Guest Post at Old House Dreams

I want to thank Kelly at Old House Dreams for allowing me to author a guest post on the Seneca County Courthouse.

I mentioned earlier this year the county commissioners’ attempt to close the Seneca County Museum and auction off its contents. Thankfully the museum now appears to be safe, but the county’s 1884 Beaux Arts Courthouse remains on the chopping block, with bids for demolition set to open on November 8th.

So please head over to Old House Dreams, and if you feel compelled please consider contacting the Seneca County Commissioners and urging them to save this irreplaceable building.



Artist's depiction of renovated courthouse



Curiosity and the Cat

I've moved from roofing to siding. Labor Day was spent on the west side of the shed.  I took down the corner boards, then took out and framed in the old window.  My father-in-law helped me wrap that side in tar paper, and then we put up four rows of furring strips.  The existing siding is very rotted, so we'll rely on the furring strips (which are screwed into the shed's very solid framing) to hold on the new siding.

By mid afternoon we had the first three pieces of siding cut to size and the kidlets were set up with paint brushes and a pail of primer.  If you look carefully at the picture to the right you will see that Neil's attention is not on his paint brush but instead on a kitten who came to help.  I figured there would be curious kittens and had warned the kids to gently move any kitties that came too close.  Two kittens acted as I predicted, cautiously creeping up the project, sniffing curiously at the primer's strange smell. And Neil did an excellent job redirecting. 

But one kitten acted in a way I definitely did not predict.  Throwing caution to the wind, Maude's most adventurous kitten approached the kids at a full run and without pause jumped . . . . straight into the gallon of primer.  Poor Neil didn't even have a chance to intervene.  

The poor kitten jumped back out almost immediately, leaving a splat of primer on the grass.  It clearly wanted to escape, but rather than running it executed a series of quick sideways leaps, leaving more splats of primer on the grass.

The next 15-20 seconds were pandemonium.   I was attempting to catch the kitten, which was still pathetically jumping through the grass.  The kids were screaming and yelling, and my father-in-law was laughing out loud.

Meanwhile, there were several thoughts running through my head:

1 - we can't let this kitten try to lick itself until we wash off this primer

2 - Crap! We can't just wash this off, it's an oil based primer!

3 - I think I better call a vet and see what they suggest

4 - Crap!  It's Labor Day and I'm sure the vet's office is closed

With the kitten wrapped tightly in an old rag, I dialed our veterinary's phone number.  As I feared, I got a message that the office was closed, but I left a message explaining our predicament.  I then held the kitten while praying that the vet would call back before the primer completely dried.  Luckily, she did.  The vet said to go ahead and use paint thinner to wash off as much primer as possible, and to follow immediately by a thorough washing with dish soap in warm water. 

By this time the kitten had pretty much resigned itself to its fate.  Using a rag soaked with paint thinner I carefully rubbed down all four legs, and then turned my attention to the very round kitten belly which was also covered in primer.  Luckily, the kitten's head and back were mostly clean.  I then switched to a warm dishwater bath.  By the time I was done the kitten was a pathetic little sight.  And it was shivering.  The day was chilly, so we put our now very contrite kitten up in a small cage in the kitchen for the night.  Besides keeping the kitten warmer while its fur dried, I also wanted to keep the kitten isolated.  I had done my best on the two baths, but I was still worried that the kitten might get sick when it began trying to clean itself.  I also didn't want Maude to get herself sick trying to bathe her kitten.  The kitten sat shivering in a corner of the cage and gave a few mournful meows.  After a few minutes I coaxed it into eating and drinking a bit. 

The next morning I woke up a bit early and walked with some trepidition across the quiet kitchen.  But when I lifted the towel draped over the cage the kitten (now christened 'Primer') stood up, stretched and meowed.  I took her out of the cage and gave her another good combing - during which I realized with a smile that Primer is learning how to purr.  Apparently having nothing worse than a slightly matted coat to show for her adventure, later that morning I returned Primer to her siblings and mother in the barn.

Hopefully Primer has shared her lesson with all of our other kittens and we won't have a repeat performance when we break out the red paint this weekend.  : )

Updates

Good News

Celia with one of the twin tiger kittens

We have kittens at the EH!!!  Maude's taking good care of her three little ones who are now ten days old.  Ethel's litter was born yesterday - there appear to be 6, possibly 7 (including at least one calico!).  And because my husband we are softies, we've also adopted twin tiger striped brothers that were dumped in a ditch.  Anybody need a good kitty or 4?

Not So Good News
Preservation Ohio recently announced their list of 2011 Ohio's Most Endangered Historic Sites and the Seneca County Courthouse and Seneca County Museum both made the list.  (The courthouse for the fourth time.)  At a recent meeting of the Seneca County Commissioners, Commissioner Jeff Wagner "made a motion to seek bids for courthouse demolition, but there was not a second. [Wagner] said he would have been remiss had he not made the motion."


