5.7.2017

Jim and Kyle enjoying a quiet Sunday morningng!

Kyle & Julia...

 

Celebrating Kyle's birthday a few days early!

Then it was back to work!  Kyle and Jim worked on cutting and making the blocking for the ends of the storage space above the auto bay.

Installation of some of the pieces required a bit of contortionism! 

 

The scaffolding is set up in the auto bay so when Jim was over far enough, he was able to stand on the scaffolding to install the blocking.

 

 

Assembling the blocking...

 

 

Meanwhile, Julia and I were back in moving mode.  We actually moved most of the household/kid storage boxes out of the metal shop and into the master bedroom.  From there, we'll be able to put them up into the attic. 

 

 

High 51/Low 37

 

5.6.2017

Kyle and Julia came up this afternoon for a visit!  It is so good to see them - they haven't been up since Christmas.  Kyle's been really struggling with his back issue this year - so much so that he has to have surgery in a couple weeks.  Keep him in your prayers for a successful surgery and quick recovery!

We were excited to show them all the progress in the carriage house since the last time they were here - it sure has changed a lot!  So today was mostly about show-and-tell!

I got to see the newly-framed area for the medicine cabinet in the bathroom that required multiple stud changes (thanks dear!)!

Jim and Kyle did work on building the plywood wall for mounting all of the manifolds and plumbing tubing for both the heating and plumbing systems.

Here Jim is caulking the bottom before the bottom piece is installed...

Bottom piece in place...

Fastening down the last piece!

 

Meanwhile, Julia and I were busy moving boxes from the metal shop up into the master bedroom.  We cleared out a good chuck of space.  Then, we went up into the attic space and Jim & Kyle passed boxes up to us and we put them in various parts of the attic.  We have to be cognizant that Jim still has vent work to do in the attic but it's a good start!

 

We came back to the apartment and spent the evening relaxing, eating pizza and watching the latest Star Trek movie - great to have them here with us!

 

High 63/Low 45

 

5.5.2017

Jim headed out to the Drywall Center this morning to pick up some more steel that he needed.  One of the things he did with the steel was to frame out the medicine cabinet in the bathroom (picture to come!).

He also put his planer to work today...

Making a spacer to hold the vent pipes in place for the urinal...

But the big news of the day was working on getting the plumbing ready for its pressure test.  There is a balloon that Jim has to inflate and put in the cleanout part of the stack to seal that.  Then he put caps on the other areas.  The first time he tested it, it leaked.  Ugh.  There are probably over 200 joints in the system - finding a leak would take forever!  However, Jim was able to quickly determine that the leaks were from the plastic screw-down caps he was using.  He had one metal one that he used but needed another one.  He was going to go to the plumbing company to buy a replacement but decided to just sacrifice a cap and glued that on.  Once he did that and ran the test again, it held perfectly!  It was still showing the same reading when he left, about 1-1/2 hours later.  That's a huge relief and means Jim can go talk to the inspector Monday and have him come out for the test knowing that it will pass!

 

High 51/Low 48 - rainy

 

5.4.2017

I had to head to Staples this morning to pick up flyers for a big mailing I had to work on today.  I stopped at Lowe's to pick up the glue Jim needed and dropped it off to him.

He was able to get all the rest of the stack glued so he'll be starting to get things ready to test the system soon!

He also worked on more electric - he got the 2 security lights all wired up as well as the switch box.  He just needs to bring power to the switch box and all that will be done.

In the afternoon, Jim switched his attention to the outside.  We are supposed to be in for some rain over the next few days and he wanted to see if he could divert some water so that we don't have more washouts.

This is what the area up by the carriage house looked like after the hard rain we had.  This is where we had planted grass seed (although if you look very closely, you can see some baby grass growing!). 

Jim wanted to get the soil and potential grass seed back up where it belonged without getting driveway gravel where it doesn't belong - not an easy challenge.  It took lots of hand shoveling and then some Bobcat work.  But it looks much nicer now!

Then Jim took the temporary electric box down from the post.  This post is in the ground over 3' so that would require lots of digging to get it out.  But he was able to hook the lip onto the Bobcat bucket and pull it out!

This tree has been down for a long time - but it's right in the way for our water line work.

Jim got his big strap out and hooked it up to the Bobcat...

...and was able to drag it out into the yard!  This looks easy but this was probably over 1-1/2 hours of work!

