Week 17

This week, we had another surprise, but also good progress on wrapping up the framing.


Monday

On Monday, we came home to this:

Where did the cabinets go? Oh, here they are:

Where did all the stuff inside them go? Oh, here it is:

Why did this happen? So the rest of the kitchen ceiling could be opened up:

Ok, then. 

We spent a little time that evening getting breakable things out of harm's way, & getting all the food into the main part of the house, behind the sturdy door that gets closed & latched every night. The last thing we need is some kind of critter to waltz into the kitchen in the middle of the night, drawn in by the feast. In addition to the mice, rats, cats, & possums plaguing the neighborhood, long-time readers may recall some of the other fearsome animals we contend with on a daily basis:

The guys also did another massive clean up on Monday:

The shock of the cabinet situation was somewhat tempered by the relief at having a yard and walkway again.

Tuesday

On Tuesday, they made more progress in the kitchen.

The engineer's plans call for a post to remain at the end of the counter, because we weren't planning on making any changes to the ceiling (not knowing what was under that soffit that weirdly dropped the ceiling height by 2 feet in the middle of the kitchen), and that post holds up the low beam supporting the roof:

Once we asked them to leave the ceiling over the sink & stove open (rather than replace the weird soffit), they went ahead & figured out a way to raise that low beam a whole foot, & have it supported by that heavy duty header they put in last week:

This is the spectacular sight that we came home to on Tuesday:

Conceivably, we could comfortably seat 6-8 people at that counter, by the way. We're very excited at how this has shaped up.

They also finished off the south wall upstairs, which stopped the loud Tyvek flapping that was disturbing poor Pickles:

Downstairs, they cut the openings for two of the windows:

Wednesday

On Wednesday, the bathroom wall was framed:

And the chunk of the original foundation started getting knocked out to make the threshold for the door from the garage. 

View from the garage:

View from the room:

Thursday

This was another big cleanup day, and the threshold for the door was finished:

The framers -- one of whom has a hardhat shaped like a cowboy hat -- are getting ready to wrap up and move on, and Mr. Bunkport is getting ready to move his own crew in. Following AJ's lead, where she has declared that she does not ever again want to hear another estimate on when something is going to happen (since, infuriatingly, the timeframe is almost never right), instead of saying what should happen next week, I'll just say what comes next: completion of roofing, electrical, plumbing & concrete, and beginning of exterior finishes (siding, and installation of windows & doors).