So so close

We are almost there. Very bummed as we won't be in by Christmas, but maybe we'll have at least the kids in by New Years. My parents are here and my dad is totally savings us by doing most of the trim work. 

Steve is helping where he can, but someone has to work to pay for it all right?  I'm helping in between x-mad prep and two super busy littles.  Almost there!  

It's been a long while, friends!

Sorry for the long absence, friends. Life has been a whirlwind to say the least. Between starting a new job (and doubling my hours), two very busy kiddos, managing this house project, doing a lot of the work ourselves and life itself, the blog has been low on the totem pole. But we're happy to report that we are nearing completion!  And we are thrilled with how it is turning out!

We will be in the space this month at some point (whether it's 100% done or not). :)

Hopefully I will get up some photos of the in-between in the next couple weeks :). 

Remaining projects by us include:

-door install

-trim around doors

-wainscoting master bath

-baseboards

-closet systems

-electrical (over 1/2 way done with fixture/switch/outlet install

-door hardware

-window hardware

-paint halls, master, master bath, office

-paint trim

-2 coats poly on banister

-get final permits approved

-smoke/carbon monoxide alarms up

Projects by subs:

-finish tile (over 1/2 way done)

-shower glass (templating tomorrow)

-caulk marble counters in master

-install master toilet/faucets

-install shower plumbing hall bath

-finish baseboards on built ins

-spray paint doors and possibly built ins. 

Hope that the holidays and life are treating you well!!!

Not all smooth sailing

It surely hasn't been all smooth sailing but we feel fairly fortunate that everything is starting to fall in place and we are (sort of) seeing the finish line. 

Unfortunately, the pedestal sink base for the kids bathroom arrived shattered yesterday...after placing the order through vintagetub.com a month ago. 

Everything is really coming along for the exterior work.  They hoped to be done by this week but hit a few snags so the new date is 9/9. Still will be a week ahead of the original schedule!

As far as interior, we hope to have the initial inspections for heat and plumbing by the end of next week. Steve and a friend started the electrical work yesterday.  

By the end of the weekend, I will have bid out cabinets, insulation, wood floors, tile, plaster repair and paint!  Woo!

Next week I need to re-bid drywall and a couple handyman jobs (like putting in the bathroom fans) that Steve could do but we just don't have the time for.  

Steve has spent all day today stripping paint off the old lapboard siding that was used to replace what was torn off (and some damaged) when the sheer wall panels were put in. He's been limited to the front porch as it's raining-yuck. 

We're exhausted.  I have just started a new job and nearly doubled my hours from last year.  Will be nice to increase my income but also have summers off as I'm working for a school district!  However, timing is poor as we have come to the point of the project where all of our extra hours will be filled with house projects until the holidays :)   Here's to lots and lots of coffee!

What a way to spend a Labor Day!

I've got a Golden Ticket

This may not look Golden, but it sure is in real life

After 3 hours at the permit office this morning and a boat load of $$$, I walked away with a phase II/habitable space permit as well as a homeowners electrical permit!!!!  
Even though it took forever, I was very impressed with how smooth the process went and how helpful each of the people I had to go through (3) were. 
None of them were familiar with a permit being split into two parts-FIR permit with a contractor that covers structural/framing/exterior and the second part including all the trades and making the place habitable. 

sorry I'm sideways-darn iphone photo.

our layout.

There were just a few changes that the permit office made, including adding electrically linked smoke/CO detectors on the main floor and basement.  They also made us label all the spaces on the main floor and add in a hand rail on the stairs (which we planned to do anyways).   Super minor changes which made me (and our architect) pleased!

Now on to officially getting all the subcontractors started!  Quite the feat with starting a new job and doubling my work hours come Monday. 

Batten the Hatch

hatch door from stairwell-this mother is HEAVY!!!  Steve always goes overboard to make things durable!  it will be nice to keep dust down during drywall

Because we are doing our house project in two phases and Red Rooster Remodeling is part of the FIR program for the first phase, we are required to build a hatch door over our stairs as one of the steps to close the initial permit. The initial permit includes everything that we are hiring our general contractor, Red Rooster Remodeling, to do.  This includes framing, structural, windows and exterior work.  

