Day 81 - Stairs

The new stairs were delivered and installed Saturday, they look good. (and are a touch safer)

Day 80 - It's getting hot in here...

With the plumbing and electrical inspections successfully complete it's time to start closing stuff out. 

The house was full of insulation on Wednesday and by Friday the bags were all gone. The plan is to get the vapour barrier done Monday and have another inspection Tuesday. 

By the way, we were told by the inspection a couple weeks ago that, because of the proximity to the property line (less than 4 feet), we would need thicker drywall and fire retardant insulation. Ok we say, no problem. No problem just $3,000 in added material and labour costs. Damn property line. 

Day 76 - it's all about the right tools

So I'm at the house today waiting for Reliance to come and install the water heater - surprise surprise they were 45 minutes after they called and said they would be - so I start chipping away at the mortar covering the brick going down the stairs to the basement using a hammer and chisel. The first photo shows how far I got in about 30 minutes of work. Not bad. 

Then Jeremy comes over from next door to investigate what all the noise is about. After seeing what I was up to he offers me his chipper, a big drill with a flat bit. Thanks I say and get started. 

The next picture is how far I got with the chipper in the next 5 minutes. 5 minutes!

And after another, let's be generous, 10 minutes. 

Clearly it pays to have the right tools!!! (Too bad there was no tool to speed up the clean up... that was less fun)

PS - plumbing passed inspection yesterday and the hot water tank was installed. Electrical inspection tomorrow.

Day 75 - siding

We seem to have narrowed in on a siding selection - finally.

Ever since we were forced to move away from our original wood siding choice by the inspector, it has been a little tough to pin ourselves down on something new. Admittedly from my side, because it is not a 'critical path' item, I have been focusing elsewhere. But with the windows coming in a couple weeks it is time to get this done. Plus I'm sure the neighbours are tired of looking at our white Typar. (though perhaps they will think our siding choice is as bad?)

We have landed on a steel siding, quite modern looking I think. Below are the options we considered, 1) all rust, 2) all dark grey, 3) dark grey on the sides and 4) rust on the end and dark grey on the sides and the bottom of the back with rust on the top. Sounds like we have settled on the last option. 

Hope it looks cool when all is said and done!

Day 74 - inspection time

Big inspection day tomorrow, both plumbing and electrical are set to take place. Both trades have confidence that all will be fine but I'm holding my breath until I hear positive word back. 

And apparently the roofer is coming back to install the new sun tunnel as well (the one that was made for a flat roof as opposed to a sloped one like the first one). 

This pic is of the temporary stairs and railing that Jeremy did for us so that the ESA inspector would go into the basement, apparently he has been known to refuse going down incomplete stairs like we had previously. BTW, the new stairs apparently coming on Friday!

This is just a shot of the crazy plumbing going on in our basement. Between the sump pump and the sewage ejector, there is a lot going on down there. Would have made life a lot easier if we could have had both of these things on the side of the house where the main drain is. Instead we have several pipes running over head to get from one side to the other. They will be covered with dry wall mind you but it made for a quite a bit more effort for the plumber. 

Day 70 - more wiring fun...

Not a ton of visual excitement to share I'm afraid. The electricians keep running wire and installing lights, switches and plugs. We made some tweaks today to the placement of things they put in but overall quite happy. Though I am longing for the days of Paul the framer who wouldn't charge for extras so long as they were onsite already. With these guys (and with Jeremy), every extra plug or switch is a change request and an updated quote from the back office. Sigh.

There are two large additions that they are taking on. First is a result of the work we had Paul do to raise and re-enforce the ceiling in the living room. He had to 'sister up' (attach in parallel) some ceiling new joists with the existing ones to add strength and keep them from dropping further. As luck would have it every single wire running to the 2nd floor ran through those joists and had to be cut out. As a result, Daniel and his guys now have you fish new wire to all the rooms upstairs, which was definitely not in the original scope. On top of that, after learning from Rogers that they do not fish coax through your house, I asked Hotwire to run 5 outlets to the new parts of the house. Again, not in the original scope. 

Dan also told me that he believes that the ESA inspector will not go to the basement to complete the inspection without proper stairs in place - figures - so Jeremy has offered (at some expense I'm sure) to add a couple stairs to the bottom along with a railing in the interim. 

Aiming for plumbing and electrical inspection Friday. 

Living room pot lights

Daniel marking out the location of the fixture in the middle of the family room

Kitchen wall, hole in the top left is the vent for the stove

Day 68 - we have power

After a couple of weeks sans power in much of the house, the electricians started today and we'll have the house fully up and running again by the end of the week. 

I was concerned that they would not start today as planned because their admin was adamant that they would not start until the other trades were done, and well, the plumber was not done (despite his insistence that he would be) and a little bit of framing remained as well. But despite they got rolling right away and wired up the top floor and will be working on the main floor for the next 2 days before finishing up in the basement by the end of the week. Very efficient. 

I was impressed for their work so far, the pots and outlets are right where we asked for them, and they remembered the heated floor in the bathroom which we didn't discuss this morning. 

Meanwhile, our HVAC has passed and furnace and AC up in and ready to go. Now we need to make a decision on siding and flooring and get the kitchen ordered. If plumbing and electrical inspection happen this week then we may be ready to start with insulation and vapour barrier next week. Very excited. 

Really looking forward to having the windows put in in a couple week too, right now the place is very dark. 

Getting started in the dark this morning

And after

Hallway to the master - before

Ensuite bathroom, wired up and ready to go