Related and Better News
Following up on my earlier post, today's local newspaper reports that at their most recent meeting, the county commissioners "voted 2-to-1 to not sell the museum or any contents, including three paintings possibly created by the Hudson River School art movement."  As for Mr. Wagner, the most civil thing I can write here is to quote a Facebook user who said, "there is a certain political movement that wants to bulldoze the past; at the same time they claim to revere the past."

Not So Good News
It poured rain here again last weekend.  Somewhere around 4 1/2 inches overnight Friday into Saturday.  Although there's a footer tile around the house for the gutters to drain into, it is obviously not large enough to handle the volume of water these summer storms pour into it.  We're slowly accepting that we're going to need to dig it up and replace it with a larger tile.  We also have a new 6 inch deep gulley at the end of our driveway.  It's obvious that a permanent solution to this problem is going to involve more tile.

Since some might be wondering - The basement had water coming through the walls, but with the bypassed tile still in place the sump pump was able to keep up for the most part.  I've not ventured down to check the stone bridge, and I'm not planning to either.  There's nothing we can do for now so I'm trying to just not think about it.

Bragging News
Cecilia was completely thrilled with the cake I made for her 6th birthday.

(Charles thinks I'll have a hard time topping this next year.  I suspect he's right.)

Bat News
This year's crop of baby bats took wing earlier this month. I spent a couple of nights watching them fly out of the bat houses.  The babies are easy to identify, not only because they are smaller, but also because they flap their little wings so much more quickly than the full grown bats.  They're really rather cute.


In other bat news we have bats back in our attic.  Although the majority remain in the bat boxes, a fair number have noticed a small gap in the very corner of the eaves.  We had a local tree-trimming company lined up to come out with a bucket truck to install another one-way bat door, but they had to cancel because the truck was needed to clean up storm damage (see a few items above).  I still need to call and reschedule this.

Bad News
When we contacted the neighbor who told us last February that we could take siding from a barn on his property to let him know we were about ready to use the salvaged siding he apologetically told us he has sold his farm (and aforesaid barn).  This will obviously delay work on our shed.

More Not So Good News
Taking a good friend up on her offer (see the comments to this post) I went to Lowe's prepared to order roofing for the shed.  Only to find out that they can not match the 24" seams on the current shed (16" is the widest available). 

This next bit is a little difficult to explain.  There is a 14" strip on the original shed, immediately above where the new awning joins the old roof, where a previous owner removed the old standing seam roof.  Because I rebuilt the new awning using the old one as a pattern, this 14" strip still remains.  The transition strip available to change from 24" seams to 16" seams and to make the change in pitch only covers 7".  After considerable discussion with the salesman we had four options:

1 - partially dismantle the awning I just built, extending the joists and increasing the pitch so that the new joists would join the original roof at the top of the fourteen inches instead of the bottom;
2 - remove the rest of the standing seam from that side of the building and replace all of it with new 16" standing seam;
3 - use flashing to cover the remaining 7" so the resulting roof would have 24" seams on the top, 16" seams on the bottom, and a seven inch strip in the middle with no seams;or
4 - leave the remaining standing seam and shingle the new roof and the 14" strip above it.

I've tried to talk myself into #1 but I just can't.  #2 would double the cost and labor required for the job and that's something that we're not comfortable doing at this time.  If we went with #3 that flat seven inch section in the middle of the roof would drive me absolutely crazy.  So shingles it will be.



Expect it to be a couple weeks though before I resume work on this project.  As this post shows, I've got a few other issues demanding my attention at the moment.  And I've got kittens to spend time playing with and cuddling as well.  : )

That Which They Labored For...

I opened the local newspaper’s website this morning and immediately felt sick to my stomach.

I’ve tried to remain vague on this blog as to the Einsel House’s exact location in Ohio, but I’ll admit today that I live in Seneca County.  Seneca County - where thanks to Governor Kasich’s budget cuts the county commissioners have new ammunition in their seven year long fight to take a wrecking ball to the county’s 1884 Beaux Arts courthouse. And where just yesterday the same commissioners cited Kasich’s budget as justification to cut funding (all $42,000 a year) to the Seneca County Museum. And then while they were at it they also decided to sell the 1853 Greek Revival housing the museum and all of the contents thereof.

From the Toledo Blade article linked above:

The news, which came after no public discussion, was a shock to those who are involved with the museum and its foundation. Seneca County began its collection of local history artifacts in 1915 and moved into the Greek Revival home on Clay Street in 1942.

Some items could be sold by auction locally, [Commissioner Dave Sauber] said, while some of the more valuable items -- paintings and some antiques -- could be sold through New York auction houses.  The extensive collection includes numerous items that were locally manufactured or have local significance such as a large collection of Tiffin Glass. Many items were donated by residents who wanted them to be shared with the community. 

