Gary & Rue

The Final Push to Finish the House!

2010-08-04T19:59:00.000-07:00

We are nearing the end!

March 2009-Aug.6, 2010

I haven't updated the BLOG for quite some time so to let you know we haven't died or broke a leg or otherwise given up on our little project. To say the least I will spare you all the details of what we have been up to but needless to say we have not done much but work day and night since December to finish up hundreds of projects. Rue and I have been working virtually alone to do everything but the plumbing (I installed all of the fixtures) Rue did all of the tile work and painting (she doesn't trust me with a brush)! we hired out the carpet install upstairs but I did the hardwood floor by myself, we hired out the siding as I decided after climbing up about 20 feet and painting soffits in preparation for the siding that I was way to OLD and FRAGILE to take a chance at falling off of the ladder. So we contracted out the siding and seamless gutters for $2,100. We still don't have the siding complete since we ran out and are waiting on the delivery of one box from back east somewhere! Supposed to be here this week but we haven't heard if it showed up and it hasn't been delivered. We've been waiting 3 weeks now. Less than one box needed to finish. I have finished every room except for some minor trim

in the office and on the back porch and one dead bolt lock hole in the door between the sewing room and the store room. We finished installing the brick patio pavers last night and that is a big relief as it took quite a while to get it in. My knees got tired and I nearly wore out my knee pads. I must have wore out 6 or 7 pairs of gloves and still had plenty of splinters, cuts, bruises, and blisters!

Our goal was to finish everything before winter set in, get our winter wood supply in for the stove and my shop (lucked out when we had 80 mph winds in town and my neighbors 60 foot spruce blew down and I cut it up for wood without leaving town and hauling it home in a wheel barrow, nearly two cords!), go fishing and camping, and go to Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons! Well we are nearly complete but two things I have failed at since I felt guilty if I wasn't working on some project so the fishing suffered with only one attempt and I blown off the lake with Chris, Caylee and Aiden and we haven't been camping even once! We had a 4 day trip planned for the 4th of July but I wound up spending 3 days in Chris's basement helping him with his rough in electrical, plumbing and installing a shower. Spent time at John's at Stevens baptism. He was sure excited! We had a good time at Chris's and Johns so all was not lost! So what follows are some of the highlights of the last several months! We are now ready to leave for Yellowstone to meet up with Matt and April and kids this Saturday for two weeks away from home!!!!

I will try and get better photo's when we return from Yellowstone! It was good to hear from Matthew today as he informed us that he just got a new job with a promotion and bust in pay today. He was pretty excited as much as Matt shows excitement!

Novembers progress and our trip to New York City.

2009-12-12T18:30:00.000-08:00

This is part 2 of my update. I'm trying to keep things in order and it appears that there is a limit to the number of photo's that can be added to a blog at any one time.

No one can say I don't have an education even Rue says going to Harvard (even for a couple of hours) made my head swell! The following photo's are of our day trip to Boston where we continued our visit to the original Harvard Campus. As you can see it was raining while there but we had a good time and really enjoyed the history!

Here Rue is rubbing the left foot of a statue John Harvard the founder of Harvard. The purpose of rubbing the foot is for good luck and you can see that under Rue's hand the foot is very shining. It has been rubbed by many students and visitors alike!
The photo's below are of Boston Common's with all of the 300 year old or older buildings still in use. We were moving so fast with our guide and never were able to get a good map of the area that we aren't sure which building is which. Rue and I both decided that we are going to come back when we have time to really look and walk around.

The building below is the capital of Massachusetts. It is across form the large church at left. I haven't learned to rotate my photo's prior to importing them so several are are sideways.

This is a statue of Benjamin Franklin and below is the Old State House where the Declaration of Independence was read to the citizens of Boston who were standing in the commons front of the balcony below. The commons is now and intersection with a traffic light.

Below is a picture of the USS Constitution the oldest ship of the line in the US Fleet. It is in for

a major overhaul to replace rotten timbers. The USS Constitution was launched on October 21, 1797. The ship is 212 years old!

The large monument to the left of the flag pole below is the Bunker Hill Memorial where one of the first major battles of the American Revolution took place. This is just above the Navel Ship Yard where the USS Constitution is berthed.

We left New York the next morning and returned to Denver where we were able to visit over night with Chris and Heather and kids. Below are Sawyer and Caylee.

Caylee is a sick girl in this picture and doesn't look very happy!

Well we are back to working on the house which is a never ending project. We are making progress! Rue has claimed her pantry and below is doing finishing touches on the molding.

The laundry room is nearly finished at least enough to pass the occupancy inspection. Rue has set the tile on the counter top, she will grout it this week while I am in Denver.

