1790 House, 133 Old Ferry Road, Newburyport MA

Some updated photos!

2011-12-06T12:11:00.001-08:00

So when Robert Frost talked about "miles to go before I sleep" he may have been talking about a house renovation! We haven't posted in a long time so we figured that we'd post a few updated photos. We're still not done but we're getting there - Rob has been furiously painting while Leigh has been chasing Lucie around the house. Enjoy the photos - captions below.The Kitchen with an island counter top made by our good friend Chris Kearney of CB Kearney - www.cbkearney.com
We have yet to face our pantry cabinets but we are about to order the metal mesh that will make the pantry a bit more opaque.
We still can't believe how many windows are in this house!

Our guest bedroom - until Lucie get's big enough to want more space...
Our master bedroom -- we love the vaulted ceilings and all the light we get in here...

Our dining rooms is small but we've found that it's perfect for family gatherings..
The living room is painted and awaiting some new furniture...and a custom light from our friend Adam Policky of Inspired Wire in Portland Maine. www.inspiredwirestudio.com
While it's been incredibly warm outside recently we've been able to squeeze in a few fires!

Come back soon for more photos.

Master Closet, Fireplaces and Office

2010-09-16T15:37:00.000-07:00

So the finish carpentry has come to a close -- we'll the wallet needs to be closed so we're done with everything that really needed to be done. Gus and Ricardo did a fantastic job. One of the things that we appreciate so much is that we felt that we could really trust these guys - they had a key to our house, worked when we were away and just got the job done. They really cared about the quality of their work and we feel that they did an A+ job. These photos show some of the latest additions to the 1790 house. Here you see the custom master closet -- we're still figuring out who gets more hanging space but this is one closet that may actually fit all of our clothes!

Master Bedroom fireplace -- we decided to go pretty simple here...you can see the sconces above it -- and the mud that we had to apply becuase we tried to install the sconces just a little bit more to the outside and discovered -- that's not where the wires were!

Guest bedroom fireplace -- this was Gus's creation -- more ornate but still classic.

The centerpiece of our living room is the old cooking fireplace. We decided to keep this one pretty true to the original. With modern code, we had to expose more of the brick than was in 1790 but we like it.

These are obviously bookshelves -- they are in our office and will finally provide a home for our extra large collection of books!

Finish Carpentry...the adventures of Gus and Ricardo

2010-09-04T17:58:00.000-07:00

So we've been quite for such a long time that there's way too much to tell in one entry. It's been a busy summer -- we've painted the exterior of the house with Sherwin Williams Duration....hope that's the last time we have to do that. We still have a little bit left to do but it's very manageable. We've also planted a lawn -- more on that another time (the nightmare of crabgrass). And most significantly we've been having Gus and Ricardo do lots of finish work at the house. Gus is a guy that we met when Ed was restoring our house. He worked on Ed's crew. He's a great guy and has a great attention to detail. Here are some shots that are very exciting to us...it's nice to have shelves to put things on and closets to hang things in. But mind you -- just because we have these things doesn't mean that we're not still living out of boxes! This is our dining room china closet -- it's modeled after the close in my grandparents 1600's house in Marblehead.

Here you're seeing the built-in that is to the right of the large fireplace in the living room - the top has space for at 32" TV and the bottom is for man equipment -- stereo stuff :)

Coat closet! and my less than often used blue blazer

Book shelves that are attached to our kitchen island -- now full of cook books -- and Riley begging for some food...

This is the fireplace in our office -- really great job by the guys -- the design was collaborative between all of us but the execution was all Gus and Ricardo.

I'll post some more photos of their work. Fall looks like it's going to be a very very busy time but we're working hard at getting loose ends tied up!

Some updated photos

2010-06-22T07:55:00.000-07:00

Sorry that there hasn't been much in the way of updates these days -- not much time and not too much to report. We can't take too many interior photos because the house is just a mess! Here are a couple of exteriors. We're getting ready to start painting the exterior this month -- we're thinking that we're going to do a tone on tone white for the trim and linen for the house -- and we're debating whether we'll do High Gloss or Flat for the paint -- any suggestions?

We were going to move in this weekend, but...

2010-04-01T16:27:00.001-07:00

These were taken several weekends ago. We were going to move in, but seeing as that wasn't going to happen, our new neighbors invited us in for pancakes instead.

These photos were actually taken after some cleanup had already been done!

We're In!!

2010-04-01T16:15:00.000-07:00

2nd floor, 2nd bedroom in the front of the house.

Master bathroom.

Stairwell.

Side entryway.

Living room.

Living room from the other side.

Leigh here...

Well, almost one year after we first started demolition, we are finally moved in to the 1790 house!! "Moved in" is of course a subjective description - we still have to collect our belongings from several locations (thanks parents!!) and there are MANY small projects to finish inside and outside the house. For example, we have no shelves and no mantles yet (although Ed was just over here today talking with us about the plan for those things), and we have interior trim and exterior everything and 33 windows to paint inside and out. It will be awhile until it's "done."

But from the first night we stayed over, which was March 13, we have been SO excited about the place. It definitely feels like home. We love cooking in the kitchen and working in the office (the two rooms that are the most set up at the moment). The house has already weathered 3 major wind/rain storms with only the tiniest bit of dampness in the basement and no other damage at all (these storms brought feet of water to other basements and blew shingles off roofs in Newburyport). Ed made quite certain that it's not going anywhere!

We really can't say enough good things about the work that Ed has done. After all we've been through with this place, he's still around to make sure that the last details get finished. He is just as proud of the house as we are!!

These photos only show some parts - we'll try to get more up soon. I especially love the exposed ceilings on the first floor in the living room and office - original beams and underside of the 2nd floor floorboard. There are funky details that come from saving some of the original parts of the house and there are great new spaces like the kitchen. Although I can't really say that I knew how it was going to turn out when we started, it is the kind of place that I have been dreaming about living in.

Floors...floors...floors

2010-02-23T15:26:00.000-08:00

So the floors have been in process for the last couple of weeks...first we had some sanding problems (the new floors got all scratched up by the buffer so that when they were stained the scuff marks showed. Then we weren't sure that the cherry stain was really not bright orange. So things have been going slowly and we might be delayed by another week on the move in date. So it's hard to say if we were just so used to having light white pine floors and now we have these darker floors that we're not crazy about. We're holding off judgement until they are done -- in these photos the floors have been stained but no poly has been applied. There is definitely a difference between how the new floors and the old floors in the upstairs bedrooms. We're withholding our judgement until it's all done...and the trim is painted.

rounding the bend, finish line in sight...

2010-02-13T09:03:00.000-08:00

Ok -- so it's down to the wire -- Ed and crew are wrapping up their duties and Hector has sanded the floors to prep them for stain and poly. You can see here that the kitchen hood is in which was the last of the appliances to be installed. A couple things remain to be done -- one is attaching one of the old beams from the second floor to the LVL along the peak of the kitchen -- it will give the look of an old beam. They guys notched it out so that they can fit it around the LVL and attach it with timber locks. That should happen on Monday but they'll have to do their work in socks because the floors have been sanded and if moisture or foot prints get on the floor it will show once it's been stained. Another view of the kitchen -- the plywood on the island is not staying -- it's just there to keep it out of the way for Hector. We plan on using some of the floorboards that were in the attic to make a counter top for the island. We're going to do this in my uncle's work shop -- the plan is to plane them down, biscuit join and glue them together and then treat them with something -- any suggestions for what to use to treat the counter? We don't want to use anything oil based like poly. Thoughts? The two pendants you see here will actually have two big glass globes on them...we just did want to put them up until the beam was installed.Here's the mostly cleaned out study -- I cleaned the ceilings yesterday. Lots of spider webs and 1700's stuff still up there.

Looking from the study into the dining room and kitchen beyond. May have mentioned it before but it will have a rectangular linen shade on it -- for now it's just there for people to walk into.

We're looking at the pantry in these photos -- you can see to the right of the fridge that Gus has done an excellent job creating a counter top look. Because the cabinet company didn't make 24" deep 36" tall cabinets we need to improvise to get the old fashioned pantry look over here. we bought base drawers and 15" above fridge cabinets and then we added some cabinet doors. For the "counter" we used birch plywood, like you see on top of the island. There are two pieces glued together. And to face the cabinets, Gus attached two pieces of pine. We're planning on painting it white to match the cabinets. The doors will then have glass in the open space.

Yesterday I had a little problem getting the fridge to sit flush with the cabinets like it's supposed to -- after all it's a counter depth fridge that is supposed to look built in -- BUT it was sticking out half an inch beyond the cabinets -- for various reason -- the ice machine tube, the plug, a couple of bumps on the back of the fridge. All of these things were more than half an inch deep. So what did we do - we cut out the sheet rock and plaster and voila the fridge fits -- the lucky thing was that as a practice Ed applies plywood to all kitchen walls that have cabinets attached. So we're in good shape.

So that's it for now...Leigh and I are going to head over to the house to move some wood out of the way so that we can have the storage trailer taken away next week. Fun stuff.

2010-02-10T19:33:00.000-08:00

Just a quick update with a few pics -- stairs look great. The posts look a lot better with the balusters in...Gus did a great job finishing up the stairs.

Plumbers mostly finished up today -- here's the guest bath sink -- looks good I think..

Master Bath sink -- also looks good - unfortunately a little chip on the back that must have happened when it was stored in the basement for awhile. Here's a question -- see the two faucets in the photo? We'll they are both hot/cold water. Normally the faucet is in the middle and so the sink stop can be operated. In our case they are off center so how do we get the sink stop to work? HMMM?

Anyway, the plumbers did a good job today...and I spoke with Ed who promised to make any of the little things that I was bothered by, right. So today was a better day.

Inching towards the finish line...

2010-02-09T20:02:00.000-08:00

It's discouraging when you have a day close to the end of the project when almost nothing gets done. We're trying really hard to get Hector into the house to get the floors done. Before he does that the plumbers need to be out of the second floor -- they were supposed to be out of there today. But for some reason they were only able to work a short day and managed to get the shower fixtures in -- that's it. So we're another day behind. Does anyone else think those posts are HUGE?

Here's the photo of the guest bath -- nice fixtures -- I'm not sure why the plumber roughed in the shower heads so low. I guess it must be to code but if I was any taller than 6 feed, I'd have to crane my head back to get my hair wet -- you know like when you stay in a 1970's hotel and you have to bend your knees to take a shower. It's not that bad but I wish they had given us a little extra height here.

You can see that the sink is waiting for fixtures.

Guest bath toilet -- the plumber made another interesting choice here too - he did a 13" rough in -- this means that the standard 12" rough in toilet sits an inch off the wall -- weird. The toilet is made to be snug against the wall -- like all other toilets...do plumbers have signatures? Could the 13' rough in be this plumbers signature?