"Once it's gone, it's gone," [Museum Director Tonia] Hoffert said. "There are items in here that once they are sold off, you'll never find them again."

I don't even know what to say.  I just feel ill.

". . . Old buildings are not ours. They belong, partly to those who built them, and partly to the generations of mankind who are to follow us. The dead still have their right in them: That which they labored for . . . we have no right to obliterate. What we ourselves have built, we are at liberty to throw down. But what other men gave their strength, and wealth, and life to accomplish, their right over it does not pass away with their death . . ."    ~John Ruskin 1849, "The Seven Lamps of Architecture" chapter 6

"Can You Hear Me Now?"

One of the quirks of living in a house with 12 inch thick solid stone walls is that cell phone reception inside those walls is basically non-existent. We don’t have a landline, but our cell phones usually work fine in the (wood frame) kitchen, so this is a quirk that I typically accept with a little smile. After all, quirkiness can be one of the most endearing features of an antique home.

But quirkiness quickly degenerated into annoyance on Wednesday evening. Technically, there were already two strikes down by the time Charles picked up his cell phone. The first strike came 11 months ago, either when Charles resigned himself to the fact that if he didn’t want to have to live with dial-up internet he would have to live with Hughes Net, or perhaps (and more likely) it came shortly thereafter when Charles attempted to download a half hour episode of some sitcom and Hughes Net cut the video 27 minutes in because we had reached our daily download allowance. Strike two was Wednesday morning, when we woke up to no internet.

Strike three held off until Wednesday night. After fruitless attempts at resolving the issue himself, Charles grudgingly accepted my suggestion to call the technical support number for Hughes Net. Standing the kitchen, he looked up at me while dialing the number and said, “You know that the computer is in the stone part of the house.” Yes, I knew.

After several minutes of navigating through Hughes Net’s automated help line, Charles finally was speaking with another human being (albeit one with a pronounced foreign accent). He asked Charles which lights were lit on the modem. With determination lining the muscles of his face, Charles stepped into the dining room. His cell phone promptly beeped as it dropped the call.

Call number two ended with the same beep.

By his third call, Charles was able to answer the automated system’s series of questions before they were even asked. “Yes, no, yes, 419-672-….., no, no, technical support…. TECHNICAL SUPPORT”. And by the time he reached a third human being (albeit one with a pronounced foreign accent) Charles had accepted the futility of pitting Verizon against the Einsel House’s stone walls. So the cell phone remained in the kitchen for the next twenty minutes while Charles traipsed back and forth – kitchen to computer to kitchen to computer – following in vain the various suggestions put forth by Hughes Net’s technical support. Our internet was still not working when Charles finally, and of his own volition, ended the call. Hughes Net is sending a technician to the house to resolve the problem. In the meantime we’ll be without internet service at home for 7-10 days.

It's going to be a long week for my husband.

Enough Already

This is still at least two feet lower than the water was the night of February 28th, but the creek is obviously still rising tonight.

And it's not going down anytime soon.



Good Riddance

At work today I was strongly tempted to spit on the calendar page that said February before turning it to March. 

Illness and revolving snow storms had already placed this February among the most overall craptastic months I can remember.  But last night managed to top it all.  In the course of 72 hours we went from blizzard to tornado warning and flood.

This is what our creek looked like at dawn this morning:

And this is what our basement looked like at dawn this morning:

I've been up right now since 2am.  I caught the basement early in the flooding, but Charles and I couldn't do a darn thing to stop it.  It was too dark at 2am to see it, but the creek had risen so high that the tile the sump pump drains into was itself underwater.  Because of this, no matter how long the sump pump ran it was unable to push any water out.  The water in the basement just kept rising.  God bless the crew from the local heating and plumbing company (same ones who installed our furnace & heat pump) who came out at 4am.  By 6am they had figured out the problem and had rigged a temporary tile that is by-passing the buried tile.  It is still pouring water about ten feet away from the house along the hill down to the creek. 

At its peak the water was somewhere around 10-12 inches deep throughout the entire basement.  Once the by-passed drain tile was in place the sump pump ran non-stop somewhere between 5 and 6 hours to empty the basement. 

It's going to take a lot longer than that to clean up the mess though.  The back room of our basement had a dirt floor.  It now has a mud floor.

The picture below (which is of the bin that collects dirty clothes under our laundry shoot) shows how high the water reached:

When the by-passed drain went into action the water was less than an inch from reaching our furnace, heat pump, hot water heater, washer and dryer.  As it is, the only valuables we may have lost are our shop vac and cordless drill.  We were lucky we didn't lose more down there.  But our greatest possible loss is outside the house.

