Category: Home Renovations

And the prepping for drywall continues…

Saturday Ryan screwed down all the firring strips in the tv room (ceiling), then we installed all the recessed light canisters and the fan/light box in there. I also got the back row of recessed lights wired. They have push in connectors which are much faster than wire nuts. I also found some time to move my scrapbooking crafts from my sewing room to the guest room and get that room setup so now it’s a combo guestroom/craftroom. My sewing room with be for just sewing (also has a futon and a tv/dvd player so Ryan can visit me in there) 🙂

Sunday Ryan finished the firring strips in the bathroom’s ceiling (he had to put up the metal ones) while I moved all the loose/extra wood we had upstairs down to the basement for storage. Then I set up some new shelves in the upstairs diningroom and moved all our china and kitchen items that were stored in the real diningroom up to the shelves. This is preparation for demo of the interior walls, the less stuff that’s downstairs, the less that can get dusty from plaster 🙂

I love halloween and now we get to share it with lots of little trick-or-treaters! Halloween was so WARM! Windy but warm.

Saturday Ryan spent the day firring out the wall between the bathroom and tv room so it’s ready for drywall. He also screwed in all the firring strips in the gym’s ceiling so it’s ready for drywall. While he did that I spent the day priming the insides of the windows (sashes and windows themselves). I had to take advantage of the warm weather since the windows needed to stay out over night.

We had to take a break from 6-8 to hand out candy and handed out the last pieces we had just before 8pm! We got a ton of trick-or-treaters and there were some adorable costumes! We sat on the porch and read so it was a relaxing evening.

Sunday Ryan had to work (he did squeeze in some tree pruning though and we finally attached the window sill extension he made a while back) so I continued with the painting, got a coat of primer on the window casings and sills (outside), they came pre-primed but after filling nail holes and some sanding i decided they needed another coat of primer so I did that. Then I did some caulking along the siding where it needed it (until it was too dark to continue). I ended the evening by doing a coat of paint (yea first coat of actual paint) on the outside of the window sashes. They are a flax/yellow color.

Wow – the insulation is in – and it’s so much quieter in here! I’m sure it will be warmer tonight too when the temperature drops. Rather than copy pictures into the post – here’s a link to the album with the insulation pictures:
Insulation Pictures

We had the exterior wall of the tv room insulated, and under the stairs at the top – we decided not to drill holes through the plaster that would then need to be repaired, so we just had them insulate what they could reach. The stairs were just for sound anyway and they’re in a closet.

The exterior wall of the bathroom and the small part of the ceiling which is actually a roof was insulated.

The exterior wall of the gym and the small part of the ceiling which is actually a roof was also insulated. And we did the wall of the gym that is part exterior/part interior because it’s the wall to a porch which will eventually be a garage hopefully so we figured it was better to insulate it for now.

It’s so great having it done and we now have 20!!! bags of “extra” carved off insulation. We’ll probably get rid of some of them at the dump as soon as we borrow a truck 🙂

This weekend was a busy one. Insulation was scheduled for Monday so there were a lot of small tasks that needed to be completed before then.

Friday evening Ryan firred out the 2×4 by the porch door, then he demolished the ceiling in the closet so the light could be installed. After a short trip to home depot for a new semi-rigid vent for the bathroom fan Ryan proceeded to make a decorative block for the soffit (for the bathroom fan). I primed the mouldings we had on hand.
Here’s the block Ryan made:

Saturday we got an early start, we spent the morning installing mouldings – first the window of the bathroom got its moulding, then the porch door got its moulding. Aimee and Jason arrived just as I had installed the closet light.
Here’s the bathroom window with it’s moulding (and the soffit block is in):

And here’s a closeup of the moulding detail:

After another trip to home depot (needed drywall) and some lunch, Jason worked on plumbing (connecting the vents for the bathroom and running them up the exterior wall to the second story – they will later run to the attic and out the roof.
Here’s the plumbing:

Ryan installed the new semi-rigid vent for the fan and then made the extended sill for the double window and we got the drywall up covering the old door in the “gym”.
After dinner I rewired the bathroom vent/fan with a romex connector this time 🙂
Here’s the finished vent/fan:

Sunday after Aimee and Jason headed home we continued the projects, installing the first of 6 recessed lights so the wire could be run to it.

