Monday, November 4, 2013

wow, what a week! Thank goodness it's over

In the past week there was some major craziness going on at/to our house.  It started on Monday morning when hubs picked up a lift so we could put a new roof on our house.  The original plan was he would put the new metal roof right over top of the existing shingles.  But, it turns out there were not three, but FOUR layers of shingles on the roof, the bottom layer we believe are the original cedar shingles from the mid-1800's when the house was built.  The shingles were just too thick and warped to evenly nail the 2x4's on to put on the metal roof, so the guys ended up having to scrape 2 layers off the roof so the new one could get put on decently.  So there was a little unexpected work.  They worked their butts off, especially hubs, and managed to put the last of the roof on Friday in the rain.  It also poured on Thursday, all told, about 4 inches in 2 days.  The chimney flashing and soffits aren't up yet, but the main part is up and looks all nice and red and shiny.   Since we had the lift, hubs wanted to get as much use out of it as possible, so after the roof guys would leave for the day, he'd keep on working.  By last night, we had the 4 windows in the upstairs bedrooms replaced (one of them was also probably pretty close to original to the house) all the top layer of oh so healthy asbestos siding taken off the sides of the house.  They also got the lower layer of cedar siding, the tar paper and some weird kind of paper layer torn off the top half our house - our house is a house of many layers, apparently.  Once we got down to the original logs or boards, depending on what part of the house we were doing, we put that house wrap stuff up as well as some board insulation.  That's only on the top half of the house, the bottom half will just have to wait until we've got the time.  While hubs and WE were doing that, Angel #4 and I spent a fun filled couple of days picking up tons of shingles, siding, tar paper and nails up out of the yard.  We don't have it all picked up yet, but we're getting there.  It would be easier if it wasn't so stinking cold and windy outside.

Hubs headed out to Hawaii this morning and I thought the craziness would stop for awhile.  Oh, how foolish I was.  We were about 5 miles from the airport when the transmission slipped out of gear in our van.  It got worse and worse and we were afraid we wouldn't get to the airport, but fortunately, we pretty much coasted to a final stop right in front of the departures entrance to the airport.  I got hubs on the plane and called the tow truck guy.  So yeah, I got to ride home in a tow truck this morning.  Not quite the plan.  The guy brought it to our local garage, but after looking at it, they decided it was definitely the transmission, so they had to continue towing it on to the transmission place where a mere 2 years ago, I spent $2500 getting a new transmission put in.  Hopefully they'll honor the warranty without any issues, and if I'm lucky, they'll even pitch in to pay for the $300+ towing bill I've got.  It looks like it'll probably be at least a week before I can even get the van back.  I've got a loner car from the garage, but I'm sure they'd like that back asap.  Our truck is currently filled with about a ton of shingles and crap - the landfill put the wrong closing time on their website, so when hubs showed up to dump the garbage from the house project, they were already closed.  The garbage is too heavy for me to unload on my own, so our only option is for WE and I to head to the dump at 7 tomorrow morning and get rid of it then so we've got a vehicle to drive.  There's also a trailer full of garbage that also needs unloading, that one will have to wait until Wednesday when the kids have a half day of school and WE can get one of his friends to help him empty that one out.  Sigh,  things can be so complicated.

But, on the plus side, my new roof is SOOOO pretty.  :)

1 comment:

Tanya T said...

Congrats on the new roof! We replaced ours in 2010, we were going to go with metal but shingles cost us less and I figured I didn't want to spend the extra $ since I know we want to sell in the next 2-3 years anyway. I really wished my hubby had carpentry skills we have 2 new windows for the upstairs and a new front door sitting in our garage waiting for us to save up enough to hire someone to do it. I feel for you on the transmission break down, had to put one in my Taurus. I sure miss the good old days of buying a decent used car for $1,500 or less.My dad is getting older and has too many aches and pains to be my cheap mechanic anymore.