Aug. 31 - The last Eagle has landed

At lunch time, the Eagle French slider for the dining room arrived and it is now installed. We have also received a couple of replacement sashes and the brick molding to surround the great room sliders.

Lots of cleanup work this morning and afternoon. We got rid of a lot of scrap and carboard. And, I mowed as much as a I could where it was needed to most (topping off the weeds).

This afternoon I ordered enough stainless steel cable rail assemblies from Menards online to complete the deck and deck stairs railing system. That should arrive next week.

For the first time ever this house is now locked!

Notice that the 2 damaged garage door sections. We're waiting for replacements. Still cannot believe the manufacturer calls that color "walnut".

This house came a long way this week towards being ready for drywall and getting enclosed.
We could use some more siding.

Come Tuesday, we hope to see Moorman Heating & Cooling show up.

Aug. 30 - Siding on south side of house is finally on

Tom's crew worked on siding the house most of the day. We are officially out of siding and waiting for more from Lockridge. They also applied OSB to the fireplace. I cleaned up and labeled my video wiring in the morning and painted garage doors (for the second time) this afternoon and evening. Another long, hot but satisfying day.

As you can see, the colors are starting to show in the trees. Too early for that. 

But gosh, folks......this is the view from my GARAGE!

By the way, Tuesday I met with a young man who has his own landscaping business. He's an Iowa State grad with a degree in landscape design. Looking forward to what kind of a plan he comes up with for us. I won't be able to do much, if any, landscaping yet this year but we need a plan going into 2013.

Dang, that Amber Bock went down easy.

Aug. 29 - Long day. Not much to report.

I worked with Tom's son-in-law Nick tonight to route the wiring for each TV location. We stopped at 8:30 and I don't have many pics to share.

Tom's guys got a lot of cedar trim installed today but they ran short on materials from Lockridge. We also learned from Lockridge that we will not have shakes this week.....supposedly, they are "backordered". (Or, maybe they were "never ordered"?)

Tomorrow I have plenty to do. Continue working on the video wiring plus more painting and staining. 

You see, I didn't like the color of the garage doors so I made another trip to Ottumwa to have Sherwin Wiliams darken the paint. I get to paint them all over again.

Moorman Heating and Cooling is supposed to be on site next Tuesday... after Labor Day. Finally.

We are also making arrangements to have Ron Jackson's concrete crew return next week to pour the concrete parking area in front of the garage, create a front walk and a front entry step.

Also, I am amazed that this blog has now passed 2500 page views!!!

Aug. 28 - Gable Trim is UP!!

I'm pretty stoked about this. The gable trim went up today and I have to say that it looks awesome. The color gets a little washed out against the siding and roof when in the shade but otherwise it adds a lot of cool to the appearance of this house. Hope you all like it, too!!

Randy and Chuck putting up the first gable trim.

We are waiting for more shakes (siding) to arrive so they can complete the gables on the rear of the house.

Here's the last light before sundown hitting the front of the house.

I painted the garage doors today. They will be the same color as the siding. At least I painted them as far as I could until we discovered (after removing the protective cardboard covers) that 2 of the panels for the big door had damage.  There's always something unexpected that happens like this. Now we are waiting for two replacement panels to be ordered and shipped. Tom and his guys will still be putting both garage doors up tomorrow....bad panels and all. That should make for some interesting pics.

The replacement door from EZPorch showed up today. So, we can finish up the screened porch now.

Lockridge measured for drywall today. We believe that our French door from Eagle will ship tomorrow from Dubuque so we are hopeful that it arrives on site on Friday.

The big holdup now besides the French door is the heating and cooling company to get their butt in gear. They should be installing all their heat runs so we can be drywalling but they say they won't be here until next week after Labor Day. That stinks.

Tomorrow....with some help I will be installing more twisted pair wiring and coax for my all TV connections. Getting ready for drywall day! By the end of this week.....will we have the exterior (95%) finished? Let's see......2 doors to install, brickmold on one door, lots of siding yet to go up and more cedar trim to install and stain. MMMMMMMMaybe.

Aug. 27 - Foamed

Today, they applied 5 inches of open cell foam insulation around the sill plate and inside all exterior walls. This adds up to R23.