Master Bath toilet.

Master bath shower fixtures -- low shower head.

Alas -- when we do our next house we'll be able to address all of these issues...

Getting close...

2010-02-07T16:05:00.000-08:00

We're getting there -- not moving in over vacation week but we're getting close. We're at the point of all finish work - this past week Ed put in a good push, with four guys at the house all week...it's just a lot of details at this point. All of the trim is done with the exception of the mantels. The tile and counters in the bathrooms and the kitchen are done...pretty much all of the electric is done -- we're just waiting for some fixtures at this point. We selected a gray soapstone slab for our counters but we think it's actually green....hmmm. Anyway, here you can see the white subway tile that we selected for the back splash in the kitchen and for the wall by the sink.

A little bit closer in...

Here you can see that the pantry is coming together...since we didn't do custom cabinets we had to be a bit crafty to put the pantry together. There will be glass in the doors - we just haven't had them cut cut yet. there will also be shelves in the cabinets.

Here's the dining room -- the central pendant will have a large rectangular linen shade on it and the sconces will have drum shades.

Gus has been working on the stairs for the last few days -- they look great. He takes a lot of pride in his work. I think on Monday the newel post and the banisters will probably go in.

The plumbers will be here on Monday to install toilets and sinks -- the one major thing that is holding us up from moving in is that the floors need to be re-finished. Unfortunately Hector can't work next weekend but we're hoping that evenings this week will allow him to get lots done. We'll see...

2010-01-22T16:56:00.000-08:00

The most obvious part of this photo is the fireplace which Mark E and his helper have been working on this week..Mark picked up some 1700's bricks to use to re-face the fireplace -- he had to build it out from the original depth because code required Ed to build the walls 2" from the opening...the bit in the middle that looks like new bricks are new bricks -- we're going to ask Mark to change them to old bricks -- all in all it's looking good though. You can also see the door that goes into the first floor powder room. Norm and Gus have been working on hanging doors and trimming them out this week... This fireplace is waiting to receive a new face as well -- the other fireplaces in the house will be skim coated with plaster/mortar and painted black - -this is how the house was when we bought it.

Here you can see the master bath where Hector has been laying tile...you can also see a bit of the door trim that went on today.

The tub surround...

Here is the floor of the guest bathroom...

Doors..Sink...Counters

2010-01-19T15:10:00.000-08:00

So our interior doors arrived today -- 1600lbs of them! Here are a couple of photos of the doors that were installed after they arrived.

The Kitchen Sink was also installed so that Russ from Eno's could come template the counter tops -- which with any luck should be installed in the next couple of weeks. Things are moving along nicely.

Other things happening this week -- Mark the mason should crank out some brick work for the fireplaces and get the insulation in the chimney. Hector is working on the bathroom tiles and we're going to try to get the basement bulkhead closed up so we don't keep losing heat!

A milestone day...

2010-01-17T14:11:00.001-08:00

With unseasonably warm weather for the last two days, Leigh and I were able to FINALLY finish siding the house...this is a major milestone for us -- if you recall we had hoped to be done with this part of the job by May 15th or so last year! How about that only 7 months off our estimate! Anyway -- it was a good feeling. You can seem me here up on the plank getting ready to put that last piece in. Leigh was working inside today cutting the angle on all of the shingles and handing them out through the window. The final shingle...

Our friend Bruce today asked if we were hand nailing the shingles or using a nail gun -- good question -- I can tell you that if we were hand nailing them (see left hand) we would be done by about May 15, 2010. So yes, we used a nail gun and stainless steel nails (very expensive) but they are better because they will not have a reaction with the white cedar. With galvanized nails, they often react to the cedar and create black streaks as the cedar weathers. Our plan is to let them weather to a nice grey and to sell the house before their 30 year life span requires replacement!

These next two photos can only be shown because it's already happened -- otherwise, our mothers would be too nervous...getting up and down onto and from the plank is a bit awkward...

Finally today - and entirely unrelated to siding -- is the master bath tile is is starting to go on the walls - Hector worked on Saturday to get started -- these are subway shape but more like 5x13...they are grey -- yes grey -- I seem to be in a phase where grey is my go-to color. The question of the day is WHAT COLOR DO YOU THINK THE GROUT SHOULD BE? I am leaning towards a lighter color to give it a bit of a retro look -- and so that he vertical brick pattern is a feature. Tile store folks suggest a dark grout...WHAT DO YOU THINK?

The floor tiles are a really pretty white 18" Square with a subtle line pattern in it.

I am hoping that this week, doors arrive and that Mark E shows up to finish up his masonry work...it would be nice to have that wrapped up. Also, painting should be done.

Paint and Trim

2010-01-14T15:21:00.000-08:00

So finish work continues -- paint, trim, water and heat have been the latest additions. You can see the living room here - I think I mentioned in a previous post that most of the house is painted Revere Pewter...and the trim will be White Dove. They are Ben Moore colors and will be a neutral palate on which we will apply pops of color through art, rugs, window treatments etc... Here's the Master Bedroom -- you can see above the beams that we've installed insulation that will ultimately be covered with barn board. Gus is doing a great job trimming out the windows -- not all of the walls are straight so it's a bit of a challenge but you can tell that he really takes pride in his work.

Appliances arrived the other day and are awaiting installation...

They are not actually blue - they're wrapped in a protective coating.

Because we are going to have so much white in the kitchen (cabinets and tile), we decided to go with a darker color for the wall...jury is still out...

All in all things continue to go well -- we're still not sure when we will be moving in but we're crossing our fingers for the end of January....this weekend we're hoping to finish the siding...but we'll be happy if we get it almost done.

Happy New Year -- we'll be in the house in 2010

2010-01-05T16:46:00.001-08:00

So the year has come that we'll move into the house...finally! We think we may actually be a couple weeks away from being able to move into the house. You can see here that kitchen cabinets are installed -- we had some damage in the storage trailer and one cabinet base was ruined and four drawer fronts need to be replaced but we're getting there...appliances will be delivered on Friday and the gas should be turned on by then so it shouldn't be too long until we're cooking our first meal. The base cabinet that is missing is part of the pantry which you can see on the right wall here...so we'll likely be without that for some time. In the middle, you can see the island which will house the wine fridge and the microwave -- we're going to make the counter top out of salvaged wood floors from the attic...that should be done in a few years... (notice that the lights are on in this photo...

Here's another view of the kitchen -- we're trying to figure out what color to paint the walls --cabinets are white, tile is white, counters will be grey soap stone -- ANY SUGGESTIONS? Most of the rest of the house is Revere Pewter (a shade of grey)

My mom's very generous Christmas present to us was to have the walls and ceilings painted before we move in -- we had planned on doing this ourselves but due to the overwhelming kindness of my mom we won't have to worry about it! Leigh cried... Here you can get an idea of the wall color, though it's a bit hard to see in the photo. The trim will be white dove...

Looking forward to seeing the trim go up...

Scrooge here...

2009-12-24T13:12:00.000-08:00

Leigh and I just got back from the house -- it's Christmas Eve and we're getting ready to put our elf caps on...but need to get this quick update in. Lots of photos here of the great work that Ed and his crew have been doing over the last couple of weeks. The plaster guys are almost done -- just one last touch up. It looks great. Hector has been working installing the floors upstairs and in the kitchen (hope to get cabinets in next week. You can see in this photo that we're saving the original floor but Hector repaired the far side by patching it with new white pine.

It's Amazing how the house is coming together -- it's almost just finish work left to be done.
Here's the living room...Hope to see the mason next week to finish his part of the project...

Looking into the master closet

Looking into the small bedroom on the second floor - paper down over the floors so they aren't damaged before the finish.

Ed has had Imar's crew at the house to get the siding done quickly so that the house is fully weather tight. We really appreciate that he brought in such a good crew to get the job done quickly. They took care of all of the clap boards and you can see some of our handy work - we're doing the shingling.

Today we got half way up the right side of the house and started on a little section by the left of the Kitchen door.

The place looks great -- we're so happy with Ed and his crew -- they should be proud of the great work that they've been doing -- Merry Christmas!

Extreme Makeover - Home Edition

2009-12-20T16:56:00.000-08:00

We'll not really done in 7 days but close right? Just a quick update -- Leigh and I worked all day Saturday and into the night...we got this part of the house sided -- on this particular wall we had been getting a bit of water in the house during driving rains and wanted to be sure that we avoided that going forward. So we worked until about 6:30 with headlights and halogens...good fun. We're hoping that we can get our part of the siding job done by the end of Christmas week..we'll see What we didn't have time to photograph is the interior which has been transformed by a skim coat of plaster! It looks great. This coming week (we'll the first two days of the week) should mean some floors start to go down - maybe kitchen cabinets...we'll see!

The other thing that we are contending with is lack of heat in the house -- that will be fixed when we get floors in but for now we are using heaters that get the house warm during the day and then are off at night - so as a consequence we're having tons of condensation inside the house -- and it freezes at night...not great for the wood windows. Hope to get that heat in soon so that we can keep the temps consistent.

Been a long time coming...this is a long one

2009-12-16T15:19:00.000-08:00

So, it's been far far too long since I've updated this blog...lots has happened and we're about 3 weeks away from moving in. We're not going to quite make Christmas but better to get it all done right than rush to get into the house. More or less, I'll just illustrate the photos -- not that they aren't obvious enough. This is a good break from wrestling with lighting fixtures which I am ordering right now... In this photo you can see the kitchen has been insulated, the low voltage recessed lights have been installed and in the top right of the photos you can see a white piece of plastic where the speaker wire will be secured for the in ceiling speakers (which will go in later as budget allows). Leigh and I did all of the wiring for the whole house audio -- so we'll see how that goes. There will two speakers in every room of the first floor.

Here you can see the vaulted ceiling of the kitchen -- the off white things between the rafters are Styrofoam vents to bring cold air in from outside to keep the roof temp cool.

This is the insulated living room. The coil of yellow wire to the left of the windows is the speaker wire. You can also see some primed clapboards on the floor. Leigh and I spend days and days priming these pine boards. They were milled for us by Rand Lumbar Yard in Rye NH.

Living room looking towards the kitchen...lots of insulation.

This is the living room fireplace -- we left coils of wire so that we can decide where we want to put the sconces once the living room is finished.

Upstairs looking towards the back of the house.

Here is our super efficient gas heater and on the left the 45 gallon hot water tank.

Ed and the guys installed plywood where the cabinets will be installed.

Blue board in the dining room, waiting to be plastered. Imar and his crew had the blue board one in only a few days and are now in the process of plastering the house.

Most of the house was insulated using traditional insulation but we insulated the roof with closed cell spray foam insulation only 4 inches has an R value of 30. We did this so that we could keep the vaulted ceiling exposed. Because we used spray foam we do not have to vent the roof.

