Our New Old House

This summer finds us cutting lots of trees and shrubs down at both of our new old houses. In Des Moines Brandon cut down the shrubs in front of our porch. They’d overgrown the space provided and I wasn’t able to trim them back far enough to be able to use the sidewalk. I’m going to replace them with rose bushes.

Before:
(With bushes, and snow)

After:
(Bush free and summery)

We did a similar job at our house in Clear Lake. The shrubs in front of our porch there were getting dead spots and were kind of preventing us from keeping the rest of the area around the house clean, so we decided to cut them out too.

Before:

During:

After:

Obviously, we have more clean-up to do now that the bushes are gone. We’re going to dig out the stumps and clear all the weeds out, then plant some new flowers there.

In the back yard in Des Moines we’ve got a bunch of trees that were volunteer saplings many years ago and have now grown to be total pests. We’re gathering quotes this week to see what it will cost to have them removed, as well as what it will take to have the big catalpa tree between our house and the neighbor’s taken out. I’ve got a good recommendation for what kind of tree to replace it with, so that will be a big change coming up sometime.

And while I’m talking about future plans I might as well list out some other things we have coming in the (hopefully) near future.

• Reshingle the roof
• Repair the front steps
• Tear out sidewalk blocks & have a new one poured
• Paint the back wall of the house
• One more coat of paint on the rest of the house
• Build a shed on the old garage slab

Phew! That’s a long list. Better get to work then!

I was feeling presidential today so I thought I’d clear some brush. (wink)

I focused on the fence line along the alley.

Before:

After:

More Before:

More After:

Zoot watched through a new storm window.

I found a stick with four snails on it. Can you see all four of them?

Here’s a closeup:

There was a dried out puff ball mushroom left over from last fall.

I stepped on it to help Nature along. Fungi are a very important part of the ecosystem and they get a bad rap.

While I was walking through the yard I found evidence of violent warfare!

Not very threatening when you put it in perspective, though.

This tree has grown around this rock.

Wish I knew what kind of plant this was. Anybody know?

The east side of Des Moines has an awesome system of alleys. Here’s the view north up our alley:

And south down our alley:

I did not take a before picture of that one, but notice how clean the fence line looks after I got rid of all the dead sticks and weeds.

I’m so glad spring is finally here!

[tags]yardwork, trees, photos, alley, weeds[/tags]

Since we’re going to be so busy the rest of this summer working on our new old house, Brandon and I made it a point to go up to Clear Lake this weekend and work on our other house. We did some outdoor jobs that we’ve been putting off too long. Brandon mowed the grass while I went to the hardware store (more about that later), and when I got back he had borrowed a neighbor’s tree trimmer (sawblade on the end of a LONG pole) and was cutting away the branches that were brushing the roof. I changed my clothes and got on the roof to help. He gave me the lopping shears and I snipped off everything I could reach. Then he handed me a big broom and I swept the whole roof. Our neighbors on two sides have really dirty trees that drop two sets of leaves every year, PLUS these little peppercorn-like seeds that act just like ball bearings under your feet when you’re trying to walk around on the roof. Yeah, I was taking my life into my hands, no doubt about it. But after I got the roof swept off I put on my rubber-coated gloves and cleaned out the three inch layer of mosquito-infested compost that had built up in our gutters over the course of the summer. Amazingly, I escaped with only one mosquito bite on my whole body, and it’s on the knuckle of my right pointer finger. All in all it was a very productive and exhausting day, but we did get to go swimming so that made it all feel a little like a vacation.

My trip to the hardware store had two purposes: to buy some things we actually need, and to scope out prices and plan for future projects.

Here’s the stuff I put on my list to buy:

• latex gloves
• a gallon of kilz
• a couple new brushes (since the foam ones I used last time have since bit the dust)
• a face mask
• furnace filter
• protective eye goggles

I got all those things.

More importantly, I did some planning for future projects. Here’s what I came up with:

We want to remove the countertop sink in the bathroom and replace it with a pedestal. I found a really lovely one for about $60. Faucets tend to cost between $40 and $60, so I’ll budget for $60. That doesn’t include any additional plumbing hardware we’ll need to connect it with, so I guess I’ll add $30 for that and come up with a total sink replacement budget of $150.

We need to buy a refrigerator. Menards had a 10 cubic foot self defrosting fridge/freezer for $309. We were hoping to spend no more than $400 for a fridge, so that’s probably what we’ll go with. I had hoped to buy an Energy Star appliance, for the tax break, but they only had one at Menards and it was around $600. This one only uses 386 kwh per year, though, so it’s not like it’s an energy hog.

We can borrow most of the power tools we’ll need from friends and family, but we wanted to see what it would cost to buy them anyway, because it’s always nice to have your own tools.

I found two circular saws that I liked and that were in my price range. One was a Tool Shop brand. It was $23.66, a nice compact size, and had all the standard features. I found a Skil one at Sears, though, and it felt more balanced in my hand. It costs $39.99. They had a Craftsman saw at Sears that I picked up but it just felt awful. All the weight was in the back and it felt really bottom-heavy. It was also $39.99 on sale.