I was at work early to get the first of my 8 video runs completed (to an exterior basement wall) before they started. The entire house was sealed off and no one else worked during this process. They were there before 7:30 am and left about 2:30 pm.

After the foamers left, I got some staining done on the front porch's cedar trim before supper. I couldn't stain the outside because of the soft ground. The front of the house has a pretty good sized pond after 0.8 inches of rain on Saturday night and Sunday morning.

As soon as it dries up enough, we'll get the gable trim put up. Tom uses his material handler machine to lift Chuck and Randy up to the gable peaks. I'm guessing it will still be to wet tomorrow to allow the machine to get around the house.

I plan to get set up to start painting both garage doors so they can be installed. And, the young man from Lockridge is stopping out tomorrow I'm told. Don't count on Brenda inviting him in for a cup of coffee. Hopefully, we'll get an update on the arrival of our last French slider and the brick mold from Eagle.

Aug. 25 - Frank is headed back to Korea

At 6 a.m. this morning I dropped off my son Frank at the Des Moines airport. He has good connections on his flights back to Seoul, Korea. Minneapolis to San Francisco to Seoul. 24 hours and he'll be half way around the world once again. It was so nice to have him around us all for a few days. Frank got a chance to fish on Sundown. We also spent a morning fishing at Lake Rathbun.

Our family is already looking forward to Thanksgiving. Hopefully, we'll be in the house before then and our boys and their families can be with us. Frank is planning to bring his family to Iowa about that time (upon his return from Korea in a couple of months).

This is a rarity......Tyler, Frank and I were able to have a couple of beers together last evening at a Des Moines pub. Nachos, wings and a couple of beers with my sons.....and I'm a happy man.

On Thursday, Tom's guys finished installing the white-washed pine car siding under the deck covers.

The state electrical inspector was here and completed his inspection on Thursday.

Friday morning while Tom and Chuck measured and cut the remaining gable end trim, I was busy staining all those cedar 4x4's. It's all ready now to be permanently installed on Monday on all 8 gables.

Late Friday afternoon, the crew of three finished up their stone work on the front of the house.  Three long days for them. I hadn't anticipated that it would take that long but it looks nice. Francisco, his son Francisco and Santiago. They are from Guadalajara.

All the support posts will be boxed in with cedar boards. All the cedar gets stained the same dark color as the gable trim. The color was chosen to also match the rear deck color.

We are ready for foam insulation of the exterior walls which starts on Monday. Word is that we should have our new Eagle French slider and the brick mold that goes around the exterior of the 4 doors from the great room to the deck. When those pieces arrive, we should FINALLY be able to fully enclose the house and get all the siding & exterior work done. The replacement door from the EZ Porch people is scheduled to arrive on Monday, too. I'll be busy next week painting the garage doors and staining more cedar.

This afternoon, we paddle our kayaks over to Tim & Jill's place for lunch and social time. It will be a great opportunity to meet a lot of other Sundown property owners. Everyone has to paddle something to their beach to attend this affair. No motorized boats.

Aug. 22 - Almost Stoned

Pics from today's work on the front of the house.....

They're coming back in the morning to finish up....stone front porch posts and grout everything.

Aug. 21 - Didn't get stoned today

The Centurion Stone guys called this morning to say that they were finishing up another job today and would be back tomorrow to finish the front f the house. So, that was a bit disappointing but I can live with a one day delay to see what the house looks like with stone.

We did get a lot accomplished today, however.

Roger from Moorman Heating was here all day to work on the heat runs for any exterior walls before we do the foam insulation. His young helper couldn't get his butt out of bed this morning. Roger drove and waited in the car for him for 30 minutes..... kept calling him to roust him out of bed but it didn't work. Roger worked all day by himself drilling most of the holes that his young helper was supposed to do.

Tom's guys installed the drain system for screened porch ceiling. It was boxed in with treated 2x6's. Now any moisture that makes it through the decking above will drain outside the screed porch.

Tom, Chuck and Randy mocked up 2 of the gable end 4x4 trim that is a major requirement for this house for me. What do you think? Every gable end will have this look. I'm trying to decide what color to stain these 4x4's and the cedar around the entry and deck posts.

Once we get more 4x4's, all the gables will have the same look.

Like it?

Frank worked on running speaker wire for our lower level surround sound system.

By the end of the day tomorrow, the front of the house will have a completely different look.