We never did rent that bad ass chipper I was talking about back in October but we did buy a not so big but still bad ass red chipper with the idea that buying one would be cheaper than the years worth of rental fees we would end up paying in order to finish all that needed to be finished. We had mountains of wood to put through it and after long hours and a couple foot deep pile of wood chips we have a medium size hill of wood to put through the chipper. And we still have numerous trees and bushes to cut down yet. Good investment I think.
And we have a bunch of firewood to boot..........even though we don't have a fireplace anymore.........oh well.
We couldn't tell by the weather but we had some other indicators letting us know spring had arrived here in Northern Nevada. A very loud, very horny, very early rising woody woodpecker became our new roommate and left us with no question as to where all the holes in our fabulous wood siding had come from. Starting at about 6am Mr. Woody would start banging his head against the wall in order to attract any fly(get it) young Ms. Woodies in the area. The first time it happened I thought the worlds most persistent Jehovah's Witness with gigantic hands had set up post on our front door. It only took a couple of mornings to figure out what was going on and it quickly became my routine to run outside and scare him off with a couple of rocks. I can only wonder what our neighbors thought about seeing a very sleepy, fairly hairy man in nothing but his boxers in the front yard throwing rocks at his own house. Comedy gold. Needless to say, we patched up the hole and with only limited protest Mr. Woody left for more hospitable climes.
Before he left though Mr. Woody must have posted a listing on Craigslist because we had new roommates in one of the other holes on the back side of the house. This time it was a young family of hawks. Much quieter than Mr. Woody needless to say. Now you see 'em........
Now you don't...........
But it hasn't all been a'fowl........we have made forward progress. Our good buddy Rebel hooked us up with a great HVAC guy named Chad. He installed a brand new high efficiency heater and will be installing a brand new high efficiency A/C this weekend, not that the weather is nice enough to need it. We really wanted to do the whole radiant heat thing but it was just too expensive. We would have had radiant heat and nothing else done. Oh well, the new heater might not be as efficient as radiant but it comes close and install is way, way cheaper.
Another project we kind of finished and kind of turned into a huge project is in the sunroom. There was a planter box installed inside the sunroom against the outside foundation wall which was a bad install and a bad idea as far as holding moisture and wicking moister into the wood framing of the house. So we decided to remove it.
But during the demo I noticed that the outside wall with all the windows just didn't sound right or feel right when I was bumping the shovel against it. So I decided to pull a few trim pieces and discovered the entire wall all the way down to the plate and the 4x6 posts was completely rotted out. I have no idea what was holding that wall up but not much. I had to call in a pro on this one so I had my friend and construction guru Aaron swing by and check it out. We used a 2x10 and some blocking as a temporary structure support and started ripping everything out. It is now very open.
Aaron will be back tomorrow to frame everything in. We should be able to install a big giant glass and aluminum slider in there and move forward towards that modern open look we love. Eventually the whole sunroom will have a level deck and lots of sun and plants. As a bonus we used two of the big windows from that wall in the holes on the interior that we had covered with plastic. We still need to trim everything out and drywall and paint and all that but the vision is starting to come together.
So there you have it. We are updated. Stay tuned. Promise we'll keep you posted more often.
