A double caterpillar day

Dear readers,

This will probably the last “building under construction” piece from me until after we take up residence at the Folly.  This would certainly give the impression that we are close to doing that—not so.

The reason for my inability to blog away here is that I will be blogging away at tile and paint and plumbing and kitchens and bathrooms and – well it’s a long list.

The Folly is moving along at a now exponential rate—the closer we get the more hectic the pace it seems, and driven by the looming closure of our lease at the little yellow house. While I have in fact extended that by one month, it doesn’t seem like enough, given all that still has to be done.  Should I bore you with the list? Later maybe.

Going back to where I left off last time. 
I got tired of climbing ladders and attempting to paint the outside of the house and –given that I knew I could not scale to the high parts, (even with both original hips) I succumbed gladly to a recommendation from DtheB to a guy called Carlos.  Carlos bugged me for 15 more gallons of paint and promptly finished painting the house in two days.  Such a deal!  I was glad to cough up this cash as I was very bored with my slow progress.   But I must tell you a story of my last day with brush in hand because it amused me highly.

First let me tell you that I am really lacking in insect tolerance—see a spider and I run away like a frightened two year old or usually squish it fast!  So one sunny day while Jake,—(to whom we owe big apologies ‘cause his name is in fact JESSE—Paul got it all wrong again),

was covering in big holes that had been dug for pipes various, and running around in the aforementioned Caterpillar, who should I spy on the very top of my ladder, (i.e. on the platform) but a big furry brown caterpillar.  He had climbed all the way up to the top from the ground in a determined effort to say Hello it would seem. I stopped painting and watched in a bemused effort to not be “bug nuts” and decide what to do with him; you see I did not want my phobia of bugs in general to get me skittish up a very tall step-ladder!

So I waited as said furry thingy walked slowly in centipede fashion to the edge of the platform and poked his head over the edge.  And you could read his thoughts (or in any case I did) and he said—“holy smokes-that’s a damn long way down!”  Actually what he muttered to him/herself may have been a bit more “blue” than that but I am deferring to my high-class readers!  So furry slowly turned around through 90 degrees and walked to the next corner… same process.  So by the time furry had checked out all four corners of my ladder platform I decided that I had stuff to do and did not want furry making  me the next part of his route, in his search for a way out,  up a portion of my anatomy!  

So I did the unspeakable and flipped him gently over the edge,…. whereupon he flew with his furry parachute gently to the floor and didn’t miss a beat before waddling off.  He was very determined that he wanted to play with me because a few minutes later there he was again crawling up the garage wall into my line of vision. It was a double caterpillar day.  Jesse is now happily going under the moniker Jesse-Jake and he says he’s quite happy with that!

MEANWHILE:  All the subsidiary house systems were put in place by teams of guys who all came in and made a big mess—BIG!

The electricians came and turned Rob’s (Framing Fairy) forest of wood into a spaghetti factory. Every joist got drilled and wires passed through them.  We go regularly and adjudicate with visions of where our furniture will go to ensure sockets and switches must go—needless to say the COUNTY has a say in that too!  “YOU CAN’T put the switch for the Jacuzzi in the bathroom!”  Blah blah blah.

The same scenario followed for the heating guys who put giant silver tubes in the ceiling everywhere to carry air in and out and made big holes for fans.  We have had quite the dust-up with the COUNTY as I have islands in my kitchen but did NOT want a big ceiling- mounted extractor hanging over my head while cooking- I am a minor claustrophobe and those things bug me and I also have a tendency to bang my head on ANYTHING I can find within distance.  And I have a pot rack that is much more appealing!   Each insertion or process means waiting for another INSPECTION and a signature.  As I write Paul is meandering around the property waiting for our inspector to come and review the dry wall hanging.

Once the drilling, banging and hole-making was complete, I went in and vacuumed up ALL the sawdust between the framing for SEVEN HOURS!  Matter of fact, one of the inspections occurred while I was doing that and – it turns out- that our inspector—usually the same dude, says “haven’t seen a house this clean and over built in five years.”   Goodness!

Then came the insulation--- fluffy stuff between the joists and even piped in foamy stuff around tiny apertures.  Brother are we insulated. 

