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Help has Arrived

Today was a giant sigh of relief. Our awesome hired contractor, Keith Cox, arrived this morning for a consultation to discuss the details of tearing down the bay wall. He let us know he might be back tomorrow, but then showed up just a few hours later and began work right away. Knowing he was there to get going on this leg of the process was a huge relief. We no longer have to worry about whether or not he would have time to fit us into his schedule, or whether that wall was going to delay all the forward progress.

So we are moving forward working side by side with another contractor for the first time. It’s so great seeing multiple things happening simultaneously. We are confident at this point that we are going to complete this job ahead of our previously foreseen schedule. Knowing that we will be moving into this place, and the fact that it is ours gives us so much motivation to work every spare second we have.

This past weekend we were able to complete the framing disaster on the first floor and close in the hole. The new joist supports are in and connected to the new concrete pads. All the joists have began leveled and decking has been laid on top.

We also handled another funky lip in the floor where the kitchen meets the hallway, and started the electrical work on the second floor.

Derek was also able to finish the skirt and platform for the dual pack hvac unit so that it will be ready for Bob when he comes to install the unit.

Progress is being made every corner you turn and all of it at a rate we didn’t know we could achieve.

Tomorrow we will have the city inspector out to just take a look at a couple of the things that we are worried about, especially the old chimney next to the bay wall that Keith is tearing down. It seems to be brittle and may need to be rebuilt with a bit off additional supports on the walls even though Derek already supported the bottom.

Even with a little hiccup it looks like we will still be finishing far ahead of schedule!

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The giant, gaping hole

This weekend was an interesting one. We did actual demo. On the first floor of the house we had a lot of issues with the floor heaving. So, with the help of our awesome friend Felicia Davis, we created a giant hole, by cutting out the subfloor. Then we were able to find a solution to the problem.

The cause of the hump was the fact that the entire house settled around the front basement foundation that only runs half way through the front living space. In order to correct this we had to shave down the joists that rested upon the foundation, and also cut back the other joists so that we could drop them down onto a new header that we attached to the front basement foundation.

This was a long painstaking process that also included cutting out all the old radiator pipes, waste line and whatever the other miscellaneous abandoned pipes were under there.

We finished the full process today and are now ready for subfloor. Because of how severe the hump was we will make up the difference by having a threshold in the doorway of the first suite. This will allow us to have an even floor at the front of the stairwells.

Once we opened up the floor we also found the issue with our sagging second floor in the hallway. The wall in the center of the first floor, directly below the hallway, wasn’t placed above any supports. We poured two footings that will support another joist directly under the wall and hoist up the sagging. It is minimal sagging, but it will make a definite difference. This bearing joist will be placed this week after the concrete sets.

Granger and I even found enough time to set almost all of the electrical boxes on the second floor. We had to wait until we were confident Derek wasn’t going to kill himself while we were upstairs. Sometimes the remodeling processes can get really hairy.

With a fist bump, high five, and congratulatory smack on the behind we are feeling super accomplished this week. Even though it looks like we went a bit backwards we have actually made a bunch of improvements. Please enjoy this week’s update video, and while you are here please scroll all the way down to the bottom of the blog and subscribe so that you don’t miss a thing, including our public open house that we will host as soon as the project is completed.

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Moooovin!

In right around a week and a half we have completed the framing of the second floor. We can now move our operation down to the first floor. And on that first floor, other than the firring of the outside walls there’s not a lot to do.

There were a lot of hiccups in the ceiling of the front, South section of the second floor. There were odd splices, and large gaps and lifted boards from the settling of the eaves. These have all been repaired.

We are also ready to begin setting electrical boxes and stringing the wire on the second floor. I think we will meet our goal of 180 days for initial inspection. But that will also hinge on our contractor’s timeline for the demolition and rebuilding of the bay wall. We are very excited about that process.

Other than the framing overview video above we have uploaded a few other shorts to give you all an idea of what we are dealing with and the progress we have made.

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When the “remodel” part of this job comes into play.

Up until this point this job has been a breeze. We were planning on completing the framing for the whole second floor. However in the original section of the house there is a bit of separation where the roof has been putting tons of pressure on the eaves and that has caused the ceiling rafters of Rider’s proposed room to lift. We spent most of the day devising a plan that would amend the lifting as well as secure the eaves. By the time we did this, because we are in Utah and it’s a Sunday, all of the stores were closed and we were no longer able to purchase the boards we needed to complete the job. And we were so close! This is the first hiccup we have had because of the old building’s sagging body. Sometimes the fun of remodeling is the problem solving. Sometimes the headache of remodeling is the problem solving.

