Frustration!

We were moving right along working on the house when we came to a stop as we waited for the concrete people to come back and finish our floors. After almost 3 long months of waiting they informed us they weren't coming back to complete the job....HUH??!! so we hired the man who had done all our earth moving and in a week he was on it. It was a fun process to watch...wenching the cement truck up the hill because it was too heavy to drive up..pumping in the concrete through a window hole then cramming the equipment needed to smooth the concrete through the windows. But by the end of the day we had a lovely concrete floor in the basement. Once the floors were in other things were completed while the floor cured...Patching the gaping hole in the front and the floor, putting siding up on the front, and of course putting in our very expensive, special order, windows pictured in the last post. When the concrete dude was building the walls he mis-measured or something and 1/4th of the way up the window I caught the mistake! After talking to the building dept. getting some ok's on window sizes for code we had to special order windows to fit the openings. Crisis averted!

Destruction!

Tearing things down is kinda fun...the cleanup not so much :/ We tore down the small bit of ceiling downstairs and cleaned out all of the nasty insulation left clinging to the bottom of the house. The upstairs we had to tear out the living room ceiling due to water damage as well as the ceiling in the end bedroom. Kind of satisfying to rip those big chunks down! However, the nasty, moldy,stinky, full of dead critters, blown in rock wall insulation clean up...not so fun! My wonderful son helped do the downstairs ceiling and most of the livingroom ceiling with his friend. My Father also got into the action and helped tear down the bedroom ceiling and then helped bag over 80 contractor black bags of the muck! I pulled out nails galore and staples, staples, and more staples from the rafters. My son did find a little nest, completely intact with 3 little blue eggs, nestled in the insulation. We carefully separated it and found a shadow box to frame it in. The plan is to hang it in the house when it is finished. About the same time we primed the outside of the house, except the one side we didn't have access to. It was so nice to get rid of the gross yellow shingles. What a happy day to remove most of the tyvek! We can now appreciate the view on our hill... I am soo going to love living here.

And the Waiting Begins!!

I am feeling much better about my little house now that it is securely attached to something instead of balancing on wood blocks and steel beams... Jenga anyone?? They are letting it set for 2 weeks then will be back to pour the floors!! happiness and joy joy! In the meantime we are having them backfill around the back of the house so we can have access to it so we can work inside. That also means we don't have to crawl in through the window and climb a ladder everytime we want in! In the meantime the 4th happened so we drug our fire pit and all the trimmings for roasting hotdogs to our hill to watch the fireworks from the house.

All my girls! Behind them all along the skyline is where the Columbia River is and where multiple firework shows are done. We had an awesome night of chatting and watching all the firework displays. I am going to love it here. We have decided next year we will have all our friends/family come to our house to BBQ and watch the display, just doesn't get any better than this! --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- We also started the roof..off with the old, patched, leaky roof and on with a new perfect one. My sil and little boy worked hard for a couple weeks and were able to complete it. My sil has mad construction/carpenting skills which he has been willing to help us out with!! ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------Our special order windows came and our talented SIL was able to install those for us too.

I know not very exciting to anyone but me :) One step closer to removing that nasty tyvek and letting our house breathe and see the view.

Can you Hear the Crickets??

So after finally moving the 5.7 miles to our land and arriving at her final destination our little house just sat, quietly, in the wind, waiting..cue crickets chirping. I was actually amazed how smoothly the move went.. the hot water heater in our front room didn't tip and we had a mcDonalds cup on the counter in the kitchen both of which were still standing! Here is the front room and I will have to find the picture of the cup!

Because it was a DOT purchase and they wanted it off their land we moved it pretty quickly (deadline was the end of the year to remove it and so the last Sunday in December was moving day) needless to say the building permits had not come through yet. So she sat thru 3 1/2 months before we got the building permit approval!! Yes we did a happy dance jig!

The basement was the first thing we started to get the house on a foundation and take a load off our minds. The house was jacked up 12 foot in the air and footings were poured

Once the footings were dried and passed inspection, wall building commenced!

Then the lovely support beams under our house which it has rested on for 6 months were finally pulled out and our house was settled on its new basement/foundation.

Moving 5.7 miles...in the snow

Moving Day!! We were up before the crack of dawn to watch the process of moving the house. Of course we had, had a very clear dry December until the night before our move when it started to snow!! Moving a 64 ton house up a hill in the snow - well lets just say I was a nervous nelly. So I packed all the kidlets in our big ol van and we headed out to view the move. It started a little late and I didn't actually get to capture the pulling out as there was a ton of equipment ..snow plough and a de-icer for the road so there would be no slippage, plus all the workers..etc. etc. So I opted to stay ahead of the entourage and went a couple miles up the road and parked. I was sooo giddy and could hardly contain myself. of course my kiddos thought I was just crazy to stand in snow in freezing weather and stare at the horizon. You could hear the engine on that big ol truck beast as it came creeping up the hill long before they came into view- and then there she was my little house!

Can you see that little bit of roof on the horizon of the road??

My kids were going wild by this time!

Once the beast made the climb up the hill there is a slight decline and then the turn..Everyone was a little anxious about this part the whole stopping and turning onto the side street :/

The Beast!

Turning the corner..slow and steady

Not an everyday sight on an early sunday morning

Another little hill covered in black ice taking 25 minutes to traverse 100 feet. The beast was just screaming and we had our doubts for a few minutes but she made it. See the guy on top?? That little red speck? he had to manually pull the wires over the top of the house as she went under...man I wouldn't want his job.

Finally, last corner and a tight squeeze it was

Just a few branches needing to come down and the street sign needed to be ripped out.

Here is where Beast meets Monster Beast for the pull up the final stretch to her resting place.

This was pretty cool..monster beast wenching beast, who was cabled to my house. Very slow process and only a few feet were gained at a time.

House has cleared the road and is now officially on our land!! We all did a little jig but it was short lived. The wench on the beast broke so we were literally left hanging for a little over a week.

And there she stayed until a new truck could be brought in. I took this picture from my neighbors deck. We were very blessed the house cleared the road as it is the only way in and out of 5 of our neighbors houses.. I don't think we would of had a warm welcome if it hadn't Then after 10 days she was finally in her resting place. For now we are just happy it all went well.

Prepping to move

In order to move a house all the wires need to be cut and water needs to be capped off, duct work under the house needs to be removed and the plumbing needed to be removed. Not to mention cutting off stairs and then ripping the house off of its foundation!

We have Air!!

Kinda amazing

The remains of the house...including my stairs :( A crew of about 8 men took a week to prep the house in order to move it. Then came state and federal permits to use the roads between point A & B. (It really helped it was a DOT auction ..approval flew through) But in the end she was loaded on a house moving dolly hooked to a truck with a massive concrete slab on the back.

And there she is all wrapped up! Merry Christmas to me :)

Dilemma

In moving a house there are many factors you have to consider and one of them is whether the fireplace and brick facade stay or go. The house's front was completely brick and while it wasn't my first choice of style it was ok and if we kept it we wouldn't have to figure out something to replace it. Then the fireplace issue. It was an extra $2500 to move the fireplace because of the weight and trying to balance the load. And while I like fireplaces and the ambiance of sitting in front of a nice little fire while it is cold outside I wasn't sure it was worth the extra cost of moving it. So we debated and decided to keep the facade and lose the fireplace. It was a nasty thing anyways!! and once it was off we saw the damage the fireplace had done.

Well somehow our wires got crossed and and BOTH the brick facade and the fireplace were ripped off. Leaving a gaping hole in the front of the house.

Our poor little sad house. Now to decide what to decorate her front with????