Stonework Completed

The stone crew returned in full force on Friday and stayed until nearly 8:00 last night finishing things up.  I am impressed by both the quality of their work and their dedication to doing the job well.  I am VERY impressed.


This was before noon, the crew was working on the columns in the center of the porch:

 And on the other side:

Plastic to protect the cedar posts:

Looking down the porch toward the end of the day:

John, our general contractor, measuring to determine where the railings will go.  They are to be installed on Monday.

Front of the house toward the end of the day Monday:

This is one of the pictures that impresses me most.  When the original porch was pulled down, there was no stone work behind it.  The crew filled in the missing stone.  Can you tell where they did it?  I can't and I even went up and stood directly in front of the wall!

Windows and Posts

All of the windows have been installed!  We have one small snag that will be fixed next week, but it's nothing major.  The window company sent us a window with regular glass for our upstairs bathroom and they will replace the sashes next week with obscure glass.  There isn't really a view in or out of the window, so it probably doesn't matter, but I will feel more secure knowing no one is going to see me stepping out of the shower unless they are standing on the roof looking through the sky light.  ;-)


Here are the updated photos from late yesterday and today:

Father and son checking out the house at the end of the day on Wednesday:

New kitchen window.  I can't tell you how much I love this.  It's my new favorite window!

Let there be light!  Finally a usable window in the laundry room!

All new windows across the back.

The lower posts have been "stained" with a clear coat.  They are stunning.  I didn't realize what a difference it would make and I couldn't be happier.

The stonework started at the other side of the porch, so you can see what the bases of the columns are going to look like now.  Getting closer!!!

Finally, one more picture of the kiddo.  Still working on self-feeding.  He's making a mess, but he loves it.  :-)  This was peach/squash yogurt with dinner.

Busy Boy

Isaac had quite a day today!  The windows crew returned to finish installing windows, so he got to watch them work while he ate his breakfast.  He got to have black beans, his new favorite, with lunch.

He is working on learning how to eat with a spoon, so he had a lot of fun making a GIANT mess:

Then this afternoon, we went to see Daddy at work for a little Halloween Spooktacular event at NI.  We had a great time, but, alas, I didn't get many photos.  Here's what we did instead:

These are the 2 photos I managed to snap:

Tuesday & Early Wednesday.

The name of the game this week is WINDOWS!  The crew has been really nice and seem to be pretty efficient.  They got the first 4 windows replaced within 2 hours yesterday morning.  They left early today to celebrate a birthday, which I didn't argue because I HATE to work on my birthday...  They will finish up the last 4 windows tomorrow morning.

Original window on front of house (den):

Bye-bye window!

Replacement window on front of house:

Sliding glass door that we have cursed an unknown, but very large, number of times:

No door at all (already an improvement)!

New door in place (and before Jackson jumped through the screen door a mere 5 hours later):

Original Dining room windows: 

No more windows!  This opening is actually wider than the one for the sliding glass door.  I didn't realize it until they had pulled all of the windows down.

New dining room windows!  The center is a picture window and there are casements on either side.

A view from the outside:

View of the new windows from the front of the house:

Freshly painted surround for the front door.  I need to repaint the door itself, too.

View of front of house this morning (before new windows on top):

Isaac watching the men work.  Thank goodness his grandparents will be arriving shortly after this project is finished because I am not sure what I am going to do for entertainment!

New windows in the master bedroom.  So much brighter!

Front of the house around noon today (with new windows in):

More new windows:

Windows in the master bedroom:

There is a cold front moving across Texas and we are expecting a 40% chance of rain tomorrow.  Hopefully the windows are going to be sealed enough to prevent the rain from getting into the house.  There are gaps around the windows where new windows are perfectly square and the holes they are in are not...  Fingers crossed...

John, our contractor, came by this morning to walk through the project with the stone guy.  The stone bases for the lower sections of the posts are supposed to be installed this week.  Once that is complete, we can have the railings installed and I, for one, will breathe a huge sigh of relief.  They are also going to stain the concrete on the first floor and they still need to paint all of the ceilings, trim all of the windows, and stain the decking and shutters.  There are various other items, as well, but those are the "big" items remaining.

House & Isaac Updates

Not much noticeably changed on the house on Friday, so I decided not to post an update.  In addition, Friday was the day I finally (nearly) cracked from all of this construction, so I thought a short hiatus might be a good idea.  The roofer kept climbing down and asking me questions I had no way of being able to answer...  Saturday, the roofer came and finished up both the "contract" work and a few extra repairs Todd authorized him to do.  The other crew were doing a lot of little finish work on the upstairs porch and it didn't look all that exciting.  :-)  Today, however, they made progress even I can see.  They boxed in (with Hardie plank) a lot of the edges of the porch.  They did a LOT of caulking to seal things up.  They also started painting, which is very exciting.


Todd examining the porch progress Friday:

View of the house Friday afternoon:

Windows delivery (also Friday)!!!

Painted back of laundry room/garage this afternoon:

Painted back of house:

Windows!

More windows!  The installer should be here tomorrow morning (and last Wednesday, last Friday, and this morning).  I blame the General Contractor's scheduling, not the windows guy.  I will just be glad when they get them installed.

Painted side and back of house:

Freshly painted side of garage:

Front of house end of Monday (with paint):

Close-up of the encased gable:

In Isaac news, Todd and I took him to the park on Sunday afternoon.  We ran into 2 families (who also didn't come together) from National Instruments, a friend of mine from church, and a woman I used to go to music class with over the summer.  Rather impressive given the size of this fairly small park... 


Self-feeding with yogurt:

First attempt at spaghetti (we usually have smaller noodles): 

We like spaghetti!

I want to go in the attic to help Daddy rewire the ceiling fans!!!

Isaac has a bit of a cold today and has been coughing, so I bought him some Little Remedies Saf-T-Pops to try to soothe a sore throat.  He had fun making himself into a super-sticky mess!