So, this weekend was productive as it relates to progress on the house. Matt was in North Myrtle Beach for a networking golf event, so I was in charge of house stuff. Luckily, I was in town, because I caught a couple of what would have been "big" problems. 1. The were going to put doors between the kitchen and den.... not in the plans. There isn't even supposed to be a wall in that location. 2. They were going to keep the size of the master bed room instead of make it a foot longer in one direction. That may seem small, but not as it relates to furniture placement. Earlier last week we thought we might have a roof today and as you will see in the following images that is not the case! Patience is a virtue and we learn a little more about that every day.

This picture shows the house on Thursday afternoon. There is no roof on it - obviously. The roof is what you see laying across the front porch!

This is standing in the house looking up. It rained later in the afternoon that this was taken. I freaked out about it, but it turned out not to be the end of the world.

This shot was taken from inside the same day. A little hard to see because of all of the sunlight pouring in. Taken from the back of the house.

This was taken this evening. Different from Thursday. They've removed the aluminum siding as well as the original wood siding that was behind it. Also, they've removed all of the old windows and added the studs around where the new front door will go.

This was taken in the future stair case. It's the only place in the house where I can see blue sky when I look up.

Here is a shot taken from right inside the front door. The fireplace on the left will be removed later and bookcases will take the place. People question getting rid of a fireplace, but this one would need replacing. Unfortunately, a new masonry fireplace is not in the budget!! Matt is standing in what will be the kitchen.

This is taken from the master looking into what will be the master bath. You can see that the floor for the 2nd floor has been installed above.

Well that concludes the tour for now. I hope that we'll have some drastically different images soon!

D is for DEMO

The picture above shows a view from the front door, the fire place would be on your left in this picutre. Luckily, we didn't have any pad surprises when the walls came down.


Below - this is the fireplace and looking into the bathroom from the den. They don't build them like they used to!

So last week, progress was made. From the outside it doesn't look like anything has happenend, but they've taken down the plaster walls and ceiling. I looks like a skeleton at this point. Here are some shots of the progress. It only took 2 days and one dumpster to get to this point. We're having a soggy couple of days here in the queen city, but when we can get a couple of clear days in a row, they will remove the roof and start framing the 2nd story!!

PERMIT

So Kevin went to the permit office Wednesday and they told him to come back Thursday, which is typical government workers, but we won't go into that. He went yesterday and I told him to call me afterward if the news was good, bad or ugly.

He called around 10ish with a colorful rant on how he feels about the people at the office. So, of course, I assume that we don't have the doggone thing yet again. At the end of my 2 cents about the situation I ask what do I need to do so we can get the permit? He calmly says, "well, I guess you don't have to do anything since I have it in my hand." I was elated!!!

So yesterday, the only visible sign of progress was putting the permit in the front window. Doesn't sound like much, but to us it was a huge step. We're finally going to have progress and we're so excited! The dumpster will arrive on Monday morning and the first half of the week will be spent doing demo. The 2nd half nothing will happen because Kevin's guys have another job late in the week and through the weekend. A week from Monday they will start framing and we'll see how it goes from there!

PROGRESS

So, something was accomplished at the house today and it wasn't much, but something is better than nothing!! Took a few shots of the "damage."



But first, this is a picture of the garage doors that we built... Not sure why I took the picture from the street, but you get the idea.

We don't have a dumpster quite yet, so here's the pile of junk that they've ripped out of the house.

Finally, here is an interior shot. Today they took down the baseboards, all of the mouldings around the windows, and all of the doors and door frames.

Kevin is heading down to the permit office tomorrow to see what's going on. I hope that he can leave with the permit in hand. The next best thing would be that he could get a dumpster out to the house so the guys can start taking down the plaster!

Finally Go Time?

Well, it isn't the first time we've heard it, but word from Kevin is that some of his guys will be there first thing in the am to start DEMO. I will believe it when I see it, but can't help but to be excited!!! We still do not have a permit, and the friendly folks at the City are taking their sweet time issuing it. We applied on April 22nd and they have 5 to 10 business days to let us know something. It's been more than 5, but not quite 10. Kevin is going over to the permit office on Wednesday if we don't hear anything tomorrow. In the meantime, I didn't think I would ever be so happy to hear that people were going to tear up our house!

Not much else to report other than...

1. Matt and I finished the garage doors. They look good and there weren't any injuries or melt downs. Label it as a success.

2. We've been shopping. We picked out and purchased all of the door interior and exterior and all of the windows. Big stuff, but not terribly fun. On the fun side, I bought great marble tile for the bathroom floor today - love it!

3. Courtney has helped me start picking paint colors - yes, it's wildly premature, but still fun!

Hopefully a status update and pictures of mass destruction tomorrow!