things take shape

Every day is a 3-ring circus now, the plumber, the furnace man, the electrician, and of course the carpenters, all scurrying around doing their things.










The furnace is now in the attic and the attic looks like the movie, "Brazil"! with all the shiny heater ducts twined and twisted around in every direction.

Getting the furnace into the attic was no small feat. They tried up the inside attic ladder, no luck; they tried up a ladder in the new room, no luck, so they finally had to cut a hole in the ceiling to get it in place and then replaced the ceiling piece.















The bedroom entrance now has a 45 degree dog leg into it, to accommodate the required "strong wall" where the new part joins the old. So, the closet has a dog leg in it, too, but it's still a really big closet!!




There is only a small (2 foot) crawl space between the old attic and the new, so we are getting another attic access door and ladder for the new space. ka-ching. And the fireplace for the bedroom, ka-ching. And the floor heating wires that will go under the tile in the bathroom in the shower and around the vanities, etc to keep the floor warm, ka-ching. And refinishing the (old bedroom) doors that will be the new front doors, ka-ching. The new on-demand water heater system has arrived and is installed, ka-ching. See the money clock go round and round!

The carpenters are putting up interior walls (closet, bathroom, shower stall) and drilling access holes in the studs as fast as they can, to keep up with the plumber and the electrician who are running water lines and wires all around and through everything.

We have had to make a lot of decisions kind of quickly: what kind of ceiling lights do we want, and where; where do we want the wiring for the TV, computer, telephones; where do we want light switches, floor outlets, etc. From nothing happening except outside framing and major plumbing connections, all of a sudden we are down to the nitty gritty. The stucco and dry wall guys came around to make their estimates. Bill says they might start as soon as next week!

And this morning, the carpenters put up plastic sheeting around the front door and started pulling everything down to make the new front entrance. The hall closet (where immense amounts of things have been stored (coats, boots, blankets, leaves for the dining room table, hats, and on and on)) are now all piled on our bed and around the living room in any available corner. As Gary mentioned earlier - we're going to end up huddled under a tarp in his study and using the honey hut outside (which now smells, even though it just got cleaned!).

When they all left for the weekend, they kept the sheeting up, because, while the doors are in place, they have no hardware. All that is between us and the outside are 2 layers of plastic sheeting - that breathe! "Natural breathing" we call it, an art installation.

The windows and new doors got delivered - more ka-ching! For the first time since they started on the room, we have opened the door from the hall into it - and - voila! - new bedroom!

The roofing materials were dropped off by a truck with a long belt that lifted the heavy slate shingles up onto the roof and will get laid down on Monday.






Our water apparently has to come through a garden hose from the street (at least til some inspection is had). We have to turn it off when not in active use, so the pressure from the street main doesn't blow out the hose! Even so, over the past weekend, the connection started leaking and looked as if it would break any time, so Bill came over and he and Gary worked on it. That meant lots of cussing, 2 trips tot he hardware store, welding torch action, etc. Naturally the plumber was unavailable - he's fishing! Once again, if something can go wrong, it will, and on the weekend!


Video's of the new front door, and the art installation (with commentary).