Blue board in the study.

Here you can see the master bedroom with the plaster on the walls...looks great!

Master bedroom looking towards the closet.

Hector and Mike have been doing the clapboard siding -- they're doing a great job of lining the boards up with the bottom and top of the windows. We're hoping that their part of the siding will done by Tuesday next week so that they can start laying the floors which arrived on Tuesday. We have to let the wide pine acclimate to the house for 7 to 10 days before installing them.

All in all, things are going well - we were hoping to be in by Christmas but it looks like we'll still be in the house ahead of schedule. Tomorrow we make some decisions about trim...I'll try to keep the blog updated on a more regular basis...no promises though.

2009-11-19T15:36:00.000-08:00

Here's a quick look at the septic system -- it's a gravity fed, drive over system -- this means that the pipes in the ground are schedule 80, not schedule 40 so they are twice as thick.

Here's the finish grade...the driveway will be fairly close to the fence and we're thinking of using the rocks that you see by the tree as the base for a stone wall...

Hope that Ed and crew will get the last of the windows in tomorrow...

Mechanicals..

2009-11-18T18:08:00.000-08:00

It's all about the mechanicals this week -- plumbing, septic, electric, gas...lots of fun stuff but not lots of worthy photos...We're moving right along -- we got the septic system in under the wire and the boiler got fired up for the first time today! Here you see the electric panel with the outgoing sewer pipe...we ran into a small snag with the septic -- it turns out that it is 5 inches higher than the sewage pipe that leaves the house -- oops. So, no big deal, right? WRONG....we have to install a double pump with a 100 gallon storage tank to pump the sewage out of the house and up into the septic tank...which is a gravity tank.... ($4000) which we didn't plan for...ouch. So instead of going on vacation, for the next three years, we'll go into the basement and look at the pump. Sure beats the BVI. When we have this pump installed we'll be sure to post some photos. (Family if you are reading this, you'll understand why there will be no Christmas presents this year...instead you'll be welcome to use our toilets anytime...)

Back to the good stuff. Here's the plumbing for the powder room on the first floor. The rough in is complete and inspected -- signed off on by the plumbing inspector.

Here's the guest bathroom upstairs.

We also started Eclectic this week...lots of progress there -- we should be done with rough in by the end of this week so that insulation can start.

Here's one component of our Contender boiler -- it's small and super efficient -- 93% actually.

Water tank, boiler -- orange tubes are for heat, blue for cold water and red for hot water...

Lots of photos today...

2009-11-10T16:47:00.000-08:00

It's been awhile so lots has happened...work has been progressing nicely over the last week and it seems like we're close to a milestone -- almost all of the walls are framed, plumbing is going in and windows should be in soon so that the house can be closed in completely. You'll be able to see from these photos that the rooms are starting to take shape and we're not too far off from installing sheet rock...maybe last week of November. Cross your fingers! You're looking at the Kitchen here with the breakfast nook in the corner.

As mentioned in another post, we've been using and electric plane to plane down the tybeams -- just want to take a moment to say that we couldn't be happier with how the bedrooms are coming out. Ed really went above and beyond when he was doing the second floor -- instead of taking the easy way out he really showed his commitment to restoring the house when he decided to replace the roof using traditional post and beam construction. The outcome is magnificent....and we don't have to worry about snow weight on the roof -- in most houses the safest place to be during a hurricane is the basement -- not ours -- come on over and enjoy our second floor if you need a safe place!

Here you can see the upstairs hallway looking back into the guest bath on the right and the smaller guest room on the left.

This is the non-working fireplace in the front of house guest bedroom.

Last Sunday we painted exterior doors...here's the main door that we will be using.

2009-11-01T15:14:00.000-08:00

We're getting down to the details now -- Ed and crew finished up some tricky interior work this week and tackled the bulkhead (which I think looks great). They also had to re-frame some windows because of the previously mentioned window problem and they started to finish the front of the house. Ed thinks that they have a couple more days until the House is totally closed in and about three weeks until we start with Sheetrock -- WOW. That puts us towards the end of November for interior painting. Plumbing will start this week. In these photos you can see the shingles that Leigh and I put on on Saturday. Because of time constraints and budget, we've decided to reduce the amount of the house that will have shingles and revert to the original plan of clapboard on most of the house and shingles only on the parts of the house that originally hand them. Ed and crew are going to do the clap board installation and Leigh and I will do the shingles.

So it's a busy week at the house and unfortunately Leigh and I won't be able to be there very much but we are looking forward to seeing what it looks like at the end of the week!

Ed and the crew is scheduled to start a new job by the middle of November so we're hoping that means that we'll be pretty much done at our house by then except for electric, plumbing, sheetrock and trim...

Just a quick look back

2009-11-01T15:10:00.000-08:00

As we're getting ready to re-frame the front entry I was looking back at some photos to give to Ed so that he can reproduce it well and I thought it would be a good time to contrast the new house with the old house! Here you can see where we are -- with the addition, windows, getting ready for siding and below you'll see what the house looked like last March...

Easy Guard...

2009-10-25T15:16:00.000-07:00

So Friday, Saturday and Sunday were all good work days at the house -- first Friday -- I showed up at about 9:45 and the roof was almost half done. Imar and his crew did a great job and got the shingles on in one day. Mark E was also at the house and finished most of the basement floor. On Saturday Leigh and I worked for a few hours -- she primed water tables that will be installed this week and put Styrofoam vents in between the rafters on the second floor while I used an electric planer to plane the tybeams in the upstairs guest bedroom and to put a beveled edge on them -- sorry not photos of that...

Then on Sunday, I finished applying most of the house wrap and tyvek tape so that no more water can get in the house. This is also almost the last step before siding starts. Early this coming week, Ed and crew will attach the water tables (bottom trim board) and then I can go to town with the shingles. Imar and one of his crew will be back this week to do two days of work. The goal for the end of this week is to have the house closed in with the exception of a few windows we are waiting on. This means building the front entry, installing doors, re framing the middle part of the front of the house.

I'm hoping by the end of the week, that the front of the house will be ready to start applying the clap boards...cross your fingers!

Finally, we're about ready to get started on the septic system - we're just waiting for one more bid before we get started.

2009-10-22T15:40:00.000-07:00

So it's actually starting to look like a house with windows and trim and interior walls...things are moving right along. Today two guys worked on getting corner boards on and two worked on getting windows in. I cut out some windows, put on some ice and water shield and did some house wrap taping and got some of the site cleaned up. Here you're looking at our dining room as seen from the entry hall. Standing in the living room looking to the side door and towards the kitchen,

The kitchen...

We're trying to figure out now if we do actually want to do cedar shingles for most of the house or if we want to go back to the old plan of clapboards on most of the house and shingles on part. Still not sure and would welcome suggestions.

The great guys from Newburyport Water Department came to take away 8 or so loads of fill that has been a fixture in our side yard for quite some time...so nice of them. We also had National Grid at the house to install the gas line -- now we have power, gas and water.

You can see in this photo, to the right of the door, we had to cheat the trim board over a few feet so that it lined up with the roof of the addition. Hopefully it won't look too weird when it is sided.

Here's a nice look at what will be the main entrance to the house. Tomorrow Imar and his helper will start shingling the roof and Mark E is coming to finish the floor. I'm hoping that Ed and I can get some of the water tables done and that Leigh and I can go to town on shingles this Saturday. We'll see.

2009-10-20T15:13:00.000-07:00

I was only at the house for about an hour today but here are a few photos of what's been accomplished over the last couple of days. Here you can see that Mark E has been working on the chimney in the guest bedroom... The chimney has been re-built to its original height and is setting. When the mortar has dried, Mark will put a blue stone chimney cap on top.

Ed, Hector and one of Ed's old employees have been installing the trim around the roof line so that the roof can be put on. This has taken priority over other things like getting the sheathing on and putting windows in etc. Obviously it's important to get the roof on before too much longer!

Here's another view of the chimney. Mark E was able to reuse the old bricks so it will look original.

I'm anxious to start getting siding on and I've been trying to push Ed to get a wall ready for us to do this Saturday. I'm hopeful that we'll be able to get one wall done over the weekend. I think it's looking pretty good...it will be quite a milestone when the house is finally buttoned up.

Other things today -- the electric service was hooked up so we have power! and I met with Henry Richards a local contractor about installing the septic system. Stay tuned...

Just a bit of bad news, Mike, one of the guys who has been working on the job may not be able to continue and he's done a great job. We'll hope to see him again.

2009-10-15T20:49:00.000-07:00

We'll we ended the week on a good note -- the kitchen roof was framed and we started to put the house wrap on -- and actually installed one window...that should keep the rain out this weekend. As you can see - the house is really coming together. We had a dead brain moment this morning and thought that the pitch of the roof wouldn't work with the window in the top right of the photo -- but as you can see -- it worked out. The Kitchen ceiling will be vaulted and there will be a window in the peak, right where that vertical board is now.

The other moment of pause came today when Ed gave me the quote for the 8 new windows we have to order...one of them is supposed to be tempered glass because it's near the tub and it was going to cost $1100 for one window. So I re-designed the bathroom and moved the tub. Now it can be a regular window...

Here you can see the house wrap...we're not going to put external insulation on because the house is now framed with 2x6 studs. Plus every contractor that we have spoken with pretty much thinks it's a bad idea.

So, I've been crunching numbers tonight and we are quite a bit over budget and trying to figure out where we can trim some costs -- we were going to get Rhuntl radiators for their low profile design and more modern look but that would add about $4000 to the job...guess it's ugly old baseboard...alas.

Finally, if anyone knows someone who needs 8 Brosco, true divided light windows 8x8 glass 6/6. I have some that we're not going to use...please pass on the word. They are brand new, just picked up and just the wrong size. They retail for around$380 and I'll sell them for $350 each.

2009-10-14T18:53:00.000-07:00

Some good progress today. Ed brought in a couple of extra guys to move things along. All said and done, two sides of the house were sheathed, the kitchen walls were framed and Hector built the sloped roof over the dining room -- I spent the day painting the trim boards which Ed hopes to put on tomorrow. I'm hoping that by the end of next week that the house will be closed in. Tomorrow, Ed would like to get the roof built for the kitchen. Things seem to be progressing well.

Our scheduled move in day is February 17th but Ed and I were talking today and he's pushing for a couple months from now -- which would be great. We'll see...

Electricians also came to install the electrical service today. In the photo below you can see, right next to the ladder, there is a chase for the wires from the street. We'll see how long it takes National Grid to hook up the electric now...

Though you can't see it in these photos, Mark Eldredge has broken through the roof and is building the chimney. His hope is to have the exterior part done by the end of this week!

Framing the second floor...

