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