I spent today putting case trim and molding around the down stairs windows today. I nearly finished them but rain out of steam!. Only need to put the top molding return ends in place. They are cut out but need to be glued and nailed in place.

When I get back Rue and I will start laying the wood flooring. When that is done I can install the last door downstairs and start putting up the door casement and trim. After that we will be mostly done with the downstairs and can apply for an temporary occupancy permit and move in our furniture and finally clean out Rue's garage so she can park her car inside for the first time since March.

We are looking forward to getting this room done, even though there are cabinets and closets to build but I will work on those after the big stuff is done.

We are looking forward the upcoming holidays as we will travel to New Mexico to see my mom and brothers and sister. Then we will go to Chris and Heathers on the 27th of December to pick up Caylee, Aiden, and Sawyer for a week to give mom a rest since Heather is due on the 23rd of December with a little girl. We will then travel back to take the kids home the following weekend. A lot of road time so here is praying that the weather will cooperate!

Rue and I wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a prosperous New Year!

The House Work Continues to Progress Slowly but Surely!

2009-10-27T08:09:00.001-07:00

27 October, 2009

We have started working on finishing rooms and I have tried to show several things that have occupied our time over the last month or so! Rue is starting to set the cultured stone for our wood stove. Our tape and texture crew was a week behind in their work so it put us in a bind and we had to have the wall finished by Thursday morning so the stove installers could get their work completed. So Rue and I started after work on Wed. at %Pm and worked until 2:50 am to get the wall stone installed. Rue had to go to work but I stayed home as the plumbers we in that day as well to replace the hot water boiler system piping from the boiler into the original part of the house which had developed a leak since we started working on the house.

New corner finished at 2:50 am Thursday morning!

Stove pipe installation

New sewer lines! A far cry from what was there for 609 or 70 years!

The new heating lines are the two PEC's lines that can be seen seen next

to sewer pipes.

The crawl space below the addition allows you to

move around with ease. The main house you are

on your back with only inches to spare.

Laundry room cabinets.

Laundry room with garage access. Old access was

outside. Now we have an attached garage with indoor

access! New door and trim still need to be installed.

Stove installed and in full use. Heats the entire down

stairs!

New floor in pantry

New walls glued to the brick in pantry and Rue sanding Patches this morning getting ready to paint prior to putting up wall paper. Will finish electric in this room and laundry room tonight and computer room tomorrow. We have the flooring for the downstairs and within two weeks we will be laying it down if all goes well. Still need to paint the family room before the flooring goes in. We started this project 7 months ago and have made a lot of progress. We have gotten this far with a total cost of $45 per square foot with Rue and I doing everything we can ourselves and help from friends. I expect to finish everything we will be at about $55/square foot when we are done. We have purchsed furniture but not bathroom fixtures to date. Will update our progress soon!

Sept. 17, 2010

2009-09-17T19:50:00.000-07:00

It has been nearly two months since I have updated this blog. We are still working on the house and I believe we will for the next year or more! We finally got a roof on with over 20 days of rain and only minimal damage to the sub-floor. We hired a plumber to come in and the rough plumbing since it was beyond my limited plumbing skill and way beyond my limited patience! We failed our first rough plumbing inspection and pasted it a few days later after fixing the problem. I then started concentrating on the wiring. In this addition there is more wire than in the entire rest of the house. I started out by buying 750 feed of 12-2 wire and soon bought more and more! I now have strung over 1200 feet. A friend form church helped me wire the breaker box and we passed the electrical inspection with only a few minor corrections last Friday. We passed the inspection at 11:30 on Friday and Rue called to set up a Framing Inspection for Monday but he couldn't come because he was going on vacation. Well he said he could come around 2 PM if we were ready. He came and spent about 15 minutes looking and made a few comments and passed us. That days was really crazing since the sprinkler contractor came at the same time to look at repairing our damaged system. He left and a couple of scout friends came by and loaded up our old left over metal roofing and lumber we salvaged from the demolition of part of the house. They are using it to roof a building at the new High Adventure Base we are building an hour from here, the lumber will be used for a deck at the rifle and archery range. Yesterday the foaming crew came and started insulating the walls and ceiling and they returned today and finished it. The sprinkler crew came today as well and started working on the sprinkler system. Rue and I were at work but came home before lunch to check on things! People and vehicles were parked every where. The insulation is done except where Rue and I will be hanging it as sound proofing between rooms. We will get this done this weekend since the drywall crew is coming on Tuesday morning! Things seemed to be going slow for so long and no all of a sudden we are in high gear! I have to rent a cement mixer tomorrow to try and finish my side walks which I started pour two weeks ago. The mixer I had borrowed broke down and we fixed the carburetor but it still doesn't start. I have to get at least to more sections poured this weekend, three if my back holds up! No kids here to help!. John came and helped one day and I got the missionaries to help another day. I also have a load of sheet rock being delivered tomorrow. Hopefully I can get it unloaded close to the house and then I will tarp it until the drywallers arrive! We following are pictures of the addition from where I left off last time.