2009-10-13T17:11:00.001-07:00

Second post in one day...wow. I thought it was important to show today's progress...The addition partition walls and ceiling were the event of the day -- here you're looking from our Master Bedroom into the Master Bath and beyond to the guest room and on the right the second full bath. This is the main part of the house -- the "attic" window is in the middle of the peak.

Guest bedroom on the left and bath on the right...

I've been deliquent...

2009-10-13T17:02:00.001-07:00

Okay, loyal blog readers (all 16 of you)...I've been delinquent and let too much time pass between posts. It's been over a week and Ed and crew have taken good advantage of the time to make some excellent headway. We now have a roof, a second floor addition and are nearing weather tightness on the exterior (Ed says maybe by the end of this week). This post simply chronicles the process of building the roof for the addition. This part of the roof was done in a more conventional way. Rather than post and beam, Ed used modern dimensional lumber.

While they built the roof, I knocked down walls...

Above you can see all of the rafters for the second floor...

Here you can see that the Ice and Water shield has been applied to the back (this was done on Columbus Day by Mike and Ed who stayed until about 7:30 to finish the job because it was supposed to rain today. You can also see that the wall that I cut out was re-framed today with the attic window in again.

We continue to be impressed by the efficiency and dedication of Ed and his crew. They have no problem working 10 hour days and working on the ocassional holiday.

Ed Makes good...

2009-10-01T18:36:00.000-07:00

So, last week, Ed told me that the roof would be sheathed and would have ice and water shield on by Friday this week AND it's done one day early. Today especially was a triumphant effort. But let's go back before we go forward. It was about a week and a half ago that we realized that the entire old roof and all of the rafters were going to have to come off. They were rotted and had been invested with powder post beatles and carpenter ants. With that done - Ed and crew replaced all of the second floor posts, the plates, tie beams and over the last week, installed rafters, perlins (sp) and the sheathing for the roof of the old part of the house. I'm sure that most contractors, who are concerned more with the bottom line than the final product, would have used conventional lumber and built the second floor and roof with 2x lumber. Not Ed! I think that the way he's restored the 1790 house will ensure that it's still here at least 300 years from now.

You can see from this picture that was taken on Tuesday that the roof is on one side of the house.

Fast forward to today and you can see the crew installing rafters and pearlins.

At about 3:30 all of the sheathing was on the roof and the guys were ready to put on the ice and water shield. Here you can see Hector standing on a palate elevated by a lal (sp) which is a fork lift with a long hydraulic arm. He's getting ready to install the ice and water shield.

And here's the ROOF from the rear of the house - the Ice and Water Shield is installed and next week the crew will be working on framing the rest of the addition and the guest bedroom on the second floor.

It will be great when the house is weather tight...even though we've had tons of sun, what little rain we've had has caused some of the old floors to warp a bit.

All in all a great week. Leigh hadn't been there since Monday and she said that she felt like she was on Extreme Makeover Home Edition because so much progress was made in one week!

Cross your fingers for another good week!

2009-09-24T17:24:00.000-07:00

Today 3 rafters were cut and installed while I took care of some demo and clean-up. Here you can see Ed and Hector on the roof and Mike on the second floor. The construction and installation of these rafters was no small task. First they had to figure out the angle of the roof and cut the bottom of the rafter, then notch the other end of one rafter and create a tongue on the other one so that when they joined up top, the would lock together. The bottom of the rafter also has a tongue that locks into a groove on the tie beam. The rafters are then secured to the tie beam with huge timber locks.

Here you can see how the two rafters lock together.

Ed's saying the whole roof will be on by next Friday -- we'll see!

Memomirs of the trash guy...part 102

2009-09-23T19:41:00.000-07:00

Though you will see not photos of my efforts today, I can assure you they were valiant. Hector tore the whole roof of the other day and there was no more space in the dumpster for it. So, today I cleaned up shingles (four layers), wood and rotted rafters and beams. Hector tells me that he didn't even have to use a hammer or any tools to get the roof off...wow. So Ed and crew are re framing the second floor and putting a new roof on. Ed has this handy machine that lifts beams up to the second floor...not sure how he's going to adjust when it has to go back to the rental place in a month!

So there was good progress today - they installed four tie beams that sit on the upper plates and will hold the rafters, which hopefully will be installed tomorrow. Good progress!

2009-09-22T18:46:00.000-07:00

Sorry for the long lapse in blog coverage -- my fingers have been too tired at night...we're way behind -- Ed and they guys are moving too fast to keep up! But here's the latest - in reverse order. Alot has happened in the last couple of weeks. We have a second floor on the addition, the first floor of the old part of the house has been re framed and the most of the basement floor has been poured -- oh and the roof is gone. Here you can see a photo of the front of the house tonight. On the left you can see all of the new roof rafters, tie beams and plates that will replace the rotted oak that has been eaten by carpenter ants and suffered from exposure to the weather over the last 40 years or so. You may also notice that the roof is no longer on the house.

Here's another view of the removed roof.

You can see the new plates that are sitting on top of old plates -- these are 8x8 beams that are milled in Rye NH at Rand Lumber.

The view from the addition into what will be the master bedroom.

Last week Ed and crew were working on re framing the first floor and replacing corner posts. They did that on Monday and Tuesday as well as installing the LVL beam that will hold up the back wall of the house. On Wednesday or Thursday (can't remember) - maybe even Friday, I put up new 1" rough cut sheathing on the back and on the front left of the house.

You can see the new sheathing here -- anything over 5/8" is considered structural.

Here's a photo looking down the stairs hole into the addition basement -- Mark E and crew did a great job polishing the floor so that it would be smooth. To do this they used a huge power trowel that we had to slide down a ladder through the bulkhead to get it in the basement.

The cement truck shot the cement through one of the basement windows.

Mark and two of his workers spread out the cement with rakes and shovels and then smoothed it out, waited for it to dry and then used the power trowel to finish it off.

Here you can see LVL that I mentioned before. It covers part of the kitchen and is the outside wall for the second floor of the house.

Earlier in the week, this beam and wall was put up -- it will help support the two main beams in the bedrooms.

The main stairs to the second floor!

New framing for the front wall of the living room.

New framing for the other living room wall -- the one that got new sheathing too. That wraps it up -- it will be very interesting to see how Ed and crew approach the roof project. It seems pretty tricky to me!

2009-09-10T19:19:00.000-07:00

Ok - so it's hard to know where to begin this week. With only three days to work, because of the long weekend, Ed and the crew have been working at a blistering pace. Last week, you may remember, the first floor was decked and ready to start framing. Over the last three days the walls have gone up and much of the second floor has been decked. Part of the challenge with this house is joining the old and the new. In this photo, Ed is notching a post so that it will fit in with an existing beam on the old house. This is one of the many posts that Ed will be replacing because of rot and termite damage. Ed is using a special corner chisel to make sure that the corners are notched out.

Here you see the finished product fitting in nicely with the beam. After the post was in place, Hector used timber locks to secure it. With the beam in place, they were able to attach the new LVLs that will support the second floor exterior wall in the addition.

It is somewhat hard to get a sense of the rooms because the walls are just being framed but in the photo below you are seeing the dining room on the right and the front entry hall on the left and you're actually looking right through the stairs. Ed, Hector and Mike are taking great care to make sure that everything is level and square.

The photo below was taken from the Master Bedroom looking out on to the second floor of the addition where the master bath, guest bath and guest bedroom will be.

Here's the view from the second floor looking down into the kitchen. The beam to the left of the photo is an LVL - there are actually four 10" x 17' LVL beams nailed together. This will support the second floor.

Finally you can see that the sheathing is on part of the first floor and the windows and doors have been cut out. Still some problems to address with the joining of the old and new houses but things are rolling along!

Water Installation

2009-09-10T18:02:00.000-07:00

Today Eric and Dan and their crew from the Newburyport Water Department came to install the water line. These guys have been great since day one. They put the new water line in by snaking a wire through the old water line, attaching the new pipe to the old pipe and pulling the old pipe out with the backhoe. All in all it was a very smooth operation. They even cleared some brush that was so slightly in the way. Here you can see Eric pulling the old line out with the back hoe. I was impressed by how quickly and seemingly effortlessly they did this job.

Hooray! A basement and floors!

2009-09-05T08:38:00.001-07:00

Leigh again - since I was at school all week I came to the house Thursday night for a real treat. The progress is amazing thanks to Ed and his hardworking crew, including Rob, and Mark Eldredge (Chimney Cleaning Experts, 603- - yes purposeful plugs for these guys inserted here). Below I am standing behind our new addition which now has a floor! The side where I am standing will be the kitchen, and in front of that to the right will be the dining room, and on the left the entry. The opening in the foreground will be the cellar stairs.

Look at our basement - woohoo! - it's huge! We were worried about having enough headroom because at some point we will want to make it into finished space (for the media room, says Rob), but the ceiling height won't be a problem.

On Friday I helped out mostly by picking up nails around the site (guess I'm the new trash guy). Rob and Mark E. poured some concrete here - this is the top of the wall that was backfilled with dirt (which Rob described previously). This will be the powder room (aka half bath) and the orange triangle is where the plumbing will go.

Also on Friday, Gus and Mike finished the flooring in the study. The flooring in the living room has been completed as well. This was a major goal for the week and they got it done.

The last thing on Friday was installing this beam in the front of the house where the stairs used to be. Gus and Mike did a great job.

You can see in this next shot the outline of where the staircase was.

On Friday evening Rob and I came back over to start marking out the layout of the first floor addition. Ed made this smart suggestion so we can see where everything is supposed to go, get a feel for how it will be and think about making any changes. We laid out the walls, doors and kitchen cabinets with chalk lines (although tomorrow we're going to put tape down). We like the current setup, and are just thinking about making some small changes to the dining room and entry areas (adding a closet in the dining room that would serve as a china cabinet). Here you can see some of the chalk lines. Riley, get off the kitchen counter!

Rewind: Barn Move Part 1

2009-09-05T08:16:00.000-07:00

Leigh here... Just getting a chance to recap the moving of the barn, part 1, which happened a few weeks ago. Our neighbor David did most of the work, with sons Sparhawk and Rowan lending a hand on the tractor. We did our best to roll it along on some round logs and posts, and Sparhawk and I helped move those from the back to the front as we made progress. Even though we added some bracing to the open end, at times it was leaning badly and looked like it might come down. But it held together and by the end of the day, David was able to put enough lumber back on so that Chip (the white horse) could go back into his usual home, although with a slightly different view.

