Cooler Wednesday

Today's weather was beautiful.  A little cooler than the past week or so and the breeze was a welcomed addition to the day.  Today was a 1/2 day with Todd, Eric and Bonnie working to put in the upstairs exterior closet, the front of the house closet wall and the last of the faceted window walls. 

Todd's new "spinning" view



New walls in the front of the house



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The garden is doing well and the best part of a new dirt raised bed is... no weeds



Eric and Bonnie putting in the last of the faceted window wall.





Bedrooms and Swimming lessons

It was just Eric and I for most of the morning.  Some things came up so we got a little later start.  It kind of set the tone for a laid back kind of day which was just what we needed.  We completed the master bedroom deck and got a start on the East and West facing walls.  Through the afternoon Bonnie and Dave joined in and we got a portion of the walls up.  It was good to have Dave on hand to figure out the slope of the top plate.  All in all it was a fun yet productive day.

And on a different note Finn started swim lessons this morning.  He and Bonnie headed over to the school pool and had some summer fun. 

Now we are off  to Poppie and Nana's for some tacos.  I'm hungry!

Story 3 is on its way

Dave, Eric, and Todd started the day with a hike up to the look out.  Dave took us up through a shoot so it's really more bouldering than hiking.  Then on the way down run ran the trail.

 Bonnie, Pat, and Eric took the lead on getting the master bedroom deck framed.

Pat helping to make the wing wall plumb- this wing wall supports the master bedroom

We took no photographic evidence of Eric's work today to help make the wing wall plumb.  But Finn and Bonnie have taken to calling Eric the "Monkey Man."  We are ever grateful that he is on "our team."

North wall looking from north side

North side Master bedroom wall

Bonnie and Eric hanging the deck joists



Don't try this at home

Eric took on the challenge of adjusting a rim board for the second story.  Needless to say "fine tuning" is not yet part of our process.

2nd Floor Going in

The second floor started going in.  Most of the morning we blocked the joists, layed strap, and added some backing for drywall.

Eric putting on the glue for the sheeting

Second floor/ new bedroom flooring

 Bonnie started to build the pantry.  It'll be small but it's more then we have now. 

Bonnie checking the drawings



Putting up the pantry wall

 Today we are looking to complete the second floor.  In the next day or so we should be able to start on the second floor walls. 

The day started with Dave, Eric, Pat and Trevor getting the joists set up.  Trevor wasn't feeling well so he spilt after about a half an hour.  Dave helped  Eric and Pat get ready to lay in the joists.  After a couple of hours it was just Eric and Pat hammering out the second floor.

Tomorow we are hoping to start laying down sheeting.  We'll actually have an addition on the second floor!  On an other front Bonnie comes home tonight so tomorrow will be good even if we don't get to sheeting.

Today we got a couple of the big heavy beams, that frame the second floor, in place.  It took Dave, Eric, Pat, and myself to place the first one against the existing house.  Then,  thankfully Trevor was able to swing by to help us with the larger beam that runs perpendicular to the first beam we placed.  Eric and Pat got the task of cutting the very expensive beams to length. 

 At the end of the day we got the two beams, the rim joist on the back wall and most of the rim joist on the front wall in place.

In the end the second level addition will be 22 feet out from the existing house.  Tomorrow Finn and I are going to hang out and maybe have some fun at a water park.  Eric Pat and Trevor will finish off the rim joists and start to put in joists.

Pat came up first thing this morning and started hammering.  Our goal was to get to a the point where we could add the first couple of glue lam beams to the structure.  That mean getting all of the main level walls done and a start on the wing wall.  The wing wall will support the canted portion of the master bedroom.

Tomorrow Eric and Pat will be back up late morning.  Dave will swing by about the same time and the four of us will install the two main beams in the second floor framing.

Father's Day through Tuesday

We haven't posted a new entry for a few days as we took Father's Day as our first official day off.  Todd rode down to Palm Desert where Bonnie and Finn picked him up at the Santa Rosa visitors center. It was good for him to get a bike ride.  As many of you know, he is alittle addicted to the sport so to have cut back so drastically on his main summer source of entertainment has been hard.  After a good ride, Bonnie and Finn took him to lunch at the Yard House and we ran some errands around in the desert.  Luckily it was only about 98 degrees so the weather was pretty mild for this time of year.  We also ordered the MLB.tv package so we can watch the Brewer games via the FoxSports Wisconsin coverage.  We are trying to make the best being so far away from our usual summer activities.