Then we ran the first ethernet/cable drop to the tv room from what will be the patch panel in the basement.

Finally we covered the tub and moved tools and everything out of the room – ready for insulation!

This weekend we went back to NY (with a stop in MA) to see family. Saturday we attended our nieces 3rd birthday party (princess themed). She was beyond adorable and loved the princess car we gave her.

We spent the rest of the weekend at my parent’s house, helping them move stuff and just visiting. It was a good weekend.

Then Ryan had Monday off since it was Columbus day weekend so I took the morning off and we worked around the house a bit. We installed the porch outlet and wired the exhaust fan in the bathroom.

Here’s the outlet:
Contrary to how it looks here, it has actually been completed, wired and closed up. I just haven’t taken a more recent picture yet.

This weekend was not a major renovation weekend. More of a family weekend, we had my cousins over so I could take them shopping to pick out fabric for their halloween costumes. They left pretty early Sunday though so we did manage a small project – installing our new porch light.

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It takes a CFL bulb – it is not however connected to electricity yet so it’s just for show at this point 🙂

Saturday was a beautiful day this weekend and we got up and started working at 8am. Since we stripped the paint off the siding around the door Friday night we were able to get started right away on putting the new siding up. I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves…

Here we are just getting started:

And here the siding starts to go up:

This was the point where we needed to stop and put in the block for the light that we made Friday night. We also had to make and attach the cap on top of the door before we could continue:

And we’re done!

On Sunday it rained so putting up the mouldings was not really an option. We took a much needed break, visiting with family and then I decided to clean up the demo’d rooms and put down protective paper on the floors. I felt pretty good getting the rooms in shape:

Tonight after work it was still light outside so Ryan and I headed out to finish up the last few pieces of siding that needed to go up. We put up the last new piece and then put a few of the old pieces back up over the porch to be replaced when we do that whole section at a later time.

Then I sanded and primed the bathroom window casing so if we get rain this week we should be all covered.

It’s hard to see in the picture because it was getting dark but the siding is done here (just have the siding by the door to patch!)

On the list for next weekend:
– Strip paint off siding near door
– Cut siding near door to prepare for new siding
– Make and mount a block for the porch light (were thinking something like this: Porch Light)
– Fit in new siding around door
– Make and attach cap for door

With luck we’ll get that all day with or without rain since it’s under the porch. I’d also like to put mouldings up around all the window caps but that requires good weather and more time. We’ll see how far we get.

This past weekend Ryan and I worked on siding the house. It was a long but productive weekend.

This is where we were siding wise prior to this weekend: http://groudasfamily.com/nicolesblog/2009/08/anniversary-and-vacation/
Just under the top of the windows. The first pieces we had to do this weekend needed to be cut around the window caps.

First up though – Ryan had to remove a bit more of the siding that wrapped around the porch roof and needed to be replaced so he did that.

Then we got down to business cutting siding with our new jigsaw.  We put up the row of siding that wraps around the window caps, and got up to the first part of the frieze board under the soffit.  This is where we ended Saturday night:

And this is what took so long – each piece had one or two sides that had to be cut like this:

Oh and we had to cut the frieze board to lay flat over the siding – this was all very time consuming work but we loved the outcome:

And on to Sunday – the siding continued – we were hoping it would go faster however one of the first projects included making a drip cap for the bathroom window and getting a tight fit between that and the frieze board on top.  Then cutting the old side frieze board to match the new frieze board.  Here is the bathroom window cap – this took a while with the table saw and some figuring out but it actually came out perfect (compared to plan anyway).And then we continued siding – this part took a good long while:

And finally – the finished product (well as finished as we got over the weekend) – there is still a full run of new siding that needs to go up and then 2 partial runs of old siding over the roof that need to go back up until we get around to redoing the siding up there.Don’t think we are done either – we still have:
– mouldings around all window caps to install
– moulding under soffit to install
– double window extended sill needs to be made and attached
– siding around the door on porch needs to be put up (after the window block is created and installed)
Stay tuned for next weekend when we try to tackle that list!