I don't have any pictures of the stone bridge to post here.  Most of it is still under water anyway.  Most of what is left of it anyway.  Back in my 'plans for 2011' post I said we planned to make rebuilding the bridge a four year project, but after last night our timeline has been cut drastically.  Right now the middle of the bridge is still standing, but it appears the entire east side has mostly collapsed (and the west side was already collapsed before last night's storm).  One more backhanded slap from Mother Nature and I fear we won't have a stone bridge at all.  Our basement is one heck of a mess, but it's the bridge that has me fighting back tears. 

 So if you're reading this and have a few prayers to spare for north-central Ohio they would be much appreciated.  At least one neighboring county has been declared a "state of emergency" and based on phone calls and the internet I know that many, many of our family and friends are dealing with their own flooded homes right now.  I'd especially appreciate prayers for my parents.  In the morrow they face the not unexpected but still very painful loss of a much loved family pet.  In the morrow they will also face the continued job of salvaging what they can after pumping eight inches of water out of their own (partially-finished) basement.

So good riddance February.

(...and God-speed Redigen...)

Grumpy

I'm going to spend this post whining.  I'm apparently also going to spend this post being blunt.

Last Wednesday
5:00pm - With trick-or-treating only 24 hours away, I settle in at the dining room table to make Neil the ghost costume he requested.  I've got white sheets, scissors and some thread.  How difficult can a ghost costume be?

8:00pm - Very difficult.  Thoroughly frustrated, I drive into Walmart and come home with one of the last Super Mario Bros. "Mario" costumes left in the store. 

(Highlights from the three hours in between include Neil posing in a perfect billowy ghost costume followed by Neil walking smack into a wall in our dining room because the eye holes in said perfect billowy ghost costume kept shifting so he could not see where he was going.  Followed by me deciding that instead of two small holes, I would cut one big hole for Neil to see out of.  Followed by Neil posing in a perfect billowy Muslim hijab head covering.  Not what I was going for.  Followed by me deciding that I would put two eye holes in the pillow case and hope that would stay in place better than a whole loose sheet.  Followed by Neil posing in a perfect KKK costume.  Definately not what I was going for.  Followed by the trip to Walmart.)

9:00pm - Neil (never one to like change) announces he doesn't like Mario and isn't going to wear any costume.

Last Thursday
4:00pm - At my aunt's house for a hair cut, Neil announces he does not like Mario and isn't going to wear any costume.

4:30pm - Neil does not like Mario and isn't going to wear any costume.

4:45pm - Neil does not like Mario and isn't going to wear any costume.

5:00pm - Other kids (in costume) start appearing on the sidewalks outside my aunt's house, empty plastic pumpkins and pillowcases in hand.

5:05pm - Neil decides Mario might not be so bad.

5:15-6:45pm - A rather enjoyable, if somewhat cold, hour and a half follows.

7:30pm - Finally back at the EH, Charles and I begin packing for a weekend camping trip. 

Last Friday
7:45am - Frantic activity at the Einsel House.  Last minute packing for the camping trip.  Costumes into bookbags for the kids' school Halloween parties.  Packing a lunch for Cecilia's fall harvest day field trip.  More last minute packing for camping trip.  Everyone is at least 10 minutes late leaving the house.

2:00pm - Aunt Flo decides to join me for the weekend.  (I debated including this detail here, but you know what, this little bit definately fits into a  post titled "Grumpy".)

4:15pm - Meet family friend Adam and all pile into the van to begin the drive down to Lake Hope State Park.

6:00pm on a Friday night - not the best time to be in Columbus attempting to merge from Route 23 onto Route 270

6:20pm on a Friday night - still not a good time to be in Columbus attempting to merge from Route 23 onto Route 270

8:00pm - winding our way south somewhere in Vinton County, Neil announces "I need to use the restroom."

8:05pm - Neil: "I really need to use the potty."

8:10pm - Neil: "I REALLY need to go potty!"

8:12pm - Neil: "I CAN'T WAIT!!!"

8:13pm - Charles pulls off onto some steep stone road.  The three passengers of the van who are able to pee standing up exit the van and line up on the side of the road.

8:15pm - We pull into the drive for Lake Hope State Park and locate Cabin #14.  We unload the van and all go straight to bed.

Last Saturday
1:15am - I wake up.  With a stomach flu. 

9:00am - Avoiding me like the plague, everyone else leaves the cabin to enjoy Lake Hope's ROAR Day activies (ROAR stands for Rural Ohio Appalachia Revisited).

10:00am - Cecilia is dropped off back at Cabin #14.  With the stomach flu.

Mid Afternoon - Charles reappears at Cabin #14.  With the stomach flu.

Thanks to my parents and Adam, Neil is able to enjoy the ROAR activities and has a very busy and full day. 

Last Sunday
8:00am - I wake up feeling weak and a bit shaky, but no longer nauseous.  Cecilia wakes up chipper and joins Neil for a game of Jr. Monopoly.  Charles wakes up feeling weak, a bit shaky and still nauseous. 

