Day 23 - Getting a thicker skin

Beautiful day out there today! Work continued on framing the first floor ... they were putting up plywood over the studs in the garage, guest bedroom, and family room. 

Nailing plywood to back of garage, guest room

Different view, now that I can get to this part of the yard!

The front of the garage looked more filled in by the end of the day, too.

Around 2:30pm

End of day - hey, where did these kids come from?

Inside the new garage - still needs a cement pad (among other things!)

Obliging their mother, here they are in the mudroom, in front of door to garage

Getting excited to see them start the second floor!

Day 22 - The Garage

Four guys were here early today - ready to get that garage framed. And that they did - here's how it went down (or up, I guess):

7:00am

11:00am - Go Byron!

3:00pm - zoom!

Around the time that Tim got home this evening, there were thunderstorms in the area once again. Good thing he went around checking the tarp - one "isolated t-storm" decided to park itself right over our new garage. Few rumbles of thunder around 7pm, and two minutes later - torrential downpour! Thankfully, all stayed dry.

Aw, there she is again with that camera!

Here are a few more shots of some of the new spaces in progress:

Carys at the doorway to new bedroom (that's the front gable)

In new master, looking at old door to bedroom - at right is entrance/wall to new bedroom

Tim in doorway of 1st floor guest room (off of mudroom)

Day 21 - Filling in

Couple of old friends showed up this morning:

"Back Fill" time!

For some reason, I was thinking Friday was going to be a "quiet" day - I knew the excavator was going to return to do back fill, but I thought that was about it. Bob's guys were there, though, too - Byron and Erbin were working on framing the outside wall of the new guest room/office, as well as the extension for the new family room.

Building floor over new foundation

Oh, and our neighbors were repaving their driveway. Let's just say there was a bit of a traffic jam along our street, as cars, trucks and the T bus tried to squeeze through all day long.

Neighbors' driveway construction - I see two dumptrucks here ...

And here's our driveway - one more dumptruck = 3 dumptrucks!

By the end of the day, all of those dirt piles in our yard were gone - filled back around the foundation, and in the garage, where they will pour a cement pad.

Now if only they could have thrown down some grass seed ....

Meanwhile, Byron and Erbin made great progress on the guest room and back of family room:

Double window at back

Taking shape

This coming week should be a big week - lots of framing ahead! 

Days 19 and 20 - Build Me Up (Buttercup)

On Wednesday of this week, Bob's guys kept going on framing where they could (waiting for the foundation to be ready), as well as window trim. I now know what ours is called - "908 Casing" - might come in handy if I'm ever having a conversation with someone about window casing (pretty much can't imagine that ever happening, but I'll be ready!). Since it rained so much on Tuesday, we had to wait another day for the guys to come take away the forms for the foundation.

But Thursday morning, we were good to go -  we have a foundation!

Don't cross the caution tape, though!

The foundation guys came to "strip the forms" - and lo and behold, underneath were the lovely concrete walls of our new foundation. OK, so lovely might be stretching, but they sure do look sturdy.

The extension of the family room downstairs, master bedroom upstairs

Smile, Manny!

And for those of you who might not have gotten my reference, let me leave you with this ... one of my favorite Oldies ... and no, I'm not THAT old! This was already an "oldie" when I was in high school, thank you very much.

The Foundations - Build Me Up Buttercup ....

Day 18 - No, for real, it's pouring!

It really did pour today - actual rain, not cement. Woke up at 6am to the sound of pouring rain, and as I walked from my temporary "bedroom" in the dining room (yes, you heard that right - see below), by the "old playroom" on my way upstairs, I noticed a small puddle of water on the floor and the sound of drip, drip, drip. Thankfully, it was just a little bit of water. The old playroom is directly under our old bedroom, which is still topless and in the middle of being framed into the new bedrooms. The guys had put a huge blue tarp over the space, which was doing it's job for the most part, but some water had pooled up in the tarp and was leaking down along the outside wall.

Tim did some quick make-shift fixes to stop the leak, and when the guys showed up at 7am, they moved things around, adjusted the tarp, and all was dry - even during the heavy downpours throughout the day. They moved all their stuff under the tarp and worked away on framing and structural beams in the new bedrooms upstairs.

Since there isn't much to see in terms of pix from today, I figure it's a good time to explain exactly where we are living. Several people have asked us, "are you guys actually living in there?" Why, yes we are! We are basically living on the right side of our house (better than being on the wrong side ... ba-dum-bump). On the first floor, to the right of the front door is our dining room and kitchen - voila:

Breakfast in bed?!

Like a studio apartment!

Other than a bathroom, that's it for the first floor right now. As for the second floor, well, half of it was demolished and is being framed as we speak. We still have the kids' bedroom on the right side of the house, and the bathroom. We rearranged the furniture in their room so Tim and I could move our dressers into their room - it's cozy, but it works!

He's just counting down the days until this room is ALL HIS!

What Feng Shui?

So there you have it! It's .... cozy. Thank goodness it's temporary ...