 I happened to stop by during this process (which they got done in ONE day) but did not have camera in hand. The insulation team consisted of two guys ON STILTS. The stilts had little feet on the bottom.  They were very sure- footed on them too striding about the floors like ninja’s as they stuffed rolls of fluffy stuff in every hole they could find.  I did catch the STILT process in a photo when the dry wall work was being done though—see below.)

And then it was time for the “sheet rock” aka “dry wall” material to arrive.

I had to supervise this and was prepared. I don’t know how many tons of this stuff there was but it filled a truck and a trailer!    The guy who did all the man-handling of this stuff weighed 150 pounds – go figure!

They unloaded the sheets one pallet at a time and swung them on a giant crane from the vehicle right into the front doorway.

Then they unloaded sheets one at a time onto a dolly and from there into each room of the house.  That was last Friday and on Saturday most of it went up onto the walls.

The last step now is to come along and do the process called Mudding and Taping; take all the nasty nails and joints in the material and apply goo and tape over them until everything is smooooooooth!

Another stilting process!  Then they will sand and spray and blow dry and then apply a texture – a bit like orange peel over everything so – you can’t see the joins! 

At this juncture we wait for this all to dry (around June  22^nd hopefully) and – the Paul and Maggie team finally get control of their domain inside anyway.  (As it happens dream ON!)

We bought 2000 dollars worth of paint a few weeks ago with me standing in the store saying, “we’ll do that bathroom in this color and the other bathroom in that color and wishing I’d figured it all out properly and earlier.  But when somebody puts the paint on sale you concentrate!   It remains to be seen as to whether I made the right choices!  We filled the back of Paul’s truck with many many buckets o’ paint!

We rushed to Renton and bought many dollars worth of cabinets which are now taking up space in the garage. (The MAN CAVE is full of appliances and kitchen cabinets-- to the doors!)

We took delivery of same a few weeks later and spent THREE HOURS checking the list.... have you got a 923.641.004?  We have to do that exercise all over again shortly when we start assembling them. Which pile belongs to the main bathroom, the guest bathrooms etc?"  Talk about bloody big jigsaw puzzles. We fight constantly as I want to begin work on this chore and Paul argues that we can't until the sheet rock work is complete.   And the clock ticks.

But at least we got two garage door openers!

Meanwhile I meet with carpenters and flooring dudes and Propane tank companies and tilers. Well I’m still trying to get with the tiler but – he’s busy; all the good ones are like Kings and have their subjects begging for alms and a slot in their calendars it seems.  (I finally got one but there's always a catch like "mom is sick and I have to go to California.")

You might wonder why Propane tanks—we’ll be like our own little filling station with a 500 gallon tank of it in the back yard. Why?  Well remember we are out in the boonies and there aren’t gas lines around here.  We will be using Propane for M’s gas wok cooking (I have an electric cooktop too) and for water heating and for WHOLE HOUSE POWER in a power outage. In Renton power outages were usually fixed in about 4-8 hours; over here we expect to be at the bottom of the pile so we plan accordingly. Anyway after some haggling the propane tank got installed and is gloriously ugly.

Paul (who has installed ALL the low voltage wiring throughout for cable, TV and internet type stuff and saved us a bundle) is setting up the Folly such that if the power goes out, the generator kicks in immediately to sustain us.  It’s a big one! No wonder I’m going broke.

JOCK—(all the folk who work here have names beginning with J, Josh, Jesse, Jim, no wonder Paul is confused) came to visit and looked over the estate.  He’s a landscaper. He went away muttering – “you do know that this is going to cost you $50 grand right”?  

No Jock me boy, I did not! But I feared as much!  Paul is going to need a riding mower to keep this lawn under control—it we don’t get it seeded before winter it will for sure become forest land again.  The other side of the house is already doing that with all kinds of flora and fauna poking through—and there ain’t too much flora - -crab grass and blackberries.

So I am frantically trying to decide how I want this 2.4 acres filled up before nature decides for me!

Yes I know—it’s too big… don’t nag!  It would have been full of trees only P wanted a fancy heating system!

The pile of wooden waste doubled in size.  Fortunately the neighbors know someone who is entirely sustained by wood for everything so he’ll be over like a hungry vulture to take it all away as soon as we give the permission.

