Insulation & Drywall

This is such a major step in our remodel. I couldn't wait to get the insulation done so we could put drywall up. I was really tired of looking at wires, pipes, and 2x4's. In order to meet the code of the R value in our now vaulted ceiling in our main living area, we had to get spray foam insulation. It is quite the process. Very interesting too. You need to make sure you hire someone who knows what they are doing. Two different chemicals meet at the tip of their spray gun which creates the foam. If you don't have the correct balance it can be a huge nightmare. Here is one of the guys who worked on our ceiling.

This is what it looked like when it was done.

I know, probably isn't too exciting for those reading, but to me, it was super exciting. When we first started working on the house this milestone seemed so far off. It started to feel like we were never going to get insulation. But it finally came!!

It looks like we hired out the rest of the insulation too! Mark's dad did most of the batt insulation, which was a huge help in speeding up to the next major milestone, DRYWALL. Thanks Ron!

From down below looking up, getting the drywall on our now 11' high ceiling wasn't an easy task. Thankfully the men did it all. It definitely was a group effort. My dad, Mark's Dad, and our friend Ryan came to help hang some big (4x12) and heavy sheets of drywall. I love this picture, it's a reminder of how much help we have had in this huge undertaking.

This picture is great too because Ryan is so happy!

That same day my mom and the boys helped prep the front yard for grass seed. It was fun seeing them working together and they really did a great job for how young they are.

The ceiling was just the beginning of many days and nights of hanging drywall. UGH! I would drop the older boys off at preschool in "normal" clothes, come home and change into my work clothes, put up as much drywall as I could in 2 hours and then change back to my "normal" clothes again. I really looked pretty bad in my work clothes. I didn't want the boys teachers concerned about my kids home life! Then I would just repeat the process when we got home from preschool. Lets just say the kids watched more cartoons then is recommended. But it was all for their better health in the long run.

I was so motivated to get the house to a point where we could get everything taped and mudded. I am in no way a pro in putting up drywall, I felt soo slow, and I was. But I wanted it to be done right so I took my time.  After the kids were in bed Mark and I would hang more drywall.

We hired out the mudding and taping as I am pretty sure it would have taken Mark and I a whole month or longer to finish. It took them a week and that was only because of the process of letting it dry between coats. They are amazing. I swore I took pictures of them working on their stilts but a kid must have deleted them.

Up next, PAINT!

Hardwood Floors

When we did the inspection on our house we realized that underneath all the carpet in the bedrooms and living room on the upper floor was oak hardwoods. I felt like I was on a HGTV show and was so excited to find them, jackpot!

The bedrooms would be our new dining and kitchen, our main space when you walk in, will be restored hardwoods. The problem was that where there was a wall, there was no hardwood. Well I took on the task of patching all the hardwood. It was hard work but so worth it.

The first video is taking pieces out so that I could weave new pieces in. Basically you drill a hole on each side of the piece you want to take out and then run a saw down the middle of the wood on each side of the hole so you can take out a chunk from the middle of the wood. This allows you to pry out the nailed down side and the interlocked side of the piece of wood.

 

If only I really did that much in 1 minute! The next video is me patching a few pieces back down where there was once a wall. Our kitchen island will be covering up where it looks like I missed some patching. You can see me coming back and forth because I was cutting down the wood to the right size outside. I also put down construction adhesive (Loctite PL Premium) prior to nailing the wood down to help prevent the floor creaking and just to make it a stronger floor. 

This was by far the hardest part. It took a REALLY LONG time! Sometimes the places I was patching were very difficult. In one part I had to rip the wood down because I couldn't fit a whole piece in. If you don't get it just right, it does not look good. Sometimes you have to keep rearranging the wood to see which ones work best. This is probably the biggest project I did. My mom helped when she could and pushed me to keep going.

Marks dad cleaned most of the hardwood floor after I was done patching. We had to be careful what cleaner we used to not damage it.  The carpet pad that was against the wood left spots of carpet pad that had basically turned into a sticky mush that had been hardened. Not easy to get off.

Here is a picture of a heat register I patched (sorry I should have taken a before picture).

 

One of the few things we hired out was refinishing the hardwood. I knew I could patch it but I wanted to make sure it was refinished professionally. With 3 kiddos running throughout the house it needed to be scratch resistant. Here is a beautiful picture of  the floors after they sanded them down. I couldn't believe it!

 

 And here is the finished product with stain and a Swedish finish. 

 

It feels great knowing that the original hardwoods are still in our house and got to come back to life. I am a nostalgic person and also one that doesn't like things to go to waste (which can sometimes be a bad thing) but in this case a win.

Tonasket - looking back at summer

My Grandpa lives in Tonasket, WA. Each summer we try to make it over there. I love being unable to receive texts, phone calls, etc. To be forced to unplug is so healthy for me. Plus he lives on 60 acres and me and the boys can just roam free. My mom came too and we had a lot of fun.

The boys beating the heat, mid 90's, with an ice cream bar

There was a robins nest that I was able to reach with a ladder to take pictures. Each day I would get up to see if the egg had hatched. Our last morning I snapped the picture of the new born birdie

Miles and Luke working for Great Grandpa picking up Ponderosa Pinecones with their grabbers.

A Gardner snake we found. Luke wasn't quite ready to hold it yet but Miles loved it.

I remember drinking hot chocolate with my brother and sister out of these same mugs. Its not going to Great Grandpas if he doesn't offer you hot chocolate EVERY DAY, his signature.

Love the memories made at Grandpa's!

Electrical & Plumbing

So much has happened since my last post. Almost all of the electrical and plumbing that needs to be done before insulation is finished. There has been so much that has gone into both of those. There is no eye candy when you are working with wire and pipe. Without knowing what Mark and Dave (our plumber) were working on it was pretty hard to see what they had been working on for hours after the major items had been completed. Here is just an start of all the work they have done. 

