Thanksgiving

We had Thanksgiving at our house as usual since it's my favorite holiday. We thought we would take a break and celebrate with our great families. We had a good time (even though it snowed and we were thinking of our uncovered roof getting all wet again). The roofer (Valley Roofing) left with the roof only half covered with weather guard because he ran out and he hasn't been back since. We left him an unpleasant message on Saturday. A recession? People out of work and desperate? Not in NJ. We've gotten sky high prices from just about everyone, contractors not bothering to show up and jobs left half finished. We were at the house this weekend putting spray on foam insulation in the crevices between the roof and the stone just trying to keep it dry inside until our contractor comes back. The doors and the big arched window for the kitchen should be in this Tuesday. The two glass doors came in two weeks ago, but the framer doesn't want to put them together, the lumber yard where we bought the windows from won't and Andersen Windows doesn't want anything to do with them. No one wants the responsibility. Now we have to find a carpenter to put them together so the framer can install them this Friday. No worries.

The big push

The framing continued at a fevered pitch - everyone pitched in to help - even my daughter, Paige and her friend Izzy

The building inspector gave us a hard time with the sheathing. Make sure your builders ask the town if they want a gap for expansion or not. We had to rip out all the plywood along the sill and redo it. Also, make sure they use galvanized nails with the new treated lumber otherwise the copper in the lumber corrodes the nails. I'm learning a lot.
The floor in the basement was finally poured after we put down the tubing for radiant heat.


Here are more framing photos
A picture of the crew. As you can see they more than happy to pose!

The new builders

The new builders pulled up to the house with dust and gravel spewing out behind them. The door to their van opened and just like that little car in the circus they just kept coming out. Twelve in all and three more in a second car. They couldn't squeeze in three more? They attacked the house and in about 5 minutes the living room deck was on.

Now, I was used to things crawling along at a snail's pace for the entire summer. Suddenly, things were happening! Wait! Too late.
The walls were up. It seemed as though things were happening just that fast. I loved it. We were running out of time.

In less than 3 weeks the house was framed. Arturo and his workers (John Prevete Framers) were amazing workers. They each had their part of the framing to do and they did it very well and even though it was quite complicated, very fast. Our architects were impressed and every other contractor who came to the house asked who did the framing. They all thought it was great. We had made some changes to the plans and Arturo was very patient with me when I wanted to change something else. One day though, he said "I change nothing else! Talk to John!" I knew I had reached Arturo's breaking point. Below are some photos of the framing.

Another beginning

Well a lot has happened since I last blogged about our project. We replaced our builder because after three months the roof still wasn't finished. He deviated from the plans (which was why that beam was sagging - the way he built the roof, too much weight was transferred to the center of the house instead of the sides) which did not make the building inspector too happy. We had to have the engineers come up with a solution which the builder had to complete before we let him go. As we were digging for the foundations, we found an old well. It was a thirty foot deep, hand dug well lined with stones and about three feet wide. I can't imagine that someone dug this with just a shovel and went that far down. I'm sure many people were killed by cave-ins digging these wells so long ago. Unfortunately, the well was in our living room, so we had to fill it in. My husband and I felt guilty destroying something that took so much hard work to make. Here are some photos of the well.



The foundations were dug and poured by the Guiliam's brothers without any problems. The block work was finished and passed inspection.

So you want to build a house....

Well. I haven't blogged about the house we have been building since June because I had to clear all the profanity out of my head first. It's almost gone but not quite. It is now October and we haven't started framing yet. Why? That's a good question. Maybe it's because our builder was in a contest of wills with our architect and engineer and spent weeks arguing that his design was right instead of following the plans we spent thousands of dollars on. Maybe it's because he decided to spend all summer with the interior of the original house instead of taking advantage of the dry, sunny weather to do all the outside work such as framing and block work and pouring concrete. It took awhile but we realize we made a huge mistake in our choice of builder. I think the project was beyond him and he just wasn't the right one for us. We now have a crew coming in to frame.

It's not just icebergs

Our excavator, John Peach, was working at the house with his trackhoe grading, doing foundation work and pulling out stumps. He walked across the front lawn and noticed the top of a rock about a foot across showing in the grass and asked if I wanted it removed.

"Okay, sure!"

The builder versus the engineers

For the past couple of weeks we have been between the builder and the engineers. There are two 5"/14" beams that will hold up the entire house now that we have taken down the stone pillar that was resting on one rock. Will they hold or won't they? The engineers say yes, they will hold, no problem. The builder, the person right there watching this beam bow with just a little weight on it, says no way is he taking out the support. The engineers insist the beam is large enough to hold but the engineers are in Philadelphia. The builder is standing under the beam. Who would you go with? We went with the person under the beam. We now have two 7"x14" power beams in the basement and so far, so good. Still waiting for the other chimney to be built. Still waiting for the chimney professionals to come up with one answer for lining the chimneys. We have been told a 5" flu is sufficient, a 9" flu is good, a 10" is okay and 'I wouldn't go with anything under 12". Two flu liners, a 9" and a 5" would be just as good as a 12" (wrong). The liners need to be insulated to 'Why insulate? It's a masonry chimney'. The chimney needs to be pargeted to 'Why parget it? You're going to need a liner anyway'. We now know the elusive mathmatical formula to calculate the size of the flu (height x width divided by 12 - not exactly rocket science) and are looking for someone to install it. Summer is winding down and we haven't even started on the footings yet.