11.30.2016

Much of the day was foggy - Angel just looks so beautiful and peaceful shrouded in all the mist.

This morning, Jim worked on getting all the trim pieces and backing boards cut, primed and painted that he will use when we attach the conduit to the house for the permanent power.



Then it was back to steel work and he got all the other studs cut for the wall.  He has put in a steel order for more studs, but he had enough to complete this wall.

 

Time to fasten all the studs in place to the tracks.

Working on attaching to the bottom track...

Putting another stud in the wall enclosing the box beam rafter.

Next, it was time for some ceiling joists.  This first piece is over 18' long - Jim is marking where he needs to make cuts...

He has to cut the flanges off so that the steel will lay flat against the rafter, as well as put angle cuts to make the joist connect right to the top of the outside wall and the top rafter.

Cutting the other side...

Marking the spot where it will attach to the top rafter...

No pictures of us getting this piece into place - Jim had to get one end up to me on the ladder to put it into place on top of the wall and then get up on the scaffolding and put it into place at the top.

It was a perfect fit - however, there are screws holding the clip angle to the rafter that are now preventing the joist from lying flat.  So we had to take the joist down from the top, lay it on the scaffolding, and move it out of the way so that Jim could undo the screws.

That job done, we got the joist back into place and Jim is fastening it down.

You can see how the joist fits against the box beam rafter as well as sits perfectly on top of the end of the wall we just built.  Jim is fastening the joist to the top rafter.

Now comes the longest ceiling joist - this one is over 22'!

Making the cuts...

This one fit perfectly the first time too - he's checking to make sure everything is level.  Jim is happy because both of these ceiling joists are actually structural elements, tying all these different elements together to make everything stronger.

 

High 48/Low 42

 

11.29.2016

The morning started out with freezing rain - it later switched to just an all-day rain.  Definitely not a day to work outside.

Jim spent the morning doing some errands - took the plates off the box truck and the 4Runner and took them back to the DMV, took insurance off both vehicles, and went to the electric supply company to buy conduit for the outside of the wall to bring the permanent lines into the house. 

He came home for lunch and we had to spend some time doing mouse containment at the apartment (ick).  Jim brought home a can of spray foam, I took everything out of our bottom cupboards, and Jim foamed up the many holes in the cabinets.  Hopefully that will help.

After lunch, I headed to the grocery store and Jim went back to the property to work in the stairwell.  He got out new sloped recessed light fixture mounted...looks really good.  We are so happy that we finally found the right fixture.

Then he got the ceiling joists attached to the top of the stairwell.

 

High 44/Low 36

 

11.28.2016 - Front auto bay roof done!

Jim had an appointment to get the results of his ultrasound of his kidneys this morning.  Thankfully, all was good - no more swelling in the tube.  He still has stones in his right kidney but hopefully those won't give him any issues.  The doctor said he could have surgery to get rid of them but Jim politely declined!  Glad to close that chapter with a good ending!

We were anxious to get to the property and see how the auto bay roof looked!  Here Jim is putting on the last shingle...

 

Then he moved on to finishing the hip shingles...

It was a bit of a stretch to reach some of these shingles - he eventually put up another roof jack to finish.

The last piece had some pretty crazy cuts but Jim was able to use the shear to make easy work of it.

Last piece - well, there may be one more but Jim will put that on when he does the ridge shingles.

Looks amazing!!

Always a little scary to take roof jacks down because then there's no second chances, but very exciting to see them come off the roof.

Dismantling the bridge and scaffolding tower...

Last roof jack coming off!

Wow - the entire front of the west wall and auto bay roof is now complete!  Jim is leaving the small tower of scaffolding in place to help with fascia and soffit work on the auto bay.

Jim is using the scaffolding from front to build up a tower to work on the back side of the auto bay roof.

Dismantling all of the wooden blocks that held the scaffolding in place.  You can see that there is still ice build up on the toe boards from our weird groppel storm yesterday!

 

Jim got these boards all removed - we'll be ready to work on this area as weather allows!

 

High 41/Low 26

 

11.27.2016

Although it looks a bit muddy from this vantage point, this was the final picture I failed to take yesterday of the filled in trench for the permanent electric and cable lines!

The plan today was to start working on the shingles of the auto bay roof now that the scaffolding is down.  Jim took off all the wood blocking and connections that held the scaffolding on the roof for so long.

Because this is a smaller area, it requires lots of cuts.  Jim started out by cutting half shingles to use as edge pieces.

Starting to mark course lines...

Putting the first shingles in place...

 

Integrating the edge shingle with the step flashing worked out perfectly - Jim had lined all the step flashing up just where it needed to be so when he put the shingles in place, everything was just where it needed to be.