Days 8, 9 and 10

2009-09-02T19:24:00.000-07:00

I missed a couple of days because of having to be at work but Ed and the crew made some excellent progress. Everyone is very excited about how the job is going. On Monday and Tuesday, Ed, Hector and Mike started to frame the back addition. Today the framing of the back continued. One of the This first photo shows the footing that we had to add on to today. The other 2x2x2 footing was slightly off center. So today, first thing, I dug a new hole 2x1.5x1.5 and poured more concrete so that the post that will hold up most of the house will be able to be in the center of the footing. It's nice to have people to work with who take pride in the quality and the pace of the work. Ed sets goals each day and they work hard to achieve the goals. Last night he told us that by the end of today that the "deck" would be on the addition and it happened. They started work just after 7am and finished just after 4pm. Besides being the trash guy today, I also attached the joist hangers, dug the previously mentioned hole, mixed some concrete, helped lay the floor and made a dunkin donuts run. In this photo, Hector and Ed are putting in the joists. The darker wood are LVLs. They are plywood glued together. One (actually 4) runs the length of the basement and will be a major support beam. There are several others as well.

Here I am nailing down the subfloor.

The view from the back of the house - there will be a 7.25" step up from the addition to the old part of the house. We had to do this so that we'd have enough headroom in the kitchen for our pantry.

Here's the view from the Living Room to what will be the entry.

We'll see what tomorrow brings -- maybe walls -- but first the rest of the floor needs to be finished.

Day 6 and 7

2009-08-29T16:35:00.000-07:00

So it was a good week at the 1790 House -- Ed and his crew and Mark the mason made some good progress that will set us up for a great week next week. Over the last couple of days we have seen our living room floor completed. In this photos you can see the 8x9 beams that are the floor joists. They are huge -- we could pull a fire truck right into our living room. This floor creates the platform from which Ed will be able to improve the structure of the rest of the house. The new block wall seen here replaces the pressure treated wall that Mark B put in. Behind the wall, we back filled it with soil and gravel to hold the base of the chimney together. That's an 8 foot wall that needed to be filled to the top with dirt -- and there was no way to do it except with paint buckets. Needless to say we were a little sore the next day.

Here's another look a the floor and the block wall.

And here you can see that we have done a good job of getting the dirt to the top of the wall. Actually I took a very strategic break to go out and get water and by the time I got back, Roger had finished it off.

On Friday the actually sub floor was applied by Gus and Norm. They also put the sills on the new part of the foundation. Last task for the day was pouring a 2x2x2 footing for the central post in the house. This spot will be carrying a load of over 32,000 pounds.

I'm writing this after returning from the hosue on Saturday. As you know it was pouring rain -- but David, our neighbor had borrowed a tractor from the farm to move the barn. So with the help of John, David and I moved the last piece of the barn off the concrete pad. We now have three pieces of the barn sitting on the other side of the gravel driveway...

I hope that David get's lots of enjoyment out of the barn...glad to have it moved. That will allow us to break up the slab and finish grading the land around the house. Hopefully we'll be able to use all of the dirt pile.

2009-08-29T16:24:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted any photos of the new "landscaping." This is the view of the house as you are driving down the road. Unfortunately we had to remove the lilacs because the septic tank can't have trees or bushes within 10 feet and the tank will be placed near the bulkhead. We will be able to save the maple on the corner of the house. Does this look familiar -- no, it's not a photo from months ago before we put the siding on -- it's a photo from yesterday after I TOOK OFF the siding -- this should go into the shoddy workmanship category -- not our shoddy workmanship -- we had to take off the siding because ED needs to re frame the walls and then nail the sheathing to the new framing. We are hoping that since the right side of the house has all new sheathing and new studs that we'll be able to keep the siding. UG - it was painful taking that stuff off.

Here's another view. Our new driveway will be about 6' towards the house from the fence. We were thinking about cobblestones -- two tracks with grass in between. We'll see. We want something appropriately farm like. Eventually we'll have a barn style garage.

Day 5 - memoirs of the trash guy

2009-08-26T19:25:00.000-07:00

So, I'm the trash guy. Today I spent the day undoing things that had been done over the last 5 months. You can see in this first photo that all of the shingles have been removed and the second floor beam is exposed (see the previous entry for more on that). I also spent time cleaning up the site, moving dirt and collecting rocks. It was painful to take off the shingles (with the help of Roger) but I feel good about doing it because I know that taking a step back will allow us to move forward in the right way. We had to take the shingles off because Ed and his crew will be re-framing the walls and they will need to nail through the sheathing to attach the new studs to the house. Hector, Ed and Mike worked on the floor in the Living Room today - the timbers that they are using for this are HUGE. They are spread two feet apart and will certainly ensure that there is no bounce in our floors. The used the pulley that you can see in the photo to steady the beam while they were securing it with a post in the basement.

Here you can see the floor joists after they have been installed. To fit them in you can see that thy are notched on the right and they rest on the 2x12 sill plate. On the left the major beam has been notched and the joist sits in the beam.

While Ed, Hector and Mike were working on the floor, Mark Eldredge was busy building this block wall which will be back filled tommorow to shore up the base of the chimney.

Tomorrow more work on the floor and the wall and then hopefully framing will start on the back of the house fairly soon. Ed is busy working out some of the engineering problems. So far so good...

Shoddy workmanship

2009-08-26T19:17:00.000-07:00

Presenting a new series -- shoddy workmanship -- things that have to be re-done because they weren't done the right way the first time. We've had the pleasure of ripping off our shingles (which took four days to apply and 1 hour to rip off) so that we could expose the beams that support the second floor. Because of the sub-par work that was done by Mark B, Ed wants to double check to make sure that nothing was overlooked. You may recall that one of the beams suffered from some major rot. After we discovered that we asked Mark to take off all of the sheathing to look at the beams all the way around the house -- we'll that never happened. Luckily when we did this we found the beams to be in pretty good shape. Also luckily we found that the replacement studs that Rocky and Mark put in were not done properly and were therefore not structurally sound. You can see in these photos that the studs (the 2x4 wood) are not cut properly and that there is a gap between the top of the stud and the "plate" or the beam.

The problem with this is that the stud is meant to carry some weight and if it's not touching the plate, then it is carrying NO weight.

We'll keep you updated as more things are uncovered!

Day 4

2009-08-25T19:20:00.000-07:00

Just a few quick photos today - we have been away from the jobsite for a few days and there has been a bunch of progress. First you should know that the auto focus on our camera is broken so apologies for the somewhat blurry photos. Leigh and I just celebrated our 5th anniversary and we've been joking that it's the crushed gravel anniversary because we just spent $500 on crushed gravel to fill in below where the foundation floor will be. Anyway, Ed and his crew have been moving right along. In this first photo you can see one of the new main beams on the first floor - it is a custom milled timber that will be what the joists are attached to. It will be supported by two major posts that will come up from the basement. Ed told me that it was pretty tricky getting it in there as it weighs about 500lbs. Apparently the pulled it in with a truck!
Here's another view of the new beam. You can also see some of the temporary measures Ed has taken to support the corner and back of the house.
Finally, here are some of our floor joists that were milled in Rye NH. I'm pretty sure that our floors won't be sagging.

I'm back on the job tomorrow as trash guy - cleaning up the site. We're also meeting with Randy from ASI to have an inspection so that we can draw on our construction loan.

Finally - hoping to get the barn moved so that Jay can finish the regrading of the property. We have some spots that need to be addressed or else we'll have quite a bit of standing water after rain storms.

Chapter 2 - Day 1

2009-08-19T16:49:00.001-07:00

As any of you loyal readers know, we have been involved in a classic contractor nightmare -- worthy of a Dateline NBC expose...we'll we've turned the page and are now happy to say that we are moving on. The first step in this process was selecting a new contractor. After interviewing several folks, we decided to go with Ed Mcqueeny who owns a company called Old House Restoration. (makes sense right). During the process of "interviewing" Ed he impressed us with the amount of time and thought he put into his analysis of our situation. I think he actually spent over 12 hours at the house just looking and thinking. He was brutally honest - which was intimidating at first (can you say Money Pit?) but also refreshing. So today was day one on the job - to prep for Ed and his crew I spent some time at the house taking off the water table and some siding and then the first course of sheathing to expose the sills, which Ed felt strongly about replacing. It was difficult taking a step back but gratifying to understand that the work is going to be done correctly this time. In the photo above, you can see the front right of the house. Hector, one of Ed's guys was able to dig out the field stone that the front corner post and sill were sitting on. It was amazing how easily this part of the foundation came out. He then built a foundation for the big rock that you see there now. This provides a much better footing for this corner of the house.

Hector's next task was to remove part of the sill that Mark and Rocky put in. They are replacing the new sills for several reasons -first, Mark's sills were bolted into the foundation but only using a 6" J bolt -- code requires at least 10" bolts. They only replaced a section of the sill because so that the house could rest on the other part of Mark's sill. It took him all of 10 minutes to remove the sill and the loose rocks that it was sitting on! The next step was digging down to large foundation rocks, installing a 2x12 pressure treated sill plate, leveling it, and filling in the space beneath the sill with larger rocks. Doing this allowed Hector to install a longer bold that will attach the sill plate to the foundation. On top of the sill plate, Ed and Hector will place a 6x6 to which they will attach the floor joists.

You can see in the photo above that the sill plate that Mark and Rocky installed is already bending. This is what the whole house is built on.

In these two photos you can see the end of a days work. The top one compares the two sills and the bottom shows Hector's foundation work.

So, things seem to be going in the right direction. Tomorrow Jay will return to back fill the foundation and regrade the property. Mark Eldredge will return to finish up a part of the foundation that couldn't be poured.

New finish date is February 17, 2010.

2009-08-19T16:45:00.001-07:00

So the foundation is in and now dampproofed with a tar product. Leigh and I spent the better part of a half day taring the foundation getting ready for it to be back filled by Jay. Leigh went back the next day to do a second coat on some spots that were still showing concrete. Of course we picked two of the hottest days of the summer to do the dirty work...

2009-08-08T15:12:00.000-07:00

3rd Blog in one day...we've finished painting the front of the house and today we did one of the side windows and the water table. We also spent some time cleaning up the site so that it can be re-graded away from the house. We think that we're going to get the front of the house "tight" and then really focus on the back part of the house so that we might be able to move in and finish the front after we're in. We'll see... we actually had some folks from England walking by today and they asked us if it was new or old house...hmm - I suppose by English standards it's fairly new. Either way - they obviously hadn't looked inside if they were asking that question!

Friday - Day 3,512

2009-08-08T15:04:00.000-07:00

On Friday, Peter and his crew from Hampton concrete came to set the forms for the foundation walls. The job isn't as straightforward as it could be because we have to tie the old foundation into the new one...there are several levels as well. Peter has been flexible and very helpful...and patient with our questions. It's an interesting experience working with these guys because, while they often have recommendations, they often defer to us for final decisions about pretty impactful things. All seems to be going well. By the end of next week, we should be ready to frame the new addition and get moving. We're in the process now of speaking to framing crews.

