First rough coat of stucco

Replacement windows in front

OLD WINDOWS:
- Single panel glass (cold, street-noisy, and unsafe)
- Tacky acrylic safety panels for childproofing
- Rotten window frames

NEW WINDOWS:
- Energy star - efficient and warm!
- Double paned glass - hopefully we won't have to turn up the volume anymore when the bus goes by
- Tempered glass in LR - no more risk of shattering glass and falling to death on concrete sidewalk two stories below
- Solid wood frames

Not much stylistic difference (as intended), but functionally, these new windows rock.  And we can actually open them - what a novel concept!

Joy!

Old LR window

New LR window

Old DR window

New DR window

Fireplace selection

We had to face it: we're a fireplace family.  The kids love to curl up with books and hot cocoa in front of the fireplace on rainy days; R loves to enjoy the fire and Christmas tree lights in December.  And of course, I'm a sucker for that quaint, warm glow myself.  With our new plan to move the dining room into the old living room, we'd be losing a lot of our favorite fireplace moments.

We've decided to add one in the new family room/living room.  Here's the one we picked (totally different surround/mantle, though!):

http://www.regency-fire.com/Products/Gas/Traditional-Gas-Fireplaces/P36-%281%29.aspx

All waterproofed and ready for stucco

Paper and lath

Whileweareatit #1

Before - eaves removed on the right

After - properly vented!

We knew there would be a few additional things we'd want to do "while we are at it..." This week we took a detour for whileweareatit #1: fix the eaves and gutters.

For the 11 years we've lived here, R has had to bail out the gutters periodically because of the poor downspout design. We've also had an ongoing moisture/mildew problem under the eaves. These were the biggest design flaws of the house.

Not anymore! We've now replaced all the fascia boards, added all new gutters, and vented all the eaves.

Christmas came early, R! No more water will be sitting on our roof!

Loft windows

They installed the loft windows this morning!

Seeing through a glass brightly

These are the layers in the building wall sandwich:  interior gyp board, stud wall (done), plywood (done), exterior gyp board (done), 2 layers of paper (in progress), windows (in progress), lath (Thurs/Fri), stucco (Sat and into next week).

Today they installed several windows! We are incredibly pleased with the rapid progress that's being made right now.

Kid Bedroom #1

Kid Bedroom #2

Living Room/Family Room

Master Bedroom - interior

Master Bedroom - exterior

Gyp board layer

Back side of house - loft and master BR windows

View from the treehouse...

Also known as Sheetrock... Passed this inspection today...

The roof! The roof! The roof is on the house!

They're finishing the shingles today, hooray!

The luxury of laundry machines

Kitchen sink laundry...

Rocks...

Almost 2 weeks ago, I started doing laundry and found a flood on the floor after the second wash load. I asked our neighbor across the street if we could use her machine, and she kindly obliged.
A week later, thinking the drain had been fixed, I started the laundry again. The laundry drain overflowed. We looked at the mesh lint strainer on the laundry output hose, and discovered a huge hole in the end of it. We imagined a big clump of lint blocking the drain. I felt responsible for not noticing the strainer was rusted out.
I held off on the laundry... but after 3 days of watching the contractor try various snakes, the kids were out of pants and socks and I was resorting to handwashing (at least our dryer still worked). I didn't want to trouble the neighbor again.
Today we discovered the blockage: rocks! And sand! It wasn't lint - it was construction debris. We are glad to have persisted in asking the contractor to clear the drain.
The machine is humming away now... Looking forward to fresh laundry!

Plywood walls are up

We had our plywood nailing inspection today (passed, of course). All of the exterior walls are complete and covered with plywood. It's such a different feeling walking around inside now.
They added roof shingles today, too.
Next comes a layer of gyp board, then waterproofing, then the windows go in!
The weather has been crystal clear and was even warm today. There's no rain in the forecast at all for the next 10 days. Feels like a miracle. How can we be this lucky? The contractor's opinion: "God love you!"

Torturous tarps

30 mph winds + tarps over the house = wild banging and rustling noise all night long = no sleep.
Ugh. Need coffee.

Solar!!!!

I am such a tech and enviro geek, so of course I've always wanted solar panels!

Today I met with Luminalt, who installs solar in SF. We went up on the roof, where he performed his shade analysis. Despite our hill, despite our three-story neighbor to the south, despite our relatively low usage, he says we qualify for solar!

The plan is to go through a company called Sun Run. They bear the cost of the panels and installation (no up front costs for us), and we then pay them for our energy usage instead of PG&E. There will even be a couple of points in the future when we can purchase the panels at a discounted rate.