All that remains to be done must be completed by August 28^th or so – when our lease expires and I have already planted myself into the calendar of the team who brought us here.

It’s an almost impossible task. Fortunately we have some jolly carpenter dudes (one of whom is 82 with a pigtail) standing by to install our smashing kitchen just as soon as the paint is dry.

It is surprising how time can be such a big factor. The bamboo (flooring) arrives in boxes on June 27^th.  ( not!) Apparently it must be allowed to get snuggly IN THE HOUSE for at least five days before it can be laid down.   “This is my new house, do I like it here? If not shall I throw a fit and all curl up at my edges. I think I’ll come out of the boxes and see.”  

Untll you do this in person you would just never know right? In the final analysis I had to defer that event for another two weeks or so.  NO room at the inn.

So dear readers, I am going to be working my a$$ off for next 8 weeks or so trying to hold tools for Paul, cutting and grouting tiles and laying a few maybe. And painting, doors, crown molding, floor molding (aka skirting boards) and nineteen interior doors.  (Not to mention the front door and garage doors too.)  And of course I have to repack this house ready for moving.  I am woman, hear me roar. 

If I can I will post a few photos for you to look at – but even that takes time which I may not have.

AND I won’t be able to blog much or at ALL after we move as—all the big ISP providers here are TOTALLY NOT interested in providing us with Internet services. So we have to go wireless and with very limited date transfer.  THAT DISCOVERY caused me a couple of days of angst let me tell you as I do a TON of work on the web daily, finding and sourcing things for the house and right down to recipes often.

GRRRRR

And so it goes and will go and go and go until we fall over!

Post Script.  Well here we are on July 4^th and most of the above is true apart from a few nasties. The dry wall team keep disappearing and my promised completion day went by several times.  We had expected to have all the painting done by now and we’ve not started yet and don’t know when we will be able to.

It is enormously frustrating as the end date does not go back in relationship to the damn delays.

Meanwhile we have tried to be productive:  I spent three and a half hours in our local department store on Thursday with a big spreadsheet in my hand with all my window sizes.

Three hours that went like this:  This window is light blocking with double cell shades, this window is textured, 46.625 or is it 46.5?  Did I make a mistake as I entered all this data at 00:30!  By the end of this session my head was pounding but I saved 1000 dollars  on my shades so it was well worth it!

I painted the ugly grey electrical conduits on the side of the house...(if it moves salute it, if not paint it.)

I wanted to be sure that when the masonry went up, the pipes would blend nicely. I think I did a good job don't you?

Paul visited one of our local lumber factories and got a contractor’s rate on all our crown moulding and floor molding…  1200 feet of each and ALL of which has to be primed and painted by yours truly.  I bought a sprayer! SIGH.

Last week we FINALLY got around to making the template for our bubble frieze.... we're late doing this and will be unable to acquire the bubbles in time to tile the main bathroom-- so the "floating bubbles" (which would take too long to explain here) will have to be used in the main counter backsplash instead of the original plan. The bubbly folks are becoming famous and people are ordering bubbles by the bucket-full so we're at the back of the queue.

In the middle of ALL of this I got pneumonia and a nasty thing called Interstitial Cystitis.  (Remember how I said my kidneys were bugging me last time?  Well not actually but it feels like it.) So I went through some fun exercises that included cameras in fundamental orifices and a force-filled and emptied bladder. At the end of which the docs shrugged their shoulders and said, “some women suffer this way.”  Gee thanks!   After some VERY miserable and painful weeks I took myself to a homeopath who correctly diagnosed me as suffering from near Adrenal failure and has recommended supplements which support the glands and have made a difference.  For a while there I could not hold myself up on my own legs—pneumonia takes a devil of a time to fix and of course having really weak lungs from allergies I am coughing up portions of lung daily.  Hardly the state you want to be in to face the work we have to do! 

And I know this ceased to be a funny blog didn’t it?

So did my life actually.

Meanwhile please cross your proverbial fingers for me—the next few weeks are going to put us all to the test! The County has a million reasons for not letting one move in and they may not get to vote!

And so it goes! 

Thanks for reading

Maggie