Thursday 20090730 13:32
Still fixing, but; not as much as before. We had to replace all of the floor, sub-floor and joists as well as level and top off two of the foundation walls. Sunday, we went to visit Austin, Faun's brother in St. Louis Park, MN. and came back with about 160' of steel rain gutters for the house. See photos below.
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Austin's gift in the back of the Ranger. |
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The beginning of jacking up the addition. The northeast corner was almost 6" low. |
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This shows the rotting floor & joist |
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More of the rotting floor & joist |
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The addition is all jacked up. Now the addition is pulling away from the house. |
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Sirius guarding the addition. He did a great job! Not one critter took up residence under the addition. |
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We had to knock out the foundation on the north east corner and the tops of the north and east foundations because the corner had rotted away so much and it was not level. Now it is! |
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Our new foundation for the north wall. |
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I am bolting down the foundation plate. The floor joist will be nail down to it after the addition is lowered in place. |
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Got the floor half in. |
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This photo shows John setting up the chains and come-along. We tried to drag the addition back into place against the house. Didn't work :} |
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Our new sub-floor. Now we need to find floor covering. |
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The north wall was all rotted out. |
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Almost done with the north wall. |
I nailed the east wall-plate down to the foundation plate and finished nailing down the sub-floor. All ready the nail are starting to back themselves out. Think we need to get out John's trusty ol' screw-gun and put 2' sheet-rock screws into the floor between the nails.
We went out looking for a floor-covering earlier this week. Not real happy with what we saw however, we did find a laminate that will only cost about $500. We stopped at a thrift store and found a ceiling fixture for $3.00 sans nipple. No big deal. I actually have some. Also for 4 outlets for $2.00!
What do we have left? Once we get flooring in place in the addition we get to move everything on the south wall into the rest of the room. Then most of the stuff in the front room will move into the addition.
The east wall has some issues. Old leak where the addition and house meet on the south side. Leak was fixed last year when we replaced the roof, but; the interior damage will take a bit; part of the ceiling has come down and the entire wall needs to be inspected. It may have many of the same problems that the north wall had.
We need to inspect and replace much of the soffets and close off the bat's revolving doors. The porch want to be covered on the underside and painted sky-blue.
21:06
Tom Mabry, the Lieutenant on the Balsam Lake Fire Dept came by this evening with a department pager. Now I don't havta carry the Bearcat Scanner all the time. Even with a new battery the scanner was unreliable. We went to Tom's house and met his wife, a truly excellent photographer.
Tom noted that we had some windows that could use replacement and then offered us two new ones with frames still in the wrappings and a coupla other windows without frames. All of them are double pane. Great guy!
Tuesday 20090616 21:28
Gus & Jack got loose yesterday when Loretta came to visit. Apparently, Gus pushed his way through the kitchen door and went running to Loretta who was coming in the back door. When she got in the door, it did not shut because we don't have the closer on it yet. Jack followed Gus into the kitchen and they saw the open door and bolted.
Gus came back before Loretta left, so he wasn't gone long. Jack on the other hand, loves to run and run and run. When he finally turned up we didn't realize anything was wrong. It was a hot day so, we walked both dogs down to the river to cool off. Jack started limping on the way back. His hips looked strange. After we got home we looked at his paws. Pads on both front paws were torn and raw. Faun put triple antibiotic ointment on his paws and we hoped he'd get better. I felt his legs & hips and found no deformities. Faun felt his legs and did some range of motion. She said one of his hips popped.
This morning his paws sorta looked better, but; he had a very hard time walking to go out to potty. I called the vet and told them what happened and told them what we had done. I declined to bring him in. Later after the boys came back inside, Faun said she thought his hips looked weird. We decided to take Jack to the vet after all. I opened the back of the station wagon and Gus jumped in. I had to pick-up Jack and carry him and put him in the car. As I left home I called the vet to say we were coming in, NOW!
The ride to the vet was uneventful. I had to put Gus' leash through the right back window and close it to keep him in the car. I carried Jack inside and we went immediately to an exam room. Dr. Nelson looked him over and told me the obvious. Then he wanted to see Jack walk so, I put Jack on the floor and we went outside to walk a bit. Dr. Nelson mentioned how wide Jack's hips are and said something about the possibility of displasia (hips being displaced.) He did not seen to be in as much pain as earlier.