Day 17 - It's pouring!

When Bob told me they were pouring the cement for the walls today, I wasn't exactly sure how that was going to work. I knew there would be a cement mixer:

I did not know, however, that there was going to be a huge cement pumper truck - OMG!

Basically, they pour cement out of the mixer into this big basket on the back of the pumper truck. Then it gets sucked up into the hose and up through the length of the crane - they position the crane where they want to pour cement. Like, over our house, for instance:

This made for some good viewing! My kids and I, and the neighbors and their little boys watched the show:

The pumper truck driver (red shirt in the photo) had a remote control strapped around his neck - from that device, he was able to manipulate the crane, the pump, and the flow of the cement:

Bob supervising the whole process

Filling in the forms for the walls

Status Check

Thought it might be a good time for one.

Day 16 - 99 and counting

As if the week hadn't been hot enough, Friday turned it up just a wee bit more. Thermometer hit 99, but  with the humidity, that "felt" way over 100. The foundation guys showed up at 6am ... sorry to our neighbors! He explained later that he just wanted to get as much done as possible before the heat got worse. Can't say I blame him. They did a ton of work ... set up all the forms for the walls. I may have said something similar to this in an earlier post - you'll have to excuse that, as I really have no clue exactly how they do the foundation. I'm pretty sure what you see in this shot is the forms, now in place for the cement to be poured:

New garage

Chris from Bob's crew was also here all day working on trim. He added the "water table" trim (thanks, Brad, for telling us what that was called!) - which is the white trim board you see along the bottom of the house where it meets the foundation. He also added the trim along the bottom of the gable and roof line - this has a name, too - I just have no idea what it is! I do love how it looks, though.

Days 14 and 15 - Workin' up a sweat

Wednesday and Thursday of this week were all about the heat - we're in the midst of our third heat wave  this summer, and it's been brutal. Temps have been up in the 90s, but the humidity is extreme. Normally, this is when I like to complain about how horrible this weather is for my hair - but knowing the guys are outside all day working in these conditions makes me think twice about saying anything about my frizzy hair.

As we wrapped up our trip to Storyland with a round of mini-golf, and headed home Wednesday, Bob and crew were working on framing the second floor. 

Rafters going in

It was such an awesome sight for us as we pulled into the driveway after being away for two days - remember when we left Monday, they had just torn off the roof. And here it was Wednesday, and the new second floor was already taking shape. The strangest moment was opening the door to our old bedroom - this was what we saw:

Open air concept?

This week has also been all about getting that foundation in place - once the footings were inspected, they set up the forms for the walls:

By Thursday, Bob's crew started putting on some Tyvek and trim on the front of the house - it's amazing to me how much more definition the trim gives to what you see when you look at a house.

Nice to see the front window again!

Buttoned up for the day

Day 13 - The shape of things to come

As Tim and I and the kids continued enjoying our mini-vacation in North Conway, NH, things really started to take shape back at home. Just the day before, Monday, we left behind a house with half of a roof - actually, half of a second floor. All that was left was the kids' bedroom, a bathroom and a lonely chimney sticking up.

But while we blissfully passed through the gates of Storyland for our second day, Bob and the guys were busy back at home, framing the front wall of the new second floor. My friend Megan (another spy!) snapped this shot Tuesday morning:

Editor's Note: In compiling all the photos supplied by the spies, I mistakenly credited this one to Megan, but in fact it was taken by my brother Paul!

And what's that cement mixer doing there? Oh yeah, there's still that unfinished business with the foundation - we had the forms there for the footings, so today was the day to pour cement. My brother Paul snapped this shot around midday - I should also mention, one of the hottest days of the year. 95 with high humidity - not a fun day to work with cement!

Meanwhile, Nolan was engaged in a huge battle - Splash Battle, that is! His favorite Storyland ride, hands down.

Carys opted out of the water wars and instead went searching for a sweet treat ...

Mmm, Dippin' dots!

By the end of the day, the sweetest treat of all was seeing this photo that Megan sent:

Ta da!

Day 12 - Raze the Roof

Yeah, well, we knew it was coming. It's not like it wasn't part of the plan. But, yet, when a few guys with hardhats and crowbars have at it with your house ... well, it's an eye-opener. They started at about 7am - within the first hour, here's how it looked:

They pretty much just heaved stuff out and down the "shoot"

So, our plan was to actually get out of town for a few days ... seemed like a good time to do it, don't you think? We were packing up the car at about 10am to head to Storyland up in Glen, NH.

Nolan surveying the "damage"

We were watching as they literally ripped chunks of our house off, and then hurled them over the side:

OK, we're outta here!

The scene up at Storyland was altogether different ...

Right around the time we got off the Carousel and headed to the Polar Coaster, say 3:30pm, our architect Brad texted us this photo:

All done! Just a bit "airy" for now!

Since we were going to be away for a few days, I had a network of spies in place, ready to take pictures of the progress (well, how else can I keep this blog going?!). My brother Tom snapped this shot at the end of Day 12 - house all tucked in for the night: