I'm only halfway up and running tonight. I won't have any pictures since they're on the other computer, which isn't here right now. I'll do my best to paint a picture of our progress to date. As of my posting last week, we were sleeping with the carbon monoxide detector. I'm happy to report that it never woke us with its alarm, and the water heater has been vented properly, more or less.
The siding is as complete as it can be for now, until the roofing and decking is completed. We're really happy with how it turned out in the end. We had to have the workers change the siding on the dormers, since they filled the whole thing with framing and no siding. It looked silly, but looks great now. We realized that the front roof isn't very stable, so we're having to rebuild that. So far, that's been the only unexpected project.
Today is a huge landmark. The electrical and plumbing are all roughed in, so the drywall can start to go up. Once this starts to happen, it'll really start to look more like a home. I'm getting a little tired of our temporary status, as we enter our second month of living from the basement. It hasn't been too uncomfortable so far, but it does get frustrating having dust coat everything and sleeping on a dying air mattress loses its charm.
I finally identified our basement critters as camel crickets, thanks to the help of the Washington Post. Apparently these guys really like the dry weather we've been having. In the scheme of basement bugs, these crickets aren't too bad, but I'm not a huge fan of them. They're usually at least an inch across. They don't bite, and they don't make noise. But either way, I do NOT like sleeping anywhere near them. For more info: http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/ent/notes/Urban/camelcrickets.htm
Tonight our basement had an unusually large presence of camel crickets, and so I'm moving our bedroom upstairs to the kitchen area. This means sweeping and mopping, but I'm happy to oblige.
W & I had our own project yesterday in trimming the ash tree that is close to the front porch. W bravely pulled out one of the big ladders and scaled up the tree with the chain saw to cut off one of the limbs that was brushing the front. I'll post a picture to show the improvement. It looks nice now that the front has a clear view. We still have a lot of work to do on the old oak tree along the street. It's over grown with a couple vines. We've cut the roots and hopefully the winter will aid our efforts.
Before tree trimming, and before they fixed the dormer:
The workers were focused on putting up the siding, and finishing the electric and plumbing last week. This week I think they'll be working on the front and rear decks (only a small one out back) and putting up dry wall. They've framed in the powder room downstairs and the bathrooms upstairs. W & I have almost finalized all the selections, which has been no small task. Picking bathroom tile proved to be the most difficult selection. We ordered our kitchen cabinets, so we may have a functioning kitchen in 4-5 weeks! I'm hoping for a washer and dryer sooner than that.
One of the nicest things about this renovation has been the neighborhood's excitement about our project. They are thrilled that we're fixing up this house that had obviously been uncared for for many years. Many people stop just to shout "looks great!" through their window as they drive by. And lots of others have walked up to chat with us about our project. Even in Lowes, the tile guy said, oh that's YOUR house!
So maybe by my next post, I'll have some dry wall to show off! I'll try to get pictures up tomorrow.
One quick shot of our friendly neighbors, Sam & Bella:
