Brother-in-law Tim returned to us on Friday and is still here on Monday night. That’s devotion (or insanity). But with great gratitude I tried very hard to let him do the high stuff so I wouldn’t reinjure my shoulder. We all three worked 10-hour days and continued to make incredible progress on the interior.
Here are a series of photo diaries:
Kitchen Sink
Our orphaned corner, which will have a free-standing table-slash-counter surface for toaster and microwave, with shelving above.
The sink itself, a ‘free’ find at HFH Restore. We since found better-quality fixtures (also free), but I haven’t installed them yet. The plumber is expected this week to hook up the supply lines.
The full effect (sort of). The counter extension now has a leg under it. The left end of the under-sink cabinet will house a stack of four small drawers.
The Stairs
Original stairs — rough, pressure-treated, open-decking style.
Working for now on just the bottom half, we pulled up the treads (they’ll have a new life outside, where they are actually better than our current outdoor steps). The far right stringer is buried in the wall. We left it there — it would have been ridiculously too much trouble to try to reuse it and then have to insulate and sheetrock around the new stair treads and risers.
So after insulating and sheetrocking, we attached a new stringer on the surface — well bolted to the studs — made from some PT 2×12 I’d been saving for a different stairway project.
Another view through the new “stair wall.”
After sheetrocking the left side it was time to fit the new stair treads to the stringers.
Meanwhile, on the outside of the stair wall, we fitted a removable hatch to the under-stair storage nook. However, we plan to put a large bookcase against this wall, so that will not be active storage any time soon (or a guest room for a young wizard nephew).
And then this morning I fitted the risers to the new treads — half a finished staircase! Next — repeat the process for the upper half!
The Porch Salon Parlor Agora Sunroom
Tim single-handedly put insulation up in the entire ceiling; while Marsh continued on the walls. The walls at each end were a bit more involved than appears, since we have been “shimming” them out by the width of an additional 2×3 on every stud. The added cavity depth gives us a higher R-value throughout.
Then he also single-handedly put up the strapping to hold the ceiling drywall.
And by this evening we had a single full course of ceiling drywall on that strapping…
…which in turn permitted us to start the sheetrock on the wall below it. We had had grand ambitions of completing this wall, but exhaustion and hunger overtook us. We’ll see what we get done tomorrow morning.
Other
The refrigerator was delivered today. It is very satisfactory. We plugged it into an extension cord and it works. The full installation will wait till its wall is taped and mudded and its assigned electrical outlet is hooked up. But we can already visualize being able to stock up a bit more on foodstuffs. The camper has been great, but a fridge that can hold only a half gallon of milk, a tub of butter, a few jars of condiments, and couple of tupperwares of leftovers has cramped our culinary style. Luckily we’ve been working too hard to really notice, except on the scales (I’ve lost more than 20 lbs since May).
What I’m really looking forward to is having a full kitchen next summer and fall when it’s time to can and preserve!