Day 65- Living in the Dark Ages

Ok, so I am going to go back a moment and tell you the real story on the siding...and how it put me in the dark. So the honestly the siding that I blogged about below was really only about 95% complete at the time. On Day #65 we had a HUGE issue which really could have killed a few sub-contractors. BUT, let me start with a back story to explain. So I had to get all new wiring for my entire house. There was some existing knob and tube wiring running through the house which is NOT safe. I was first going to pull out the knob and tube and re-wire as needed and because we could not see some areas in the ceilings we went ahead and re-wired the whole house. So for the first month while new wiring was being run I had one outlet that worked and it was down in the basement, so lots of extension cords and such were run all over from the basement. Then when we were actually ready for Indianapolis Power and Light to come out and power up my new meter they took their sweet old time of 2-1/2 weeks. They powered to the new meter but it looked horrible with the new whips going to the original porcelain anchor on the house which was 3-4 feet from my meter that had been moved over for my new back door location. I was told by my electrican that they would install a new anchor next to the next meter. Problem being that this was wrong- my electrician should have installed the new anchor because IPL doesn't do that anymore. So needless to say when my new back door got installed you could reach up and touch the electrical lines...awesome. So I called IPL and about a week later a guy showed up who then informed me about the anchor and that I would need to move my meter base over 1 foot, extend a pipe up to 13' above ground (which I would have to custom bent around my new gutters which hadn't been installed yet) and then attach it to my top dormer for support because my house does not have a soffit. OR...I could go underground for $500 and he would allow me to not have to move my meter base over. Well I thought about it for about 5 minutes while we stood in the rain discussing this and decided that once I paid my electrican and a custom pipe bender to re-work everything I would probably only be saving myself $300 to make something that was going to look hideous. So I decided to fork out the money and pay IPL $500 and a Trencher $400 to get my power underground and never think about it again. It was a good decision...just hit my budget kinda hard.
Soooo...while I am waiting on IPL to come and change it to underground (another 2 weeks) my siding guys are trying to finish my house. They were working around the new back door, standing on a metal ladder ledge strung between two other metal ladders they moved the nuetral line with their hand in order to get a siding dimension underneath it and the old porcelain knob on my house SNAPPED IN HALF! The 120' drop between the telephone pole and my meter was now hinged on the top of my meter base which was unscrewed from the house because they were putting siding up and therefore SNAPPED at the top of my meter and set fire and sparks flying and fried my new meter base. Needless to say as soon as the sparks started flying the two sub-contractors JUMPED off their metal ladder basin and hit the ground running. Now if only I had had a video tape there to capture the chaos...instead a get a phone call from a contractor who is kinda shaken up because he almost died and is not sure what to do. I called IPL emergency who came out right away and at least got rid of the live wire laying in my yard. So now the problem was I had NO power at all and decided I would just wait on the underground to be trenched and laid so that I didn't have to pay IPL to give me temporary power. Luckily my neighbor was nice enough to let me run an extension cord from his garage for what turned into two more weeks. THANKS NEW NEIGHBOR!!!! I definitely owe him some cookies or something!!

Day 36 & 37- Exterior Facelift

The exterior has definitely gone through some changes. The original plan was to keep the aluminum siding, patch and paint it until I could afford to do something different later. So the exterior would have a new roof, new attic window and be painted...that was the original plan.

Here is the original house...

Here it is with a new roof and carport removed...
Here it is once we realized that we couldn't perfectly match the existing aluminum siding and that I was spending 1/2 the money trying to patch and fix it as I would be just putting all new siding up. Soooo...off came all of the aluminum and the picture below is actually showing all of the original wood siding that was underneath the aluminum siding. It also shows my new attic octagon window and if you can see where the black is on the left that is actually showing the original window placement to the kitchen. If I would have had the money to change my kitchen cabinets I would have tried to put a window back in this location. What I found very interesting is that the house (underneath the wood siding) is covered is 1"x6"s vs. plywood that they use now days. You can see this around the new attic window.

I am thinking my neighbors probably started to wonder what the heck I was doing when they saw the house looking like the above. But once all the wood came off it looked better in Tyvec wrap than it did in aluminum siding if you ask me.

Here is a picture of the old carport and side door in case you forgot what it used to look like...

And here is a picture of the carport gone, side door closed up and new back door opening. Much better right??

New siding is almost done...you will have to stay tuned to see!