hatch door from upstairs

Steve agreed to build the hatch with scrap material from the dumpster to save on cost. He did this last Saturday-it only took an hour or two.
 The other step we were told to do to close the permit is lay insulation on top of the subfloor.  We were at first told it would have to be R-30 which was a huge bummer being that we wouldn't be able to re-use it and then would be faced with spending a ton of money on something (R-30) that we would only need to have down during inspection.  However, the inspector agreed to R-21 which we were ok with because at least we could re-use it in the walls.
Then of course we got to thinking about where we would store the insulation after we passed the framing/structural/Red Rooster FIR inspections until just before drywall.  It just all seemed silly.  Why should we go to all this work to lay insulation when we planned to almost immediately have plumbing/heating contractors start work? 
I guess that the idea behind the FIR program requiring this insulation is that because we are homeowners and acting as general contractors for the remainder of the project, we may never finish the project.  If we don't, at least the attic will be closed off and insulated.  The inspector had horror stories of this happening. I gotta tell you, we are not THOSE people.  We aren't spending this much money and going through this much stress/time/continuing to live in our basement to not finish this project. 
Luckily, Red Rooster and I were able to chat with the inspector yesterday.  He is a super reasonable guy, and I think he empathized with me.  I came up there with baby on hip and we chatted.  He said he understood.  He was willing to write orders that we don't need to lay insulation!!! He agreed that it was silly being that we had our sub-contractors on deck and he felt there was no need to expose ourselves to unnecessary work and toxins.  YEA for small victories and reasonable people!!!
He also wrote orders that we could have our permit issued without closing out the FIR program permit-DOUBLE YEA!!!! 
I hired a sitter last week and went down to the city to get our permit-I got a (very nice) BIG FAT NO WAY!!!!  They said we couldn't start any work (which would delay us 2-3 weeks) until the other permit was closed.  I was so upset last week.  I am just so happy that the inspector was so reasonable and willing to work with us.
So this week has been good (pending me successfully getting our permit at the city tomorrow).  Plumbing should start Monday and heating sometime next week.  We'll start electrical (doing ourselves) as soon as we can get our act together.  Doing electrical ourselves will delay finishing our project but save us thousands so it should be worthwhile in the end.  We do plan to hire a company to upgrade our panel.
We passed the framing and structural inspections yesterday!

Here it is all framed out with the roof!  There has been quite the gang of workers here since last week.  Luckily we've had the exterior staircase so that we still have the main floor of the house mostly to ourselves. 
At the end of last week and Monday, we had contractors working in the basement, on the exterior walls and upstairs-ahhhh!!!!  Kids trying to nap with that noise was quite the treat :)  Luckily, I think Q only skipped one nap despite the noise....so glad my kiddos are used to noise when they sleep!

Change orders to forgo insulation and issue our permit!

We've got a hall

The roof went on last Thursday and it looks great.  Took the team of roofers just one day to get it all done.  They will need to come later on in the project to roof the dining room bump out and back porch overhang.

The hall all framed out.

Tiny bedroom

hard to tell but there is a bathroom with medicine cabinet all framed out on the far side of the pic (everything gets boarded up each night so I can't walk around up there)

Master bedroom

They started taking off the sheathing today to make way for the sheer wall panels they will hopefully install tomorrow.  They didn't realize we had blown in insulation so that definitely added some time and mess to the day.  Luckily, it didn't fall out on its own so they only had to remove it from a few cavities.  I plan to go buy some batt insulation to wedge in there right after the inspection is finished (I think for the tie downs?) and they put the sheer panels on.

And why not some more photos from our coast trip?  These kiddos just love the beach!!! The weather was just gorgeous-can't get over it!

Roof Up Next

Things continue to move along. They delivered roofing shingles yesterday afternoon. The roof is supposed to start today. 

I can't wait for the tarp to be gone!  

I'm busy purging stuff in the house and gathering bids for plumbing, insulation and HVAC. 

I've also started ordering plumbing fixtures which is fun but draining on the pocket book! 

Researching a tub that looks period appropriate, is cast iron and doesn't cost a ton has proved to be a challenge. I'm hoping to head to the vintage plumbing shop in town to see if they have any leads. Let me know if you know of any. I love the kohler Bancroft tub but it does not come in cast iron and the reviews on the americast material are less than convincing. 

Rafters & Tails

here's how the house is looking from the back.  TALLLLL

And from the side/front.  Really taking shape.  Can't believe that all the rafters and tails are in.  It is just unbelievable how fast a work crew can put things together-it took us the better part of a summer to replace our rafter tails (just to be torn off a few years later [insert cries]). Roof goes on by the end of the week :)  Here's to no more tarping!  Our house just cooks with the tarps on. 

We escaped the construction and heat this weekend for more tarped living-camping-at Cape Lookout State Park.  The weather was in the 70s and perfect.  We had an awesome time!

Trusses are in!

Last Thursday was a day of framing, framing and more framing 

Friday was an exciting day around here.  The workers spent the first half of the day getting the trusses delivered and placed. 

It took over an hour for them to even start as there was worry over cracking the driveway concrete. Then we had to figure out who would be responsible for repairs if the concrete cracked (the framing company took that on as they switched over to trusses from framing in place as specified on the plans to save $$$). They marked all the existing cracks prior to the truck backing into the driveway. 

Here's the crane lowering the trusses. It was really cool to watch. 

By the end of Friday, it looked like this. 

We're making some great progress. 

With the rain last night, we got some water in the living room and the basement :(. Thankfully, it appears that nothing is damaged. 

Framing it all up

After the subfloor took seemingly forever, things are really starting to move quickly. 

The north wall of the house is already framed and they are over half way done with the south wall. They anticipate the trusses being delivered by Monday and roofing going up by the end of the month. 

It is exciting to start seeing everything take shape!

We even were able to bike out to the beach by the airport over the weekend. Despite getting rained on in 80 something degree weather and biking much further than expected, we had a blast!

Steve and I got to go on a date (gasp! ...it doesn't happen often these days) to see Book of Mormon.  It was fabulous!