The vet prescribed doggy advil and paw bath minimum once daily. Then I got Heart worm meds and FrontLine flea & Tick for the boys. Jack's totals were $195.17. The meds were $83.01. Then there was taxes. Total damages, $278.18, but; the boy are part of us now, part of our family. We could do no less for them!
We'd like to thank congress and President Obama for the stimulus check we got last week. It meant Jack could have the best care.
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20090510
After working on our prise for more then a year we have actually moved in! The first thing that the dogs changed for us was the screen that use to be on the east side door, off of Faun's someday to be , studio. They ripped down the screen on the door. Thankfully, they did not break the glass on said door and hurt themselves.
The next thing I discovered, after being here about a week, was that I did not seal all the drain pipes from the sink in the upstairs bathroom. Seems when we run water in the sink it is deposited on the not so drywall of the downstairs bathroom. It runs across the ceiling to the furnace vent and then down on the furnace. Found out a coupla days later that the furnace no longer works. Too much water I guess :} Oh well, trial and tribulations of being a home owner and we don't even own it yet. <LOL>
We have replaced all four windows upstairs. Replaced parts of the upstairs flooring. Plumbed and wired the upstairs and put in toilet, vanity & shower, that we still have to finish by gluing the shower stall on to the walls. Put in a ceiling fan. Great buy at a church sale last month. 32" ceiling fan with light for only $5.
The kitchen window has a temporary replacement window in place. Wanna swap it out this summer for something like we put in upstairs. We put in new doors in the front room and kitchen. Hadta fix the front room door already. I looks like our steel clad door is bent :} The screws were pulling out of the door and frame. I think I have it fixed now. I replaced the normal mounting screws with drywall screws!
This summer Faun & I wanna empty out the "soon to be studio" room and rip out the flooring. We need to check the floor joists as the floor is springy and shouldn't be. There is also a third of the floor in that room that is 6" lower than the rest. Wanna bring that up. We also need to rip out the closet and rebuild it bigger so that the freezer can fix inside.
20090603
'Bout time for an update. We've got the vanity drain problem fixed, I think. Hadta cut out a PVC elbow we had put in and replace it. The replacement is done and two weeks later I see no sign of leakage :}
On our TO DO List:
Buy new furnace
Buy new stove
Buy new frig
Replace parts of the "studio" floor done
Finish replacing parts of the "office" floor
Replace kitchen window
Put a clothes pole in the "office" closetdone
Clean out the basement
Fix kitchen sink leakdone, mostly
Fix 1st. floor bath ceiling (from prev leak)
Make & install a cold air return
Fix 2nd. floor shower
Remove deck planter
Increase deck size
Replace the furnace & water filtersdone
Finish cleaning up the outside of the cabin
Things we have taken off the To Do List:
Finish cleaning up the inside of the cabin
Finish moving out of the cabin
Install a clothes pole in the armoire
Moved queen bed from the house to the cabin
Fixed leak 2nd. floor bath vanity
Put door between kitchen & front room
The Balsam Lake Fire Dept. 1st Responders are back on duty. We had been issued a 'cease & desist' order by the State of Wisconsin because, someone, a righteous individual I'm sure, called the state anonymously, to report that someone on the 1st. Responder team had lied on their application for state certification. Therefore, the entire team of 1st. Responders & the community of Balsam Lake was punished! Last night at the FD meeting, we were told everything had been straightened out and I got my Cert of Continuing Education: "Emergency Medical Responder" and wallet ID card! Now all I need is a pager so I can respond to all called for BLFD instead of just the ones I hear on my scanner.