Contractor Update and Footings

2009-08-08T14:51:00.000-07:00

So - it seems like Mark B is out of the picture - we haven't heard from him in about a month. Maybe 3 weeks. So we've taken things into our own hands. Because the foundation hole was sitting there for 8 weeks, with no foundation, we had some erosion that had to be cleaned up before the concrete footings could be poured. This was unfortunate as we are essentially paying for the same work twice. Nevertheless, we hired a local guy named Jay Palermo to do the work and he's done a great job and been very helpful in getting us moving. Jay is also a builder and will be submitting a bid to complete the job. Once the hole was cleaned up, Hampton Concrete came in and poured the footings for the foundation and then on Friday set the walls. On Monday they will pour the walls and Tuesday they will be broken down and we will tar the outside of the foundation to waterproof it.

So we're half way through our contractor nightmare...we seem to have shed the dead weight - now we just have to get our deposit back...there's a TV expose in this somewhere. Anyone have connections to Dateline NBC?

2009-07-26T15:00:00.000-07:00

We feel like it's time for a little before and after -- we spent Saturday putting a finish coat on the front of the house -- actually we spent it adding primer over stain spots (see below) and then putting another finish coat on. We used a stain blocking primer on any of the nail holes and on any areas that appeared to be staining. In many places you can still see the joints of the clapboards. See the bottom photo -- it is of a spot that was not spot primed. We'll go back and prime over that spot next time it looks like we'll get through the day without rain.

Regardless of our frustration at the slow pace of the project, it is gratifying to see the progress that Leigh and I have made on the weekends.

Does anyone have suggestions about what we should do about this staining? We're wondering if the wet paint/primer is drawing the stain out and if that will be all that will happen -- or if it is actually wet underneath and will cause problems for us down the road. Thoughts?On another note, we had a couple fellow Newburyport residents and blog followers stop by to check out the house in person -- Joe and Mary Beth -- good to meet you. Hope we'll see you around town. (hope we got the names right). On that note - if any you are curious and would like to stop by the house, we are there most Friday, Saturday and Sundays. Just remember it is a construction site and there are lots of ways to hurt yourself.

2009-07-20T19:13:00.000-07:00

Well, Leigh and I have been busy for the last couple of weeks putting the clapboards on the front of the house. Here you can see that they go all the way up to the tops of the second floor windows. We stopped there because we are actually going to remove the top trim on the windows and put a fascia board there...

Here you can see the roof line of the front entry. Mark B. put this up so that we could complete the siding before the front entry is done. It was very tricky to get the angle right on the cut of these boards. When we were doing the left side, it took all day to do 5 boards. However, Leigh devised a system where she basically made a jig so that she was able to re-produce the angel. As a result we were able to do the other side much faster. All in all it took us about 5 days to completely side the house and prep it for paint.

Today, while I was at work, Leigh and Mark Eldredge (the mason) worked. Above you can see the handy work of Mark E who built the foundation for the front entry. This will allow Mark B. to build the entry and for the front of the house to be enclosed.

We spent about two days prepping the house - filling nail holes, sanding, priming etc to get it ready for painting. We're using flat "super white" Duration by Sherwin Williams. This paint has a lifetime guarantee so hopefully we're good! Leigh painted about half of the front today and hopefully we'll finish it up this week.

It's worth noting that based on the contractual schedule, we should be moving in in two weeks...BUT we still have a 15 foot hole in the backyard and no idea when it is going to be filled with cement! So the story goes...

2009-07-12T19:20:00.000-07:00

So with a weekend of nice weather we were able to get quite a bit done. You can see from the photo above that about 3/4 of the front has clap boards have made it on to the house. Friday and Saturday were really prolific days for siding; Sunday we ran into some technical difficulties. In the center of the photo you can see the roof line of what will be the front entry. This area has caused some trouble for us. On Friday, Mark installed the flashing for the future roof so that we could continue siding. The angle was pretty tricky and took some trial and error. Once we got up to the windows we discovered that they were 1/4" off...in other words the window on the right was 1/4" higher than the window on the left. This may not seem like a huge problem but if it stays that way it will make all of the clapboards look uneven. So we started on the other side, only to discover that the flashing for the soon to be entry roof was higher on the right than on the left....hmmm

So, we've asked Mark to come take a look and make adjustments on Monday.

Here's Leigh making some of the angled cuts with a box knife.

And here's the right side the house where we are almost done shingling

Some people have asked us why were are putting clapboards on the front and shingles on the sides...

We'll there are several reasons. First, that's how it was. We like the look - it's very common on Nantucket and in other seaport towns. We think it goes back quite awhile when clapboards were much more expensive than shingles and so the front was the formal side and the other sides were where they pinched pennies.

We like the look of weathered white cedar and they last for 30 years without paint.

That's all for now...

2009-07-08T19:26:00.000-07:00

A local mason, Mark Eldredge, has started working on restoring the chimney. He came over the weekend to drop off scaffolding and today he started taking down the chimney. You can see in the following photo that we now have a large hole in the roof...but it's nice to see some tangible progress.

2009-07-08T19:17:00.000-07:00

This is a rare sighting of Mark B working on the house. Four of us worked on Friday and were able to accomplish quite a bit. Mark and Rocky installed three new windows and put some flashing on where the entry roof will be. Leigh and I continued applying shingles to the side of the house and we got a couple of more clap boards on the front.

In the following photo you can see that I am enjoying a cold glass of lemonade which our kind neighbors brought over to us on a silver tray...

2009-06-28T16:31:00.000-07:00

Today was a slow day because of the rain and because I was lacking some key materials to go any further. I was able to get the shingles to the top of the window but was not able to go over the top and continue up because I don't have the proper window flashing to cap the window with.

We'll also have to get some ladder jacks so that we can work up higher. Working from a ladder is okay but it will be much quicker if we can get two set up and a board running between them. We're crossing our fingers for some good weather this week so that we can make some real progress! We'll keep you posted!

2009-06-27T16:19:00.000-07:00

What started as a very frustrating day, running all over New Hampshire looking for stainless steel staples for my siding gun, ended fairly well with a good amount of siding accomplished. It literally took me three trips to Home Depot to remember everything I needed. Ug.

We have decided on a 5.5 inch exposure. This is fairly standard on Nantucket and on the Cape. Apparently on the North Shore people choose up to a 7 inch exposure. We like the look of the smaller reveal, but it obviously requires more shingles. The truth of the matter is that the exposure ranges from 5 to 6 inches so that the shingles will line up with the top and bottom of the window..a little cheating was called for. Most people won't notice unless told. Next time you are looking at a shingled house, take a close look and you'll see that not all exposures are the same.

Anyway, there you have it -- my Saturday from 9am to 7pm.

2009-06-26T20:37:00.000-07:00

So most of today was spent running around picking things up...another rough cut pine board for sheathing on the back, white cedar shingles for the side of the house, ice and water guard for the windows, caulk and caulking guns etc...the one thing that I couldn't find today is stainless steel siding staples...does anyone know where I can get these?! We don't want to use galvanized staples because the will cause staining on the shingles...but Lowes, Home Depot and Moynahan lumber don't carry stainless...alas. Anyway -- you can see in these first two photos that we were able to get more of the clapboards on the house today. Slow progress but good progress.

Rocky and Mark framed the two windows on the right side of the house and installed them. They also attached two corner boards, and the water table (see bottom photo). They did this so that I could start doing the shingle siding while Leigh is away visiting our nephew and family in Lancaster PA...if I could only find those damn stainless staples...

Hopefully Riley and I will be able to make some progress tomorrow...

2009-06-25T18:56:00.000-07:00

Today Rocky and Mark got two windows in and put up the corner boards. They also outlined the front entry so that we could start siding. We didn't have much daylight to work with but we got four clapboards on...tomorrow we should make a bunch of progress...

Wall cave in...

2009-06-25T18:50:00.000-07:00

So, we had a little cave in. Gary, the building inspector suggested that we pour footings for the old foundation wall. Ok -- so in order to do this, we dug down about 10 inches beneath the rock foundation and then three inches under it. The intention was to then pour cement and create a footing to re-enforce the wall. Sounds like a good idea. We'll on the wall that you see below, we had already removed a few LARGE rocks to add space for a bulkhead. The result was that the wall caved in. No one was injured and it wasn't as much of a disaster as you would think.

We ended up pouring some of the footings as you can see in the photo below. Once the rocks are removed we'll have to add a new foundation wall. Good news is that the house is still standing!

June 20 - 11 hours of work

2009-06-21T08:00:00.000-07:00

We started this morning out by going to Esty's Lumber Yard in Groveland to pick up some rough cut 1"x12" pine boards to replace some of the sheathing that was pieced together on the front left of the house. Over the last few weeks, Rocky has been trying to use as much of the old sheathing as possible to patch the house back together. While he did a good job with the material that he had, you can see in the photo above that it really was a patchwork. Since sheathing is an important element in the structural integrity of the house, we decided that longer runs of 1x12 would help support the house better. In the above photo, I am pulling off the 1790 sheathing.

On new houses it is typical to use plywood or OSB to sheath the house. However, according to the preservation covenant we are required to use 1" rough cut pine to sheath the house. While there seems to be some room for interpretation in the covenant, we felt like adding the OSB on top of the old sheathing might be taking a bit too much liberty with the intention of the preservation document.

Here you can see the new sheathing boards. There is one that goes all the way to the roof and then the other three are beneath the upstairs windows. To make these fit together nicely, we cut them on a 45 degree angle - they fit nicely while still allowing the house to breath. Leigh is taking out any old nails or pounding them in so that they don't rip the Easy Guard house wrap.

Next we wrapped the front of the house in Easy Guard House wrap. This is like Tyvek - it allows the moisture to get out of the house but keeps it from getting in.

Here's the house all wrapped and ready for insulation. Because there are so many gaps in the sheathing, we decided to apply a layer of 1/2" Styrofoam insulation on the exterior of the house.
We will also use spray in insulation to fill the gaps from the inside, trying to make the house as energy efficient as possible.

In this photo you can see the results of 11 hours of work!

Wed June 17 - It doesn't look any different, but...

