Outside Work

While the inside work is at a bit of a standstill, the outside work is progressing nicely. Our acreage includes about 4 acres of dense pines. While calling area loggers, we realized pretty quickly that they were worthless and that we'd be lucky to find someone to take them without charging us. We got lucky!



This company has a buyer for pulp wood and has agreed to take our trees. We may even walk away with a couple hundred dollars to put toward the bathroom!

Looking north from our smaller shed. The logger is taking every other row of the pines per directions from the DNR forester who said our woods needed thinning. This shot was taken after the cutting.

We did have the logger clear-cut from the bigger shed to the smaller shed. We'll get this area good and cleaned up and plant a few fruit trees.

It's amazing to see the setting sun through the trees! By the time this shot was taken, they had gotten about equal with the pole shed; just getting into the thick stuff to the north. That smaller pile is 2x4 worthy- cool. Jake suspects it will take them about 7 or 8 days total to get all that we want cut. The logger also took a big one from the middle of the front yard (that blocked what little sun we get facing south), one too close to the garage, and one in a weird spot in the back yard.

Here you can see the clear cut section better (and the setting sun!). They've got about 4 piles like this now (which will be taken later by truck). We figure it will take us (ie Jake) nearly all summer to clean out the "leftovers". The loggers leave about the top 8 feet of each tree, as well as all of the branches they cut off. We already have a big burn pile started, but will surely add more and more and more.

Or FREE WOOD to whoever wants to come and clean it out! :)

All night long

Another example of the previous homeowners doing things a bit-less-than-up-to-code.

I was putting the little ones to sleep. Jake was putting the bigger kids to bed.

I hear a thump thump motorish sound. At first I thought it was our silly neighbor who revs his engines late into the night (yes, we have one of those). But it sounded too consistent, so I called to Jake to check it out.

I hear him stomp downstairs and a few minutes later he's back up, "The sump pump quit. I'm going to try to fix it."

Nearly two hours later, he has it all apart and realizes that the actual sump pump was buried in mud and could not be fixed. He had taken a gallon bucket and scooped out the water into two 5 gallon buckets he dumped outside. Six times he had to do this to get all the water out.

Our sump pump runs about every hour and a half. (I don't completely understand. See, the basement has a beaver system (like drain tiles) that empties into the sump pump. But the sump pump hole, about 4 feet down, hits mud and water seeps in which the pump has to pump out. To me, closing up the pump would take care of that problem, but then I guess the beaver system would not have anyplace to drain to.)

Aaaanyway, Jake came to bed and set his alarm for an hour and half later so he could go empty it again. 60 gallons. Up the stairs. Outside. Took him 45 minutes.

Back to bed for another 90 minutes.

Back downstairs to 60 more gallons.

Ridiculous.

Repeat.

Repeat.

Of course we were coming on Sunday morning so nothing was open until 8am.

One more time.

He arrived at Home Depot at 8am sharp.

He came home before the 90 mintures were up (I told him it was very unlikely that I'd start hauling buckets!) and installed a new sump pump. The right way. With a layer of gravel. A container for the pump to sit in with drain holes. More gravel. A beautiful job, really.

And it takes the sump pump 60 seconds to empty the water.

We're focusing on the bright side: that we caught it, the basement didn't flood, Jake was able to take a well-deserved Sunday nap rather than stumble through work, and we have a nice new sump pump.

Nice work honey.

Framing and Plumbing

Part 1 of a 2 part plumbing job. Yesterday Knutson Plumbing came out and redid the drain system for the upstairs and downstairs bathrooms. They moved some stuff around so we can relocate the toilet and shower. They cleaned up some pipes that hung low in the ceiling and brought others in closer to the wall. They did a great job and will be back after we frame to relocate supply lines and hook everything back up again.

And Jay with Integrity framed in our future guest bedroom and family room. It's so much easier to visualize the space with almost-walls in place! This shot is looking from the guest bedroom into the family room. That leather couch back there is for sale for $100 by the way...

A view looking into the guest room with the new window installed. In this space, we have electrical and lighting yet to do, spray-in foam on the exterior walls, drywall and finishing, and flooring.

New Window and Door

Jay with Integrity of Rochester came back for more! He installed a new garage access door and a window in our will-be guest bedroom.

This is the wall pre-window.

We also had a cement-cutter out to prep the floors for our new plumbing plan.