still pushing!

Wow! What a week!

This was a busy week. In no particular order, the electricians started doing their finish work installing switches, plugs, light fixtures and the like. The interior painters finished up for now; they will return to do a little more closer to the end. The trim man came to build the stairs from the garage to the house, which replaced the 2x4 treads the framers installed. Then he went on to install the wall cabinets in the kitchen. The base cabinets will be installed after the hardwood floors are installed next week. And we started on the driveway outside the garage. And the stone guys finished.

In the end I think we used about 60 tons of stone. The front steps were a challenge but I think they turned out well. Beautiful work by some true craftsman.

The driveway was a real experience. First, understand the order of things. The upper drive, which was removed when the burned house was demolished, needed to be replaced first. Next the lower drive needs to be removed. Then the power company has to run their new line up the hill under the driveway. Then we will replace the lower drive. The wild card in all of this is rain, for rain can wash wet concrete away and, given the hill on the lower drive, can literally wash the hill away.

Given we haven't had any rain in six weeks, I thought we would be okay to start on the upper drive. Once again, my thoughts proved to be dangerous as the rain started an hour or two after the concrete for the upper drive was poured. This made for a very long night as well as the next day but, in the end, we think we were able to save the concrete, although the finish shows it. Hopefully, we can get through the remainder of the driveway project without too much difficulty.

So, hopefully next week; hardwood floors installed, base cabinets installed, exterior paint start and remove the old lower drive to get ready for the power company to run their new line.

Oh, and figure out how to replace those 2x4 front columns with something a little more substantial.

details, details . . .

No major accomplishments for the week but several smaller ones.

The interior paint continued and will hopefully finish this week. The electricians started their finish work with switches and receptacles and the like; they will wait on the actual light fixtures until paint is finished. The tile guys finished all the tile they could; the tile for the half bath is supposedly on a truck somewhere as is one of the bathroom sinks. Most of the new light fixtures are here, except for the two that fell off the truck which are being replaced. All the plumbing fixtures are here except for the kitchen faucet and sink (which we've yet to order) and a lavatory faucet I hope to win on ebay tonight (which is where many pieces of this house have come from).

The stone work has slowed almost to a crawl. Hopefully, they will return and finish what little they lack this week.

I've spent a fair amount of time cleaning up several old ceiling fixtures we found at an antique show last winter. I would call them "school house lights" although I'm not too sure that's the correct name as they were used in many places other than schools. Anyway, the globes all cleaned up nicely and the fixtures themselves have been cleaned and are being refinished. Since we are having to do all of this due to a fire, I thought it appropriate to rewire them as well so I finally found enough new original style light sockets to put them back together.

So, pictures this week include one of a bathroom with tile and the walls and beadboard painted, another of an unrestored school house fixture, and a picture of the great room with a peek at the kitchen colors.

Hopefully, we can have the plumbing fixtures set this week and the interior paint finished and the stone work finished. Then we can move on to the floor as well as a new upper driveway, so we can redo the lower driveway, which has to be done before the power company will run their new lines. And the exterior still needs to be painted. More details to be taken care of, everywhere you look.

still plodding along . . .

Well, when we left things last week I, apparently being the eternal optimist, was hoping for both the stone work and the interior paint work to be finished by this post. Unfortunately, sharp eyed readers may have already observed the picture from this week looks suspiciously like the one from last week.

However, if you look closely, you will see the steps have been started. Recognizing the English language is only a concept (and a very vague one at that) to the stone masons (equalled perhaps, only by my concept of Spanish), our animated and motion filled conversations were finally reduced to crude drawings and pointing to numbers on tape measures. I felt we had reached a breakthrough of some kind since the blocks were starting to look like steps (although not exactly like I'd planned) when the stone masons simply stopped coming to work. After a few days, we noticed we were out of sand, a key ingredient for stone masons. So, more sand has been ordered and hopefully they will return to finish. I'd estimate the stone work to be more than 90 percent complete which is good; what is even better is we have not paid for 90 percent of the work so I am fairly confident they will be back before too long.

The painter is apparently enjoying this job for he is in no hurry for it to end. I told him the electricians were going to start hanging lights this week so hopefully that will speed things along. The tile guy is going to start on Tuesday and install the tile in the bathrooms and laundry room. (California Sand, for those so interested. It was on sale.)

And the kitchen cabinets finally arrived, although the packing list and installation instructions were for another job leaving me to wonder exactly whose cabinets are these? As with most things, time will tell.

So hopefully, by this time next week the interior paint, tile and stone work will all be done and the electrical finish be well underway.

still working!

Things are still moving along.

The stone work continued and is now essentially complete less the front steps and front porch floor. The block arrived yesterday with which to build the front steps and additional stone has been ordered so hopefully by this time next week the stone work will be complete.

I've also attached a photo of the back porch. While the sun washed out much of the picture, the stone was laid on the porch floor the other day and it looks nice. And while every decision has a budget consideration, after much discussion we've decided to replace the existing column on the back porch with a nicer one.

And the interior painters have arrived. Although Monday turned into Tuesday and Tuesday turned into Wednesday and Wednesday turned into Thursday (which happened, although Friday didn't), the painters did work on Saturday and Sunday. So hopefully, by this time next week, the interior paint will either be complete or almost complete. We hope.

The exterior painters will arrive once the stone crew is finished.

stone work begins!

This was an exciting week; the stone work began.

The whole stone contracting process was an experience. In the end we used Joel, who has good English and is known as Ho-el to his people ("j's" are pronounced as "h's" in spanish)). Joel is a brick mason I've known for a year or two who swears he is an excellent stone mason, although he promptly subbed the work to Eno (Enoc?, Enic? Enen? Ennen? - he told me but his English is rather limited and I'm not real sure exactly what he said). Eno/Enoc/whomever sent a crew and they went at it. Eno, who calls me Senor, did find me today to say I needed to order more mortar. Apparently, Joel gets $1 of the $6 per square foot labor rate for "placing" the work with folks like Eno, which explains why Joel has the nice truck and Eno does the heavy lifting.

Actually, while Eno does some heavy lifting he has a crew of guys who do most of the heavy lifting. And these stones are heavy. The pallet of stone in the picture weighs right at 4,000 pounds. I estimate these stones are, on average, about forty pounds each, which the stone guys chip away at with their rock hammers until they fit together nicely. Looks like brutal work to me.

(And truth be told, Joel does play an important role for he is the one who has insurance, good English and the contacts to get the work. I'm sure all of the guys on the stone crew aspire to be like Joel and drive the nice truck one day).

On the inside the trim work is finished for now. The trim man was ready to go fishing in Florida and wanted to trim the stairs when he returned. He worked 10 days straight except for Sunday, including Saturdays and Memorial Day, so I can't fault him for that. He did a beautiful job. Interior paint is scheduled to start on Monday.

We did finally settle on an exterior color the other day (Sherwin Williams "Warm Stone" for those so interested). The exterior painters will go after the stone is finished.

So, progress is being made.