 

 

However, in the picture above you can see that we started getting some groppel - that weird ice pellet snow.  At first, Jim kept working but it became pretty much a crazy snowstorm of groppel!  Everything got wet and there was probably 1/4" of pellets coating everything.  So Jim contemplated switching gears to a different project - which is kind of hard, especially on a Sunday when our work day is shorter.

 

Before long, the sun came out and things looked brighter.  Jim debated but finally decided to go back out on the roof.  Of course, everything was cold and wet - and it doesn't help that Jim now has to climb up and down the roof for each and every cut and the roof was all wet and slippery.

 

But he persevered and started making good progress.  We did have one more episode of snow flurries - enough to make sure things stayed wet - but it didn't last too long.

So many cuts...

But, wow, really looking good!

Working on the last rows...

At the end of the day, all that is left to do are the hip shingles!  It's amazing for us to see shingles on this portion of the roof - we have looked at the underlayment and scaffolding in this area for so long!

High 39/Low 22

 

11.26.2016

Kyle and Julia arrived from NYC Thursday night - great to have them with us for a couple days!

We had a bit of a relaxing morning on Friday and then Kyle and Jim headed out to the property for a little bit while Julia and I worked on dinner.

Even though they were only there a couple hours, they got lots of good things done.  They were able to get all the steel unloaded from the back of the truck!  Here's just a few of the pieces - you can see that these two really long ones would never have gone up the stairwell.  They were able to put them into the apartment through the open window.  Some of the steel went into the downstairs shop to be used for ceiling joists in the auto bay.  That was a huge job to get done.



Once all the steel was unloaded, they got the upstairs window boarded up (no more plastic!).  We don't want to install this window because we hope to be able to have the drywall boomed into this window for the apartment.



After all that work, they were hungry for our Thanksgiving dinner.  A selfie with the turkey...



And gathered around the table...

 

Everyone pitched in to clean up and made short work of that job!  Once the kitchen was back to normal, we all headed out for a walk to make room for dessert!

 

 

This morning, we headed out to the property.  The big job we wanted to get done was the scaffolding off the roof of the auto bay.  The forecast was for rain and snow so we weren't sure how much we would be able to do.

First step was to start dismantling the top section of scaffolding.  Jim handing Kyle the cross braces...

 

And the next set of braces...

Then Kyle handed the 3' section in through the window to Jim...

Next was the really crazy part - Julia couldn't bear to watch!  These frames had feet that were attached to wood blocks on the roof.  Jim had to undo the cross braces and basically lay on the roof with the frame while Kyle removed the feet.  Then they were able to get the frame over to the other scaffolding tower.

The next side was even worse.  Lifting the frame up...

taking the feet off...

and then trying to maneuver the frame over the roof to the other side so they could get it to the scaffolding tower.  It was beyond scary to watch but they talked everything through and it went really well.

Once the pieces were off the top of the roof, then they had to be removed from the top of the tower.

Look how incredible the west wall looks with no scaffolding hiding it!

Once the frames were down, Jim had to dismantle the planks that bridged the tower to the roof.

After the pieces as well as the hard workers came back down to solid ground, they used those frames to rebuild scaffolding inside the auto bay.  Jim will use this to put in ceiling joists in the auto bay.

Trying out our new light.  However, once we did, we think we want one that mounts a little higher.  Once we got home, I did a little research and found one we think we like even better that will fit better in this area.  So a little bit of a pain to send this one back and reorder new ones, but I think in the long run we'll be happier.

After the huge scaffolding job was done, the next job on the agenda was to work on the trench.  Jim was hoping to get sand on top of the wire.  The trench has been open awhile and a few rocks had fallen into it from erosion and weather.  Kyle and Julia walked the trench picking out rocks while Jim went to get a bucket of sand.

 

Practicing their American Gothic poses (with shovels instead of pitchforks!)

Kyle and Julia had an amazing shoveling synchronization thing going!

Once we got a nice layer of sand over the top of the electric and cable lines, Jim started backfilling.  We again had to pick out the biggest rocks.

Once the trench was about a foot from the top, we rolled out our red "Caution - Electric Line Buried Below" tape and then backfilled on top of that.

A good team working hard...

Wow - looking incredible!

Found just a little rock...

We stopped for a rock break - these are some of the rocks we pulled out as Jim was backfilling.

A good view of all the different layers...electric and cable lines covered with sand, dirt, tape and more dirt!

The birds-eye view from the scaffolding! 

 

I didn't get final pictures so I will definitely do that tomorrow.  We were beyond thrilled with how much we were able to get done with Kyle & Julia here.  The scaffolding is off the roof and rebuilt in the auto bay, the steel is unloaded, and the trench is totally filled in and graded!

We were so lucky with the weather - after a rain and snow forecast, the weather was great and we even had sunshine in the afternoon. 

We loved having Kyle and Julia here for a visit and appreciated all their help as always.  They headed back to the city late afternoon to try and avoid the mad rush of people heading back on Sunday.

High 42/Low 27