Week 14

Lots of doings this week! Except for Monday, where nothing happened because the truck that was supposed to be delivering the lumber broke down.

Tuesday

The lumber!

The forms began to come off:

And they went right into the garage:

(as well as every possible corner of the yard)

Wednesday

By the time we got home on Wednesday, all the forms were gone:

And the guys were set up to go full steam ahead on framing:

The north wall was begun:

Pickles did a special inspection of the footing of the south wall, paying careful attention to the way the bolts are set into the concrete:

And I got word that the next day, they would start removing large sections of this wall:

Thursday

If you've ever wondered how they build houses so close together, where a person can't even get in between them to swing a hammer, this is how it's done -- they build the wall as a separate module, & then push it up into place. It's called a blind wall. Here is the beginning of the bathroom wall:

When it's done, they'll lift it up & bolt it down on that footing that Pickles was inspecting earlier.

Here's the beginning of the wall on the north side:

And, on the south side, the fence-like structure that the neighbor built & attached to the side of our house has been removed, with a piece of plywood put in its place while they build the walls & lift them into place:

Meanwhile, when a dog has to go, a dog has to go:

Sorry, construction guys!

They also did another haul to the dump, bringing some much-needed relief to the yard & garage:

Which they then started to fill up again, with the debris from the demo in the kitchen.

First step: remove the top of the wall & edge of the ceiling so that they can put in some kind of heavy duty header, to support the roof when they open up the 5 1/2 foot-long passthrough:

It's hard to see from the photos, but there are actually two different roofs here, making it look like this big addition to the original house is actually two additions. This picture is the best I could get:

The taller part of the room on the right, seems like a normal room addition, and the shorter one on the left,  seems like it was a porch that was later enclosed.  We've all speculated as to why the kitchen ceiling comes down two feet like that -- apparently, it's just a way to deal with the slope of that porch roof. We're thinking about asking whether it might be possible to just open that up to get some additional height in that part of the room, without it adding a lot to the time or cost of the project.

They also tore up the walls & ceiling in the back porch. Here is the view from below (correct, still no floor):

Meanwhile, Pickles is doing just great. Here she is, practicing her sit/stay in the spot where we're hoping to put the bed, while I pick up after her in the yard:

Also, fun times on Thursday, the crew managed to cut the phone cord. Mr. Bunkport is trying to get the phone company to come out "asap" to fix it, on his dime. It's Sunday, & we're still without phone or internet, but hey, no problem!

Friday

Ah, more debris:

But more encouraging, the north wall is starting to look more like an actual wall, including what's clearly a spot for a window:

Here is one of several heavy duty-looking bracket things that are part of the earthquake safety shearwalls:

Meanwhile, on the south side of the room, blind wall section number two is beginning:

And now that the main part of the concrete slab is ready for action, they started putting more support stilts back in place.

We had noticed a definite wiggle to the house since the pour, so this should help with that.

The plumber also worked on correcting a problem with the vent for the kitchen sink.

Lastly, also on Friday, writing appeared in the kitchen:

We're guessing that one day next week, we'll come home & this is where the hole will be.

Next week, more framing. Before too much longer, we'll have actual walls again, and this pile of dirt can stop being the neighborhood litterbox, aka Pickles' Snack Bar. Barf.