the second time.

Sunday, Timmy's son had a brand new baby - so he was definitely excused for stair-duty. But Mike decided to get started anyway. He dug and poured the one needed sonotube footing.

He also prepared and poured the larger slab footing.

But after that, he was excited to rip off the siding on the kitchen. Excited... PSHAW. You couldn't keep that man from his mission. But I'm proud to say, he set himself a stop point. He'd take the siding off, but not the old shingles underneath. Good thing. If the shingles came off, that was the point of no return. Shingles off - you have to put up plywood, take out the old windows, and tyvek. And at this point it was 1pm, soooo... yeah. Shingles off - he'd be working til midnight.

I'm proud to say he stuck to his stop point too! He took off the siding and then cleaned up and that was it!

Here was the outside of the kitchen - this morning.

We're getting to the hospital story now...

So today Mike got some free time and decided to finish up the job. He took off all the shingles and repaired the sill, which was leaking air like crazy. I talked to Mike on the phone and he said he could already feel a difference in how the room was holding heat. Awesome, I thought.

Now... somewhere between the shingles off and the plywood on, there was an incident. I'm still not quite sure of the details, but basically - nail gun + foot = mucho malo. (Our framing gun has gained itself a little bit of a temperamental reputation. I'm scared of it, personally.) Thinking it wasn't so bad, Mike kept on working. He took out the windows and completed the plywood.

Unfortunately, by the time I got home from work, he was in a whole bunch of pain and decided to go to the ER. He's probably on his way back right now, actually. He sent me a text and said they had to cut into his foot. Sounds terrible! I almost don't want to hear the details. And I definitely don't want to see the foot, but I know that's the first thing he's going to want to show me.

Anyway! (I'm not thinking about it!) Those windows were cursed, and I'm so happy they're gone. This is not a trilogy!

Window Wating

What a difference from last weekend's hustle and bustle! This one was calm in comparison - a much needed breather for both of us, for sure. Sunday was calmer then calm, since the guys weren't able to come by to work on the porch. Stairs next weekend! We even have the materials list in hand and soon to be ordered up.

We actually attempted to go to Home Depot, since we needed less then our usual HUGE load of materials. Plus, I wanted to check out and purchase a big 'ol window for the kitchen. (Tax credit expires 12/31 people!) But, once again, HD let us down. They didn't have the right length of board. Ok, fine. I'll give them that. So Mike went to pick out the next longer, no problem. But all the boards were of very poor quality. He gave in quickly. We didn't need them at that very moment anyway, so why not order them?

Moving on to the kitchen window.
We currently have dos kitchen windows with the fridge in between.

We'd like to push the fridge over to the left, ditch that first left-side window, and install a larger window centered on the right hand side. A little Photoshop action and you can see the possible result:

Pretty sweet, right? Imagine this with a new fridge.... oooo, so cool. (Literally)

So I researched the possible fridges I might want and found that they all were about 36" wide. (By the by, that's like 6" wider then our current fridge... imagine the space!) I then measured the approx space taken up by our corner cabinet, since we'd need to install a second one to butt up to the fridge. That was about 6" additional. In total, I figured we'd have a max rough opening size of 60" by 48" - and that's the MAX.

Back at the 'ol HD, we checked out the window section. I didn't imagine they'd have anything in stock to meet our needs. I thought we'd be ordering something for sure. But believe it or not, they had a 4' x 4' sliding glass window with screen in stock for the low low price of just $107.

That seemed like a super low price to me. For some reason, I had it stuck in my head that we paid around $100 for the small sliding window above our stove. Maybe not.

Then I started thinking out loud, well we've got more room then that. Maybe this is going to be too small. But as Mike pointed out, "How big a view of the DRIVEWAY do you want."

Excellent point.

We were there, the window was there, it matched our over-the-stove slider, and it was only $107. I'd be a ding-dong not to buy it. So we did.

Mike was even half tempted to seize the day, rip all the siding off that side of the house, remove both old kitchen windows, install the new one, and plywood the entire side. (Since we probably have enough ply in the basement to do such a thing.) But he also really needed to do some wiring in his truck as well as an oil change and a few other maintenance type things in and around the garage. In the end, sanity won out and we didn't rip apart anything. Probably for the best. No job that large is ever so easy that you can complete it in one day. Something always goes awry.