Sunday June 21, 2009

2009-06-21T19:39:00.001-07:00

Memorial Day Weekend

View of mountains above Creede, Colorado

Looking over the Creede Caldera an extinct volcano's crater.

Mine ruins above Creede.

Rue harvesting her rhubarb out of the "garden" only two

plants that have survived the construction.

Monte and Gerald tying the roof joist together.

Chris and Aidean standing in the door to the garage.

The only door that makes Chris feel tall!

The trusses in the upstairs are nearing completion.

The door to the back bedroom.

Door into upstairs store room and Rues sewing room.

The web of all of the trusses going together. we are now taking off the original roof on the house in places in order to get the new roof tied in! Only two or three days before we can get the roof closed in and the rain out! (If all goes well)

Rue cleaning up after a day of construction. We try to get this done every day to make the job site safer. We have hauled about 17 tons of debris to the land fill. This is even after giving away or storing 2 tons of brick for future patio projects. Looking forward to the time when we are getting things livable!

This weekend I worked on plumbing all day Saturday and will take a couple more days off this week to work on the house with Monte and Gerald. Hopefully by the end of the week we will be installing windows. We still need the house wrap and stairs then I will be pretty much on my own to get things finished. Am hoping to get the Elders Quorum to help put dry wall on the second floor before we close off the opening in the second floor bedroom. That's all for now.

2nd story and Rain Delays!

2009-06-07T14:44:00.000-07:00

Starting the 2nd floor.

This first photo is the tarping exercise I have had to deal with with over 8 days of rain the we have had since the Thursday before Memorial Day! We have has about 3 inches of rain in what normally is our dry season! We have had to drill holes in the floor of the 2nd story to allow water that gets under the tarps to drain to the 1st floor where Rue has spent a lot of time an energy sweeping it out the door and emptying pans to get the water out. We also finally had to drill holes in the 1st floor to help drain water to the crawl space below to help prevent or reduce water damage to the floor. We do not have the roof trusses yet as they were not ordered due to the Holiday until 5 days after we put in the order for them. The plastic hanging out the windows and door help to direct rain water out of the house. We had so much water it was coming in under the doors to the main house and saturating the carpet. We finally figured out how to stop that but we sure had a mess for a while!

Here is what is now our access to the sewing room and store room above the garage. We are in the process of building a new set of stairs in the next week or two. Rue will not venture up the ladder to work on her quilt!

This photo below shows a some of the trusses that came in last Thursday. I was concerned about how we would get everything up on the roof since we couldn't get a lift into the back yard. We started calling friends and eleven of us had 18 trusses and 52 sheets of plywood on the 2nd floor in 45 minutes with no one working up to much of a sweat! Everything slid through the opening we left in the wall. We are now starting the working on the roof this Monday June 7 and should have the roof and felt on by Wed. the 9th if the rain that is forecast doesn't shut us down again! Once we get the trusses on we will have to tear off the peak of the house in the background of the photo and lay a ridge beam and build rafters to complete the roof system. We have the windows and doors set for delivery this Tuesday and should have them in and the house rap on by the end of next week. We will be closed in and weather tight! I have started the rough wiring and Chris will be here this weekend to run the TV and computer wiring for both floors.

We have alot to do but soon I will be doing most of the work alone since the two guys I have hired to build the structure will be finished and Rue and I will be busy with wiring, plumbing, and getting ready for the inspections so we can start insulating and dry walling. We plan on having it spray foamed to seal the structure then get bids on doing the dry wall. If its to expensive I will hang the sheet rock but have someone come in and tape and texture it. So if any of you have spare time come on over when the dry wall is being hung and we will have a party!

Will add more as the roof goes up!

The work is progressing days 4-7.

2009-05-17T18:36:00.000-07:00

Day 4 started with setting the setting new steel header over the adobe wall doorway into our garage. Header was raised 17" to accommodate new floor level of house. We will cut out doorway this coming week.

We removed a layer of brick on the existing pantry/laundry room to gain more room in the new laundry room. The window has two hand cut limestone top and bottom window seals. The top one weighted about 175 pounds and the bottom one was over 225 pounds. They will be used in some manner in our new patio when we are finished. This was the main project for Day 5 and 6.

