Addition Take Down: Part Two! Would you believe it if I told you it snowed twice more this week?! Neither would I. But it did. Weird. There’s still snow in places where the sun doesn’t shine much, but it’s melting! This weekend we worked hard to get the remainder of the addition removed so that we could get the dumpster returned. It was a lot of work. Yet it was another one of those instant gratification projects. The progress could be seen every time we took a break, and it would encourage us to keep at it and get it done. On Friday I had to take a Unit Test for one of my classes and it turned out to be a beautiful day out. We opted to go for a bike ride as we haven’t been going as frequently with the crazy weather and the Cabin project ramping up.
It was challenging for me to ride up the hill to get to the trail. And it was a trail that I’m not too fond of personally. It was worth all of the pain and frustration. We went with a good friend and the guys dunked their heads in the waterfall on the way up. Crazies. I opted to drink a beer and take a picture while encouraging them from the sidelines. I’m glad they are such good sports about my whining and complaining on the way up!
Here’s where we started out this weekend with the addition take down:
Saturday I was scheduled to work in the morning. After work, I got home to a hardworking husband just chipping away at the project. He had already removed the 1 1/2 remaining walls, as well as moved all of the bricks down to the barn, and was working on removing the studs. I jumped right in and started helping and we got pretty far! We had to get the trusses down and then remove the rest of the studs. Once those were all down it was time to start pulling up the tiles on the flooring.
When it was time to remove the trusses I was pretty nervous. There were just studs holding them up and we had to pry them off and then somehow get them off top of the studs. I’m pretty sure my husband was thoroughly irritated after the seventeenth, “careful!!”. It didn’t stop me from yelling, uttering, and coaxing it hundreds of more times. We made it through without ripping out our own hair, or even each others! Then we had to get all the studs out, which was pretty easy, but definitely time consuming.
We found some cool newspapers tucked in between the Cabin and the addition. The date is from 1919, and it’s announcing the 1920 Buick models! There are pictures and prices and everything. I was pretty excited about this find. It went into the save pile. The next thing we started was removing all the tile from the flooring. It was not the easiest chore. It also wasn’t the hardest. Again, very time consuming.
Then it was time to start pulling up the floor boards. Another not so fun and time consuming job. My husband worked the burke bar (which is essentially a giant pry bar) and I was sorting and hauling the wood out of the way. We got about half way through before we called it a day. And we really felt like we earned our dinner and beer by quitting time!
My father-in-law worked on salvaging bits and pieces of the addition that were in the burn pile to build a brooder for the chicks who were hastily outgrowing their little bin. He was able to construct this beauty while we were deconstructing the addition. The chicks are in love, sprinting around and flapping their wings about as if they’ll be taking flight any time now. Read more about the chicks here! They officially have names now!
Sunday we got to work bright and early. It was the first day after daylight savings ended! We were pretty excited about the extra hour of daylight in the evening and were hoping to get the project wrapped up early enough to maybe – possibly – fitting in another bike ride. We worked together to get the rest of the boards removed, and then the support beams.
We were so focused on getting it done that I didn’t take as many progress pictures as normal. Once we got all the flooring out we had to shovel up wheelbarrows full of garbage that had slipped through the cracks. We had to find where the water came in and close the valve so we could remove the piping (and found the burst pipes that caused some of the water damage!). We got everything in the dumpster and locked it up so it could be hauled away when they were ready to pick it up. We hauled the majority of the cement blocks, bricks, and rocks that were supporting the beams down to the barn. Then we stood back and appreciated our hard work, and finally scampered off to get a little play in and celebrate the evening sunshine!
All in all, it was a fantastic weekend. I’m a little sore, but so glad we were able to accomplish our goal while still fitting in a little fun. And the first sunset after 7 pm of 2019 was worth every drop of sweat.
The Homestead Journey 
[…] We also got quite a bit of work done on the Cabin this weekend! We got the rest of the addition torn down and are ready to start on the restoration portion of the massive project! Here’s the update on what we got done this weekend! […]
LikeLike