The Skil reciprocating saw was $54.99 on sale, but the Masterforce, which comes with an actual hard case rather than a canvas carrying bag was $64.00 regular price, so I’d probably go with the Masterforce. Everything about them other than that was the same, except I like the pivot foot on the Masterforce better.

I wanted to see what a chainsaw would cost, so I looked at the 14″ ones, both gas and electric. I was really surprised by the difference in price between the gas and electric. Gas was $109 and electric was only $34.99. The electric one at Sears was $59.99. I don’t actually plan on buying one very soon. We already have an offer from my mom’s boyfriend to use his next week.

The big project I’m going to work on planning for is the retaining walls and planters to fix our erosion problem on the side of the house. I still haven’t measured for how big these retaining walls are going to be, but I got prices per unit for all the supplies we’ll need, so once I have measured we can figure out how much it will cost. Here’s a list of supplies I will need for the project (and the prices I gathered today):

• Paver base (50 lb. bag – $2.38)
• Pea gravel (50 lb. bag – $2.39)
• Retaining wall bricks (88 cents each)
• Top soil (40 lb. bag – $1.14)
• Flagstones ($1.44 each)

So, the plan as I see it in my head, having never done this before, is this:

1. Measure the area to build the walls
2. Add up how much of the supplies I’ll need
3. Buy the supplies I’ll need, plus extras
4. Put the first layer of bricks together so they fit properly
5. Mark the final layout where the walls will go
6. Dig a swath for the base layer of bricks
7. Pour paver base into the swath and tamp it down
8. Build the brick wall
9. Put a layer of pea gravel inside the planting area
10. Put a layer of top soil inside the planting area
11. Put some plastic edging strips at each end of the pathway between the two planting beds
12. Level the ground and put down paver base
13. Lay flagstones to make a path
14. Pour pea gravel around the flagstones and up to the walls to fill in the rest of the space
15. Plant hostas and other shade loving plants in the planter beds

At least that’s the plan as it appears to me in my current state of being under the influence of a valerian root sleeping pill. We’ll see how coherent all this looks to me in the morning.

[tags]budget, Clear Lake house, future plans, gutters, power tools, retaining wall, trees, yardwork[/tags]

I got to the house right at 8am and George, the electrician was already there. But my realtor wasn’t, so I called his cell and left him a message. I had a feeling this might happen. With his newborn son waking every few hours to eat, he and his wife haven’t been getting any sleep at all. The electricians were very patient and I finally got ahold of him and he said he’d be there in half an hour, he’d completely forgotten with all the craziness of having a new baby.

So they waited and we talked about everything about the house that I know and they gave me ideas about what the work will involve and everything. Once the realtor showed up and let us in they got to look around at everything. Here’s an overview of our discussion:

These older houses often have something called fireshield inside the walls behind the plaster and lathe. That means the walls are not hollow, in fact you have to drill through that stuff to fish wires through it. He’s not certain ours are like that, but it’s something they were putting in the construction of these old houses.

He measured the house to be about 1000 square feet, 1200 if you count the attic (which, incidentally, was exactly what I guessed!). And he’ll use that number to estimate how much wiring will be needed.

We talked about what it would take to put wiring up to the ceiling and run wiring for the existing ceiling lights. Because those all have knob and tube, they have to run it all through the ceiling, they can’t just fish it up through because there’s not a big enough hole for modern wire to go through. They’d have to cut notches in the joists to put the wire through. Regardless, we’re looking at ceiling patches and probably re-doing the texturing on the ceiling in the long run. If the crown molding is wood, the best solution may be to take that down so it can stay in one piece, strip the paint and texturing off it while it’s down, and once we fix up the ceiling, put it back.

The may be able to access the bedroom lights and the kitchen light through the attic crawl space, though.

The meter will have to be outside, probably right under the bathroom window. The circuit box will probably still be in its present location.

He agreed we should wire for 200 amps to prepare for a garage. I asked him about how to wire the kitchen and he said the garbage disposal and dishwasher go on one circuit, the countertops go on one, the fridge and stove go on one, and the lights may be on one with the lights of another room. That seemed to make good sense to me.

He wasn’t able to give me a firm bid today, but he’s going to get that to me tomorrow or the next day. He did generally ballpark it for me at around $7000, but I really want to wait to see what his actual bid is before I go with that number.

I learned a lot from Dan the fireplace inspector. He showed me all the specific problems with the fireplace and chimney. He had a diagram of the insides of the whole system and showed me how it all works. He recommended this kind of flue damper since ours is totally rusted out and it isn’t the best design for that to begin with.

I did get a firm bid from him with stuff specifically itemized. His bid was $5000 exactly for the whole job to make it a working fireplace. It takes about a week to get the whole chimney done and ready to use.

The tree service gave me a $400 bid to clean up all the trees close to the house and wires, clean off our roof, and haul away the cut debris. I told him I’d take care of the brush in the back and along the alley myself. I need a good excuse to buy a chainsaw anyway, and I know Brandon will LOVE that.

So that’s what we’re looking at right now. I did finally get everything done and then switched off the circuits and locked up the house. It took me just over half an hour to ride downtown, find a place to lock my bike, and get to work.

There’s just so much work that needs doing. I just want to get started already!

[tags]chimney, contractors, electricity, fireplace, trees[/tags]