2009-06-21T07:56:00.000-07:00

...we did work today! Leigh here - I guess I could say this was the first official day of my summer job. Mark the Mystery Man finally made an appearance to help resolve some small but important issues. There aren't any photos because the changes are not really noticeable, but here is what we did:
Snapped a level line on the first floor to see if the window openings were lined up properly. Aside from having to cut down some sheathing a little bit, they were dead level. Good news! We measured up to check the window sills on the 2nd floor and they turned out to be level as well.
One end of a piece of new beam over the center window on the 2nd floor was not lined up properly so there was no room for sheathing over it, so we first separated it from everything it was nailed into it and then pounded it into place.
The framing (new and old) on the second floor (left side as you are looking at the front of the house) was loose, so we added some supports below it to nail it into.
While we were working on this, Mark nailed a 2x4 vertically to the outside wall and noticed that it was a little bowed out, right at the 1st floor ceiling/2nd floor floor. So we attached some straps to the wall and to a beam inside the house, then used a rachet to tighten them and pull the wall in. Then we nailed it into the supports.
We were also waiting for Gary, the building inspector, to come by and look at the hole for the new foundation. He came by around 4, said it looked fine, and gave us several other suggestions including pouring a footing all the way around the old foundation, renailing all of the old sheathing, and covering all the sheathing with OSB (like plywood but stronger) for extra structure and support.
Did we take Gary's advice?? Find out next time!

2009-06-14T19:54:00.000-07:00

So, progress continues to be slow but there are definite steps forward that have been made in the last couple of weeks. In this photo you can see Leigh standing in the basement of the old part of the house. Just to the right of Leigh is where the bulkhead will be and to the left you can see the new wall and supports that are holding up the house. What's missing you might wonder? We'll the old foundation is missing...

In order to dig the basement in the new part of the house deeper, it was important to remove the old side and back foundation walls which were field stone -- really really large field stone. So over the last couple weeks Mark and Rocky have been supporting the house so that when the old foundation was removed, it wouldn't collapse. To that end, the middle of the wall was removed and a cement footing was poured (see middle of this photo). On top of the cement footing they built a wall of pressure treated lumber that is now supporting the middle of the house.

Part two was then removing more of the foundation wall and inserting the post to the right of this photo. It is on top of a cement footing as well. We weren't there when this was happening but we think that they used the excavator was used to prop up the house while the post was being put in place,

At this point, we believe that we may be ready to start putting the forms in for the foundation but we're note sure...there's still plenty of work to be done in the old part of the house, including windows, roof, rebuild of chimney.

Think we'll be in by end of July?

A BIG hole...

2009-05-23T20:15:00.000-07:00

We'll let the photos speak for themselves for the most. Today was a dig...er big day.

Freddie, good guy that he is, showed up on Saturday morning to dig a big hole for our foundation.

He said that the soil was great -- very gravely, good for drainage. Hopefully that means that we'll have a very dry basement.

It took him about 8 hours to get this hole, plus a couple others dug. In the process, he also pulled out a bunch of trees that were too close to the house.

To take this picture we climbed on top of the 20 foot high pile of dirt next to the 10' foundation hole.

And this is obviously taken inside the foundation hole...

It will be interesting to see what Mark decides to do about the original foundation. As the dirt was being moved away from it, it became clear that the rocks that are the foundation are not actually bonded together with mortar (except for on the inside of the foundation). Freddie left a decent amount of dirt next to the foundation so that it wouldn't collapse.

Once Mark figures out how to support the house, if the back foundation wall collapses, Freddie will be back to finish digging the hole. In the meantime, we will have the place fumigated for termites and other pests that will want to eat our house. In the next blog, you'll see photos of the basement, where Leigh and I spent the day shoveling coal.

Measuring progress in inches, not feet...

2009-05-17T18:53:00.000-07:00

For the last couple, maybe three weeks, Rocky has been working on the house by himself. While he's been doing a good job, having only one person working has meant that the pace has been very slow. Over the last week, Rocky has wrapped most of the house with Easy Guard, which is a generic brand version of Tyvek. Before doing this he had been replacing sheathing that was rotted.Other work that could have been in progress, like re-framing the interior, repairing the roof, installing the new windows, taking down the chimney and rebuilding it, taking up the guest bedroom floors - as not been happening because apparently it's been a pretty busy time for the trades and our contractor can't seem to find anyone to do the work.

You're looking at the back of the house, where with any luck and many fingers crossed, a big hole will appear at the end of this week. We'll see....

Things have been moving quickly!

2009-05-17T17:54:00.000-07:00

We haven't had time to write a blog recently because the project has been movng so quickly!

You can see that we left the timbers exposed whereever we could...

Just kidding -- this isn't our house...

A day in the garden.

2009-05-02T17:17:00.000-07:00

As you can see, the last few warm days have really brought out the green at the 1790 House. Today was a pretty big day for us. We finalized our kitchen design and ordered cabinets. This was a pretty big deal, since we've spent the equivalent of a couple of days time working with a great kitchen designer at the Home Depot in Salem. After we finished that we headed out to the house to do some transplanting. When we start digging we're going to lose some amazing lilacs and some other trees. In the photo above the small (maybe 15 year old) Maple to the right will have to go because that is where the water line enters the building. The Rhododendron right behind Riley in the photo will have to be moved to another spot when we scrape down the little hill and re-grade the front lawn.

We have to re-grade to get the soil away from the sills (one of the access points for termites!) So we're taking the soil around the house down one foot.

In the above photo you are looking at the left side of the house where the new main entrance will eventually be. As I was taking the photo I was actually standing where the new septic system will be installed. Because of this the large group of bushes and trees on the left side of the photo will have to be moved or re-moved. It appears to be white lilac, sumac and a cherry tree -- along with a bunch of small maples. Today we moved 15 lilacs to the back fence (see below) in hopes that thew will grow and provide a screen.

Above is another photo of the trees that will have to be removed.

Here you can see an old dog house and the transplanted lilacs. Cross your fingers. We read that lilacs are supposed to be the easiest plants to transplant. We'll see! Tomorrow is more transplanting in preparation for the foundation digging (hopefully this week.)

A Walk through Newburyport

2009-05-02T17:10:00.000-07:00

The other day was so beautiful that Leigh and I spent a few hours walking through downtown Newburyport with Riley. On our walk we encountered several inspirational houses. Here are some photos.

One day we hope that we'll have photos of our house that look like this! All kidding aside, we're hopeful that we'll have two key signatures by Monday morning that will allow us to get our building permit and start digging a foundation for the new part of the house.

In preparation for this, we were out at the house today, transplanting lilac trees. Unfortunately we are going to lose a bunch of very old lilacs to the construction. No way to save them but we'll be working hard to move as many of them as possible in the next couple of days.

Tons and tons of poop!

2009-04-21T17:24:00.000-07:00

In my last post I shared photos of our tenants Chip and TJ...In this post you get to see the byproducts of TJ and Chip.

It would not be an exaggeration to say that just behind our horse barn there are several tons of horse poop. It will not be around much longer as Todd will be taking it over to Arrowhead Farm where it will be used as part of their organic compost mix.

Our friends Lauren and Dave from Kennebunkport, organic gardeners extraordinaire, came down yesterday to pick up a van load of the very organic "fertilizer." They said it didn't smell but we haven't heard from them since the hour long drive home! No doubt we'll be beneficiaries of the TJ and Chip's #2 nutrients this summer when we gather tomatoes from the Tenny's garden. Check out Lauren's stylish shoveling duds...

2009-04-21T17:07:00.000-07:00

Unfortunately there's not too much to report at the house because of the rain. We were away all of last week and found out yesterday that the crew only worked 3 out of 5 days so progress was slow. Now it's raining a bit and that certainly slows down progress.

Tomorrow morning, I am meeting Mark at the Newburyport Building Department to submit our full building permit. The only thing that has been holding us up is the Appendix J, which is an energy audit form. Apparently this is something that is fairly easy for an architect that uses auto cad to complete because it's just about plugging figures into a computer program. Our Architect, however, is old school and hand drafted all of the blueprints. This leaves Mark and his trusty calculator to work it all out. He's working on it today.

The photo above, shows TJ our 20 year old tenant. He and his pal, Chip live in our small horse barn and belong to a hay farmer named Todd from West Newbury. We're enjoying getting to know these guys. They'll be around until the end of construction when we are hoping to move the barn to our neighbors yard.

Chip, the other horse did not like having his photo taken -- every time the camera came out he turned his back to us! Oh well.

2009-04-17T18:09:00.000-07:00

We've been away for the week and we stopped by the house this afternoon to see what kind of progress the guys have been making. The plan for the week was to get the front of the house framed so that we could begin siding early next week. While they didn't quite get there, they made good progress.

In a couple of photos you can see new windows on the left front of the house. These are the same kind of windows that are on right side - the only difference is that the sill is a bit smaller on the new windows. We'll have to fix that. It looks like a piece that can be easily changed out. We'll see.

So the new windows are only installed on the first floor. The guys spent quite a bit of time replacing two beams on the front middle of the house which was totally rotted by years of rain pouring into the house. The also framed the front wall so that the windows should be able to be installed on Monday. After that, we'll put the corner boards on and the footers and we'll be able to start siding. You can see a before and after shot here. In the first photo the new first floor windows are in - in the second photo you can see that the old windows are still in and there is still a large hole in the front of the house! Stay tuned...

A "before" tour

2009-04-11T17:39:00.000-07:00

Leigh here... Since the excitement of knocking down walls every day is over, I thought I would keep things interesting by putting together a house tour of what it looked like before we started. Come on in...

This first photo is a view looking into the front door. Once inside the front door, to your right, was the parlor. This room will become our library/study. (photos below)

..On the first floor to the left could have been a living room or a kitchen... it will be our future living room. This room has the largest fireplace of the 4. There was an ell off of this side of the house to the back, which was removed well before we came on the scene. We believe it contained a kitchen and possibly a bedroom on the second floor. We'll definitely have to do some more research!

..Up the stairs to the right will become one of our extra bedrooms. At some point an additional wall was added which split off roughly the back 1/3 of the room. Some work has already been done to the front wall of this room (as well as the front wall of the parlor below) by John and Chrissy Skibbee, the owners of the house prior to us.

..Lastly, upstairs to the left will become our master bedroom.

We are enjoying reading "Arrowhead Farm: Three Hundred Years of New England Husbandry and Cooking" which was written by members of the Chase family for the 300th birthday of Arrowhead back in 1983. There is a lot of fascinating information about who lived on this land and what their lives were like, going back as far as the 1600's. We'll post some excerpts soon!

2009-04-10T14:30:00.000-07:00

We'll we've been away from the house for a bit, mainly because there isn't so much for us to do now that the bulk of the demo has been done. Our two Russian carpenters have been pretty busy at work on the site. As you can see from these three photos today - we have a new floor system and the front wall of the living room has been re-framed.

Other big news is that Bill March has finished our architectural drawings and we'll be going in to see the Building Inspector on Monday morning to apply for our full building permit. This won't mean too much of a change in what's been going on because there is still quite a bit of work that needs to be done to get the front part of the house in stable shape. We'll hope for good progress next week.

2009-04-08T18:01:00.000-07:00

In the top photo you can see the new floor system on the library side beginning to go in . Over the last couple of days this has been completed. We have chosen to use modern dimensional lumber as we re frame the house. This will ensure that we are able to stay within our budget and have a house that is structurally sound. In the photos at the bottom you will see that we were finishing off the removal of the siding to assess the rot in the sheathing. The big hole in the middle of the house, used to have a window but the roof above it was so damaged that water was virtually pouring in there for years, leading to quite a bit of rot.