9:30am - Since Charles clearly isn't up to any hiking, my dad and he leave to head back north.  The rest of us finish packing up the cabin and take off for Rock House State Park.  The kids have a blast hiking and crawling around inside Rock House.

8:00pm - Finally all back at the Einsel House, I do some basic unpacking but the house is still very disheveled at lights out.

Monday
6:10am - My nose feels cold as I hit the snooze button on my alarm clock.  I snuggle down under the covers thinking how good it is to be home. 

6:10-6:40am - ...I hit snooze a few more times...

6:45am - Finally downstairs, I notice Cecilia is shivering when she gives me a hug.  Hmmm.  I walk over to the thermostat.  It's set at 68 degrees.  The house is 59 degrees.  Damn.

9:00am - I'm half an hour late getting to work and the house is still mostly trashed, but a technician from the company that installed the furnace is supposed to stop by sometime during the day to look at the furnace.  The furnace they installed barely seven months ago.  (Just how much abuse could the thing have taken between the months of April-October anyway?)

2:00pm - Furnace tech calls.  Some gas valve is the problem, he'll get a replacement and install it tomorrow.  In the meantime he overrides the thermostat so the heat pump will continue running despite the cooler-than-a-heat-pump-prefers temperatures. 

5:00pm - My dad leaves a message on my voicemail telling me we're in the dog house for giving he and my mom the stomach flu.

7:00pm - I call my parents to apologize about the flu.  Mom sounds rough.  She tells me family friend Adam now has the flu too.

10:00pm - Kids in bed and the house 1/2 put back together the heat pump kicks in.  LOUDLY.  No wonder they don't suggest you run the thing in temperatures below freezing.

Tuesday
6:10am - Noting with relief that my nose is not cold to the touch, I hit the snooze button on my alarm clock.  I snuggle down under the covers thinking how good it is to be home.

6:10-6:40am - ...I hit snooze a few more times...

7:45am - It's school picture day, so the morning has been another frantic one, but Charles and the kids are out the door on time.  I'm heading through the house one last time to turn off lights when I stop suddenly in the dining room, staring in disbelief at the rug underneath the table.  Apparently Tiny the Cat has the stomach flu too.

8:50am - I'm 20 minutes late getting to work and the house is still 1/2 trashed.  What remains of the four puddles of diarrhea on the dining room rug are soaking under wet rags.  Larger dry rags are shoved under the rug to protect the newly refinished hardwood floor underneath.  I'm beyond caring what the furnace tech will think when he comes to repair the furnace.

2:00pm - The furnace tech calls to tell me the wrong part was shipped for our furnace and they won't get the correct part until tomorrow.  He hopes the heat pump is keeping up in these cooler temps.

5:30pm - I eat two chocolate fudge poptarts for supper while shopping on-line for a new dining room rug.  Stupid rugs are expensive.

6:00-8:00pm - I derive a perhaps undue amount of pleasure from the writing of this post.

But I really should stop now and finish cleaning up the mess in my dining room...

Spiders are Scary

I stumbled today upon the blog Hyperbole and a Half. And I found this:

Spiders are scary. That is a universal truth. I don't know why. I don't need to know why. All I know is that when this:

comes crawling across the floor at me, my brain interprets it like this:

That is a spider with a swastika and the words "I KILL YOU" carved into its flesh and it has knives and guns strapped to its legs. That's how scary spiders are.

Now - This is my laundry room:

It’s in the basement. Of a mid 1840’s house.

Built out of stone.

I made myself a rule the day we moved in. I don’t do any laundry after dark.

For over two months I followed this rule religiously.

But yesterday at 8:30 p.m. I realized that there were clean clothes sitting in the drier. I debated with myself briefly. Then I flipped on the basement light and headed down the stairs.

(More H & 1/2)
...Blind optimism and impulsivity often cause me to ignore logic and instead
make decisions based on a hopeful projection of what's going to happen next… In hindsight, there was absolutely no reason to believe that it would not happen.
But for some unknown reason, I ignored a lifetime's worth of cautionary evidence and pranced merrily onward into the unavoidable consequences…

I made it into the back room of the basement and had the drier door open before I saw it. Charles (who is well aware of my self-made “never after dark” rule) had heard the creak of the basement door opening and came to investigate. He reached the top of the stairs just as I hit the bottom step. “GET OUT OF MY WAY!” I screamed as I came at him, taking two steps with every bound.

Dutifully, he moved out of my way. As I stood there in the dining room, trembling and out of breath, he looked at me with exasperation and said, “Why did you do that?” Good question. Then, dutifully, he went down to the basement asking, “Okay, now where did you see it?”.

The spider (and I) lived through last night’s encounter. But since then Charles has (dutifully) emptied a container of this stuff on all of the basement walls and windows:

For now, I think we have enough clean laundry to get us through about four days.

