This week, Duden & Viken put in the remaining soffit panels at the second floor and the finish trim around them. They add a nice level of smaller scale and refinement to the project (even though they are difficult to see in this photo…)

Inside, we applied poly to the ceilings to receive foam insulation. The insulation will follow the second floor ceiling, follow up the attic truss knee wall, extend up the sloped attic ceiling, across the flat attic ceiling, then back down the other side the same way. We devised the idea of using rigid foam to help create continuity of the vapor barrier while limiting the foam insulation to the areas that need it. Gary and Matt did a nice job of fitting and foaming the rigid into the spaces between joists (actually, these are the bottom chord of the trusses.)

May have a delay in the insulation: the local Building Official needs to review AirKrete’s testing data and approve it. Apparently, the State of Minnesota knows nothing of it, even though it has been around for decades and has been installed all over the place, including Biosphere 2 in Arizona.

Then, in one day, all the sheetrock went up on the second floor and attic ceilings. Still waiting on exhaust fans in the bathrooms, so those ceilings couldn’t go up.

It is exciting to see the project move toward finished spaces! We see how much nicer the house will be for us when we move back in.

At the same time, this is the tough stretch for the family. The novelty of living in temporary and slightly (heck, tremendously) undersized accommodations has worn off. We’ve been at it long enough to have forgotten which box in storage holds which stuff. Several evenings and weekends have been spent sweeping up after the contractors to help control costs. We miss our laundry machines and dishwasher dearly. Christmas without a decorated tree was pretty weird.

Still, I think it has made us stronger as a family. We have all had to become aware of how our habits and actions impact each other. Picking up after ourselves is paramount, since space is so tight. There is no way not to share meals together. Everyone has stepped up their efforts at pitching in around the house with cooking, dishes, snow-shoveling, and other tasks.

Our family and friend have helped out a lot with moral support. My friend Chris dropped by with beers last night; Mom and Dad have been following this blog almost on a daily basis. Neighbors have been watching and commenting all along. We spend New Year’s Eve at another friend’s home. These acts of kindness have not gone unnoticed! Thank you all!

Monday was another milestone (or maybe we’re just grasping for the finish…) The first load of sheetrock was delivered.

Then, without much pomp or circumstance, the guys installed the last window upstairs. No more ladder access to the upper level.

This also coincided closely with passing both electrical and plumbing inspections. Then, we passed framing inspection; the electrician drilled through the bottom chord of the attic trusses, but a quick note from the engineer appeased the building inspector’s concerns.

Here’s a little rewind: pictures from my phone. On 21 December, this was the state of things. Gary and Matt started installing the second floor windows. The rough framing inside was done, but plumbing and electrical would wait for the windows.

By the end of the day, the second floor windows and the mudroom and sunporch windows were installed. These were exciting times, since the windows meant enclosure.

While this was going on, work was also happening in the shop. While we haven’t seen them on site, front and back entry canopies are being fabricated and the window trim is being assembled and painted.

On New Year’s Day, here is an update of our project.

The soffits, frieze and fascia are mostly in place. The windows are all in on the second floor, and the contractor’s got a start on the first floor.

The duct work is roughed-in, now, almost ready for the equipment, which will wait until after drywall is in place. The neighbors have been asking what’s in that roof?!? Well, here it is: mechanical and storage space. Why, you might ask, use such space for that? Here’s why.

Stacking new stairs to the attic would have meant either significant point loads on the existing foundations or switching the span of the structure to the long axis of the house, both of which were structurally infeasible. Also, the south roof was designed for solar water heat panels; it didn’t make much sense to me to warm the water on the roof, pipe it to the basement, then pipe it back to the second or third floor for use. Too inefficient. Our budget is stretched already, so adding more finished space to the project just didn’t work. As it is now, we’ll be able to easily and efficiently add the solar water system when the funding becomes available. What we end up with is a workable second floor of four bedrooms and two baths, a striking roofline, and storage where we need it.

Confession: we may one day add a dormer on the north side…

This week we hope to see the plumber and the electrician working on their rough-ins. The insulator is slated for next week.

Mary picked up floor and wall tile for the bathrooms yesterday, which is exciting as we are already ready to move in!

We opted for a high-velocity air handler to heat and cool the house, both for efficiency and ease of routing the smaller diameter ducts. The diffusers are discretely inserted into our existing first floor ceiling. We’ll abandon the old, unsealed, poorly routed, uninsulated ducts.

I came across and old shot of the previous facade; it’s fun to see the change already!

Well, the house couldn’t be ready for Mary’s fortieth birthday.

So, we decided to create a scale model for the party.

It worked out that a 9×13 cake plan is a close approximation to the proportion of our floorplan at a 1′=3′0″ scale and that chocolate covered graham crackers were a close-enough match to our window sizes. So, my brother Bill and I conspired to create the edible model. My mother baked three 9×13’s in Wausau, Wisconsin where the party was to be. I crafted the roof out of foamcore boards (had planned peanut brittle for the roof, but ran out of time for the casting.) Then in a matter of hours, we transformed the cake in to the model. I think we’re a little short vertically (cake is a difficult material to be exact with!) but the overall impact was successful.

Mok, my sister-in-law, created an impromptu figure of Mary and our dog, Promise, for added realism. She whipped up the clay using bread, glue and (yes) hand-lotion!

Happy Birthday, Mary! And, thanks, Bill and Mok, for your expert help!

Here’s more on the interior framing; if you look close, you will see stamped on the 2×4’s, the FSC Label. FSC is the Forest Stewardship Council, which is the foremost certifier of sustainably managed forests. Check out their website to learn more. (Did you know that Northfield has the North American headquarters for SmartWood, an FSC certifying company?)

This is the stage at which our clients often wonder if the rooms will be big enough. The new floor felt huge before the interior wall framing; in contrast the rooms now seem small. No worries; the windows will expand them visually once they’re installed. As professionals, we know what will fit and how they’ll feel.

Here is the four-season porch and part of the new mud room. We opted for open web floor joists to aid in the routing of the new ductwork. Our hope is to save the barn siding on the existing wall; so far so good. The white door was our back entry door; it will remain so we can get our washer and dryer out of the basement when necessary. The new mud room will connect directly to the kitchen through a door at the existing window (hidden behind plywood and the ladder.) A double door will like the mudroom to the porch, providing a view through the new window to the north.

And, for an update on the exterior: The soffit framing is ready to receive the soffits. The pieces are being fabricated in the shop and will be installed quickly when they are ready. These must precede the windows, since the soffit abuts a continuous frieze board which, in turn, abuts the tops of the windows.

Yesterday ductwork began arriving on site with the new airhandler and boiler. Installation should start next week, in tandem with the soffit and windows!

This photo shows why I’m not a roofer. Gary Duden, our contractor, is standing on the top of the roof, straddling two trusses, and giving instruction for the roof sheathing being applied. Yikes! It is very fun to watch the crew’s agility that far from the ground. Some of the sheathing is being applied before the top gable goes on. With November weather unpredictable, Duden & Viken are trying to protect as much area as possible.

The west gable end has been attached and the sheathing is being applied to the north face. The north and south faces are each one broad stroke and the east and west ends have the hip broken by an open gable. This arrangement allows for the pitch we desired: it will allow solar panels on the south with the proper angle to the sun, and also allow for ample attic storage (I’m already mentally filling that space). The heat plant will also be housed in the attic.

The new view from the street of the front of the house. It is a terrific time of year for this photo: no snow and no leaves. The front of the house will be covered by foliage most of the year with the trees we have to the east. We are already seeing quite a bit of sun falling on the south slope of the roof, for a large portion of the day. Maybe we can talk the crew into allowing us to take our Solar Pathfinder (the tool we use to estimate solar optimization) up in the lift and re-check our earlier calculations.

Shingles! We’re thinking the house looks like a big box, but it will look more house-like again when the openings are cut out and the windows installed. Oh yeah, and when it isn’t sea green anymore…and doesn’t look like we are the Tyvek family.