Day 29- And SCREAMS went out

So on a Friday afternoon I am awaiting my little sisters arrival to come and help me with the house for the weekend. My contractors had just left and my other little sis had just run to grab something from the other house. I am trying to clean things up a bit and am upstairs using the shopvac. All of the sudden a bird flys from one attic opening to the other right above my head. Needless to say I screamed. I call my contractor to freak out and ask him what to do and if he can come back asap. THEN....my hero arrives. It is Tiffany and she is wondering why I am screaming. I start to explain what just happened when all the sudden the bird flys out again and over to a corner and into a piece of insulation. It was near an open window in Lucas' room (which is how I am assuming he got in in the first place) so Tiff decides we should try and scare it out. I agree with her...and then hand her a 2x2 while I stand frozen and gutsy girl goes over and starts hitting on the stud next to the bird. Nothing happens. We decide that maybe if we start using the shop-vac again that it will scare him out. So I turn it on and start vaccuming...then all the sudden we see insulation fall from the attic above and we look at eachother with that evil eye and whisper "there he is" and then all the sudden I look up and he is sitting 12" from my head on a ceiling joist and all I could do was start SCREAMING!!!!

The bird then flys into Lilly's room and is sitting up on top of a piece of insulation up in the corner right next to the window. At that time Cheryl comes back and wonders what is going on, we tell her the story and show her the bird and she comes upstairs to join our venture. So we come up with a plan! We will open the window in that room, close the door, turn on the vaccum and hit the wall with a stick and he will just fly out...right??

Sooooo...Tiffany BRAVELY goes and opens the window that is next to the bird so that hopefully he can fly out. We all go in Lilly's room and close the door hoping to contain him in the room (although one wall is only studs so there is about a 5' opening for him to fly back to Lucas' room). So since I did not think to grab my camera at the time; here is a description of what is happening:

-I am in the corner of the room (farthest from the bird) trying to duck behind Cheryl although she is so skinny that it is kind of difficult to use her for any kind of protection.

-Tiffany has her beating stick (a 2x2) and is approaching the bird to plan on hitting the studs trying to scare it out.

-The Bird (which is black and ugly) has its yellow eyes wide open, its beak chattering and is probably way more scared than I am...maybe.

Tiffany gets in place and starts hitting the wall...scared bird does not move. I turn on the shop-vac and start yelling at the bird to get out of my house. He flys across the room and almost out of the 5' opening but instead perches on top of a shelf. (I hold Cheryl in front of me...what? you haven't seen the movie THE BIRDS?). The bird finally realizes that maybe he should try to get out of this house where girls are screaming and trying to hit him with a 2x2 and suck him up with a vaccum so he heads for the window...but BOOM! He hits the top of it instead. Ouch! He regains his composure (while still in the air) and FINALLY flys out the bottom!!! Tiffany rushes over and closes the window, I run to close the other bedroom window and we all breathe a sigh of relief.

So needless to say I have to give a shout out to my heros that day. For some reason I could not be as brave as my sister Tiffany. Maybe its because she deals with 8-12 children everyday under the age of 5 that nothing can really scare her anymore? I'm not sure...but I am really glad that she showed up when she did.

The only brave thing I did was after the bird was gone. I wanted to make sure that he had come in through the open window and not the attic space above through a vent or something (since my house has been known to be a bird haven). Sooooo I get a ladder and VERY SLOWLY stick my head up through a 2'x2' opening that has about a 6" layer of blown insulation above it. Kind of assuming that at any time another bird will swoop towards me and start pecking my eyes out........but nope. We are good. No holes in the gable vents that I can see and we decide that maybe that was enough action for the night and that we should go eat some dinner.

Although it would have been awesome to catch on tape and post to you-tube...all I got was a pic of my sister the next day being awesome like she always is. I thank God for the heroes in my life. There are many right now and I couldn't do this without them! XOXOXO!

Renovation Day 13- A 3 story Waterfall

Ok, so as I had mentioned before I was having water leaking issues. Essentially my water valve that shuts off the water to the house does not close all the way and even though this valve is on Indianapolis Waters side of the meter it is my responsibility (of course!). So essentially something always wants to leak because of the flow. I had turned on the outside spicket but there was still a constant little flow so I turned it off thinking it would be fine....N.O. no. I got there Wednesday morning and the 2nd floor bathroom which had already been gutted leaked water out of the sink valves all night which meant that when I walked in and heard dripping I went to the bathroom on the first floor to find something that looked like this:

(I have tried to simulate water dripping from the floor above...but at least it wasn't really black). It was a mess and had started to leak out onto my hardwood floor in the hallway and down into the basement through the old shower location. It also ruined the subfloor in the upstairs bathroom (which was questionable anyway). It could have been alot worse. I only stopped by quickly to unlock the house for a sub contractor or else it would have been another 3 hours before I had gotten there.
So needless to say, I called IW and had them turn the water off at the street until we are done with plumbing...and didn't accomplish much else this day...except for finding another hidden gem:

It is actually more fun than the old sign one that was on top of it and honestly if it was in good shape I would have left it just because it is soooo vintage.

