Day 440 - Day 441

Weekend again. :D

Mom and Dad came down for the weekend to help. The goal this weekend was to get the dumpster full so that we could send it back. We worked on the third floor knocking down more of the plaster, lathe, and insulation.

This picture is taken in the landing room. As you look through the wall you are seeing Zeb's bedroom.

This picture is taken from Zeb's room. Through the wall you are able to see into Ella's room. The door with the window on it is where we lower all of the plaster and rubble in buckets to the ground. It is much less work to lower the buckets than to carry them down three floors.

This picture is taken from Ella's room. On the left you are seeing what is left of the bathroom. Jonathan broke up the big tub. And he and Dad threw the tub and the sink out the door and then we carry all of it to the dumpster. The plaster you see on the bathroom wall is the only bit of plaster left on third floor. There is also still insulation in the ceiling above the bathroom. On the right side of the picture you can just see into Melinda's room. Right now her room is where all of our tools and supplies are kept.

We really wanted to get all of third floor cleaned out. But we just couldn't do it. We were all exhausted by the end of the weekend. So I guess that little bit will have to wait just a while longer. Dad wants to get on to the fun part, wiring, insulating, and putting up drywall.

I also have the tile floor to pry up in Zeb's room. But it is looking really good up there. We are so close to being done with the destruction (at least on third floor) and ready to start making things beautiful again. The goal is to have the third floor finished and ready for us to live in by winter.

Day 437

We were working in the basement. It is nice and cool down there. We are trying to get things clean and organized down in the workshop so that we will actually be able to use it to do some work. We are starting to get to a point where we will be doing some wood work and stuff. We have also been looking into what it will take to make all of the pieces for the porches. So we have been thinking about the shop again. I am looking forward to the time we can stop destroying start building. I also finally got the freeze cleaned out and plugged back in. Now I can start using it again.

Day 436

YAY! I want to thank Judy so much. After talking to us last week she went home and made copies of some of pictures of our house when she lived here back in the 50's. Looking at these pictures was so exciting to me. We actually got to see what our front porch looked like. We also got to see the stairway in the front room. It amazingly looks very much like it did then. Only the wallpaper and the lack of woodwork around the archway (this archway has been walled up). Then she also had pictures of the house after her mother had put on the green shingle/siding and the fire escape stairs. I call the green stuff yucky (now) but back in 1950 something it looked pretty darn good. I guess after 60 years most anything would look yucky

Here is a picture of my beautiful house when Judy's family purchased it. I love all of the details on the porch... and look at the corbels. :D This is another thing that we knew should be there and wondered what they had looked like.

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Day 434

Happy Father's Day!

Today we spent sometime up on third floor again. Jonathan got the last of the ceiling knocked down. That is always a dirty, messy and tiring job. The worst is being covered in insulation. So we have to wear our blue coveralls. Thankfully it wasn't that warm. After all of the destruction was finished we got a lot of it carried out to the dumpster before we had to stop for the day.

Here is what Zeb's room looked like after we had finished working for the day. Doesn't that fluffy insulation look fun to roll around in? ;)

And this is the 3rd floor landing room. We are getting most everything out of there.

We do still have a few lathe boards on the walls near the ceiling in both the landing room and Zeb's bedroom. But now that most of the insulation is out this won't take too long.

Day 431

Jonathan took the day off of work today so that we could work on the house. The temperature got up to 93 degrees today. So it was a bit on the hot side. Lucky for us that Nebraska is the land of constant wind. With the breeze blowing it didn't feel too bad.

Jonathan lowered many buckets of plaster out the 3rd floor door down to the ground. I took them from there to the dumpster. We got most all of the plaster out of Zeb's future bedroom. :) Now we are ready to knock the plaster off of the ceiling in there and get the insulation out.

But while working today we had an exciting visit. I was down on the ground hauling buckets and a lady walking by our house asked what we were doing. We told her. And she told us that she had moved into our house when she was 5 years old, back in the 1950's. Her mother had owned the building and ran a nursing home in it. When they first started, her family lived on the first floor, but as they got more residents, her mom had turned the third floor into an apartment for their family. When they had lived in the house, the front porch had wrapped around the tower (the east and part of the south side - like we had thought it should). The back (or kitchen porch) had been a screened in porch. She told us about the stairs in the front room and how she had slid down the railing. She also told us that there had been an arched opening from the front room to the dining room. It was her mom who had put on the green asphalt shingle/siding on. The old garage was put there by her mother. There had been one there before. The original one also had a flat roof. She say that as a small child she had walked around on the gutters up on third floor, something that her mother had hated. When they had lived here, the old wood fire escape that we had only seen in pictures was there. And her family had mostly used that as an entrance to their apartment up on 3rd floor. We asked if she had pictures of the house. And she said that she did. She now lives in Lincoln. But she was going to go through her pictures and bring them down next time or make some copies and mail them to us. WOW! What an exciting day. We can't wait to see her pictures and talk to her some more.

Day 427

Another day of destruction...

We went up to third floor and started to knock some more stuff down. We are coming to a place that is really messy, the stairs. Where exactly do you stop? We aren't exactly ready to knock the plaster down in this area on 2nd floor as we are living in these rooms. So I guess we have decided just stop at the edge of the floor (3rd floor). The mess falls down the stairs and piles up by the door. We use some boards to try to keep as much of it out of 2nd floor as possible. The only good thing about this is that once we get everything knocked down there won't be as much mess ever again. :D

This picture was taken from the 3rd floor landing room. From here you can now see through to Zeb's room. We have that wall knocked down. Near the bottom of the picture you can see the railing around the stairs. Much of the plaster and lathe from that wall fell down there. We had to scoop it up into buckets just to clear the path for us to get back downstairs. But the plaster was much better than the insulation from the ceiling above that also fell down into there. Hopefully there won't be too much more falling down there until we get to the stairwell walls.

So here is the update. We have three rooms mostly cleared out. (No insulation in the ceiling, no plaster and lathe on the walls and ceilings) Zeb's room still has insulation and plaster and lathe on the ceiling. We have most of the plaster and lathe off of the walls in there. The other room that we have not yet worked on much is the little bathroom. A couple of the walls are knocked down, but other than that we have not yet started on it. If things go well, we should have all of third floor gutted and cleaned out by the end of June. :D Then on to the fun stuff....making things work...making things better

Day 426

We checked out some more books from the library today. We have been trying to work out the details of what we are going to do with the garden and lawn. Right now we can't do a lot as it might interfere with the work that we are trying to do. But we do want to get a start on it. So we are trying to do a lot of planning.

Day 420 - 425

Jonathan's back is doing much better. It has been getting hot a few of the days this week. We will have to see how this summer goes without a/c. So far there have only been a couple of really uncomfortable days. Since the kids got home we haven't done a lot of work. We have been busy with swimming lessons and gymnastics classes. But hoping to get back into the work again this weekend.

Day 415 - 419

The kids are at Grandpa and Grandma's house. We ended up going home for my Great Aunt's funeral on Monday and we were going to be going back home again on Saturday for a family reunion. So we thought we would give the kids a fun break with Grandpa, Grandma and their cousins. While they were gone, I spent my time carrying down buckets of plaster in between scanning in the rest of my Grandma's photos to get ready for the reunion. I actually got quite a bit done. Jonathan's back got a rest and the kids had a great time. And the family reunion was fun for all of us.