Next weekend, our wood will arrive and stairs will be built, come what may.

Ply Down, Walls to Go

Yes, it's down! Wow. World record. Our neighbor was supposed to come over to do the drywall, but once he came down and saw Mike making such progress, he decided to just let him go at it and save the drywall for tomorrow.

And here's the final result. Awesome to behold isn't it? So tomorrow - the drywall. It needs another coat of mud - and then it's going to need to dry again. And then sanding... and then painting.

Next weekend will be all about the paint and prime, or prime and paint. Woa, totally backasswards there. And if all goes swimmingly there, the following weekend will be all about the wood. Sweet.

Get a home insurance quote from Direct Line, voted Britain’s number 1 insurance provider.

Let the Inconvenience Begin

It was so much less of an inconvenience to be inconvenienced a few years ago when we had less stuff and no baby. Now the mudroom is fulla tables and hutches, the upstairs is fulla couches and pictures, and the kitchen is fulla miscellaneous - including liquor. Looks like we just had a rockin party, actually.


Woo-hoo we partied so hard, the living room just exploded all over the house! I wish that were the case.... there'd be less dust.

But the guys really accomplished a lot. Besides moving all the remaining major furniture, they took up the entire old floor and nailed the subfloor to the joists. No plywood yet, but already the floor feels stabler... stabler? That might not be a word. More stable. Yes, more stable.

The next unfortunate task is the leveling of the room. *sigh* With everything removed from the room, the slope and bow of the floor was so painfully obvious that it couldn't be ignored. Why a slope? Apparently, the foundation is low in one corner - as in they didn't pour it level. Why a bow? Apparently, one of the studs is jacked up too high.

How to fix it? It's difficult. Mike will have to break out the lazer (yes, lazer) level and shim, trim, and jack his way to tranquility. He's not looking forward to it. I haven't half a clue as to accomplishing something so tricky, so I'll be no help. (But apparently I'm no help with anything anyway and Mike's done the entire house by himself, but that's another story.)

I suppose that crazy task will be tackled throughout the rest of this week. We're hoping we don't royally mess up our upstairs drywall/flooring. If we do, I'm going to have a conniption fit. I'm so petrified of the very notion that I tried to convince Mike not to level anything... but of course he can't take that for an answer.

Meanwhile we've tentatively scheduled our neighbor/drywall man for this week... pending completion of the leveling process... which will undoubtedly cause mad wall crackage.

As for the weekend - it's all up in the air depending on how the next few days pan out.

Get a home insurance quote from Direct Line, voted Britain’s number 1 insurance provider.

Missing All the Action

It's a sloooo day. Relaxing in fact. Soothing. Yeah.... soothing. So soothing in fact that I deleted the earlier blog I posted this morning in favor of the greater good. For those of you who missed it, yeah, I was pretty miffed. I could get riled up and miffed off again pretty easily - I'm still not very happy with my situation, but I'm going to give giving a second chance and see what comes of it. Karma and all.

And I really think blogging about it will make things worse, so I'm ending the story there.

The weekend. Where should I begin? We cleared out all we could from the living room over last week and Saturday. A timely HD coupon worth 0% for 12mo's found itself well used on everything I could think that we'd need to finish the downstairs - front door trim, stairway trim, hallway trim, plywood, baseboard trim, mudroom closet doors, mudroom trim, french door trim, caulk, and an eyeball. (Recessed light eyeball trim.)

Of course, due to a certain someone's late coming Saturday evening, plans for riding on Sunday, and inclement weather for Sunday night/Monday/the rest of the week - Mike had to run around like crazy taking all the measurements for all the crazy trim work first thing Sunday morning. I couldn't even help him write it down... I had my hands fulla baby.

And he wasn't too happy about that - like it was all my fault that his plans nearly screwed up an entire winter's worth of projects riding on this one opportunity for 0% financing that by the way expired today so it all had to be purchased over the weekend.

Ok, moving on -whatever. We made it, we purchased, and who knows what we forgot and how badly we measured. Already I know we missed window bottoms. The good news is that in all the confusion and miscellaneous woods and trims, the lady at the register missed a big chunka stuff. We definitely made it out of there with more then we paid for.

