Long Overdue Update

Wow, it's been 3 1/2 months since I've written on my blog. I just got worn out from working full-time, taking care of my mom, and trying to finish things up around the house, especially the landscaping. There were just so many things left undone when we moved in.
One of the biggest things holding me up has been the damned cistern. I couldn't fill in the hole over it until I had connected the drain pipes from the south roof. Alex and I dug out trenches for the tubes in early May. Then it rained and rained, and rained so much that the trenches, which were dug in hard-as-a-rock clay, collapsed. I had temporarily set the tubes in the trenches to catch the rainwater, but hadn't glued them together because it started raining when I was ready to do that. Then it rained every weekend for six weeks or so. The picture below shows the trench I dug from the downspout to the cistern. Alex is working on the area where the overflow tube is going to go from the cistern along the south side of the house to the front yard rain garden (one of the last things which will be finished).
Alex got about halfway, working with a pickax before the rains came.

I bought two peach trees from McKay Nursery in Wisconsin. This is called the McKay peach tree and it's meant for zone 4. I had to use a post hole digger to dig holes to put them in, to loosen up the dirt so the roots would be able to spread out. The tree in the foreground never got any green on it, and I think it's dead. The one near the porch is thriving, though.

My goal for the summer of 2010 was to get all my perennials in, both fruit, vegetables, and flowers. I wanted to get the yard landscaped, all the raised beds in, and put a living fence put along the driveway to block out Olson Memorial Highway. I wanted to get walkways put in, especially the one from the front sidewalk to the front door, the porch built, and the patio and pergola done. Oh, and put in the living roof on the main house and the porch roof. And I wanted to be sure to have a full vegetable garden so I could do my canning this year. Also, I scheduled about 7 quite large social events at the house. Did I mention that I work full-time in a demanding job and I take care of my mom, who lives with me?
I got two asparagus beds put in. I planted strawberries along the retaining wall, and they should produce a good crop next year. I did get a garden in, but it hasn't been doing too well because it rains every weekend I have time to work in it. So the weeds totally took over and nearly drowned out everything.

I have four or five rhubarb plants, and quite a few raspberry plants, and a couple blueberry plants, all holding space in the back garden, awaiting transplant to a permanent location. I plan on putting them in some raised beds in the back, if I ever get the cistern hole filled in. I have about six or so grape vines, waiting for the pergola to be put in, so they can climb up it. I have about 8 lilac trees growing in pots, waiting for the front to be landscaped. My friend Jan gave me two great hostas about three months ago, but they are still in pots.

The cistern is still making a mess of the back yard because there's still a hole there messing everything up.

Pictures of Inside; back temp ramp completed

Okay, the first picture below shows the living room before, then the third below shows current. The picture below shows the "before" view from the living room to the kitchen. The fifth picture down shows the current view.

Front bedroom/office. My sister was visiting, and we were doing things around the house.

Current view of kitchen from the living room through the dining room.

Mom's setting the table for a family get together.

The back deck at the start of the project. It rained the night before, so it's just mud. We're putting together pipes in the foreground for the railing.

My brother Cliff and sister-in-law Rosa. Cliff is sawing off a piece of cement that was in the way of where the pavers would go. I laid fabric on top of the soil, then we put some rock on top of that.

Then I put more fabric on top, so I could put sand on top of that. The stacks of pavers are VAST pavers, made of recycled tires. They look like bricks, but are very light. You buy them in 1 foot square grids, at $7.99 a square foot. Even though they are made here in Minneapolis, you have to buy them through a dealer like Natural Built Home, which is where I bought mine from. I just laid them down the way they came, but later I'll pull the bricks out of the grid and mix the colors up and lay them in a pattern that I've made up. These are permeable pavers, so my ramp is just temporary as built. I needed to get something in ASAP for my mom. The step off the deck (without a railing) was just not good for her. Later, I'll pick up the brick grids, and dig down 12-18" and put in a proper drainage base with a permanent edging.

Below is the sand on top of the top layer of fabric, ready for the pavers.

Half done! Everyone is taking a break.

Finished with the railing installed. Safe for Mom, and now my friend Teddy can come and visit me.

It only took the three of us five hours to put this in, so it wasn't too bad. It will take a lot longer to dig it out and put the proper base in, though.

