projects on the go
This is a house built in 1906 at 1403 3 Ave. N., Coalbanks (later to become Lethbridge), AB, Canada. It was the same year the Lethbridge Viaduct (commonly called the High Level Bridge) was built. It is one of the only two-storey houses built in the area. It’s been added on to four times but still maintains close to its original look. I bought the house in Dec. 2021 as a rental property. It has a 3-bedroom suite on the main floor and a one-bedroom suite on the second. This blog is an account of all that we (FT and I) have done to make it rentable. Read about the main or 2nd floor (“up”) by going to that category. Comments are welcome (but moderated)!
I need a new ceiling fan for the kitchen. However, all the simple, clean, white ones without any extra goo-gogs and dingle-bombles and doo-dads all over it have single light or an LED cluster that isn’t suitable as a) it doesn’t offer enough light for a kitchen or b) the lights are built-in and not changeable. Here’s not a bad one from Home Depot.
A couple of weeks ago I snapped a pic of the grasses in the Costco parking lot. I asked around various gardening places to see what they were.
I cleaned out the van and back yard (garden) today, and Dave trimmed a lot of the trees at the alley. Some of them were crowding the power lines.
I wasn’t supposed to come in today as I had other obligations, but I was called away to a sewer problem at another property. In my spare time between tasks, I came here. Light duties today.
I found out why the kitchen light only sometimes worked. Here was the pattern:
bedroom light turned on
There was a rather unattractive pile of seemingly junk lumber stacked outside the back door while we worked on the mudroom. I restacked and organized it all in the front porch (sunroom). It is all usable.
Many of them have yet to be de-nailed.
The day started at 7:30 with a trip to Home Depot to get some screws for the ceiling fans. Costco is close by. Their parking lot has tall grass shrubs. This is what I would like for the boulevard to dress up the front of the house.
The boulevard is covered in weeds. I would like to plant some of the same blue flowers (a wild flower) that both neighbours have, some sunflowers, and a type of tall bushy grass (I see these in the Costco parking lot). I also trimmed one of the trees.
But the priority for my time is getting the house suites complete. The outside will have to wait.
As none of the weeping tile, run-off mitigation, waterproofing, etc. has been done yet, the heavy rains in the past few days have caused some difficulties.
The mudroom leaks. None of the flashing or sealant between the four-square house and the mudroom has been replaced yet, so the mudroom leaks.
Is today the day the welding actually starts? I’ve got my 5th or so draft of the staircase completed.
We’ll see.
The new shower stall base was put in, and the back and side walls were added. The results: The house is still crooked.
As Dave would comment, “It’s built like a pig barn.”
The only solution is to continue raising the add-on (pig barn) to be level with the remainder of the house. You can’t have plumb, level, square, and straight in an old house, so I’m told. There’s always going to be one or more of those missing from the equation. In this case:
Next step: Jack the add-on and east side of the house until it is level with the west half. There can be no progress in the eastern half of the house until this is done.