Look Ma! No Chimneys!

Our masonry contractor has been busy at the house. First up was the lintel over our walk-out cellar stairs. In the before picture below the lintel is mostly hidden, but if it was visible you would have seen that it was wood and it was basically splitting in two lengthwise. The before picture clearly shows the effects this was having on the stone wall above the lintel.

Below is a picture of the new lintel. It is limestone (like the rest of the house) rather than wood. Even without the pointing around it complete it looks soooooo much better!

Next up is an interior threshhold. This is between what will be our dining room and a walk-in closet/laundry room on the first floor. The threshhold is stone, but it had split in two and one part was basically falling into the basement. This was because years ago the stone wall directly under this doorway had a hole cut into it for ductwork. This doorway seemed to shift noticably just in the time we have been in the house, so we are very relieved to have this issue resolved.

And there's the chimneys. We were at the house this morning getting a quote for insulating the attic. I was standing in the living room talking with the insulation contractor when we started to hear rather loud knocks and bangs. After a little bit, the insulation guy said, "Sounds like they're trying to knock the house down for you!" So I went up to a window and looked out, just in time to see two bricks fall from the sky. "Well," I said, "I hope that's only the chimney coming down out there." Luckily, that's all it was. The mason will rebuild these chimneys for us next summer, but because there are other repointing jobs that are more pressing, for the winter they will just be capped off just above the roofline.

To the left is one of the chimneys just before it was taken down. They literally took the things apart by hand. Both chimneys were down within five mintues. So far, we are quite impressed with this masonry company. When we left they were busy (in the 34 degree weather) starting to grind out joints on the east wall of the house. The weather early next week will be back up around 60 degrees and they want to have all the prep work ready so they can start repointing as soon as the thermometer is cooperative.

I've got to say - in the midst of the ever growing "to do" list, it feels very good to see some progress being made!

The Water's Rising

It's very early in this process. So it's not too surprising that the "to do" list right now seems impossibly long - and getting longer every day.

Take the lack of a furnace as a case in point. We contact an HVAC contractor to prepare an estimate on a new furnace and duct work. He wants us to have an energy audit done so he knows what size furnace we will need. The energy audit reveals that the attic needs insulated (not a huge surprise). The insulation contractor says he can insulate the attic, but won't do it until we evict the bats and clean up their mess. Every pest control place I've called says they don't handle bats. I've called two county extension offices and got the same reaction at both - "Hmmm. That's something we've not dealt with before. We'll have to look into it an get back with you." And that's where we are right now.

We're also facing the reality of the weather. The roofing contractor informed us that temperatures are already cold enough that he will not be able to resurface the standing seam roof until spring. Any hope at getting the exterior painting done before spring has also been all-but-given-up. Highs are in the 40s the rest of this week, with wet snow in the forecast for the weekend.

But all is not woe. The bat issue will be an adventure, I'm sure, but it has promise of being an educational and interesting one. I've been perusing websites and it seems that the best time to bat-proof a house is in the dead of winter when most bats are hibernating in caves. In addition to sealing all openings to the attic, several websites recommend installing bat houses on the property as further encouragement to the returning bats to stay out of the house. Call me crazy, but there's a part of me that thinks this could be kind of fun!

And although Charles and I have been stymied this past week with full time jobs and two kids with nasty coughs, my parents have been busy at the house. My dad was brought over his loader tractor earlier in the week. He pulled down the outhouse and cleaned up several brush piles behind the house. (About gave me a heart attack that day when I pulled in the drive and saw smoke rising above the house! But it was just the burn pile he had started in the back yard.) And yesterday my mom donned coat and gloves to attack the weeds and junk next to the shed. Our mason starts work tomorrow, shoring up a shifting threshold and replacing the lintel over the walk-out basement stairs. And Charles's parents have offered to watch the kids on Saturday, which should help Charles and I get a productive start to the weekend.

So the water's rising for sure, but I don't think we're in over our heads yet. (Hopefully I've be of the same opinion a week from now!)

It's Cold Outside

I spent most of the weekend at the house with a chipper little four-year-old for company. She entertained herself quite well while I puttered about. Mostly I worked on scrubbing walls and cabinets in the kitchen addition. The pictures from yesterday's post don't show the layer of grease, dust, cobwebs, and general grime that cover most surfaces in the kitchen. I also did some work insulating outlets along exterior walls. Our energy audit showed the outlets as a large source of cold air intrustion in the kitchen.