You can see in this picture how much the boards lifted above the wall in this room.

We were able to do the last of the interior demo today. In Ryu’s proposed room there was a bit of wall and ceiling left that was lathe and plaster on strange, inadequate framing. Granger pulled all that down (see video) and we cleaned the space up. Granger is really sad that we have to put the wall back up in order for it to be Ryu’s bedroom because it looks great opened up to the stairwell.

(Pay close attention to that window on the right that Keisha busted out with a ladder)

(Oh, and this window pane, the very same window just the upper pane that Derek broke out with a board. What a pair we are…lol.)

We have been in the house now for just over a week and have made really great progress. We purchased this large stack of lumber and look how much of it we used already. And this was after we had used up our huge stack that we reclaimed from the demo.

I’m confident that barring any major burnouts or divorce we should finish on my timeline. We have many update videos available. Follow this video on our YouTube channel and check out all the others while you are there.

One of the main things we are trying to accomplish with this remodel is completing the project with no mortgage whatsoever. We were able to pay cash for the house, we also had much left over from selling our last remodel that we have been able to use toward some of the big purchases such as the dual pack heating/cooling unit and the bundles and bundles of lumber. We will also be selling our current home in Helper and should turn a great profit so that that money can go toward the completion. I think that with good management, hard work and being very careful to stick to our timelines we should come in on budget. Another big plus toward this goal is the fact that we have a few buyers for our Helper home just waiting in the wings and Helper is BOOMING! I’m confident this is our time.

One of the things I love about this home is our wonderful neighbor Faye. He takes such wonderful care of his home and yard and I just love looking out the windows of our proposed master suite and seeing how big beautiful roses and tranquil landscape. I’m very grateful, and I hope after all the racket we are making now is done we will be able to offer him the same.

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Murphy’s Law

As in most any endeavor that is worth while, Murphy’s Law always applies to construction. We planned to work two long days straight over this beautiful memorial day weekend. However, half way through the day Sunday our generator started to bog down. It made for a very tedious last half of the day. We had to stop work over and over to attend to the generator and keep it running for long enough to build up air pressure in the compressor. As Derek shouted measurements for me to cut, our perfect workflow became stumbled and then halted after about half of the master bedroom was framed in.

The kids and I did manage to finish cleaning up the front yard including taking a sledge hammer to the massive radiator. We had to break out the whole middle in order to have manageable pieces to place onto the trailer. There’s a small video here. And first thing Sunday morning we stacked a truck and trailer full of logs and kindling behind the garage.

Monday morning was also a bit of a bust. My grandmother passed away last year and we have been trying to get her house ready to hit the market. Our whole family feels like we are losing a limb seeing it go. But life goes on.

As always when someone passes people fight over some belongings while there are always things that don’t get claimed in the house. My mother just couldn’t let any of it go, so guess where it ends up? You know, because we have plenty of space. This morning my younger brother and dad both pulled up in large, covered trailers full of stuff. Not necessarily items or belongings, just stuff. All my brothers were there to help move everything into the house that was staying. Some hush hush, don’t tell mom stuff made it into the back of my oldest brother’s truck to be donated, and some back into my dad’s trailer to go back to their house or business building.

My second oldest brother had to come back with his tools to help us after we purchased a spark plug for our generator. Our efforts are all for naught. It still didn’t properly run. So back to the stores to buy a new one. We will buy a new carburetor for the old one and get it running later, but we just need to keep moving at this point.

After getting up and running again with power and pressure we were back at it. Derek shouting measurements, me cutting and him placing each board until we finally ran out of reclaimed boards large enough to use. We have many half pieces to still use but our next step is purchasing some bundles of 2x4s in order to keep going. We hope you enjoy our progress video. If you want to see more, keep reading the blog or just check out the rest on our YouTube channel.

Please scroll down to the end of the blog and fill out that subscribe section to make sure you don’t miss a thing.

