Grand Parlor reboot

The "grand parlor" had been "renovated" by the previous owners. I don't know exactly what the style was that they were going for. They went through the trouble of removing the lath and plaster from the ceilings and exterior walls, removing the blown insulation, installing fiberglass insulation, etc and then put ceramic tile (previous post) on the floor and tried to make a cathedral style ceiling. Things were done pretty poorly, so we tore out the ceiling and the build around the fireplace. We revealed a beautiful original brick fireplace that is truly something to see. It is clearly designed with the basement fireplace to heat the house. One more step of destruction towards getting things back to the way they should be. Some of the brick work is broken and needs repaired. If you know anyone who has worked with brick that would be willing to help repair, please let me know.

The boys and I will be headed back tomorrow (Dec 31) and probably Tuesday ( 1/1/2013!) to do some more demo. Hopefully we can start the floor jacking tomorrow as well, but we will see.

Anyone wanting to help out, just let me know. We need general labor right now to finish the demo and prep for new materials.

Thanks for looking.

Finally - Oodles of Photos!!!

Front of house from driveway

Most of these blog posts are done by Brian, but this is Lindsay here.  When we went out to the Quincy house two weeks ago (which was the first time I actually set foot in the house!), I took a lot of photos with my phone.  But when I tried to put them on the blog I ran into all kinds of trouble due to my hoarding too many photos and videos on my phone, and the fact that 2 of our computers crashed - sheesh!  So, after much ado, I am finally able to post these here.  My phone has been uploading photos to Google+ for an entire week, but it's finally finished and - viola! - here they are.  I wish I had more detailed photos of some things, but at least there are many photos of the property and the house - inside and out.  I know these are things many people have been waiting to see, so - here you go!

View from front porch facing east

View from front porch facing north

Front (north side) of house

Woolly worms!

Back side (south side) of house

east side of house

Tree climbing adventures galore

looking out over west end of property

lunch break on the back porch

Multiple tree stands on property (aka FORTS)

All I could think was "this is a photographer's playground!"

creek on property

looking at house from west end of property

The girls are quite happy with the new stomping grounds

Standing in kitchen looking through to parlor

kitchen with rear porch/laundry room off to right

looking into dining room from kitchen

looking through dining room to parlor and front porch

The grand parlor

Looking through parlor and dining room; coat closet at left

stair well

looking from stairway down into parlor

southeast bedroom

roughed-in second floor bathroom

southwest bedroom (aka the CAT room - yeck!!)

Master bedroom (northwest bedroom)

northeast bedroom

stairs to attic (previously bird infested)

large attic

more of attic

stair landing

Kids find adventure everywhere :)

south side of house

front porch glory  :)

Demolition Continues

Parlor - Before

This past Friday and Saturday we worked at some of the demolition work needed on the main level. I found out that the water heater does not work, so we will need to get that replaced before we can clean with hot water. On Friday Andrew and I tore out the tile in the "grand parlor". He was a great help! We tore out the floor and threw the tile into the back of the old truck to be hauled away eventually.

Parlor - After

Once the tile was completely torn out, the floor looked much better and the dip in the floor at the bottom of the stairs was not nearly as pronounced. The brown tile that surrounds the fire place is original to the home, assuming that the wood flooring is original. We opted to keep that. I think that it will look really nice once we sand it out and refinish it. When we pulled off the trim around the tile I found at least one mouse nest location as well as some mold surrounding the front door due to condensation where they never sealed the doorway when the previous owners "rehabbed" this room.

Kitchen - Before

Boys like to burn stuff

Aaron and Beth came by on Saturday to help with tearing out the old kitchen cabinets. The counter top was more of the same tile that had been used on the floor. We just broke it up and burned everything. The original kitchen floor, which you can see in this picture, was torn out  with the help of our three boys.

Kitchen sub-floor and under-lying sister boards

Once we got past the first layer of flooring, the sub-floor  had to come up to remove the sister boards that the previous owner had put into place. They basically tried to level out the kitchen floor with these additional boards by simply nailing them up higher and higher. I want to try to level the floor out as much as possible using jacks, so these sister boards had to go along with the sub-floor over them.

Kitchen - After

Here is the final picture for Saturday.  There were hundreds of nails holding those sister boards in place, so it took me about an hour to pry them all off. We won't be out to Quincy again until later this week or this weekend, so hopefully the pipes don't freeze before we get back out. Thanks for looking at things! We hope everybody had a Merry Christmas - we had a great time at the "old" house in Noblesville.

Week One

Our first week of work!

half of the basement before

bad

We have completed the cleanup of the basement for the most part. Removed the moldy drywall and insulation from the ceiling and swept up 100 years of dirt/dust. In the picture to the right, you can see the support beam that is falling. It has been stabilized with a support jack, but it needs more work.

Burning Debris

We burned most of the lumber that was rotten, one of the advantages of being in the country.

We have had the septic checked out this week, its in good condition. The well is on and the tiny water heater seems to work (we will have to replace this just because the size will no way work with eight of us!). The furnace works too after getting some propane in the tank. Heated up the house 20 degrees in about 10 minutes (then I shut it down - don't want to waste that propane!)

After Rough Cleaning

After Rough Cleaning

 We will hopefully be able to pressure wash the basement before the end of the week and move towards additional demolition projects on the main level. Chances are, we will need to reclean the basement anyway, but its a start!