I had hoped that this could cost-effectively solve our electrical energy limitations (we don't want to spend $15K upgrading our electrical service with trenching through the sidewalk, etc, but we don't currently draw enough power for the additional load of the remodel). Seems like we've found a viable solution.

I'm doing the happy dance!

Early Christmas presents

Packed into our garage -
not much staging area on our job site!

We ordered our windows on 10/24 and they arrived today. The delivery estimate was 4-5 weeks; actual time was 5 weeks, even with Thanksgiving. Not bad! We'd heard so many horror stories about window orders causing delays, so I was relieved to receive them (and to hear my contractor say "good timing!" upon arrival).

We chose Pella wood/aluminum clad windows - an upgrade from the vinyl we originally planned. I know it will be worth it!  They look so nice, even in the packaging.

I checked every window against our order - looks perfect, even with a last minute change we made. No backorders either. Hooray!

Can't wait to see them installed.

Roof nailing inspection

Our construction team worked their collective tookus off getting ready for today's roof nailing inspection.  Originally scheduled for Monday, we had to postpone once already, and our contractor was determined to hit this milestone today.

They started work extra early at 7:30 am today, we pushed back the time to the latest possible inpsection slot at 11:00 am, and by golly, we passed!

This means the contractor can start covering the roof with paper, followed by shingles, starting this Friday.  We're still under tarps for tomorrow's rain.  We've lucked out with the weather so far - although it's been rainy, the timing has helped (e.g. rain on Sunday, and tomorrow, Thanksgiving, when they wouldn't be working anyway), and it hasn't been stormy or windy.  If we can just hang tight for one more rainy day, the forecast shows clear weather into next week.

Cool view from the hill

View from the back yard

Rene climbed up behind our neighbor's house to get a good shot of our progress earlier this week. You can see the extension of the wall above the original wall height on the left side of this pic (the blue exterior wall stops at 8 feet). We raised the wall height and roof line to create enough head height for access to the loft.

Our treehouse used to look so much taller, higher, and more imposing...  see how puny it looks now, hidden there to the right!

New roof line emerges

The rooms are really beginning to take shape now!

The family room

The loft

Loft with rafters in place

The roof nailing inspection is scheduled for this coming Monday.  The inspector needs to make sure the roof is nailed properly (nail size and spacing), and that it satisfies the 1-hour fire rating requirement, before we are able to cover it with roofing material.  Our contractor is *hustling* to meet this appointment (and he wants the roof on to protect from rain just as much as we do at this point).

It's currently raining (lightly), and is supposed to rain all day tomorrow as well, which probably means it will be too slippery for the guys to work on the roof plywood.  They'll be here all day Saturday trying to complete the overhang, fascia and plywood in time for Monday.  Tonight everything's covered up tight with tarps.

Luckily, on our side of the temporary wall, we are still cozy and dry in our little apartment!

We made it through the rain

Some water/dampness on the left corner of the subfloor, but it
should dry out over the next few days. No apparent water on the
hardwood (which is covered with paper).

It rained all day yesterday, but to our contractor's credit, they did a good job tarping everything. I'll admit, it went waaay better than I anticipated.  It's clear today and good to be on the other side, but I'll really celebrate after the new roof is on. More rain is forecasted for next Friday, so we'll see how much they can accomplish between now and then (5 construction days).

It's a strange feeling knowing that we've paid someone to demo the back half of our house!  No pain, no gain?

Bye bye bedrooms

Our old bedroom is (was) on the left

Kids' old bedroom on the right

The only drywall remaining is the thin barrier between our living space and demolition chaos:  the stairwell wall, the temporary wall, and the bathroom wall are somehow keeping us cozy!

The roof is off

The moment we've been worrying about

No turning back now!

But rain is still forecasted for Friday...  I feel so exposed!

Temporary wall is up

Can you see it there, to the right, behind the jackets?

There's now a wall across our hallway, from the entry to the bathroom. And the schedule has moved up - roof comes off tomorrow!  90% chance of rain forecasted for Friday.  Contractor promises that he will have it framed and covered by then.  Gulp!!

Starting on the second floor

We had a chance to walk around the second floor addition this weekend.  We're very excited to be at this stage!  The contractor says that the roof will probably come off next Monday, and it will probably take them a week to frame the loft level and the new roof.  We'll be watching the weather like hawks and hoping that we can proceed on Monday.

Checking out the beginning of the second floor framing

J takes a peek at the view

Preview of the loft view

Doubt comes in at the window

On Sunday eve after a busy weekend, R went out to measure the framing to check the rough openings for the windows.