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Warrick the Vampire Slayer

He looks up to Buffy, wants to be Angel, secretly envies Petyr and has a mission all his own. Our little Taika Waititi fan has been scheming his vampire attacks. This kid has been feverishly sharpening his stakes and strategically placing them throughout the renovation so that he’s ready for every Viago, Vladislav, Deacon and Nick. He practices impaling and slashing and even defensive rolls. Many people told us this house was haunted, but little did we know we needed to prepare for a vampiric infestation. Thank goodness we have a 5 year old that will save the day.

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A slow start.

We don’t have much of the supplies at the house yet in order to get moving, but I decided to grab the boys and do some work in the yard since Derek is currently indisposed. We stopped at the IFA that is about a block from the house, grabbed a couple new spade shovels, gloves and a hand tool. We dug up the awful noxious succulents, myrtle spurge, along with the sweet pea. We then decided to dig up the horrible railroad tie border.

After pulling out the giant pile of sweet pea I found the old downspout 90 that fell off. I was cleaning it out with my, thankfully gloved hand, when I spotted a mommy black widow and her giant egg sack. We found her a quiet spot off to the side of the house, nowhere near a window (I’m not sure that really matters). It’s not that i felt i needed to spare her life more than it’s about not having to hear that “pop” when you squash one. It gives me the chills just thinking about it.

We will just have to learn how to cohabitate, because I’m not going to kill her and hopefully she feels the same. We are invading her space after all.

We posted a short little video about cleaning up the front yard and finding our friend.

After finishing the front yard we started clearing out the space behind the garage. I bet I removed over 100 fiberglass tent poles. Who collects tent poles? Seriously. Anyway, we were able to get it spiffied up and ready for stacking the wood that we will need in our two wood stoves during the winters. We stacked a little of the wood we recently received from our lovely friends’ home, but there is much more to get to fill that space including the wood from my grandparents home. I can’t let a single thing my grandfather did go to waste. He will keep us warm for at least one winter.

Derek was able to come by later in the day after working his other two jobs. He finished pulling up oak flooring upstairs and finished the tedious job of removing all the nails as well. He will be saving the oak to line the walls of his music studio.

All in all it was a very successful day. We will be getting to the real renovation next week after Derek is done working on his clients’ homes.

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Best birthday present EVER!

For my birthday this year we finally were able to obtain our permits from Price City. What a chore that was! Now we can finally start working and spending every penny giving Bertha the beautiful facelift she has been longing for.

Today however, Derek is working feverishly to button up some other jobs renovating another house and business for some of his clients. And I decided that we needed to do some cheap advertising for the blog so I went down and painted the front window.

Hopefully this will bring some more traffic to the page. I will be going back with the boys after a quick lunch to get rid of those noxious weeds in the front yard and clear out the back yard. Keep your eyes peeled for another post tonight or tomorrow.

Seeing this permit in the front door window warms my heart more than you know! It’s one step closer to getting us out of our small Helper home.

While you are here don’t forget to sign up for notifications so you don’t miss a single step of this arduous process.

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Could have been worse

Today brought us our first mishap.

We were all outside in the garage checking out the sweet piano Derek got me. I will get to renovate it as soon as we finish the house. Meanwhile, Granger was inside cutting out an unnecessary board when we heard a crash and he yelled like something was really wrong. We thought he was severely injured. Nope. The vent pipe that was used in the original master bath became dislodged from the roof and fell through both floors through to the basement. That wasn’t too terrible, but it was definitely a Funny Farm kinda moment. Now we have a skylight. We are covering those floor boards with underlayment anyway, so it’s not like it was an added expense.

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Long time no see

It’s been a long time since we had an update for you all on our renovation of turning this convent into our family home. We FINALLY found an engineer that was willing to work with us. Not just willing, but also very excited about our project. He was very happy to see how sound the building is despite it’s run down looks.

We also have a great plan for hvac. We are going to have Bob Rojas install a roof mounted 5 ton dual pack unit that will handle our cooling needs and will also add a boost to the heating if we should need it. We will also have staple up radiant floor heat throughout the house that will do the bulk of the heating. We are going to be able to afford the solar unit for our radiant heat. We will have a wood stove on each floor as well. We are accustomed to that wonderful blast of warm you get from a wood stove. As you can tell by this overkill I HATE being cold!

We have now begun reframing and the demolition of the walls we do not want. During this process we have found a few solutions to our previous problems and have also made a few changes in what will go where. I think I’m most excited about the great room. Now that the dividing stud walls are down you can really feel how grand it will be.

Here are the update videos for each floor:

first floor

second floor.