(And if you haven't already, do head over to Hyperbole, it's quite entertaining stuff.)

Lemons and Lemonade

It's another entry in the list of unexpected repairs at the Einsel House. First was the broken stone lintel over the front door. Second was the sagging roof over the north end of the kitchen. And third is the dining room ceiling/back bedroom floor.

Truthfully, "unexpected" is probably a bit of an overstatement. From the start the back bedroom made me nervous. There is a bit of a bounce in the floor, and of course we knew the studs along the south wall had dropped significantly. The south wall has been raised and a new support added in the basement, but the bounce in the floor remained. It shouldn't remain for much longer though.

The story here is a bit like a game of "Telephone". Charles and I are almost never at the house while our general contractor is working. So my mom often relays messages from us to our contractor, or vice versa. Several times I had asked my mom to double check with B that the back bedroom floor was safe. Every time mom told me that B had assured her the floor was fine. At the same time, mom mentioned to me several times that B had asked if we wanted him to take out the dining room ceiling. Now, the ceiling had no cracks in it, or any other obvious reason to replace it, so I always had mom relay to B that we saw no need to replace the dining room ceiling.

At this point, you can perhaps see where this story is going.

The dining room ceiling and the bedroom floor are one-and-the-same. It seems so obvious now, but keep in mind that the conversations related above occurred sometimes weeks apart, and we were preoccupied with the 6,741 other projects we have underway at The Einsel House. It was our contractor who finally connected the dots. Once again, I had brought up my concerns about the safety of the floor in the back bedroom. My mom took B up to the room to point out my concerns and B said, "I agree. That's why I want to open up the ceiling below this and see what is going on." Ah ha! The clouds parted and the sun appeared!

So last Tuesday the dining room ceiling came down. And it's now quite obvious why the floor felt a bit bouncy. The area of particular concern is pictured below:

At left is another picture of the problem area. If we had any doubts about the original layout of this portion of the house, uncovering this ceiling has laid them to rest. The current dining room definately had a wall along the north part of the room that was later removed. Originally, that wall served as the support for the floor joists of the bedroom above. When that wall was removed the joists were simply sistered together for a length of about 6". And (as you can see in the picture above) sometimes the joists did not even touch each other, so a small block of wood was placed between them. In the picture at left the joists on the right side of the photo are under the north knee-wall of the back bedroom and the joists on the left side are under the bedroom itself.

The wall in the dining room came down years ago and obviously the bedroom floor never caved in, but we would rather be safe than sorry. And the bedroom above this has only been used as attic storage for the past several decades. We plan for the room to house a bubbly preschooler with a known penchant for jumping on the bed.

So what's the plan? The obvious solution would be to place a beam under the sistered joists. But the walls that the beam would need to be anchored in are both stone walls. We could put the beam on supports placed against the walls, but the dining room already has one corner boxed out for ductwork and we don't like the idea of adding two more areas like this to the same room. So, B and his crew came up with another idea. They are having new floor joists made that will be long enough to span the entire width of the back section of the house. (That's the dining room and bathroom on the first floor, the bedroom with the area behind both knee-walls above.) There will be eleven of these new joists, and each will be sistered alongside an existing joist.

In other news, this week was the first time I've ever seen horsehair plaster:

At least three different horses contributed to this part of the Einsel House. We found the white hair pictured above, some black hair and some red hair.

And in still other news this week, my uncle informed us early in the week that because of the new ductwork and the location of a main beam in the basement, he was having difficulty placing the drier vent. He wondered if we had considered moving the laundry back into the basement. So say hello to my future laundry room:

You know the saying, "What do you do when life hands you lemons?" Well, if I had posted this last Monday or Tuesday it would have been a pretty sour entry. But by the end of the week I had found the sugar necessary to make lemonade. With the dining room, it came in simply seeing the ceiling opened up. I'm simply fascinated by seeing how this house is put together. And peace of mind is a nice thing, too. I'll sleep better at night knowing my daughter isn't going to wake up on the dining room table.

As for the laundry area, yes, it will be in a 160 year old basement. But, that means it can be messy and company will never know! And I will have so much more room, both in the now open room upstairs, and for the laundry itself. (I can leave my ironing board up all the time!) And best yet, we can now finish a laundry shoot in the bathroom that the previous owners had started. Lemonade is a pretty good drink after all!

A Jonah Month

I'm still here. Wrapped in blankets and nursing a mug of chicken noodle soup, but here.

First, if you're wondering about the title of this post you're obviously not familiar with the lovely Lucy Maud Montgomery. "A Jonah Day" is the title of a chapter in Anne of Avonlea. Basically, a Jonah Day is a day in which everything goes wrong. A day in which you feel as though you are in the belly of the whale. Anne's Jonah Day culminated when she confiscated a package from one of her students and threw it in the school woodburner, only to find out shortly thereafter that said package was full of fireworks. Fun, fun.

