to do this, you must do that first

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This is the story of this house renovation.  To do this, you must do that first.  It seems that anything done was to cover up something else.  It was had been a constant battle, one that makes every task take forever. 

Outside correcting old mistakes, ordinary renovation tasks always seem to play out this way.
The goal was to add drywall to the bedroom door frame.
To do that, I have to drywall the stairway wall. 
To do that, I have to fur the adjacent wall directly over the stairway. 
But first, I have to rebuild the header to fix the hanging balloon stud that was cut through decades ago. 
To do that, I have to reroute all the wiring. 
But before that, I have to chip away at some of the rabbeted shiplap clad boards and planks. 
Etc. etc. etc. 

So Dave ended up adding the drywall himself.  <sigh>  Someone else is doing my job. 

I was going to add stairway ceiling drywall yesterday, but first I had to add furring strips.  I couldn’t mount them with screws in the sloped wall area as there was no room above the rafter to stuff the drill (driver).  So I went to Canadian Tire and found a 2-pack similar to this for $4.99.  Two!  The floor clerk was there and asked me if I needed help, and I told her I need 50 or 100, not 2.  She didn’t have any. 

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doors, drywall prep

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Among today’s tasks

  • hang bathroom door
  • paint doors 
  • finish drywalling dormer window
  • trim around bedroom door
  • prep remaining ceilings for drywall 

Here’s the bathroom door before being hung. 

The dormer needs a ceiling and drywall on both sides. 

The wires have been secured and the poly taped. 

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drywall, blocking, door framing 45°

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Eight more sheets of 1/2″ drywall. 

The dining area dormer drywall took a couple of tries.  I mistakenly assumed one side would take the opposite cut of the other.  Oops.  Not enough coffee yet (10:00am!).  But it’s done now. 

The kitchen east wall was drywalled.  Floyd came by and helped, and Dave came a little later. 

lunch 

Because I tend to use gangable boxes, they had to be blocked and fastened to the next stud. 

Here’s the bedroom door not quite in the bedroom yet.  The rough opening must be framed at 45°.

I was thinking to rip a 2×4 22.5° and sandwich them together.  However, my table saw doesn’t quite reach out far enough to get the whole board sawn all the way through.  I tried, with Floyd’s help, to cut the remaining 1/2″ reach with a reciprocating saw (saws-all), but this did not work well.

Change of plans – just saw a 2×4 at 45°, and use each half for each side of the door. 

This is the first day of fall (equinox), and this is the first day I see leaves on the ground. 

Dave taped and mudded the kitchen.  Looks really good. 

The bedroom door is now in.  I must talk with Dave about off-angle corner beads. 

west window exterior complete

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Today’s task is to get the exterior of the new windows complete before the scissor lift is returned. 

An unfortunate find.  Floyd says it’s a sparrow.  I think it’s too big to be a sparrow but don’t know what it could be.  Any comments? 

The first trim board is added to the living room window. 

I’m using these 16-foot-long 1x8s as trim boards – part of the house’s history reused. 

The living room trim boards are up, caulked, and ready for paint. 

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windows finally in

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When I got here this morning, the scissor lift was still there, waiting for work to begin.  

The bedroom window rough opening needed to be framed before the window went in. 

However, the lift didn’t go up past 10 feet or so.  I moved the plywood back and forth hoping to give a level ground.  Maybe the error 18 was because it was tilted sideways?  I texted Aaron at United Rentals.  A technician would call me back.

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garbage

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We (finally) got a new garbage container.  Yay. 

The old one had gang spray paint and a big crack in the front. 

The garbage bags and the rest of the refuse wood was piled on the trailer.  I’ll go in a couple of Saturdays to unload it at the landfill.  I’ve separated the drywall, white wood, and garbage (bags, painted wood, etc.) to make it easier at the landfill. 

Today we had the scissor lift to do work on the two remaining windows.  Here is the view from up above. 

begin ceiling drywall

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On to the ceiling.  But first, move the boxes full of flat-pack cabinets that are in the way.

There is no rafter tie on the west end of the house.  A spacer (1″) and backing (2×4 on-the-flat) were added for mounting the ceiling drywall. 

Floyd came by and offered a badly needed 3rd set of arms. 

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cleanup, organization, begin living room

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I spend much of the morning and early afternoon working on cleaning up and organizing construction materials and tools.  Badly needed. 

I bought Ziplock bags from Canadian Tire to organize all the electrical and other stuff.  As it turns out, I have a surplus of outlets, switches, etc. that I didn’t know about as nothing was categorized before.

Paper floor covering went into contractor bags. SONOpan soundproofing panels, cardboard sheets, all the big, bulky stuff that got in the way was organized and stacked.  The kitchen cabinet boxes were moved out of the living room to hang drywall. 

I finally found a bracket that was needed for a 1st floor suite light.

After that, wires were stapled, outlet boxes blocked, and SONOpan soundproofing put into the wall (no pic – I forgot). 

Then the next drywall sheets were put onto the north wall of the living room and taped. 

Plans for tomorrow are to reframe and replace windows, install living room protector plates, and continue with drywall.