Restoring a Dream House

Name:
Location: Burlington, Iowa, United States

Monday, November 21, 2005

Wide Open Spaces

We had quite a productive workday this past Saturday with a crew of seven: Josh, Chelsea, Becky, Joe, Steve, Drew and Katie. We loaded up all the cardboard boxes from the window kits, old window sashes, and misc into the dumpster. Then we all started demo-ing the kitchen area.

First job was pulling out the old cabinets in the kitchen and tearing out the wall of the adjacent bathroom. Everyone kept pretty busy it was a hard working crew. After getting the bathroom wall out it was on to removing the bath tub. The tub must have weighed 300 lbs!! Three young guys tried to pull it loose from the wall but it was just too heavy. We all took a break to eat lunch but Joe was still at it, when we all went back in he had the tub sitting out in the middle of the room. Amazing!!

The next problem was how to get the tub into the dumpster. They rolled it down the walk using some old plumbing then opened the end of the dumpster (which was about 2/3 full by then) shoved it in standing on end and forced the dumpster door shut.

We continued to demo the wall between the two rooms that will be the kitchen. That particular wall appears to have been an exterior wall at one time. It had 3/4 thick boards under the plaster and lathe. It was a dusty mess tearing out that wall and shoveling the plaster into 5 gallon buckets to be dumped.

All in all it was a goods day's work. Now we'll have to get Don & Matt over there to install a header to make one good sized kitchen.

Tuesday, November 15, 2005

More Window Work

Our family crew was at it again this past weekend installing more window sash kits. Last Sunday Joe Stevens (Josh's dad), Josh, Chelsea, Josh Pennock (Chelsea's brother), and myself were able to change out another 4 windows. We did run in to some trouble with the upstairs East window and even though we went ahead and installed the new sash it looks like we need to have a new frame built for that window. The previous weekend, Josh and I had changed out only one window. I think that brings us up to 15 with another 8 to go, 5 of those being the bay window.

Our carpenter's, Don and Matt may make it back for a few days in a couple of weeks. They have some free time so if Josh can get some help and gut the kitchen this weekend Don and Matt will install a header to open up 2 rooms to make one large kitchen. They will also rebuild the upstairs window frame that we need rebuilt.

So it looks like demo time this weekend in the kitchen, if you're interested let Josh know.

Becky