First Floor Lighting

More electrical rough-in's. Here are the can lighting in the living room. Those on the righthand side will be wall washers for the fireplace wall.

Holddowns

Holddowns are getting placed..we're hoping for our framing inspection to happen on Monday.

Crawlspace Framing

The wall dividing the basement and crawlspace has been framed out. That wider opening will be our access to the crawlsapce. Judging from the limited access to the furnace, I'm guessing that I will get to be the one crawling in there to change filters..unless I can train Lola to do it..

More Trench

Nice trench...

Basement Dewatering System

Looks like Dugan's starting to dig the perimeter trenches for the basement dewatering system. We used to get some water coming in the basement during the heavier rains and it seems like it was coming up from under the slab through little pin holes in the concrete, probably through hydrostatic pressure. We figured that it'd be a good idea to take care of that issue while we're doing the rest of the house.

Master Shower

They moved our shower unit into the bedroom and looks like they had to cut the door opening to get it through!

Starting Electrical

They are starting to put in the electrical boxes, starting with the second floor. We've been trying to finalize our reflected ceiling plans and picking out all of the fixtures. Let's just say there's a lot about can lighting that we never knew about.

Basement Rec Room Framing

It's hard to see but we furred out the columns into these fat columns to cover them up and to match each other. The recessed areas will be great for bookshelves in the future.

Basement Laundry Room Framing

Basement framing is almost finished. This wasn't originally part of the plan but since it was easy to tear out the existing walls, we figured it'd be best to reconfigure the basement now, rather than later. This is a view of our future laundry room.

Existing Bathroom Floor

Our gamble paid off - there was a big trapezoidal vanity against that wall and we were pretty sure that this nice original hex tile would run all the way underneath it and sure enough, it does. We'll be replacing that vanity with a pedestal sink. The tiny triangular sink that was in the trapezoidal vanity is now laying on the back lawn and the old toilet sitting in front of the house...in case anyone is interested!

Drag Strut

We had to rip out the ceiling of the existing bathroom to get that drag strut (horizontal metal bar) across and through the deck beams. I was going to explain its purpose but then I forgot. Mike, feel free to chime in...

Interior Strapping

View from the interior of the LSTA straps

That's a LOT of Strapping

The second floor and first floor come together here at the stair window and the wall here essentially acts like a hinge so we had to strap and nail the heck out of it. We had to repeat the strapping on the inside of the wall as well.

Happy Birthday Lola!

Being a two-year old isn't too hard - all you need is a pair of sassy sunglasses and stickers on your shirt. Of course we made a visit to the house today for her to jump off the wood piles in celebration.

Roof Complete!

Our roofing has been installed.

Our Fat Shower

Here's our big shower unit for our master bathroom.

Second Floor Ductwork

I know, so exciting. Here's an example of the ceiling ductwork for the bedrooms.

Fireplace Installed

There's our double-sided fireplace, sitting in place.

HVAC closet

They framed out this closet and stuck a bunch of hvac ductwork in it. We'll have floor registers on the first floor and ceiling registers on the upper level (apparently for efficiency)

Octopus Arms

It's really a thing of beauty.

Modern Day Octopus

We were going for that Old World Charm so we had them install a modern day Octopus furnace. Can you tell which photo is ours???
Ok, just kidding but I'd still like to ask Dugan about why those ducts seem so huge. The furnace is a Trane, high efficiency (>90%FLUE) unit and it's nice that they were able to tuck it into the crawlspace.

Mechanical Stuff

The see-thru fireplace has arrived...it'll go in that central wall in the living/dining room. Dugan has roughed in the gas lines for both the fireplace and the range. The sheet metal guys were here today doing some HVAC work.

Plumbing has started

Dugan has started putting in the vent pipes for all the plumbing in the house.

Who loves you?

You know your construction project has consumed your life when your contractor makes it into your child's nightly "Who loves you" list. I ask Lola every night, "Who loves you?" and she usually says, "mama, daddy, ama (grandma), etc." and the other night, after naming all the usuals, she also said, "doo-goon" (Dugan)

What's Next

Well, it did rain last night, our first downpour for the entire summer, which means that the roofing felt went on not a day too soon. They will be starting to rough in the plumbing next week and electrical in a couple weeks. The inspector will be coming out in the next couple weeks too, to sign off (hopefully) on framing/holddowns.

Not for the squeamish

So one of the roofers shot himself in the foot today with his nail gun while getting on that steep corner of the roof. He was setting his nail gun down when it went off and the nail shot into his BONE about 3/8" of the way, through the cartilege and deep enough so that he couldn't pull it out with pliers. Damn...
Dugan insisted that they finish the job (cover the roof with felt at a minimum) because it's supposed to rain tomorrow, so he had the poor guy sit in his truck and drink water to keep himself hydrated (since he was bleeding) and wait for his partner to feverishly finish the work so that he could drive him to the hospital.
I don't know about you, but I don't complain about my job anymore.

Roofing

As Lola would say, Niiiiiiice. They put up the roofing felt today so our roof is officially protected from the rain. They even got some of the roofing up as well, in the back corner of the house. (see next story)

Deck Framing

Another view of the lovely deck.

Master Bedroom Deck Framing

Deck framing for the deck off the master bedroom went up.

Stair window

Looks like they finally cut the rim joist and finished framing out the window at the staircase. The idea was to help light the stairwell since it's not completely open and hopefully the light will spill into the dining room as well as the hallway upstairs.

Stairs

Our stairs are in! They will be eventually carpeted down to the last landing and then the carpet will turn into a runner down the rest of the stairs. The bottom 4 treads will be either bamboo or oak, with the last tread wrapping around into an "L" shape ( you can see it framed out in the photo)