11:40
Just back from my first run as a 1st. Responder. A sweet little ol' lady, much like my mom, had fallen and needed help getting up. When I got the call I first went to the Fire Hall to see if we were gunna take the truck. When nobody showed up I went to the site. As I was driving down Hwy 46 I saw Tim Moore, the Fire Chief, in his city truck making the turn onto Pearl Street. When I got to the corner I could see Tim getting outta his truck and walking over to a police officer. I joined them as the police officer explained the situation. We went inside and lifted the lady to her feet and helped her sit in her walker (just like my mom's). About 5 minutes later the ambulance arrived. She did not want to be transported so, she signed the forms. Then she told us that she had hit her head, but; there is no lump. Her left shoulder hurt, but; it always does because it has been replaced. I wish I'd known. I wouldda lifted her differently. Then I went back to the Fire Hall and filled out the Response Form for Tim and myself.
Sept 2, 2009
So, Faun and I have been helping John fix up this 160 year old house we are going to buy from him. We started in May of 2008 with the roof. We had to take it all the way down to the bottom layer of one by whatever boards. We even found some of the original shake shingles. We had to replace several boards.
After the roof we tried to evict the bat colony on the second floor. We ripped out the lath and plaster walls and insulation right down to the studs. Because the house has a hipped roof, we ripped the insides out too. Then came the fun of running new electrical wiring and layingout the upstairs bathroom. Then came re-insulating, drywalling and trim (still not done with the trim).
Then we started in on moving the kitchen, which was in the addition, back to the original place, with the back door leading off of it. Had to re-wire and put in ducting for the upstairs and addition. Then came painting and moving the appliances. We bought a used range from Menard's and got a free used refrigferator from The Anchor Inn, in town where we eat a coupla times a month.
John had a neighbor, Jim Sorenson, come in and texturized the ceiling in both kitchen and front room. [Faun was not happy, but; it does cover a multitude of blemishes.] After Sorenson was done we painted the kitchen and front room and blundered on in the bathroom. We ripped out the ceiling in the bath so we could put plumbing into the upstairs bath. Also ran a TV antenna wire from the basement, through the kitchen and bath into the addition.
We put a new tall and elongated toilet into the bath for Faun's mom to use when visiting. Also installed an new sink and vanity. Of course the bath has the main duct for the heating upstairs. And of course there was the plumbing.
Through all the fixing we were replacing all of the plumbing we could reach. We had to run new lines to the upstairs bath and to the addition. The lines for the downstairs bath had to be re-routed and the kitchen had to be put back in place. I put in a new water filter. We're suppose to get six months use from a filter, but; we only get three at best. I wanna put a second filter inline with the first.
We are finishing up the addition now. John and I had to rip out the floor and joists and replace them, but before we could do that we had to knock the top off of the foundation on the north and east sides. Then it was replace the top of the foundation and make it level and near where it was. Then we ripped off the inside north wall up to about four feet. We replaced some of the wall boards and added short studs to replace the bottom of the rotted ones.
We ended up having to jack up the north wall to do the floor joists, floor and wall. Now we have a leak where the addition joins the house. Had that fixed before we jack the wall up :}
John and I have replaced several windows. Upstairs we have two dual-pane casement type windows in the front and two dual-pane sliders in the the back. We put a five foot tall casement window into the west wall of the front room and another one just like it horizontally in the north wall of the addition. John also put in two forty inch wide double hung vinyl and wood windows. We also put in two steel and one wooden entrance doors.
Last week as I was cleaning up the rotted and splintered wood from around the house and loading it up into the pickup truck. then I took it across the road to the village shop. They have a burn pile in the back and we were given permission to put burnable stuff from the house. When we got there we found a lot of 'looks like wood' plastic flooring. Figure we got over 330 square feet in 4' x 8" sections and another 200 square feet in smaller pieces. More than enough to do the whole addition. On top of that there was base boards too!
Outside of a lot of trim stuff to do [sanding, filling, painting, etc.], we have the south wall of the addition to do. It has loosly placed 2" thick white foam sheets under eight inch sheet paneling. We'll rip that out and replace with R19 roll insulation and cover with drywall. When that is done we have to fix a leak in the roof where the south side of the addition meets the house. Then fix the insulation and drywall. Of course, that'll all need painting too.
I need to get back down into the basement and stop a leak in the plactic pipe that comes from the well. And I need to pull the burner out of the propane furnace and clean the orifaces. Then it is just general cleanup down there.
Was out pricing siding today. Don't know how many feet we need yet, but my guess-ta-ment is about 300 lenier feet.