But right now I say, "Anne, you had it lucky. Because if there's anything worse than a Jonah Day, it's a Jonah Month." Which is what December has been around here.

-I started the month out with a visit to the doctor for a wicked sinus infection.

-Our son started the month out by dropping his Great Great Grandma Glick's antique glass milk jug onto his grandparents' glass-top stove. Great Great Grandma Glick's antique glass milk jug survived intact; his grandparents' glass-top stove did not.

-Our truck has been in the shop three times already in December.

-Our daughter visited the doctor for pink eye last week (and missed her preschool Christmas concert because of the same).

-Our son visited the doctor this week for a persistent, nagging cough which has been keeping him (and everyone else around here) up at night.

-Last week I discovered a giant mistake I made at work. Somehow back in October I completely spaced out and put the wrong defendant's name on a complaint. And didn't notice until the judgment entry came back. Not good.

-This giant "whoops" has also been coupled with more than a few other moments at work where my internal monologue says, "You've been in this position for more than 6 months now, Kimberly, shouldn't you have known that by now?" To which I reply, sheepishly, "yes".

-Last week our computer began randomly freezing. It will now only run for 5 minutes before everything locks up. (I'm on my parents' computer to type this.)(Oh, and don't expect any pictures here until this problem is fixed. Assuming I ever get back to the Einsel House to take more pictures.)

-Yesterday I gave in and went back to the doctor's office with classic flu symptoms. The doctor sent me home telling me to rest and drink lots of fluids. (Apparently Tamiflu only works if you start it at the beginning of flu symptoms.)

-Because of the above I'm missing the office Christmas party tonight, which has me feeling both disappointed and guilty.

-Because of all of the above, I have spent all of ONE day at the Einsel House so far this month. One.


But, thankfully, work at the Einsel House hasn't stopped because of Jonah's extended visit. There have been three contractors at the house. B has been patching plaster and skimcoating some bedroom walls. My Uncle J has been doing electrical work, cleaning up unnecessary lines in the basement, and taking outlets in the bedroom that were installed on top of the walls and sinking them into the walls. And C and J have been continuing work on the structural issues. This is moving forward but not without complications. The rotating beam in the basement is rising nicely, and the vertical supports in the back bedroom upstairs are already raised enough that they are once again touching the horizontal roof beam. However, with this is coming some expected cracking of the plaster walls and ceilings in the dining room. We will also have to take down the bathroom door soon. It still closes, but no longer latches, and we have a lot more shifting still to come.

The bigger complications are in the north end of the kitchen. At first, the beam along the roof peak was rising nicely, but this week when they attempted to raise the jacks it began to basically crumble. So, C and J began dismantling what was there and realized the current beam was basically just a hollow plywood box. They gave us a few options, but told us that the cheapest option (which would also provide the most structural stability) would be to drop the ceiling in the north end of the room to the same height it is over the kitchen. This is obviously disappointing, but we clearly cannot leave it the way it is. We are also hoping that this will allow more options for heating the room.

And finally, there's my mom. She's a good one. After her own round of sitting on the couch wrapped in blankets and nursing a mug of chicken noodle soup, she has been back at the house the past couple of days. She's working today on the transom and sidelights from the front door.

I think that brings all up to date. Sorry for the rather bah humbug nature of the post, but frankly, it's been a rather bah humbug month. It's not much fun being in the belly of the whale.

Give It To Me Straight

alternately titled, "Yes, We're Aware Our House Has Issues".

Compare these two pictures:

Much better, yes, but I every time I pull in the drive and see this part of the house my eye goes to the same area. Not the pile of junk (which has been cleaned up, by the way. This picture is about a month old. The door is also red now, and the storm door and outdoor light fixture are installed as well.) Not even that irksome casement window which should never have been allowed within 100 yards of a nineteenth century house. Nope, my eyes go straight to the roof.



When we bought the Einsel House we thought the roofline looked a little droopy in that area, but like anyone in love with an old house we downplayed it. The roof at that time was such a Joseph's coat of materials it was difficult to tell what was straight and what was just illusion. We also knew that this roof used to have a bell cupola on it right where the roofline sags and we thought this might be part of the issue.

But alas, putting on new shingles only made the issue more obvious. And while painting we realized that the problem wasn't limited to the roof. I've done a bit more playing with pictures to
explain what was happening at the north end of the addition.

As I have explained before, the kitchen used to be two separate rooms. The previous owners took down the wall dividing the rooms and opened the ceiling on the north end of the room. It makes a wonderful open space, but the old walls obviously needed a bit more help than they were left with. So to address the problem we have a new contractor on the job. This is what the north end of the kitchen currently looks like:

The jacks and cables were put in place early last week. The walls and roof look better already, but they are not straight yet. The contractor is letting everything sit for a few days before tighting the cables and raising the jacks again. Although the jacks will eventually come down, the cables pulling the walls back together are permanent. We will have them cased in wood to match the beams along the ceiling. These new beams will also have vertical supports to the roof peak as well as supports at 45 degree angles to the left and right of the vertical support. (Obviously the ceiling fan will need to be moved.)

