North Glenora Reno

So today, we sorted out the roofing and solved the whole “can’t dig a pile right where the gas line is” crap. After much discussion and thought and more discussion with the guy who came to actually dig the piles, we have come up with an off-set pile to solve the problem. Man, I hope it works.
This morning, my mom and R’s parents showed up to supply some free grunt labour. We, as a crew, accomplished the following by 3pm…baseboard and trim removed from both the spare room and the eating area (plus all of the nails pulled), removed the light fixture and plugins from the spare room along with those in the eating area, pulled the siding off of three of the exterior walls, and pulled out the laminate in the spare room. A few minor injuries and some inevitable soreness and I say a job well done.

We are so thankful for our families, they are making this insanity worth while and not quite so frantic or insane.

Tonight, we go back to the pit and continue getting rid of the extra gravel and the concrete and clay debris from the basement. The fun and exhaustion never end!

After having little luck getting roofing companies to even call me back, we made a very quick decision about what company to go with.

I have called no less than 7 different companies. Of those, two were small operations that were recommended and the other five, I found their websites and called. One of those five called me back. ONE. I was pissed to say the least.
We ended up going with the company that did R’s parent’s roof. We were not only swayed by their glowing recommendation but were also super impressed with both Wes and Debbie of Hache Roofing Inc.. They were both really nice and knowledgeable and made us feel very confident in their quote and work….AND they came in $3000 cheaper (for the same product) that the other (big name company) quote we have received thus far. They have put aside two days for us once the framing is done.

http://www.hacheroofinginc.ca/

One less task off my plate!

Today was a busy, busy day. Dad and Bill came to re-route the sewer main and add a new drain for the furnace and new laundry location. My dad is a crazy work horse, he gets going on a job and just doesn’t stop and he always tells you that it is no problem. Yep, a no problem job that took him all day. Anyway, it looks fantastic and I am so thankful for him and his great work.

Before…

After…

It turns out that it will be well worth all of the work as the old pipe was corroded and thus sewage was seeping into the ground! Yeah! I knew that something wasn’t smelling as rosy as I expected it should yesterday. Anyway, inspection tomorrow and then concrete. I got back on the countertop and blind adventures and requested consultations from Costco for each. We have heard really great things from several people about the products and services for renovations from them so we are hoping for great things. The guy who did K & M.A.’s roof also came by today to estimate and since I called him only is morning, I was pretty pleased with him too. We’ll see.
Despite this, I think that we have unofficially chosen our roofer only 2 quotes in. The people who did R’s parent’s house have been fantastic so far and blew Great Canadian Roofing out of the water with their quote. Two more quotes to go but we really like this little company.
I dug to China to expose the gas line today and low and behold it is exactly where we need to dig one of the piles for the roof and deck supports. Super! We are looking at maybe doing some kind of bridge piles and hope that that will work. Ahhh, another call to Chad.
Finally, mom and I emptied both the eating area and the spare bedroom. All three dogs supervising was super helpful.

Rob the framer and his crew arrived this morning at 7:30 not 7:31 not 7:29, 7:30. I am so happy to have him here and the early wake up (on a holiday Monday no less) has been forgiven because….We have floor joists and a FLOOR! I was so please that I took a few beautiful moments to just lie down on the floor in the sun and contemplate installing a few skylights. That’s right, made of money we are. Then I got up into reality and went to make dinner.
BTW, we are officially speaking in units, not dollars anymore. Holy shit.

I really wanted to move the laundry room. Great idea. No big deal right? Just add a new drain over to the new area, send some water over then and hook them up. I mean the jack hammering wasn’t so bad, was it sweetie? The blisters and feeling that you are still vibrating a week later will go away soon, right? Sounded simple enough to me until I realized that we needed to dig 8 inches of dirt out of the trench, well not really, dirt as I soon discovered…clay. I love clay, especially hard, wet, heavy clay. So much fun. I don’t remember the last time I had sweat dripping into my eyes from so much exertion. Oh yeah, and R discovered that he hadn’t jackhammered quite enough concrete out and got to hack out the rest with a sledgehammer and some choice words.