Two Silos Farm

Once hubby got up, he was ready to get right to work (ok, after eggs, toast and coffee – and some time on his favorite message board). First item was to remove the floor back far enough so we could start working on rebuilding the wall section and installing the header. Hubby cut the floor into sections for easier removal.

Insulation had been put in the floor, but for the most part it had fallen and was laying in the dirt. Don’t know if it made a difference because right now having the floor open to the dirt, it is not significantly colder in the room than before. And it’s about -11F outside right now. Hubby disconnected the heater in the room about a week ago.

This pic shows the board that is supporting the exterior wall (and consequently the roof). It’s pretty rotted along the bottom where it is in contact with the cement.

Hubby is putting in green treated under the wall to help give it more support. This spring we’ll be doing more landscaping to make sure all water runs away from the house.

Once that much of the floor was removed, we started working on plans for the wall and header. Spent time figuring out measures, and where the jack studs had to go. Ran into a problem, the support for the header ended up needing to go where there was no support under the sill board . . . time for plan B.

This picture from the cellar shows the problem. The previous owners had removed some of the support rock so they could install a toilet in that corner. We’ll be running the shower drain through the opening (toilet is now on the cellar side of that wall).

Since we didn’t have a “plan B” at this point, decided it was time for lunch and a trip to Menards. Chicken buffet at KFC and then about 2 hours selecting and loading lumber. My hubby is quite particular, and there are times he goes through a whole stack of lumber to find boards acceptable to him. We didn’t need a lot – that was good. If we did I think Hubby would go to one of the other lumber yards. May pay more, but at least we’d get usable materials. My Hubby about cried when he went to Vancouver (Canada) and walked into a lumber yard while he was there – can’t find wood like that around here!

It was about 5 pm by the time we got back from Menards, and then it was time for chores. I was ready to call it quits for the night, but hubby was motivated to keep working. Plan B resulted in putting up two braces so we could remove the rest of the studs holding the roof/ceiling up. We’ll rebuild the floor and put the new support wall on top. So the sill plate on this end of the wall will end up not supporting anything.

Since we weren’t going to be installing the header any time soon, hubby got motivated to remove more of the floor. Had to get more stuff out of the way.

Stuff included the washer and dryer. They are now in the hallway . . .

Good thing hubby and I are not large people – otherwise we would not be able to get through. Had to make sure to leave enough room to get the plywood into the laundry room.

Hubby got the floor cut back as far as he could before more stuff needs to be moved. Next will be moving the shower down into the dirt and removing the laundry tub. The floor needs to be cut back another 3 feet. Here is what it looks like this morning.

Tikka has been having fun exploring

When she’s not busy trying to figure out how to get at the fish . . .we got the fish last weekend and she isn’t bored with them yet.

February 2, 2007

Hubby’s been off work for several weeks now, and we are making progress. This weekend will be the big push to do the floor in the laundry room.

Last weekend the reloading room was finally finished – well, it does need a bit more trim on the upper deck and a panel made for the access to the attic, but everything else is done. Took hubby near a day to get all his “stuff” moved in there. Sure is nice having more room around the house.

Monday hubby started cutting up the laundry room floor. First he just cut open the corners on the west end so we could get an idea of what we were dealing with. The good news is we don’t have any drafts coming up. With temps below zero, we really don’t need any leaks. Must have got the outside perimeter sealed up nicely when we did the siding in 2005. Had to cover the wholes up to keep the cats out.

The next day, while I was at work, hubby removed the west end of the floor. He’s not into taking pictures so I don’t have any of what it looked like before he removed everything. In this area the joists run north/south and we are changing them to run east/west. This way we can anchor them to the basement foundation. Right now the south end of the joists is supported by an old sidewalk.

The end of the sidewalk is imbedded in the basement cement wall, so at least that corner of it should not be going anywhere. Our house has a combination foundation of rock, poured cement, cement block and sidewalk – go figure!

This picture shows the end of the sidewalk sticking out from under the house. Picture was taken March 2005.

Once the old floor was removed, hubby cut the pink insulation off the cement wall, and attached the ledger board. We’ll install joist hangers after we figure out for sure where the shower drain has to go.

Then he cut some green treated lumber and braced up the south wall. The west end of the wall is attached to the addition, so I could actually sick my fingers underneath the rotted board, it wasn’t really resting on the sidewalk – just hovering right above it. Hubby used his carjack to make it go a bit easier. This should give it a bit more support.

Today we will be installing the header to open up the wall for the half bath. The toilet/sink are on the dining room side of the main wall, and the shower will be on the laundry room side of the wall.

This is the wall the header will go in, from the laundry room side.

And this is it from the dining room side.

We’re going to do something (not sure what) in this area so we can easily remove the wall/ceiling to get at the electrical if needed. The wires going down the wall are for the heating circuits run from the heating sub panel. Everything else goes to the new main panel in the basement. The old main panel was in the laundry room, so we do have quite a few junction boxes in this area. That goofy box down low connects one of the few really old wires running to the two story part, but they will be replaced when we remodel that section. The roof sheathing you can see is the old roof, and now divides this “attic” space from that over laundry room.

Here is a picture of our little woodstove, finally in about the position it belongs. Maybe this summer we’ll get the pipes run. Got it on clearance during the summer – had hoped to get it hooked up before winter but didn’t happen.

Hubby is still asleep; he’ll be getting up soon. I’ve got to do work I actually get paid for until about noon. Then we’ll be making a “Menards’ Run” with the stock trailer and getting joists and plywood for the floor. Gotta make sure son has his laundry done before then. Tomorrow we plan on moving the washer/dryer out of the room and pulling up the rest of the floor. Hope to get it done enough to put the washer/dryer back before Sunday night. We shall see!

By the way – it’s going to be very cold this weekend, so we hope to find a way to do as much cutting in the house as possible.

Cathy

another holding place - got lots of pictures, but not time right now

to be filled in later