According to our contractor, the kitchen was considered an area of active settlement. The wall removal and cathedral ceiling were both done within the past 10 years, so presumably the sag in the roof and bow in the walls had all developed within the past decade. But the Einsel House has another area of "middle aged sag" that started much more than a decade ago. To explain this I will need to start in the basement of our 160-odd-year old house, where there are more temporary jacks in place, with a concrete base poured for the permanent support.

To explain what comes next I put together a very simplistic diagram of the floor joists in the back room of the basement. The two dark lines represent large beams. At both ends of the room the floor joists run parallel to these beams and are anchored in the foundation walls. But the middle of the room has floor joists running between these beams. Something like this:





The point of this drawing is to show that the two beams in this section of the basement have joists joined to them only on one side each. So for the past 160-odd-years, these beams have carried more weight and pressure on only one side each. The result it that both beams are essentially rotating in place, with the bottom of each rotating away from the center of the room. The picture to the right is of the beam at the north end of the basement. There is not supposed to be any gap where the floor joists meet the beam. Theoretically, if the beams continue their rotation the floor joists would eventually pop completely out of the beams and the entire middle of the dining room floor would drop into the basement. We would obviously like to avoid that scenario.


So, what's the plan, you ask. Well, Mr. New Contractor has two more steel cables ordered. He will use these between the two beams and basically try to pull the bottoms of each beam back to center. He freely admits he has no idea if he will be able to get the beams to move at all. But even if the movement cannot be corrected, we can at least stop the rotation at its current point. After that, permanent supports will be added under each beam.



And as we continue I want you to start humming to yourself, "The footbone's connected to the ankle-bone. The ankle-bone's connected to the leg-bone...." Because when you have settlement issues in the basement you can about guarantee they'll continue as you move up....


Here we have the dining room. This wall is basically right above the south beam discussed above. Check out the ceiling line.





And moving on up we have the back bedroom. It ain't pretty. (And I'm not talking about that carpet.)




The vertical supports have dropped so far that the ones in the center of the wall are no longer connected to the top beam at all. The good news is that the top beam has both ends anchored in stone walls, so there is no corresponding sag in the roof over this part of the house.


More good news, according to our contractor, is that inspite of the way it might look, these walls are actually perfectly sound. In contrast to the settling in the kitchen, the settling in the stone part of the house appears to be inactive. Scroll back up to the picture taken in the dining room and study the woodwork around the bathroom door frame and the wood chair rail. Both are perfectly straight, even though the floor and ceiling have an obvious sag. This wall was altered when the bathroom was expanded, again somewhere around a decade ago. And since the woodwork done at that time remains straight, it appears that all of the settling in this area predates the expansion of the bathroom. (This is in contrast to the kitchen, where all of the settling occured after the work done by the previous owners.)


So again, you ask, what's the plan? Truthfully, we're not exactly sure. We'll start with the steel cables in the basement and attempt to pull the two beams back in place. If that works, hopefully it will provide results that will carry all the way up to those verticle supports in the back bedroom. But our contractor has no idea if it will work. He says those beams have probably been in their current position for half a century or more, and he has no idea if it is even possible to return them to their original position. Even if they can be pulled back, he isn't sure the walls above them will correct themselves to their original positions. But we're not going to worry about a Plan B until we've given Plan A a go.

And since this post is already long, I'll finish the update quickly. I was under the weather a few days last week and not at the house (thus the Old Winchester saga in place of Einsel House news - part 3 will be coming soon). Over the weekend we did get some work done in the two front bedrooms. There are four paint samples up on a kitchen wall but no winner yet. I'm contemplating using pure tung oil on some floors and/or trim and have done a trial on a piece of walnut but again haven't made up my mind yet. And that's about where we are.

Oh - and if you've been considering a visit to the Einsel House, don't let this post scare you away. As I've been told repeatedly over the past few weeks, this old house is solid as a rock (no pun intended) just the way it is. : )

Are you there, St. Joseph? It's me, Kimberly.

Sorry to go private. Posts here may be sparse for awhile. This wasn't my plan. But the "Thank you" back in this blog's first post was obviously given prematurely.


Mr. Attorney (and believe me it takes restraint to avoid using other choice titles) has offered Charles and I $$$ to bow out of this sale. If we refuse (and believe me we will) he is threatening to contest the closing of the sale.


So if you're willing to pray we appreciate it. And if you're the type who would rather take a small cloth doll dressed in a suit and a pair of women's glasses and poke it with 18,000 pins - well, we'd appreciate that too.

(Continued here)