That evening, after riding, Mike started pulling up the old wood floor, finishing about a quarter of the room before it just got too late. He was tired, I was tired. Little Mikey was tired.

Today is really the big day. The day to take up the rest of the old floor and put down the plywood. That's a full day right there. I'm sorry I have to miss out, although happy to have a sloooo and soothing day. Next order of business drywall.

Pics to come!

Get a home insurance quote from Direct Line, voted Britain’s number 1 insurance provider.

Like There's No Tomorrow

When we last left our heroes, Jess had a HD coupon and Mike was picking away at the siding. On today's episode - not much has changed.

Yes, I used that HD coupon, but not for what I had originally planned. The dam thing nearly expired before I got a chance to use it! I realized at the last moment on the day of expiration, grabbed the coupon without measuring the doors or talking to Mike and figured - I'll figure it out when I get there.

So I ended up purchasing an octagonal window, which we had wanted for the hallway/stairway anyway. A good use of coupon if I do say so myself, especially at the last minute.

That weekend (not this past weekend, but the one previous) Mike owed me some baby time - which I traded in for house time. ie - He was supposed to babysit while I had a day off, but I instead I asked him to work on the house for me. The project of the moment - finishing the stripping on the front of the house.

You may remember that most of our old siding on the front of the house was stripped during construction of the farmer's porch last spring... except for the very top of the gambrel, above the farmer's porch roof.

Since we desperately needed to go to the dump to get rid of our old front door and some other cleanings out from Mike's parents' house - it seemed like the perfect opportunity to strip off the remainder of the siding and just add it to the pile. Mike started in on it first thing in the AM. And as soon as he began working, our neighbor Rich stopped by, eager to help.



They worked through the morning and by 2:30 were finished. Even though the dump doesn't close until 3, they decided that Sunday traffic would make it dam near impossible to make it anyway - so Rich offered up his truck to haul the plywood from the deepHo.

As you recall, under our old siding was.... well, older shingles. And under our older shingles, even older barnboard. Basically very rough, thick pieces of wood - barely processed and with large gaps and knots and all sorts of obstacles that make it difficult to attach new siding to. So when we stripped the rest of the front of the house, we decided it would be easiest to put up plywood before siding. (Makes things much more weather tight too!)

The remainder of the afternoon was spent putting up the plywood and tyvek. Our neighbor Dana came over to help with the measure and cut of the plywood - which was great because plywood cuts get tricky when you add in two windows, the gambrel shape, and the ridge vent.



Speaking of ridge vent - Mike also purchased a new one whilst at the HD. Our old one wasn't painted before it had been installed, so we figured while we're up there, lets start fresh and paint a new one so it doesn't rot right out. (I finally got around to painting it yesterday during the baby's morning nap.)

And that's where we stand. The gambrel is stripped and ready for siding! This past weekend nothing got done because... well.... I kinda sorta bought a new truck on Ebay. A new old truck that is. New to me I should say. And Mike and his friend TJ went down to VA to pick it up for me. I'm excited to get it, but the whole thing was such an impulse buy... I keep thinking to myself, "I could have and should have used that money on the house." I think about a new fridge and more siding and most of all, the bathroom.

It's the my-dad in me that makes me want to purchase things I need rather than things I want. It's the my-mom in me that makes me an impulsive buyer. So I'm pretty much always in conflict when it comes to spending, especially big purchases.

Anyway, that's the current state of affairs. We keep offering up a utility quad to any of our carpenter friends who want to come and finish the siding and put in that octagonal window... no takers yet, unbelievably.

Get a home insurance quote from Direct Line, voted Britain’s number 1 insurance provider.

Wood Weekend

Have you ever been faced with a persistent glaze of dust on everything in your home due to continuous renovations? After methodically cleaning for last week's home inspection, at the end of this weekend I was appalled to find the house looking like I hadn't cleaned in months. But for once I didn't give in to my obsessive compulsive urges - it will only get worse, I told myself, and then I'll be in the same situation next weekend and before you know it, I'll be spending half of all my weekends dusting.

And if you think that's how I want to spend half my weekend... well... you can come dust for me then.