Charles was busy all weekend with performances of his most recent play, but he was able to help me pry up the nasty sections of subfloor in the kitchen. We also pulled up the carpet from the dining room (nice wood floors under this) and from the living room (nice wood floors under this too, except they have some kind of primer painted on them).

Later in the afternoon my mom stopped by, as did my aunt and uncle J & L. They got a tour of the house and grounds. Then J wanted to see the basement. Sounds reasonable enough, right? Except that the basement steps were among the top items on our to-do list. At some point a giant hole had been cut through the support under the stairs in order to run ductwork. The expected result was that the entire staircase was collapsing. J & my mom ventured down, one at a time. Ostensibly, they went down just to check things out, but a few minutes later my mom yelled upstairs asking if we could scrounge up some 2x4s from out at the barn. So, several of us headed out to the barn, collecting pieces of scrap wood. And by the time J came up from the basement we had newly braced, sturdy steps for him to walk on. Family is such a blessing.

Now if I could only say the same about Mother Nature. I realize it is October, but really, highs of barely 50 degrees? We have a lot of outside work to do, and the sooner the better. But if we don't get temperatures a bit warmer it's going to be either miserable and/or impossible to tackle some of these tasks until spring. This whole summer has been unusually cool, so surely we're due for the mildest November on record. Surely.

Interior Pictures!

Finally - some pictures of the inside of the house!!! First off is the kitchen. Since the front door is rarely used this is the first room most people will see.



Above is the other end of the kitchen addition. (That dark stain on the floor reeks. Replacing that section of subfloor is on my list for tomorrow. Thankfully, it seems to be the only urine problem in the house.)

The picture below is one I love. This is the view looking from the kitchen into the stone part of the house.


And - into the stone part of the house. Below is a picture of those living room windows that make me melt.



Above is the doorway from the living room to the dining room. (Ignore the Easter Egg Purple walls - they'll be gone soon.) Notice to the bottom right of the door where the baseboard is missing, that's a stone wall you can see. And by the way I measured the baseboard today, it is 13" tall.

Heading upstairs we have this adorable, totally impractical little nook.

Above is a picture of one of the bedroom doors. I love them. I was studying the doors downstairs today and I don't believe they have any nails in them. There are mortise and tenon joints and wood pegs, but I couldn't find any nails. And most still have the original hardware.

I'll close with the following picture, it's not of the house, but it is the view we had pulling out the drive for a Lowe's run this afternoon.

We are homeowners!!!

Back on August 20th, we were told to expect it to take 6-8 weeks to get to closing. It's exactly seven weeks later and The Einsel House is ours! We handed over the rest of the purchase price late yesterday afternoon, and the paperwork is being filed today.

So the posting should get much more interesting from here on out!

Eager

Went back to the house last night. My grandparents wanted to know if they could see it. The previous owners are mostly moved out, just the usual 85% moved out stuff is left behind. Trinkets and toys that have been in storage for years litter the floors, along with all the dust bunnies that had been hiding under the bed and behind the fridge. Having just moved five months ago ourselves it looked pretty familiar.

But seeing the house again, mostly empty this time, was sublime. And scary. We have so much work ahead of us. So much work. How I wish this was April rather than October. But, oh my heavens, what a house. For the first time I really studied the woodwork inside the front door. It's amazing. And the living room (where those curtains I've been working on will go) is jaw-dropping. With the furniture out we noticed the baseboards for the first time. They are the highest baseboards I think I've ever seen. Will have to get a ruler in there to measure.

(Oh, and this news just in - we have a closing date! 48 hours from now we'll be homeowners again!)

Crisis Averted

Mr. Attorney's attorney is reviewing the proposed "Covenant Not to Intervene or Interfere in Sale." Provided it meets with his approval it looks like we have averted this crisis.

We had to buy this cooperation, though.

In the end, if we had gone to the sale and had to bid up to what this is now costing us we still would have been thrilled. We're still getting a good price on an amazing property. But although we feel relief, it's hard to feel much happiness at this resolution. After all, we're paying half of the malpractice deductable for a mistake we didn't make.