Demolition Day 11- A Watering Hole

Well Monday there was now an official hole in the house because they took the rotted corner out which was caused by water damage from the gutter (if you have been following along). It was funny to see someone just walk out of my house...through the front wall vs. the door. But it all got sealed up and looks very sturdy now. I will have to grab a new picture of that!
Also, when Lisa and I walked in on Saturday we could hear dripping water. We went down to the dungeon (aka: basement) and found out the old utility sink location was dripping...weird the water to the house is turned off. So I got a wrench and turned it off. Monday morning when I came back the old shower in the basement was leaking so I turned that off. Then Tuesday the other faucet at the utility sink started running. I got that turn and then the shower head on the first floor, then the bathroom faucet, then the kitchen sink faucet...and so forth. My HVAC guy showed up and told me to turn the spicket on outside and that way it would empty the system of any water still in it. So I did that and at 8:30 last night I turned the spicket off because I thought the water had to be drained out by then even though it was still dripping. You will have to read Day 13 to hear the rest...but first I will have to write it.

The Eagles Nest in the Dormer

So even since December before they flew south for the Winter there were two Sparrows scoping out where they would build a nest in the A-frame attic dormer of the house. There was a hole in the wire mesh screen behind the vent you see below. I should have closed up the hole before Spring but then again I didn't think it would take 3 months to close on this house either! So needless to say the two little sparrows were back trying to build their spring nest before I got the house last week.

Now by the size of the nest you would not think that these were two little sparrows...but more like two Eagles. I stuck my camera inside the dormer a few weeks ago bc I was afraid if I went in there they would poke my eyes out (What? Haven't you see the movie "The Birds"?)

I think their goal was to build the nest up to the vent so they could sit nicely on their eggs while watching the world outside...but holy cow that nest is 30" tall!

So I took the opportunity yesterday with my roofers there to scare them away and finally went in the attic. Their nest had collapsed a bit since the week before and I am thinking that instead of being sad about ruining their home and taking over their month of hard work that I am really helping them realize that maybe with the economy this year that a bird mansion is really not the way to go.
I am still afraid that they might find me and poke my eyes out...but I did have my dad seal up the vent until I get a new window installed. This little attic dormer/Eagles nest area is going to be finished out for a new toy room!

Sheer Brilliance

So do you ever watch Holmes on Homes on the HGTV network? Well let's just say he would LOVE this house. Because that so far whoever has done any kind of repair or renovation to this house before I bought it completely sucks (except for whoever built that extra braced wing wall in the bathroom). All the plumbing throughout has shown some sort of leak issue. There is duct tape holding together alot of the HVAC, there what is suppose to be a air supply going into the bathroom that really goes into an air return. The plaster patch in the master bedroom is the most pitiful patch I have ever seen. The false wall downstairs covering the crawl area is just scary. The tile backsplash in the kitchen looks like a 5 year old did it. The new stick down tile floors in the kitchen and bath are just plain ugly, and the basement cabling and wiring and everything else that is suspending in all directions of the ceiling kinda freaks me out.

But after yesterday I can now give an award to the top #1 Stupid Contractor- The Gutter Man. See the picture below? See the small 2'x2' gutter that is at the bottom of the A-frame dormer? Guess what- it doesn't go anywhere. It is just for symetry with the other side. So guess where the water goes that sits inside it? INSIDE the WALL! Sheer Brilliance!

Sooooooo needless to say the outside corner of my dining room is just alot of rotten wood as well as the whole structure above my front door and behind the front door. Awesome. Well honestly I cannot say that this is the biggest shocker to me, I knew there was going to be some sort of issue. I pulled back some bubbled wallpaper at least a month ago (accidentally of course since the house was not mine at the time) in one corner of the dining room and thought I saw water damage to the plaster and when I looked outside and knew exactly why. I think it just just funny as how I noticed this and not the inspector or the appraisal guy. I think I might just start my own show!

Guess I will be ripping out more plaster this weekend! And I am thinking that maybe when my gutters get installed later this week I will decide to go with what actually works vs. it looking pretty. What do you think?