Ok so we’ve got a three week post here. Sorry about that, I’ve just been too darn busy or something. All of a sudden, three weeks went by! Doh! I’ll try to get back to my usual bi-weekly posting after this. In the last episode of “what the heck are these people doing”, Kelly & Nate were all set to start fixing the masonry, and Troy was hopefully starting the porch. Well….

Boom! Kelly spent 2 ½ weeks working his bricklaying magic with us before he had to get back to Georgia. Between him, Nate, Isaac, and Kupey, the repairs on the west side and the front are complete! They installed steel lintels over all the windows, since that was one of the reasons the bricks were sagging in the first place. They even put some fancy solider rows above the windows on the front for decoration-looks awesome, right?  It’s mostly just down to pointing and stucco now. 

Yes, that’s right, stucco. After thinking long and hard and examining everything, we ultimately decided it’s in our best interest to selectively stucco various walls. It’s a historically accurate treatment, and it’s much less tedious and expensive than repointing every single brick wall on the whole place. But it’s still going to be awesome! 

An aside, but I’ve learned a little more now about the whole portland cement thing. Sometimes it’s ok to use it, depending on the mixture and the age and psi, or hardness, of the bricks. It’s just important to know the mortar mix isn’t stronger than the bricks is all, if they are bricks that are going to be getting wet. But that’s really neither here nor there, because..

Look what else is happening out back!

Troy is now waiting for the roofers to finish the slate here (it’s almost done at this point- this pic is a week old), and then he’ll be back to finish these cool porches! It won’t look like a pagoda when it’s all done.

Now about the rest of the outside: We’re still waiting on the cement truck to finish the front sidewalk and the dumpster pad, but our current goal is to have the porches, roofs, and masonry complete by the end of July. Then we won’t have any surprise leaks anymore, like this one! 

I kept smelling mold and thought it was my washing machine, which I cleaned and disinfected every way I could think of. The washer has been exonerated! What is really happening is that water is getting behind the bricks when it pours, and it’s slowly creeping through and dripping onto a beam in the floor, saturating the insulation, and dripping onto the first floor, ceiling, all directly below where the washer is.  At least that’s our working theory. The other is that a water line accidentally got a screw in it when the subfloor was installed, and it is slowly leaking. We won’t know for sure until we rip out more of the first floor ceiling. Three steps forward, one back! Oh well. At least I know I wasn’t insane, I really did smell mold! And now that the ceiling is opened and the insulation is pulled out, it should dry up nicely. 

What else? Oh, here’s what the inside back apartment still looks like:

The plumbing is in place and so is almost all the electric, so it’s going to come together ASAP as soon as we can get the ceilings drywalled. But as you can see, the porch work needs to be completed first, because as nice as all this southern morning light is in the apartment, it’s kinda not exactly water tight. The current inside goal is to get this apartment complete by July!

Bonus picture: Here is our very first Free Range Folk practice inside the music room! It was a beautiful night, so we had the windows open. Turns out, you can hear us from blocks away. Heh heh! Fortunately, we aren’t exactly living that rock-star lifestyle, so don’t worry neighbors, we’re not planning any late-night jams!

Oh, one more thing I forgot: The windows for the dormers are ordered, so we’ll get them sometime soon! At that point, we can install them and finish the dormers, thereby sealing out the pigeons for good! In the meantime, they’re still footloose and fancy free up on the third floor. Ah well!

Ok, I think that’s the complete report! See you in two weeks with an update, I promise!