Destruction and Progress

There is been a lot going on in Hyrum and not so much on the blog.  Part of it… I am the Queen Procrastinator.  And part of it is…. I can just never keep up with Curtis.  

The good news is…… the roof is almost done.  Done enough that I don’t have to worry about the rain and snow getting in.  What a relief that is.  Wow, it looks so good.  And it didn’t get done a minute too soon….. he finished what had to be done on a Friday and it was immediately covered with several inches of snow.  

Now that the roof is done, there are several other things that need to be worked on.  So many it is hard to pick just one. 

 

Curtis finished taking down the entire ceiling in the kitchen…. Not just the wet stuff, but the entire thing.  He went through all of the insulation and pulled out the wet stuff, leaving the dry stuff there so we don’t have to replace it all.  We bought the cans for my lighting and they are roughly installed so I could have an idea where they would be and how many.  I am a very visual person and I just can’t imagine things like Curtis can.  

Then, Curtis went to work on demolishing the pantry. The pantry used to be the back porch on the old house.  The ceiling was still slanted and after fixing the roof, there was room to raise it up – and it is now higher even than the kitchen ceiling.  What a project that was!

When he removed the shelving and the ceiling in there, Curtis found where the washer and dryer used to be in there.  The electrical outlets were still in there, and still live!! During the demo, he also found the original wall of the porch was still there….. including the windows, glass and all!  Demo included tracing wires and finding out what the circuit panel powers.  Curtis has pulled wires, plumbing, you name it. 

Which then leads us back to the kitchen.

Curtis was trying to figure out where the plumbing entered the house and where to access all of the plumbing.  So, he pulled up the carpet and laminate floor.  He is so glad he did.  When he got down to the old floor, he found that a large corner of the kitchen has NO floor joists.  The floor is sagging quite a bit but you couldn’t tell because there was a thin layer of cement over the top to level it all out. 

Look closely at the wood floor under the blue door...... no floor joists, so the floor is sagging.

Part of the kitchen was about 10 inches of concrete.

The concrete was mixed with rocks, boards, paper, you name it.

It is kind interesting  when, in the same breath, Curtis says to bring a sledge hammer…. and the camera.

I will say, you just have to see the pictures. Part of the old floor was actually all concrete.   It is all gone now. And there was no crawl space, so he dug it all out and hauled the dirt to the garden spot in the back. 

We have always thought the bathroom located just off the living room was a little strange, so we planned on making part of it into a closet, and changing the access of the bathroom to the back of the house, near the kitchen.  So, when Curtis started tearing things out of the bathroom, we found another doorway.  That makes three now.    But this one is kind of cool….it has a bit of an arch made right in the brick, so we are going to try and save that. It will be nice back there….. enough space for six people to drop shoes and coats, and a small bathroom.    This is one part of the house that I almost have designed how I want it. 

The most recent surprise was found in the living room.  Curtis has been working on the floor in the kitchen, and naturally that includes the entry into the living room, which had some sag to it.  And….. that wall between the two rooms was SO  thick…. 28” thick!  Well, once you get into it, we found it was layers, like much of the rest of the house.   

Rock wall...gone.

First was the old original brick wall…..that part will stay.  It is about 14” thick. In the center is a thick layer of bricks and mortar to fill in space between what used to be a rock wall in the living room.  The final layer is a steel-framed wall covered in sheetrock and about 8-10 layers of wallpaper.

the rock wall that was buried between a brick wall on one side and sheetrock on the other.