Thanksgiving

The unofficial deadline I set for myself to have the siding done was Thanksgiving.  While I didn't have it done by Thanksgiving day, and there's still a few more pieces of trim to put up, I did get the last piece of cement board secured before Thanksgiving dinner was served.  Victory!  It wouldn't have been possible without my mom and dad coming by this morning when they got back from New York to help with stuff I just couldn't do myself.  I did try to do it myself, but in the process ruined a few pieces of trim trying to cut/handle them alone.  At one point, out of extreme frustration I threw a tape measure at the floor.  The perfect bounce sent it straight back into my face.  No bruises yet, but it did serve to calm me a little.  Thankfully, my dad showed up shortly after that incident.  Which brings me to my Thanksgiving list of gratitude...

I have a lot to be thankful for:

• My children for "going with the flow."  They are taking everything in stride, and I love them for it.
• My wife for putting on her warm clothes and coming out in the wind and cold last night to help make the siding "deadline."  She also took on the task of informing Ella about Loki today when she asked why he hasn't been eating the food she's been putting in his dish every day.
• My in-laws for providing room and board for our family through this whole thing and putting up with the new level of chaos in their home. 
• My sister-in-law for  taking the brunt of the extra child care duties on top of working 2 jobs and fixing up her own house so that Amy can teach and I can work on the house.
• My parents for all they've given up in their own lives so my dad can spend so much time helping work on the house.  There's no way I could have done this without his help.

The side of the dormer was the last significant chunk of siding.  I finished that Tuesday night by headlamp to take advantage of a day with temperatures above 40.

 

 

On the plus side: He finally finished the rough grade enough to have water drain AWAY from the house!  He also reshaped the driveway to make it less steep.  On the negative side: I talked to the sewer commissioner and learned that we can't get an occupancy permit because he never paid the fees to the town for multiple sewer hook-ups he had done, so they revoked his drain layer's license, yet he continued to do hook-ups illegally.  So ours was done by an unlicensed person and without a permit.  Hopefully the pending lawsuit by the town will be settled by the time we are ready to move in.  What a mess.

The porch beam trimmed and the last pieces of siding in place.  This picture was taken 14 minutes before thanksgiving dinner was served.

Notches: the reason the last 1% of the siding took an inordinate amount of time.

Siding complete, high spots painted, window wells in, only one wet area still in the yard.

Building the tub surround was a welcome break from siding last week.  Shockingly, the tub actually fit into the cutout I made in the deck on the first try.

HVAC has been there this week working on ductwork and installing the geothermal units.  Very cool to see it all coming together, but it brings a whole new layer of decisions about locations of wells, trenches, equipment, ducts, supply grates, returns, piping, wiring, etc.

Spent a whole night contorting myself to get behind the ductwork (see pictures above and below) to seal off the soffit vents so when the insulation is sprayed in it doesn't expand and ooze out of the house.  One more day and the return ducts would have made it impossible for me to do this.

The "alien spaceship" of flexible ducts running off the sheet metal main lines.