Monday, August 17, 2015

Progress is Progress

I think the best way to amaze with progress is to just stay quiet for a while!

Lots has happened in the past 3 weeks. On Saturday, August 1, we hosted our first demo day. It's incredible what you can accomplish with the help of friends and family. So far we've been blessed by 14 unique sets of hands in addition to our own. This absolutely includes the hands that have prepared food for the crew and watched Lou, Cora & Peter.

This past Saturday, I learned how to remove plaster and lath. Once I got over the fact that I was going to get super-dirty, it was actually really fun. But I will take credit for far less than 0.001% of the total work that's been done. Nate is incredibly dedicated to this project, and for that I'm grateful!

Our hope is to be done with demo by the end of August, which seems attainable. In the next two weeks or so we have lots of contractors coming to give us bids on tasks like masonry work in the basement, the pouring of a garage slab and driveway, and siding repair or replacement. We're eager to hear whether repairing and painting the existing wood siding is the feasible, because the cost of replacing it with a wood-like composite comes with a bit of sticker shock.

Here are some photos from the first day of plaster removal. It was a family affair with my brother-in-law, Dan and my hard-working dad! And finally, a video. When we go back and watch home videos of our kids, we only regret not taking more, so to avoid similar regret once the house is complete, I asked Nate to take a house-video-tour before he locked up last night. He even narrated it!







7 comments:

  1. Wow! It's amazing all that you've accomplished so far. In some odd ways it reminds me of cleaning after the fire at Bob and Beth's house. I have the same face mask with the little square vent in the front. :) I'm impressed with your abilities and dedication! Clapping from afar!

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    1. Thanks Kirsten! Those masks are so uncomfortable, don't you think?!

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  2. Hopefully, I'll be in Madison by next week and can get in on the reno! I'm excited to help!

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    1. Yay! We'd love your help. Hope your interview goes well!

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  3. We've done the bi-annual house tour thing, but I think you guys could do it bi-weekly. Wow! I'm sorry to have missed out on the organizing and labeling of the upstairs trim. That sounds like the best part.

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    1. Nate laughed when I read your comment and said you'd probably enjoy maximizing dumpster space by stacking the pieces of lath after they're knocked down from the walls :) October!? Oh shoot, we'll (hopefully) be done with demo by then!

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