I need to leave more often!

Again today I went out shopping and when I returned some hours later, I got a big surprise. We have a kitchen window installed!! Mike did it alone, in the middle of a really rainy day. I'm hoping he'll wait for help before he installs more, but this one looks so great!!!

A favorite

I just needed to post this. I walked into the kitchen last week and saw this.

Christmas decorations

While touring the city a bit with Angie, our daughter, and her two boys, we saw a bit of the way the French Quarter decorates. A special prize will go to the first one to email me with the name of the place where the boys are eating in this picture!

Work at Christmas

Though most of the work installing heating and air conditioning was done by Mike and Colin, our son-in-law from Phoenix, we did get some demolition work done by the grandsons, Donovan and Dylan. Dylan, at 14, delighted in tearing out stuff - which was why his Paw Paw Mike specifically saved that work for him. I got no pictures of the men working but enjoy these of the boys.

Turning the corner

Last night Mike said, "We've firmly turned the corner; we are building now." That may not seem like much - and these pictures may not look like much - but he means that we're basically finished with much of the DEstruction phase and into the CONstruction phase. YAAY! Actually, we have done more construction than he gives himself credit for, but this does seem different. We will still tear down more things, but today we worked on the floor for our upstairs bedroom/study/sitting area and bath. And our heater arrived so that we can put our sweet long-suffering son-in-law to work while he's on his Christmas "vacation" here. You can see Mike at work here (well, OK, surveying his work here) but even I was able to use the nail gun and put down some boards and tar paper today.

Today we worked on the floor upstairs and progress IS being made. I was finally useful - I'm getting to be a much better nail-puller. So while Mike was out at a meeting (so HE says - likely story) I pulled nails and got flooring ready. YAY!

AND, the tree looks a little better tonight. Lots of lights because most of our decorations are stored. But where, oh where, is the angel for the top???

Mmm - for Katie M.

What could be better for people who don't want to stop and get cleaned up but are hungry for lunch? mm Zone bars!! AND tonight after we went to eat, we bought our tree. This 7+ footer looks pretty puny in the room, but since it has to share with windows and shutters, and door frames, and since most of my decorations are packed faaaar away, we'll save the 9 footer for NEXT year.

More dirty wood to see

Today we moved work upstairs and began getting a floor for the upstairs part. We HAVE a floor up there but it is far from level, and it will need to be at a higher level anyway, to put in insulation, now that we've removed the old false ceilings. Mike will need to plug some holes, too. Some were made in the ceiling downstairs for water pipes or electrical wires and will be simple. Some, like the fireplace (sadly no longer with us) and the old stairs, will take a bit more work to cover up. But it will get done!

We've finished closing in the small bedroom of the rental section and you'll see Mike on the ladder working on that (Fran, see the Winshape mug?). Occasionally Michael (in the picture with Mike) has dropped in to make a little money by doing whatever Mike wants. He helped on Tuesday and got a ticket back to Nashville where he evacuated after Katrina. He will be back, but not until March.

Pretty old

In working on the ceiling and roof, Mike found where some of the building was still held together with the original pegs in posts instead of nails.

Mike's day

In working to get the roof right, he put together the "third hands" with ladders to come up with the height he needed.

Curious feature

This little feature seems to have been an 8 inch tile stuck on to cover a bad job of grout work. Do any of you have a spare decorative, old 8 inch square tile?

Today, after using the remainder of the bucket of goo last night, and scrubbing really hard with wire brushes, this is the way it looks.

More bits and pieces

While Mike worked all day on getting the rental-guest-room roof ready, I spent another day on the fireplace. This is the way it looked when I finished yesterday.

Back to work

We've been away for almost 10 days now and we're glad to be back at work in the sunny, cold-for-New-Orleans house. Today Mike decided that there may be some additional steps that need to be taken for structural stability, and while I whined about more time, I suppose I'd rather not have the whole thing crumble under the weight of the slate roof. So here he is, surveying the place of the next work. What do you notice new?

Madelyn's project

While there is little I can do alone, I HAVE taken on the job of trying to get the gray textured finish off the bricks of the rental fireplace. Thanks to a powerful (I HOPE!) but good smelling goop that Angie put me onto, I tackled it today while Mike worked on structural stuff. The required skill for this is none but it's helpful if you've iced cakes before - preferably with pudding. Guys-who-learned-to-make-cake-icing, I'd tell you to put a little more powdered sugar in if I had my choice. ;-)

The ceiling

We made a choice to bring down the old sheetrock ceiling and go back to the wonderful bead-board and beam ceilings that were there originally. Great look! HUGE amount of extra work! It will be worth it, but it has been the main source of the slow speed of work. Here Mike takes down some more extra wood that was there to hold up the sheetrock. They used things that look like railroad spikes for this, so it's been a real battle. Building those muscles! Here's Mike at it in another room!

Slowly but surely

There are days when it feels like we're moving really slowly despite the fact that Mike keeps working 10-12 hour days and I help as I can. We've had a bit of help from a man who has returned after Katrina and doesn't have a real job. And one morning Mike had help from some volunteers for a couple of hours. Today it's my great-nephew-in-law - and he really is GREAT! Here's some stuff that's been done - like real WALLS for when we go away and leave the house!

The latest

Today we have a couple of volunteers coming to help pull down old ceiling joists so I'll have more pictures to post soon. In the meantime, both families have visited - see Mom Edens and Mike's brother Terry - and we blacked in the small bedroom in the rental side and got things closed up before we made a trip last weekend. No photos on that yet, but they, too are coming. In the meantime here we are in front of the restored corner.

Raising the roof

Well, yes, Mike really raised the roof today - literally. We have decided to keep HALF of the "unfortunate 20th century addition" but must tie its roof in with the existing roof of the big house. When Mike said he was going to saw the roof in half and then use the car jack left by the previous owner to JACK UP THE ROOF, I thought he was crazy. Crazy like a fox! He'll be sore - but back at work tomorrow. You can see the red car jack in one of these shots.

Final shots

He finished nailing down felt paper about 7:30 after a long, hard, dirty day. As I write this, he's "reading" in bed. Yeah, riiiight.

Quick turn-around

Saturday was supposed to be leaving day for Buck, Mike G., and Fred - and Fred really had to get back. But since things were not finished to the degree that Mike G. and Buck wanted, they decided to work things out to stay another day - even though we already had lights in every room - for the first time since we got the house! Soo . . . early Saturday morning Fred got into the SUV and drove back to Tampa - 10 hours or so. As soon as he arrived, Vicki got into the vehicle and drove right back - giving the two guys all day Saturday and most of Sunday to work. Then they got back into the truck and she drove back to Tampa. Now THAT's love! But I got NO pictures of her! What you see here instead are pics of the clean-up after everyone left.

How time flies . . .!!

From day two on with Buck's crew, it all became a blur; I didn't even take many pictures. Life became a hodge-podge, so that's what you'll get from that time. Plumbing and electrical work kept going, and with Colin's arrival Friday, he and Mike G. made a great team on the electrical work and we were able to have hot water!!

Day two Sands' Contracting

Today began with Fred carefully deconstructing - as opposed to demolishing - the shop door corner. It's the first step toward getting the original corner back in place.

See, no shop door

The door is gone and they've started to work on the base of the restoration.

Working away

See, a brick chain wall (a term I learned) and the frame for the new floor is there.