Other things to note here - - we took the front entry off of the house and intend to re-install it but we needed to remove it so that we could repair the house behind it. Part of the preservation covenant on the house, requires us to ensure that that the exterior looks as similar to the 1790 facade as possible.

Finally, you'll note the little skeleton that we found inside one of the walls. Looks like a mouse to us...we found a couple of Mr. Mouse's cousins in the exterior walls in the form of flying squirrels. They've decided to move on! More soon...

The House has not consumed us...

2009-04-08T17:06:00.000-07:00

So, some of our friends have called asking if we have disappeared into the abyss of our 1790 house...not so exciting. We took a bit of time off because we had to move out of our apartment in Salem and into a new place in West Newbury so that we could be closer to the construction site.

Over the last week, we've been able to make some significant progress. In a nutshell: we've finished most of the demo on the house, removed a sill on the right side of the house and replaced it with a new one, installed a new floor system in the library and in the entry, taken out the floorboards in the attic (as can be seen in the photo to the right), installed a mailbox and started to install a new sill on the front left of the house.

The work is going relatively slowly, which is somewhat frustrating. However, we recognize that a antique house restoration is more of an art than a science and art takes time. We'll add more specific blog entries with more photos including some photos of the very very wide pine boards that we've taken down from the attic that we hope to reuse as kitchen floors and an island counter top.

In our time away from the house, we've visited Home Depot and East Coat Lumber to layout the kitchen. We've also been doing tile research for the bathrooms and the kitchen back splash. Hopeful with some luck, we'll have our full building permit by Friday or early next week and then we can start in earnest.

Day 7 - March 31, 2009

2009-03-31T18:33:00.000-07:00

Today's post is dedicated to our parents, for all of your love and support. Susan, John and Ellen, you will see the first sign of something going in instead of being taken out - so hopefully this will be the beginning of your worries being asuaged!

Today Mark and Rocky started the process of replacing the sill on one side of the house. They first built a brace to support the wall, then removed the rest of the old sill and put in a plate on which the new sill will sit.

Meanwhile, Rob and I started the day shoveling out coal from the basement on the other side of the house. After taking out several loads and realizing how much coal was still there, we decided to postpone this task until we might have a bobcat or other equipment on site.

So, we moved on to continuing to demo the second floor. As a result of a great idea by Rob, we were able to make significant progress. As you can see in the photo, he put together a system for getting buckets of plaster, lathe and insulation down to the ground without having to haul them down the stairs. Guess he can brag about that Bates education after all. While pulling down the interior walls, we found what are probably squirrel nests. Someone told us that when they drove by previously, they saw the squirrels looking out of the windows. Time to move on squirrels!

In the mid-afternoon, our work crew increased by three. David, Sparhawk and Rowan, our new neighbors, came by to help out (and to give mom Gallaudet a little peace and quiet!). They are very enthusiastic and we hope to have them back often!

Day 6, March 30, 2009

2009-03-30T20:13:00.000-07:00

Today was a bit of slow going. The weather was more like Seattle than Newburyport with a light damp drizzle all day. Nevertheless we kept going. Today we continued demo and took out the old back stairs. While we were doing this, Rocky took out the floor joists in the Library. Mark returned from Home Depot and revealed the game plan. Over the next week or so, each of the sills will be replaced. To do this, Mark will support the house by attaching braces to the exterior of the house - he will then pull out the old sills and replace them with new pressure treated lumber. Rocky and Mark will also be putting in footings and new joists to support the new first floor.

While they work on that, Leigh and I will finish the demo on the second floor, which we started today. As I've mentioned before, the house has blown in insulation -- today, in the attic we found some that was blackened with mold. Things are going a little slower than we would hope, but I'm told that's the nature of renovation projects. We'll see what the next few days bring.

Fun Fact: For a couple of years the formal "parlor" was used to store hay for Arrowhead farm.

Day 5 - March 27, 2009 - End of Week 1

2009-03-27T15:41:00.000-07:00

While yesterday was full of unwelcome discoveries (termite damage galore) today was full of pleasant surprises. We spent most of today pulling down the ceilings in the Library and the Living Room. This was quite a bit more difficult than taking the lathe off of the walls. What we found made the hard work worthwhile. Once the plaster and lathe was uncovered we found that the floor joists for the second floor rooms are in great shape.

Our other task for the day was to take up the floor of the Library. We discovered the other day that most of the joists under the floor, along with many of the floor boards were rotted or destroyed by termites. So our last project for the day was to pull up the floor to prepare for Monday when we will put in a new floor system. Unfortunately we were not able to save much of what we pulled up because it was so damaged.

Before we pulled up the floor, we added a few braces to help support the second floor. If you look at the photo carefully you can see one of the 2x4 studs in the middle of the window on the side of the house. After one week we have completely filled one dumpster with plaster and lathe -- it's amazing how much can come out of a couple rooms.

The general plan for next week is to continue the demo and to repair the structure of the house. We have been working with William March, a local architect, and he is hoping to finish up our plans for the addition by the middle of next week. Once we have a complete set of drawings, we will apply for the building permit for the entire job and the fun will begin.

Day 4 - March 26, 2009

2009-03-26T17:27:00.000-07:00

Today was a day of continued exploration and discovery! It was also the first day that Mark and his crew, Rocky and Sue began to work with us. We began work on the Living Room -- took down the plaster, lathe, wainscoting and fireplace trim. We have been able to remove the mantles from both of the fireplaces so far and will hopefully be able to re-use them -- if not, then we'll be able to re-create them with new wood. As our 'exploration" has progressed we have found considerable termite damage in many of the supporting pieces. A few of the photos below will show that once we took of the bottom piece of sheathing on the exterior, there wasn't much of the posts left. Fortunately it seems that the corner posts are in decent shape and that they, along with some major beams are doing a good job of holding the house up.

While Leigh and I were working on the interior, Rocky and Sue were continuing to take shingles off of the exterior - to truly assess the structural needs of the house we need to find as many clues as possible so we're going at it from both the inside and the outside. Note in one of the photos below all of the wood that is stacked against the house..this was all taken out of the ell that John and Chrissy took down last year. Our hope is that we will be able to use these materials as we shore up the main house. If not, then we may use some of it for a kitchen table or maybe for a counter top on the kitchen island.

Every day we seem to find some fun things in the house. Today, I was pulling up the carpet when I discovered that they used newspaper for carpet pad! See the photo below.

Finally and update on Riley vs. the Guinea Hens. It seems that Riley has gained the upper hand. The photo below is of the unsuspecting Guinea Hens before Riley noticed them. Today, Riley, feeling more at home, decided to let the Hens know that she is actually a dog and not just a poser. Anyway the result was about an hour of Hen squawks from 30 feet up in a tree.

We'll see how this story develops -- Score at the moment: Hens 1 Riley 1

Day 3 - March 25, 2009

2009-03-25T19:33:00.000-07:00

The big news today is that our storage trailer arrived so we can store equipment as well as salvaged pieces of the house. We started slowly this morning, doing work outside, mainly picking up siding and debris in the yard. Among the more interesting things we found were a bunch of glass jars - mostly broken but some still filled. We're not sure what was in them and we decided not to open them.

Once we got inside, we focused on finishing the demo in the library. In the back corner of the room there was a small closet that we took out. Once we had the lathe and plaster down, we discovered an area under the back stairs, where the chimney system is. Hidden beneath the stairs we found some old stove pipe, an iron, fireplace tools, an old box and a wool hat. As we got further into the demo of the walls, we uncovered some old Indian shutters that had been covered by pine board.
The other exciting event of the day as that Riley met the Guinea hens...no harm no foul...err fowl? She ignored the hens...the hens, however let her know who was boss.

It should be fun watching their relationship develop!

Day 2 - March 24, 2009

2009-03-24T17:22:00.000-07:00

Leigh and I just returned home from Day 2 of our project on Old Ferry Road. Today we focused on doing some demo work in what will ultimately be the Library of our home. This consisted mainly of us pulling plaster and lathe off of the walls and removing some wooden wainscoting and trim. So now the post and beam construction of the home has been revealed and we're seeing the sheathing from the inside of the house. In the photos you'll see the nice detail of the mantel that we hope to pull off in once piece, sand down and re-use. We're also taking tons of photos so that we can recreate the trim with some historical accuracy. We are under the impression that most of the house is original - all of the nails are square head and we actually found some corn cobs in the insulation (which was blown in sometime in the last 100 years). We're not sure if we'll use the wainscoting as wainscoting but how often do you find an 18' x 2' piece of wood? We're certain that we'll be able to reclaim that lumber for some purpose, maybe a kitchen table, maybe as a floor board? We're open to suggestions.

Day 1 - March 23, 2009

2009-03-24T05:59:00.000-07:00

Leigh and I headed out to Newburyport to do a little work on the house. Since we don't have a dumpster yet, or a ladder we were a bit constrained in what we could accomplish but we enjoyed spending some time out there. We saw some guinea hens in the neighbors yard...Riley, however, did not notice them. For the most part, we removed some siding and nails and spent time deciding what we could save from the interior and what we cannot. Mark and his crew will start on Wednesday. They will be taking the chimney down to the second floor and next week, the mason will begin to rebuild it using as many of the original bricks as possible. You can see from some of these photos that the house is post and beam and was framed with large oak timbers. As expected, there is a good amount of rot, but there is also quite a bit of sound wood.

2009-03-22T14:59:00.000-07:00

On March 16th, Leigh and I purchased the the 1790 House at 133 Old Ferry Road in Newburyport. The house, occupied by Rebecca Chase before 1963, has been unoccupied since she passed away. Originally part of Arrowhead Farm, it, along with the rest of the Farm, was purchased by the Trust for Public Land in the early 1990's. In 1998 the house was split off from the farm by the Trust and sold to the Skibbee Family, who owned the house adjacent to it. At the time of the "sub-division" a strict conservation and preservation covenant was placed on the property to ensure that whomever restored the house would do so with the historic character of the property and the area in mind.

For the last month or so, Leigh and I have been making plans to restore and add on to the house. It is currently 1100 square feet, with two rooms on the first floor and two on the second floor. We intend to add an ell that consists of a kitchen and dining room on the first floor and a bedroom and two bathrooms on the second floor. The original house will contain the living room, a library, master bedroom and a guest bedroom.

We're working with Newburyport Architect William March, who drew the original restoration plans for the Skibbee's in 2002. We're also working with Mark Bergeron of Creative Custom Construction, a contractor that we met through North Shore Habitat for Humanity. We begin exploratory demolition tomorrow.