1.  Removed all the current electrical and replaced with new wire and lots of outlets, lighting, etc.
2.  Upgraded the panel
3.  Gutted all the old copper pipe and ran Pex throughout
4.  Added a new drain line that involved tearing up the concrete and joining to the existing main sewer drain (for the kitchen sink and washing machine)
5.  Installed new drain and water pipes for kitchen sink, island sink, additional bathroom upstairs
6.  Ran coax and ethernet throughout the house
7. Run gas line for the stove top

Here is one of the downstairs bedrooms where the concrete had to be taken up. Mark and his Dad can attest to the hardness of this 65 year old concrete. We had to do this to connect a new drain to the main drain from outside.

After the plumbing inspection. which we passed with flying colors, it was nice to see the holde covered up in the bedroom. No more dirt for the boys to play in!

Here are our cutest workers on the crew.

My future kitchen sink.....

My favorite Electrician hard at work

I did get my hand in running the wire for the fire alarms. It was fun. Headlamp needed because Mark was working on something else that required him to turn power off to the lights. I feel so cool pretending to be an electrician. Don't worry, Mark double checks all my work.



first marathon

Last month I ran the Seattle Rock N Roll Marathon. It was such an amazing experience. The process started 4 months ago when I found out my sister, friend, and cousin were all running the marathon.  

I have done a handful of half marathons and the last one I did, as I was running the race, I told myself, "DON'T RUN A MARATHON!" at that point in the race I was so sure that running a marathon would be crazy because I was so tired and I hadn't even finished 13 miles. It has always been something that I wanted to do but didn't think that I physically could. I am pretty sure my sister believed in me before I believed in myself.

It was three and a half months of training. Here is my training schedule and cheerleader section I had posted by my bed to make sure I stayed on track. It consisted of 5 days of running and long runs on Saturday. I was able to complete almost every day until my knee started getting upset with me. Thankfully with help from a PT and my amazing chiropractor I was able to keep it under control. Well, and a little help from KT Tape. Towards the end it was hard to stay on schedule. My body was feeling old and tired. But I am so glad I stuck to it.

 

 

 

The night before the race I was fairly nervous. I still wasn't sure I could actually finish a marathon. During training I got up to 22 miles but felt pretty done at that point. Plus you never know how your body is going to feel and react on race day.

 

Here is a selfie right before the race started. It was a beautiful morning. Just perfect!! As soon as I got to start running my nerves totally calmed down and I was so excited to be running.

 

 

The race didn't necessarily go how I dreamed it to go. But I got the time I was aiming for which was under 4 hours and most importantly I really enjoyed the whole experience. At times my body felt tired but most of all I felt very thankful for having the ability to run. It was a very spiritual experience and I am pretty sure I was praying for at least an hour total during the race.

 

What really spurred me on was seeing my friend cheering for me on at I-90. Which if you know the race then you understand how awful it can be. It totally boosted my spirits. Then around mile 25 I saw my dad, who I wasn't expecting to see. It totally got me teary eyed. Then right before the big climb to the finish I saw my husband, my three boys, my mom and my best friend cheering for me. I felt overwhelmed for how the Lord had blessed me and booked it up the hill.

 

 

 

Once I crossed the finish line it was kind of surreal. I guess since I didn't have anyone there right at the finish line it almost didn't feel like I had just ran a marathon. Almost 4 hours of running and then I stopped. It was over. I took another selfie since I wasn't sure what else to do but I wanted to have something to look back on after what was a huge accomplishment for me!!

 

 

 

I ran the marathon myself but it was a team effort to have the time to train. A huge thanks to Mark for allowing me to take up evenings and Saturdays to train, my Mother in Law who sacrificed many mornings so I could get my run in without children, my sister, Amanda and Tricia who kept me accountable for my long runs and who motivated me, and my mom who watched the kiddos on a whim when Mark needed to work on the house.

 

I really want to run another one! :)

 



beams & vaulted ceilings

I am so excited that we got the beams installed. It looks amazing. The upstairs feels so much bigger and its going to be such an amazing space.

This was the downstairs before the post was removed and the beam was raised and replaced. 

Here are the temporary walls Mark had to build before the beam could be removed to make sure the joists didn't fall down. To be clear, that isn't Mark in the picture but his awesome friend who came to help. He and Mark get a lot of work done together and talk just as much ;) It's fairly impressive.

Once the guys cut the joists so the beam could be raised higher than the old beam and got the beam on the lifts, they slowly raised the beam. The pictures make it look easy but they still had to pound a sledgehammer to get the beam to settle into place, about 6" higher than the old beam. Makes for a lot of additional head room.

Here they are again cranking the lifts on either end of the massive beam.

Here is another view of the joists cut and the beam placement.

 

And Voila!! Since we increased the quality of the beam (it was the same size as we had before), we were able to remove the post that was in the middle of the floor.

 

Here is Shane walking the plank!

Basically the same process was done upstairs too. Mark built two more temporary walls to support the rafters.

Then they raised the beam and connected it with hangers.

Then the rafter were raised up and connected to the beam. Wow!! It makes such a huge difference.

 

Another angle.

 

 Next up, the stairs!

Luke's Birthday

I was only going to show our house projects on the blog but decided to share Luke's Birthday Party while I am at it.

Luke turned 3! He had a FISHING party at the park. It was a lot of fun even though it wasn't as sunny as I was hoping for. The kids looked adorable in their makeshift fishing vests.

 

 

LUKE CAUGHT A FISH!

SHANE BEING A FISH



PARTY CUPCAKES

 



 

THE LONE RANGER!

Now its back to work! Up next, the beams.