So - another weekend. A really productive one, I might add. On Friday, I left work early for an appointment and decided not to come back. (Yay!) With the extra time, I met up with Mike and we picked up the hardwood and unloaded it into the baby's room. (Rather, Mike unloaded it. Heavy stuff this 3/4 as you can imagine.)

On Saturday, Mike decided that it would be easiest to hardwood the hallway at the same time as the baby's room. So he spent the day tearing up the old wood and reinforcing the beams from underneath. Late that afternoon, he cleaned up, took all the old wood to the dump, and purchased 2 more sheets of plywood. Our neighbor Rich came by too - because after he heard we were doing the hardwood in the hallway, he really wanted to help us finish up the drywall. The hallway really only needed one more skim coat and one more sanding to prepare for paint. And the last coat only took about 10 or 15 minutes for Rich to slap on, so it was no big deal.

Sunday Mike was able to finish installing the new subfloor in record time. Again, Rich came by in the evening to see if the mud was dry enough to sand. Nope. Maybe early this week if he's available.

And now we just wait for the hardwood to finish acclimating - about a week - before we put it down. And no dusting until that's done.

Waiting, But Not Wasting Time

I'm happy to report that this week really turned around for us after Tuesday.

First off, that presentation I was worried about last post was scheduled for this morning instead of Wednesday morning. So we actually had Wednesday and Thursday to work on it, much to my relief on Tuesday night.

Secondly, still no call from our home insurance rep. I'm still not sure if that's good news or bad news, but nevertheless it's given us (us, that's a good one because I'm pretty much useless at the moment) It's given Mike a chance to work on several projects.

Wednesday, he spent the day on gutters. Or, rather, preparing for the gutters. Because really once he got up on the latter and started inspecting the roof line, it was obvious that some prep work needed to be done first. One major area of concern was over the mudroom.

And we knew this was a problem because back when we did the roof, I noticed while cleaning out the attic - Hey! There's a big hole to the outside where the roof meets the wall! At the time, we brushed it off and said, "we'll take care of that with the new siding."

But of course with no new siding as of yet, and temperatures creeping below 0 lately - probably a good idea to plug that hole. So, using some of our extra PT decking (the ugly pieces left over from the farmer's porch) Mike trimmed out that area. Later, the gutter will attach directly to this piece.

Notice how the piece just melds into the farmer's porch. Perfect!

If the weather hadn't been so cold and snowy, Mike could have actually installed the gutters yesterday. He wanted to, the nut! But really, the snow plus major wind chill factor - even I'm not that much of a slave driver.

Here's the second area that is in desperate need of a gutter. This is the back of the kitchen, and when it rains, the water just slides off the roof. If conditions are just right, it can actually seep through that window and sometimes the wall itself. We had several major rain events one after another back in fall that caused a flood in the basement window directly under this kitchen window - not good.

Anyway, tomorrow the high temperature is a toasty warm 30 degrees. (Ooooo!) And sunny! (Ahhhh!) So hopefully Mike will be able to continue on this project then.

Yesterday, while the weather outside was frightful, (and at my suggestion) he started in on the baby room floor. If you remember, this room was the most unstable one. Jump on the floor and watch it buckle and shake the whole room! Not good if you can imagine the future shenanigans of a small Mike in there.

Our carpenter and good friend TJ suggested we just rip off the top layer of flooring altogether and put down 3/4 then 1/2" plywood before we hardwood to really firm things up. So Mike spent the better part of yesterday demo-ing.

In this shot you can see the old hardwood still in the closet area. The rest is the very old subfloor.

Of course, once the old hardwood was up, it became obvious just how unstable the actual subfloor itself was! It buckled to nearly the breaking point when walked on, nevermind jumped on. Luckily, we had some 2x6's in stock. (God, just call the basement the Miscellaneous Lumber Co!) And Mike began reinforcing the room from underneath.

He got quite a bit done and only has two more 2x6's to install to complete the reinforcing job. Very cool.

Plus - that's not all! Yesterday being the 15th, Mike went down to the FD and bought our burn permit. He spent some time burning what he could in the afternoon, but everything was still pretty wet and frozen. I imagine we'll get a fire going tomorrow too and continue making a dent in the ever present brush piles.