Hot Water Problems

I have a super-duper high efficiency on-demand hot water heater that is a backup to the solar hot water. After it was hooked up, but before we moved in, sometimes the hot water didn't work at all. It turns out there was some problem with the gas line being too short, so gas pressure didn't build up, so it didn't always work. Or something like that. So Steve Carlyle of O.C. Mechanical added a loop in the gas line to make it longer. Then it worked fine. Then, a couple weeks ago, my morning shower was warm, but not hot. That continued, so I emailed Steve, but he was out of town. I talked to him when he got back and he came over to look at it, but couldn't find anything wrong. Then I figured out the luke-warm showers started about the same time I installed a Waterpik Ecoflow Showerhead. I like Waterpiks and always have had one in every place I've lived. I like being able to hold the showerhead and rinse off more easily.
There were two problems with this Ecoflow, though. Number one, the shower spigot was way up near the ceiling, and when I installed it, I could barely reach it standing on my tiptoes. When I complained to Jeffrey (who is like 6'6" or something) that the plumber was an idiot for doing that, he admitted he had marked the spot for the spigot. Well, I've shrunk to 5'51/2" now, and I'd try to put the showerhead back in the holder, and wouldn't quite make it and twice if fell and banged on the tub, and the third time it fell and hit me on the head. The next day I went to Home Depot and bought and extender. I bought it right before I had a dinner party, and put it somewhere to get it out of sight, and then I lost it. But I found it tonight. Oh, the second thing that was wrong with the Ecoflow was that it said on the package it had a "pause" button. I like that, because, being green, I don't like to waste water. So I like to turn off the water while I wash my hair and lather up. If the water's on, it washes everything off while you're trying to lather up. Anyway, the pause button lowered the flow considerably, but didn't shut it off. Pause means stop temporarily to me. When I read the fine print, it never said it stopped the flow. It tapped danced around what the pause button really did. So when I bought the extender, I also bought a real pause button to hook on it. Then I figured out the third thing that was wrong. It was so "lowflow" that it wasn't triggering the water heater to come on. So I was getting the heat from the storage tanks, which has been about 104 degrees early in the morning, but the water heater wasn't kicking in. That's why the showers were warm, but not hot.
So tonight, I took out the Ecoflow, seen here below (see how close it is to the ceiling!)
and put back the Delta lowflow with an extender and the stop button. I'll get a different Waterpik that's not so lowflow. So I have this beautiful Waterpik Ecoflow I can't use. I'll give it to my sister Cathy; I remember the last time I visited her, she had such a lowflow contraption that it took five minutes just to get wet.

Then another problem with the hot water is that I keep the tank capped at 110 degrees. This is lower than even the LEED certification requires (120). But my mom doesn't want the water really hot because she's afraid she'll burn herself, that's why I keep it at 110. When the storage tanks are hotter than 110, though, the hot water heater won't kick on, it just lets the hot water pick up heat from the storage tanks, which are getting up to 160 degrees now in the afternoon, on a sunny day. They'll get even hotter as the sun gets hotter. So that's a problem. I need to let the tanks get hot so the heat lasts all night, which it has been doing. I'll need to talk to IPS and Steve of O.C. Mechanical to see if there is a fix for that.

Back Again Blogging!

The months of October and November just wore me out and I needed to take a break from house things. Unpacking during the holidays was pretty stressful; it was difficult because this house is actually smaller than the one we moved from and doesn't have nearly the storage space. It's a good excuse to get rid of things we don't need.

I was so exhausted from trying to finish the house enough to move in, the move, and the unpacking that I couldn't work on any of the finishing until recently. I had a large dinner party last weekend, and used that as a motivation to get a few things started again. There is still so much finishing left to do that the thought of it was overwhelming. But in getting ready for the dinner, I was able to get motivated to accomplish a few things that I had been putting off, like getting most of the boxes out of the spare bedroom so it actually looks like a bedroom instead of a storage locker, and finishing the basement steps, which until two weeks ago were still raw wood protected by three layers of construction paper.

I have a few pictures to post, and will take more showing the mostly finished inside of the house. Pictures turn out very well when taken during the daylight hours, but I'm never at home during daylight except on weekends. I was so busy working on things this weekend, I forgot to take some pictures.

Below is my green shed, which can be used as a garage. I could put my Prius inside, as it will easily fit, but I'm using it mostly for storage right now. It doesn't have too much stuff in it anymore, but there are some furniture items I need to take to a charitable organization to get rid of. The garage, from Duramax, only came in green in this size, 12 by 20. Actually, it matches the roof quite well.

View from the front of the house.The porch railing that Jeffrey did. You can also see the cement steps. I'm putting in permeable pavers, VAST Pavers, instead of a cement sidewalk. I just ran out of time before the snow came.

