The trouble lies with my camera. It is non-functioning, so I appologize for the lack of photo documentation. I'll have to see if I can borrow one from a friend tomorrow to document some of the work thus far.
As for the toiling; I've been toiling away making rubble. Lots of rubble.
It all started this morning when I picked up my building permit I should have had last night, then I headed over to the house. If you can imagine the reaction of a 4yr old girl when she gets a pony for her birthday, you can imagine the reaction when I saw the construction dumpster had already been placed in my driveway.
I ripped down all of the drywall for the extra walls in the living room and proceeded to knock out some of the studs. I now have an open staircase! I also removed all of the stairwell's drop ceiling and 70's paneling I could reach without a ladder. At 6' 1", there's not much left! So I understood why the PO's decided to go with the drop ceiling as soon as I pulled down the tiles and received a shower of paint chips. Most likely lead. Just love the stuff. The paneling was used to cover two make-shift access points to the tub plumbing and quite a few cracks. Just add it to the list...
Just so you know what I've learned so far,
DAY 1 LESSONS LEARNED THE HARD WAY:
1. Wear safety goggles. There's a reason for them. I found out that it is quite uncomfortable removing a 1/4" chunk of drywall that is stuck onto the pupil of your eye. Yep, that was an ouch moment. Well, other words came too...
2. Wear a dust mask when removing drywall. Try blowing your nose and finding the remains grey. That's just not natural.
3. Overestimate the size of your dumpster. I thought 6 yards would be plenty, but it's over half full already. Wow.
4. Wear your work gloves, even if it's 90 degrees in your house. I can't tell you how great blisters & calloused hands feel in the hot shower as you scrub chunks of drywall out of your hair.
5. Don't break your camera. Houseblog readers will become bored by your post without pictures. Sorry guys.
On the bright side, I met my neighbor to the West last night, and he was very nice. I got the thumbs-up right away when I said I was restoring the house back from a rental. He has stopped in a couple of times to offer to lend me tools if needed, and I gave him a little tour of the place.
The roofers came today and repaired the flashing around my chimney, so no more leakage. Yes! Best part: cost to me: $0, cost to the seller: $I don't care. I'm so glad thats done so I can repair the water damaged wall in the SW bedroom closet.
Also, a friend from work is coming over tonight after her shift to help pull up carpet with me. I'm going to see if she wants to help take out the cabinets in the extra kitchen too. Hopefully she'll be up for it, I don't want to have to take them down myself. Help is always good, lets just hope there's enough room in my little baby dumpster!
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4 comments:
Yeah, dumpsters fill up quickly! I ordered a 15 yard dumpster for my re-roofing, but they delivered a 20 yard instead because they were out of 15s. It's almost half-full of old shingles now and I wonder if I'll have room for the extra stuff I want to get rid of. I think I paid $20 more to go from a 12 to a 15, and $0 to go from 15 to 20, so I'm pretty happy either way. I wish I would have gotten it right after we moved in and started the demo work.
Now go out and get a new camera!
Oh no! Now you're all making me nervous that I'm making a mistake in NOT getting a dumpster. We may do that when we tear down the plaster and lath. But for now we've just got carpet and wood paneling. I'm hoping we can fill up the bed of a pickup to haul to the landfill, and make bundles of the rest to leave on the curb.
Those of you with more experience, do you think the carpet from a 1000 square foot house will fit in the back of a pickup?
Wow, Nate you're really going to town! I can't wait to see pictures. Borrow a camera? Use a camera phone? FEED MY CURIOSITY!!! Because you know, that's what's really important here, my entertainment. :-P
I can't wait to see what your staircase is going to look like once it's done. I LOVE staircases. I'm sad there's not an open staircase in my house, but maybe our next house will have one.
Yep, get the camera! I'm excited to see what you are doing...
Andrea
Not to hi-jack Nate's blog, but to answer Kelli's question, if I had a pickup and had to remove carpet from a 1000 square foot house, I would just use the truck and make a couple of trips. Same with a lot of the typical renovation work. I'm stuck with a mini-van (my life is over, I can admit it) so for me a dumpster is the best choice.
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