Uh oh.  Not only was the framing not large enough for the rough openings (instead, they used the actual window size, which doesn't account for the trim around the window), but he discovered a problem with the wall thickness.  It seemed they might need to tear out and redo two of the three walls they erected so far.

And then, as he studied the window order for the 49th time, which we placed a week ago, he noticed that the "final wall depths" were wrong on half of our windows.  (Window salesman error.)  It seemed we might need to pay for windows that we couldn't install.

This was definitely a low point for the project.  And yes, we panicked a little.

On Monday, R didn't go into work.  He waited until noon for the contractor to show up so they could discuss the path forward.  While he waited, he called all our advisers (our architect/engineer/contractor friends) to gather insight, then drew up a framing plan.  Meanwhile, I called the window company and was informed that we had until 2pm that day to make final changes.  Just in the nick of time!

By the end of the day, Engineer Extraordinaire (R) had done it again.  All problems were resolved; the contractor was on board; and the window order was updated with the correct wall depths.  There was little framing to redo (just some changes around the windows), and we did not have to pay extra for window changes.

To the contractor's credit, we realized that his plan for managing the wall thickness was the right way to go, and it was his right-hand guy who misread the window rough openings because he was working off the plans instead of the window order.  It pays to keep a careful eye on a project like this.  We are feeling very grateful to have engineering in the family!

Happy Halloween everyone - hope yours wasn't as scary as ours was!

Bwaa haa haa haa haaa.....

What do Halloween and remodeling have in common?  They can both lead to nightmares!

First floor framing

The space is taking shape...

The contractor worked all day Friday and Saturday. We are moving forward again!

Where are the workers?

Tuesday, they had two guys here.  Wednesday, they had one guy here.  Thursday, nobody.  And not a stitch of framing has gone up.

Tick, tock, tick, tock.

We have gorgeous, clear weather, a pile of lumber, and no workers!

I know that they are finishing my friend's sister's house this week... but it's the typical case of the contractor biting off a little more than he can chew.  We are trying to be patient - trying to remember that it's good for this guy and his crew to have work, trying to remember to trust in God's perfect timing, trying to remember that there's not much we can do but keep applying firm pressure to get the contractor out here...

All the while I am managing my panic about the upcoming rainy season, and hoping with huge hope that the timing when the roof is off the back of the house does not coincide with a huge storm.

Think dry thoughts!

Lumber delivery

Wood for first level framing

These guys have an interesting way of delivering lumber: they pull down a hinged portion at the back of the flatbed, and the wood comes sliding off of the bed and lands with a crash on the ground.

Foundation and slab complete

Ready for walls!

The UPS delivery guy keeps asking if we are building a swimming pool.  (?)

Concrete pour #2

Today they are pouring the concrete for the slabs and deck footings.  It's amazing how much time and effort goes into getting the foundation and drainage right.  We are all very ready to start seeing the framing go up next week!

I'd be excited to see the end of all the dirt, gravel, sand, and dust mess if I didn't know that we'll just be trading it for sawdust!

Skunked

Do not come wiz me to ze Casbah -
we shall make beautiful musicks togezzer right here!

We woke up Sunday morning to skunk smell wafting up through our heat registers.  "Oh great!  A skunk is in our garage!" we thought.  Another night creature drawn in by our construction crew's smelly lunch garbage.  We called ACC, but they don't come out until there is positive identification, i.e. we have to see it.  They recommended holding a wet towel in front of me so that I could spread flour on the ground to see tracks in.  Right.  I am so not doing that.  Have I mentioned my fear of skunks?

We ended up putting a loud radio in the garage and left the door open for a while, and R did end up exploring the area first with a wet towel waving like a matador.  We left for church in a totally skunked car.  Later we found chewed through garbage bags on the side of our house.  Our assessment:  skunk and raccoon had a fight over our garbage, skunk sprayed at the side of our house and then maybe hid in the garage.  Our workers found paw prints left in the dust on some pipes on Monday - confirmation!

For the eleventh time, we reminded our workers to secure their lunch trash!  No more critters, please!

18 cubic yards of concrete

A concrete mixer gets the whole neighborhood's attention!

Nice strong footings!

You can't help but get excited when the concrete mixer arrives.  Make way!  The yellow trailer in front of the mixer in the pic above is the pump.  The guys pumped that whole mixer full of concrete into our footings (that's 10 cubic yards) and then went back for more... All told, we've got 18 cubic yards of concrete in the new footings (the contractor was surprised, thought it would be 12!).  Solid.