Stuff stacked up in the basement. My mom can't handle clutter, so anything that doesn't have a place upstairs gets dumped in the basement. I'm working on putting in more shelves in the basement where I can to create more storage.

For a while, the main living area in the basement (my living room/kitchenette) and the office area down there were totally filled with furniture and boxes from floor to ceiling, front to back. It's getting better, but it will still be a long haul to getting rid of things to open everything up.

More soon.

We Are Moved In!

A couple pictures first:

The kitchen countertops installed. It's Ceasarstone. Space for where the butcherblock countertop will go.

The sink and stovetop installed.

Better view of the sink.

A working sink!

My mom and I didn't get moved in until November 17th, a week later than planned. The house just wasn't ready. The interior woodwork took way longer to install than planned, and then had to be stained and finished after installation (my job). We didn't even come close to finishing the woodwork, even though I had taken a whole week off work. Most of the main level has stain and one coat of finish, but that's it. The basement woodwork is complete, but no stain or finish. I'll do that over the winter, I hope.

Right now, I'm just working on unpacking. Because I had so much to do at the new house, I did nothing to prepare for the move. Now I've moved many times in my adult life, having been in the Army and working for the Army as a civilian. I counted them up, and this is my 16th move. It was the worst one, just because I didn't have time to prepare. Also, we had two complete households in one house, and we moved both into a slightly smaller house with no garage. But enough complaining about the move. I couldn't have done it without the help of my family. My sister Cathy and husband Ned came for five days to start packing up the house. They would have stayed longer, but they had sold their house and were moving the week after I was. My brother Cliff and wife Rosa were real troupers. They worked on the house helping me stain for 7 straight days, and then helped pack things up and get moved for another two days. I couldn't have done it without them. My sister Pat took care of my mom in the hotel while we got the house stuff moved.

I had hoped to put in the front sidewalk before winter. The only way I could do that now is to put it in temporarily. Use the permeable VAST pavers, but not put in a full bed underneath. Just put in a few inches of gravel, put the pavers on top, and redo them in the summer. I have a contractor who will do it for $1000, but that's way too much money when I could do it myself for the cost of the aggregate. I really need to put in a sidewalk in the rear, so my mom can get in and out of the house/porch easily. Really, if I don't do something this weekend, the ground will freeze too hard to do anything.

The solar thermal is up and running as of yesterday. It was supposed to be operational a week ago, after weeks of IPS messing around with minor problems causing major delays. One of their technicians came out last Tuesday, did some work, and declared it operation. Unfortunately, she didn't turn on the switch that activated the entire system. So as the sun shone and the panels got hot and the tanks warmed up, the house got colder and colder over Thanksgiving weekend because the water in the tubes in the floor wasn't moving through the nice, hot storage tanks. On Sunday morning, when the house was 62 degrees, I called IPS, who said there was nothing they could do, it was an HVAC problem. That kind of pissed me off, since the HVAC (the boiler back-up system) worked FINE for three weeks until IPS activated the solar. Steve Carlyle of O.C. Mechanical came out and disconnected the solar on Sunday so I could have some heat and not let my poor mom freeze to death. More on IPS and the solar later.

The PV solar (the electric part) isn't active yet, though everything is in place. It takes ExcelEnergy a while to get going, and since I don't have battery storage and am connected to the grid, I have to wait for them to do their thing.

True Blue Electric, who did the electric for the house as well as the solar PV, has done a great job. I would recommend them to anyone who needs electric or solar PV. Same with O.C. Mechanical. Steve Carlyle has been a true professional and very competent. The guy who installed my bamboo flooring, Rob Haas, was also awesome. He said he did tile, too, and I had him do the bathrooms and kitchen (all but the floors). Now I think I did one heck of a job myself picking out the tile and making up the pattern I wanted, but Rob executed the plan in an outstanding manner. I'll post his contact info on the next blog. I don't have it handy, but he was really great.

Jeffrey Swainhart has been my project manager throught this project, and I couldn't have done it without him. I'll talk more about his contributions later. He's still working on some projects to complete everything I want done, like the rainwater cistern, the back porch, the pergola, and the garage.

Two Weeks to Go!