After removing the window and wall we found that the remaining wall structure was to fragile to hold any weight so we had to tear it all out. We now have a much larger space to build Rue's new pantry and laundry room. We have to move our water and drains in the next week to get the laundry room functioning on a temporary basis. Rue was in shock when she got home form work and found the entire contents of the pantry in the kitchen and down stairs bathroom! We spent Saturday getting her kitchen back in order! She is much happier and a lot less stressed.

End of Day Six. First floor framing 90% complete

End of Day 7. We have over half of the second floor decking in place and will finish framing the pantry on Monday May 18 and finish laying the floor deck as well. We will start framing the upstairs walls and will remove part of the existing roof to tie the new roof together and create a roof line that is similar to the existing roof lines. We expect to have the walls up, ceiling up and starting to layout the new roof line by Saturday if all goes well. Any time we touch parts of the old house we half to slow down and fix existing problems.

Well we haven't found any treasures to date but we have found candy boxes galore, stashed in ceiling of the old pantry. We also removed the old cistern water tank form above the pantry which had a patent date of Aug 13, 1893. There was also an old empty suitcase and part of a 1903 Denver Post News Paper. It had an article about the first legal hanging of a double murderer to take place in Lander, Wyoming later in the summer of 1903. It described the gallows and the efficiency of the the new devise.

End of Day One of Actual Construction!

2009-05-11T20:11:00.000-07:00

End of Day One

Up until this point it has felt like we have been pouring money into a big hole but now we are going up. We have the floor joist in with most of the decking installed and nailed down.

End of Day Two

We have the floor installed and have strted building thw first wall on the south side. It is 28 feet long.

End of Day Three

South wall complete, west wall up against west wall complete. Half of east wall complete except for sheathing.

Dates to Remember

2009-02-18T11:24:00.000-08:00

2 May - Shirley
4 May- Jamie
10 May - Mother's Day
15 May - Matt
16 May - April and Matt #6
17 May - Gary
4 June - Gary & Rue #34
16 June - Kaleb
19 June - John
20 June - Steve
18 July - Chris & Heather #10
25 July - Rue

Winter in Colorado 2009

2009-02-15T15:42:00.000-08:00

WINTER 2009

January 10, 2009: A front view of our home in Monte Vista, Colorado which turned 102 years old last summer. As you can see we have a fair amount of snow on the ground in this picture. To date, Feb. 15th, we have had 22 inches, which is below average but better than the past several years. You can see one of two of Rue's pride and joy's in the photo! Her new Autumn Blaze maple trees were planted this past spring.

Snowshoeing near Wolf Creek Pass. It is a very peacefully and beautiful place to spend an afternoon.

Rue enjoying herself!

Downtown Creede, Colorado

Silverton, Colorado County Courthouse.

Mesa Verde National Park

February 2009

Rue and I had a few days in Durango this winter while waiting for her knee appointment so we went to Mesa Verde for the day since it is only an hour from Durango. Rue hadn't been here since the boys were little and it was really nice since it was a very slow winter day and few visitors. The guided tour through the open ruins was really interesting.

On March 1st of 2009 Rue and I started the new addition to our house that we have been planning for about 10 years. We started by moving all of the electrical, then digging up the plumbing which turned out to be a mess since there were no building codes in 1906 when the main part of the house was built. We tore of a small closed in porch that had been converted to a small den sometime way back. We are adding on a two story addition in order to pitch the snow and rain water away from the existng garage and store room above it. I will try and keep you up to date on our progress which I assume will be slow going with trying to work and keep up with the kids and grand kids.

The chimney is coming down!

It's down! We are on our way to getting the

addition started!

Fixing 100 year old plumbing! Backhoe at work.

Rue trying to get into the new hole!

Rue's daffodils in full bloom.

Stem walls ready to be poured.

We finally feel like we are doing something other than pouring money into the ground. The stem walls were poured today (May 4) and we are taking delivery of the floor package tomorrow and should be installing the floor on Friday. With any luck we should have the structure up and closed in by the 1st of June! I will be taking off two weeks starting next Monday and a couple of guys I have hired and I will do the majority of the framing. Some friends form church have offered to help. We will need the help when we set the roof. I will keep you posted on our progress!

2008-11-30T17:28:00.000-08:00

Thanksgiving

2008-11-30T17:11:00.000-08:00

Matt, April, Kaleb and Ashton came for Thanksgiving weekend. We had a great dinner with them and Matt and Wendy Cutter. Then we went to Lowder's for dessert and lots of laughs. Friday we went to Alamosa shopping. Not the early bird type!! Saturday we went shooting!Kaleb was very excited to be able to shoot the BB gun and his dad's new pistol. (Matt's gradutation present).