 

Next, Jim did lots more cutting of the upper driveway, as well as cutting the area where he will need to trench for the water line.  He used some of that dirt to make dams around the area to hopefully divert water into the woods.  He filled in some of the washout near the carriage house too.

 

 

High 62/Low 42

 

 

5.3.2017

Jim went to the property this morning, took some pictures of the plumbing configurations, and headed to the building department.  Before he glued everything up, he wanted to make sure Jerry was good with the design.  He was so Jim headed back to Angel and spent a big chunk of the day getting everything glued up.

Now that the urinal drain and vent is all completed, Jim built attachment blocking for the urinal itself.

Jim got everything glued except for the parts extended up through the attic.  He's almost out of glue and wants to start with a fresh bottle.  I have to run into town tomorrow so I'll pick that up for him.

So he changed gears and did some insulation work.  He started up in the attic - he got the rigid foam board screwed down using our modified caps.  Look how nice the ceiling insulation looks from this angle!

Check out that crazy piece of foam board! 

But it's a perfect fit for this spot...

Jim finished up the insulation in the second bedroom ceiling.

And got started in the hallway!

 

High 52/Low 32 (frost advisory out for tonight!)

 

5.2.2017

We really don't get that much rain in this area - and it comes at night frequently when it does rain.  However, it always seems like we do yard work and then we get a crazy storm.  Last night was no exception - we did all that work yesterday, including planting grass seed, only to have a big thunderstorm roll through in the late evening.  Hopefully our grass seed will be okay - it may just not grow where it was intended!  But unfortunately, some of the beautiful grading Jim did around the side of the carriage house washed away.  Until he can get the whole area graded the way he wants with the proper slopes for runoff, this will happen but the same day?  Oh well.

I headed out this morning for a few errands - including picking up our new septic-approved garbage disposal that came in at Lowe's as well as a couple plumbing parts.  Lowe's is notorious for having parts and pieces in the wrong bins but Jim dummy-proofs me as much as possible - he sends me links and pictures of the parts I need to pick up.  And I still got the wrong part today!  He wanted a long sweep angle and the one I got was regular. 

So, Jim had to make a trip to the plumbing supply company at lunch.  They have better prices anyway but still!  However, it was all worth it because the run from the apartment toilet to the stack that gave Jim so much grief is now finished!  Typical Jim, he just wasn't happy with it so he tore it apart from the 45 degree angle on the stack and redid the whole thing.  Looks great now and he's happy!

He also got the run done from the urinal to the stack.

The next step toward getting water into the carriage house will be to set up all the controls inside in the utility room.  This is the pump control that Jim set up on the temporary pole that we have been using.



It's now all taken apart!

 

Jim is going to put plywood up in the utility room and attach the controls to that.  So he needed to pick up a few more pieces.  Instead of bothering the neighbor again, Jim measured and figured out he could actually get it in the back of the 4Runner.  So another trip to Lowe's at the end of the day for plywood and back to Angel to drop it off ended the work day.

 

High 58/Low 44

 

5.1.2017

This was one of those tough plumbing days for Jim - the run from the apartment toilet to the stack is still giving him so much grief. 

But he got lots of other things done!  He put the stub and cap on the stack in the utility room for the sink.

He has his pressure testing equipment ready to go...

It was another beautiful day - so Jim took a break from frustrating plumbing and we worked outside in the afternoon.  Even though we actually see some signs of baby grass growing on the hill near the driveway, we were anxious to see if the new (read much more expensive) grass seed would be better.  Jim smoothed out the area we filled in a few days ago by the driveway...

Then he spread the grass seed...

Raked it in...

All done.  Is it growing yet?

With the remainder of the dirt pile, Jim brought it up and piled it around the lawn hydrant.

Then we worked some more getting the stray driveway gravel back on the driveway where it belongs.

Next, Jim took the Bobcat back up to the top and made more dirt by continuing to rough cut the beginning of the upper driveway.  Then he filled in the area behind the stairwell while I was on rock duty - we pretty much have that area done as much as we can until we get the water lines going into the house.

Jim wanted some gravel by the double doors of the stairwell - this will eventually be a concrete pad but for now we won't have to step out into dirt.

Dumping the gravel...

Smoothing it out...

With a little hand shoveling for good measure!

 

High 73/Low 55