I'm in a relative panic, as the move date is set for November 9th and many things still have to be done. Current status on critical areas:

• The electric is about 85% completed. True Blue Electric has done a great job, and I would recommend them to anyone needing electrical work. It will take them one more day to finish things up, and I want to wait because of all the ceiling fans which are left to be installed. There are still too many contractors on site carrying ladders and other long objects which could easily smash the heck out of a ceiling fan.
• All the floors are in and just have a little finishing work to be done (like sealing the grout in the kitchen and bath, and putting in transition pieces after the doors are installed).
• Speaking of the DOORS, the interior doors were ordered through Home Depot. The order has been delayed twice by two weeks each time. I'm kind of running out of time. I'm promised they'll be here by the end of this week, but in the meantime, the carpenters hired to install them aren't available after this week.
• The window finishing has been coming along. Jeffrey hired two carpenters to finish the windows, since it was taking so long. Paul and Bevin have been doing a great job, and are nearly done. I have all the finishing work yet to do (filling in the nail holes, staining, and varnishing).
• The back landing and garage slab may be done this coming week. I need the back landing put in; the yard is a sea of mud.
• I have the VAST Permeable Pavers for the front walkway, but it's been raining and is too muddy to dig the foundations out for them.
• All the appliances have been ordered and are here or will be this week. The kitchen countertops should go in this week. I'm staining the new cabinets to match the old this weekend.
• The boiler and hot water heater are in and working. Innovative Power Systems, who is doing the solar thermal, has had the panels on the roof since spring. Hopefully, they'll get them hooked up and working this week. They had to wait until the boiler and hot water heater were in.
• The clay plastering is coming along. The upstairs level is done except for compressing the clay. The lower level has the first coat on in the bedroom and office, and both coats in the living room.
• Landscaping is going to have to wait until next summer.

Below are the boiler and hot water heater (on demand), all hooked up. With all the valves, it looks like the mechanics in a sumbarine.

The bamboo floors upstairs.

Four Weeks to Go!

Wow, things are really moving at a fast and furious pace! It looks like we'll get done by the move-in week of November 9th, if I can last for another 4 weeks. In the next week, the bamboo floors are going in, the boiler and hot water heater will be installed and WORKING (the house has been in the 40s the last four days), the electric will be nearly completed, the interior doors will arrive and get put in, the solar heating panels should be working, and the solar PV panels for the electricity should be on the roof and working.
I took the week off from work to work on the house this week. I wanted to finish the clay plastering, but it's too cold in the house! I had to stop plastering today, and will work on some other tasks until the heat gets turned on Thursday morning (my fingers are crossed).
It's been an interesting week so far. Jeffrey nearly impaled his thigh with a piece of wood caught in the table saw. I'm telling you, construction equipment is dangerous! Luckily, all he has is a really bad bruise. I took a bad fall today, the fourth one since I broke my wrist in May. I was outside in a sea of mud (my yard is bare dirt, and it snowed four inches Monday). My boots were caked with mud and I stepped on a wet plastic tarp, and that did it. Construction sites are dangerous! I've tripped over power cords snaking all over the floor, over sawhorses, and construction material strewn all over everywhere. I have made it a habit to put on my heavy work boots as soon as I get to the construction site, even if I'm not planning on doing any work. Just walking around there is hazardous to my health. My chance of tripping over something is a lot less when I have on heavy boots.
Here's a picture of my new stepladder that Jeffrey picked out for me. He wasn't satisfied with any at Home Depot, so he went to a store that had a much larger selection, and got me this one.
Quite a step up from the one below, which sent me flying backwards onto the basement floor when the ladder collapsed.

Here's the gypcret bathroom floor, painted with sealer before the tile floor was put in.

The kitchen floor was painted with sealer, also. You can see the cabinets a little better.

Below is the bathroom floor, tiled, but not grouted yet.

Here's the kitchen floor (porcelan tile from the ReUse Center) ready for the grout. Porcelan tile is very hard and can be used outdoors. I have enough left over so I can tile my 3 season porch, when it every gets built.

Here's all the boxes of bamboo flooring, ready to be installed. You have to have it in the house for at least a week to acclimate. The installers are coming tomorrow morning.

Okay, this next picture is amazing. This little tiny thing is the boiler. It will heat the whole house (easily!) should the sun not shine for days on end and the temperature go way below zero. It's about the size of a carry-on suitcase. It's called a slant fin boiler.

The water heater is even smaller. It's an "on demand" heater, very efficient. It reminds me of the hot water heaters in Germany. Since it's "on demand", it doesn't keep 40 or more gallons of water hot, day and night. The hot water will be mostly heated from the solar panels. The water heater won't go on unless it's needed.

This pile of snow proves how insulated my house is. This morning, I didn't see snow on any of my neighbor's houses. My north roof was still covered with snow, and late in the afternoon, it slid off and made a snow pile.