So let's refresh - this weekend:

1. Install gutters
2. Continue burning brush
3. Complete baby room beam reinforcement
4. Purchase plywood (?)
5. Dump run

I don't know about that plywood purchasing. We don't have any 3/4 in stock, and that's what we really need right now. 7 sheets of it to be exact. We have some 1/2" although I'm not sure how much. That'll be pricey. We'll see - we'll definately be at the HD anyway for some additional gutter connectors.

Oh - and lumber liquidators is tempting me with a 12months same as cash no down no payments no interest offer. I'm wondering if I should just screw the world and go for it. Buy all the 3/4 aztec cherry for the downstairs. (Which is really just the babys room, hallway, and living room.) I have to take some measurements and all that first... but it's almost tax time and I could use the refund to pay it all or at least make a dent.... right?

Something else to think about. We're officially more than halfway to Feb after all....

Sunday Story

Dateline, Sunday June 1st..... yes, it's already June 11th - so I'm 10 days behind. And if you think I've been neglecting this blog - you should hear about all the other stuff I've been neglecting... accidentally mind you.

I think I may have perhaps reached my limit on "stuff" going on. And brain overload has caused side effects too numerous to mention. Meanwhile Mike has been taking on mad side jobs on top of his usual weekly "guy friends to visit after work" list.

On to the Sunday story.

Of course, as you know, Sunday 6/1 was Mike's bday. And even though I hadn't originally wanted to do anything, see anyone, etc etc, a couple friends asked if they could come over with some BBQ stuff for a little impromptu party. I reluctantly agreed, but then decided to stop being such a poop head and invite more people. It was Mike's 30th after all.

But when I told Mike we were all having a party, he was not too enthusiastic about it. "I just want to get work done," he said. Well, then I threw my arms up and thought, "Why do I bother?!" But it was too late to cancel - it was already Friday when all this went down.

You know the story of Saturday. (see previous post) So we'll skip to Sunday.

Mike had me up at around 7 or 8 and we began ripping siding and shingles off the house - just like before, except higher up. (Because now the guys needed something to attach the roof of the porch to.)

I commemorated the occasion on one of the walls with a note and a smiley face.

Around 9 or 10, TJ and Paul had arrived to help us out. Meanwhile, our neighbor Rich brought over his staging for us to borrow, which really helped out on the higher, 8' sections.

Soon after that, I had make a Home Depot run for plywood, tyvek, and lead flashing. And I was not happy about it. The party was supposed to start around noontime and the house and porch were both in shambles and I had to leave my post to go out.

On top of that, the bill for all the materials was outrageous. Do you know how much a 12" wide roll of lead goes for now adays?! $140!!! I nearly died and prayed that this one roll would be able to get us through.

When I got back, I discovered that the guys had appeased the porch gods with some lizard torture.
And I suppose anything to bring some good luck....

Then I had to go on a beer run. Awesome. I was thrilled, as you can imagine. Meanwhile the guys put up plywood and began attaching beams to the posts.

The party started around 1:30, 2ish. And the guys were still working. I didn't even take these pics, I was too busy trying to apologize to everyone that the bday boy did not want to stop working. Despite the construction underway, the guys hung out and watched as Mike and TJ and Paul continued working. Us gals took our drinks to the picnic table in the back yard to at least get out of the kitchen.


The guys just really wanted to get all the plywood on and make the front of the house water tight. That was their goal. So they kept at it. I'm not sure what time they finished up, but at that point, we brought the picnic table on the porch and were finally able to all hang out together.

Here's the finally tally on trash:

And then we tortured the lizard some more...

And of course we had some good food courtesy of everyone (who each brought something to eat or drink) and our neighbor Dana, who made clams casino and jalepeno poppers.

So all in all it turned out to be a really good time and everyone said they had lotsa fun. Plus we got all the plywood attached.

A couple days later, Mike and I stapled on the Tyvek - and that's still at the point we're at now. We took a break last weekend due to extreme heat and did other fun stuff - like a dump run, scrap metal run, Rich's bday party across the street, drive-in movie, boating....

This weekend it'll probably be back to work though.

And that's the Sunday story. For all the pics, check out MYSPACE