New Walls, Step 2

Today Francisco came to tape and mud up our new drywall. It's coming along, but he will be back tomorrow to continue the job. Here are some mid-progress images:

This is the inside of the closet:


Here's the area around the old built-in. It looks like it's going to stay. We might (later) cover it over with larger shelves in this area, but for now, the easiest thing was to dry wall around it. The corner looks nice and sharp.


In the world of Bridget's Nano-Projects (TM), I did a couple of small things around 83 Durant today. First job (this has been on my mind for a while now) was to tone down the ostentatiousness of the pink room. No, re-painting the pink room a non-pink color does not come under the heading of "nano-project" (oh that it would!); I just changed the lightswitch cover from the very gaudy golden one to a simple white one:

I wouldn't mind having something a little more interesting than plain white here, but this room is already SO bright with tons of white trim (and some pink-accented trim) that simple seems to be the way to go. Uncle Ernie, please note that I learned well from you: the screws are at 12 & 6!

My other tiny project was to install a screen in our front door. Yes, it's a bit late in the summer to finally be putting in a screen, but I think it will be a big help with all the dust we're raising in this whole drywalling project. Now I just have to find a safe place for the storm window, which will be going back into the door in not too long.

Roof 2.0: the Saga Continues

Today the guys worked on the front door overhang roof. Once they got started, they realized it was a bigger job than they thought. The old (and non-functioning) wooden gutters AND the fascia boards were completely rotted through, so they had to rip them off completely.

What you see here is what the door overhang looked like AFTER we had it painted last October. While it looks pretty nice here, in truth, they painted and used a TON of caulk over some very rotted work. This is lame, and makes us even more annoyed with the painters we hired. At the very top, the nicely cut part that looks like moulding is actually a wooden gutter; you can even see a tiny tube on each side (back near the wall of the house) that was supposed to drain the water.

Sadly, all the nice trim (gutter) had to come off entirely. The guys said they had no idea how they could have made these wooden gutters back then -- all with handtools no less. Here's one of the wooden gutters after they pulled it off the house:


Wooden gutters look really great (when they're not rotten), but without proper care, they rot out completely.
After removing the gutters, they replaced the rotten fascia, put up a roof cover, and then added copper trim. Here it is now:

It looks pretty nice, and the copper trim matches what's around the flat roof and the ridge top on the slate roof. It still needs some paint a few touch-ups to make it look just right. We're sad that it doesn't have the nice trim, but the copper does look pretty good. There's also a rain diverter on top so that the water goes over the sides, not right in front of the door.

Here's the work-in-progress on the side of the house. There was once a wooden gutter here, and you can see that they've put on a new 8'X2' nailer board.


At the point where the flat roof meets the rest of the house, you can see this nifty little hole: exactly the sort of hole that would allow certain flying varmints easy access to the main part of the house while they came in from the protective cover of the rotten wooden gutter:

And here's the repair, as well as a nice shot of the copper!


Here's the work in progress on the front part of the flat roof, where it appears over the kitchen door. This is actually the one place where the wooden gutter was salvagable.


And here you can see it with the copper on, as well as a small fix to the wooden gutter -- the addition of a downspout. It turns out that the house and/or gutter has settled, and this end of the gutter is actually lower than the downspout a the other end, so water was just sitting here (hence, the rotting).


We also found out that on the back of the house, there were once two windows of the same size, whereas now we have one window (into the bathroom) that is smaller. I had wondered if there was a window there at all, so now we know.

Here's the look of the new shingles. They're not quite finished, but very close. They have been pre-primed, and we're going to paint them ourselves since this area is accessible. You can also see the copper trim around the window.


And check out the chimney flashing upgrade! It looks awesome!



And here's the damaged wooden gutter before:

And after the addition of a downspout so it will actually drain:


The guys will be back tomorrow for a few small tasks and cleanup; we're nearly done!

Flat Roof Update

Today I had a helpful guy from Scott Roofing Services come check out our flat roof on the back and our little roof over the front door. The problems:

--> The tiny roof over the front door has wooden gutters with no place for the water to go, so the water/ice is bursting through the wooden moulding, causing some damage. We're not sure how to fix this, although someone has suggested we put a rubber roof over the whole thing, gutters and all

--> The flat roof on the back shows some leakage around the edges -- basically, the fascia boards underneath it (around the back porch) are rotting in sereral places. These rotted spots provide prime entry points for, oh, say, a flying squirrel or two. Or four.

--> There's a spot in the dining room (below the flat roof) where there was clearly once a leak. While it is no longer active, we don't know how much or what kind of repair job was done on it.

--> As per our infrared pictures, the point where the flat roof joins the rest of the house has an air leak -- it needs to be insulated and sealed to prevent things like frozen pipes in the upstairs bathroom.

Of course, there's too much snow around to get a good look at everything, but he did have some good news: the main problem with the flat roof on the back is probably only with the metal flashing around the edge. This should be much less expensive than a whole new roof. He'll have to come back after the snow melts, but for now, we're pleased to be on top of this project.

In other news, 83 Durant has set a new record: we had 40 people in the house on St. Patrick's Day. It was great. The avalanche of food was matched only by the avalanche of snow that fell from our slate roof -- amazing!

Small Fix-it Projects: Door & Floor

Meet Mr. Carter, Dog Contractor


Carter was an enormous help on our job today. The bottom of the front door has some heavy duty interlocking metal weatherstripping on it. Unfortunately, it was bent (before we moved in) and made a horrible screeching sound when we opened the door. It also pulled some of the wood apart at the bottom of the door. We've wanted to fix it for a while, but it seemed unwise to take the door off on some of the bitterly cold days we've had lately.

Today, with lovely 50-degree temperatures, we were ready to go. After taking the door off its hinges (a surprisingly simple job!, we removed the nasty broken and bent metal piece.



After rehanging the door, we were sad to find a rather large gap between the threshold and the bottom of the door. Thankfully, we had bought a metal/rubber door sweep last fall, and it was just the right size. So we put that on for added protection. It seems to do the job. Carter was an excellent supervisor, ensuring that everything was done to code.



Front door mission accomplished, I moved upstairs to tackle the hole in the bathroom floor.



With the proper tools (and a cool bag to carry them), the job is much easier.