The past couple of days it's just been Todd and Bonnie.  It's been pretty cool building our new home together just the pair of us.  Dave has been coming by and available by phone to field questions and offer confirmation.  It's been great having him on hand to help us out along the way, we are sure that we couldn't pull this off without him.  Tomorrow Pat is coming up and Bonnie heads out of town for a conference until Friday.  We also get Trevor and Eric back on later in the week.       



As you can see we've been hammering way on the main level walls.  In the next couple of days we hope to be adding the second level floor.

Saturday

Progress was slow today yet the work we did do looks significant.  This is the first year that we are here for our neighborhood picnic.  Our Daffodil hill neighbors are great friends and that is part of the reason we decided to add on to our current house, rather than just move.  We love the neighborhood and the people in it. 

Beautiful view from the neighborhood picnic

Finn enjoying the bubbles

...and homemade ice cream

While Bonnie and Finn partied a little longer, Todd headed back to get more work done.  Bonnie joined Todd in putting up some of the dining room walls while Finn napped.  He partied hard in the hot weather.

View looking up at the new wall.  Todd is standing in the french doors

View from the big rock in the dining room looking down at the new wall

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Now that the walls are going up the space is starting to take shape.   Todd has been losing some sleep at night worrying about the details, so hopefully this forward progress will help him sleep well tonight.

Friday progress

New entry steps from down from the currect dining room window

Dave (the architect), Finn and Todd evaluating the plans

Finn getting quite good with a hammer

So by the end of the day, we completed the steps from the entry way to the main floor and marked the layout for the walls. The guys (Eric and Pat) did the demo on the current house in order to find the second story.  We needed to find the beam on the side of the house that will connect to the new portion and then support the second story bedroom.  It is amazing how much light that lets into the house just having that 2' of overhang on the side of the house.

Yesterday Bonnie got an early start and completed scribing the boulder.  Eric and Pat finished laying in the main level floor.

 The rest of the day we worked on getting the entry way landing in. 

 This is the view from the landing looking up to the main level.

By the end of the day we had got to a place that we needed Dave to come by and advise us on the next step.  This morning he'll stop by first thing and get us up to speed.  After today it'll just be Bonnie and I working on the house for the next few days.

New Dining Room Floor

We got a lot done yesterday.  We need to make some adjustments because of some funkiness in the foundation so I spent some time on the rock.

Bonnie, Pat and Eric concentrated on getting the main level floor down.

By the end of the day we were able to walk around in our new dining room. We had a celebratory toast with our Wisconsin libations- Leinie's, Miller and Milk

Continuing on from what Pat and Eric started yesterday, Bonnie is going to take on the task of scribing around the rock.  This is a time consuming job and once she is done we'll have to full floor in.

The guys are working too fast.  We are going through material faster than we can order it.  Today we are getting a large order coming in from Village hardware so I think for the next few days we'll be in good shape.  Since we didn't have much we could do yesterday we traded our Monday for Sunday and took the day off. 

Trevor, Eric and I got out for a ride down in May Valley.  It was good to get out and hit the trails with the guys.  Later in the day Bonnie and I did some clean up and excavation.  Today we are prepped and ready to up down the main level floor.

 

Almost floored

Bonnie, Trevor and Pat figuring out joists

view from upper part of lot- new entry position for deck will be between the edge of house and the tree

Again we are moving faster than supplies allow and we only worked a partial day. We had enough wood to frame most of the main floor but need some of the larger lumber to brace the lower level.  Tomorrow we are hoping to get a portion of the larger order so we can sheet the main level floor and the landing.  Also we can get started on the new steps.  As soon as we get the sheeting down then we can start using that "flat" level again.  Our lot is very sloped ( if you can't tell from the pictures) so it is difficult to move things up and down the lot.  Once the main deck is in, our project will seem much easier.  Also, once this preliminary curved wall is complete, then the other walls will seem like a breeze since the upstairs is a normal shape.

view of new dining room from old deck door

view looking up from base of new entry

Todd has already started using the window seat next to the big rock- which is bigger than we even imaged but it will be unique.  All of our families won't know our house if it wasn't a bit unique. 

The warmer the weather is getting, the more the bats are active in our peaks.  Last night the chirping was loud enough for us to have to turn up the tv and Finn also knows how to identify the noise.  For those of you who know Bonnie's love of bats, this is a complete desensitization for her.  In fact, yesterday she was so tired during the night that she woke up, acknowledge the bats and then went back to sleep.  This is definately progress in her ability to conquer this fear.