operation paint

WOW!  What a day.  David got most of the rest of the lights done in the basement and some plugs run.  No more extension cord to the refrigerator!  One less cord to try to walk over.  LOL  I got two huge walls cleaned, wire brushed and painted, twice!  Then I had a little extra time so I was able to get all the tools and things out of the little cubby hole and get it wire brushed and cleaned so it will be ready to paint on Monday.  It is looking so good with all that white down there.  Sure does make it brighter so that we can work.  The lights are great!

white walls

cubby hole clean-up

operation lights

Such an exciting day today with the addition of several lights being installed in the basement.  It has been so dark with just a couple of pull chain lights.  Now it is awesome!  My husband always does such an awesome job!  Once the walls are white it will really be bright.  I also was able to unpack some Tupperware and get some food put into it on the shelves.  Several boxes gone out of the floor.  I am thinking in another couple of weeks we will be able to move the beds in!  That too will be an exciting day when we can wake up there and work when we want and play when we want!  Wasn't able to paint today as we ended up with not enough time.  Tomorrow will be a big painting day.  Hoping to get 2 full walls done!

ceiling lights

tupperware

operation organization

Well we are completely moved out of the other house!  Done!  Now the real fun begins! LOL    It has been one week ago today that we closed on and gave up possession of our Emden home.  I honestly didn't think we would ever get that house packed up and moved.  WOW!  It seemed the more that we boxed up, the more showed up.  Oh well, it is done and we are now living in the basement of some friends.  It is nice and cozy and warm and we are finally caught up on some much needed sleep.  Time to hit the road running and get the basement of the Broadwell house liveable.  David got the dog kennel done and it is really cool.  Oops...forgot to take a photo.  Will try to do that today.  We have the dogs and the cat home.  They are all happy to be home.  David worked on electrical things yesterday and the children and I worked on a little bit of organization.  We got most of the dishes put away on the shelving that David bought.  Today we will try to organize some of the food that is sitting everywhere to at least get it out of our way so we can walk around.  I am also going to try to paint the wall where the kitchen is going.  Exciting times!!!!

the pantry is not ready yet

organizing the dishes

operation mud hole and white walls

Well if there were ever a bubble to burst in this operation broadwell project, it was this week.  Just as I was preparing to move all my canned goods and grain buckets over into what seemed like an awesome underground pantry......I arrived one day to find it full of condensation!  I am praising God that I found out "before" I moved everything over there!  But, now what to do with all of this food.  We have borrowed a couple of tables to set up in the basement but not sure that will be enough.  I have to keep the food from freezing so I can't put it upstairs.  Guess a furnace will be first on our agenda after getting the rest of the house sealed up.  Have to get some air flow above the basement. Then there is the mud.... and more mud.... and more mud....  It is everywhere, inside as well as out!  Spring will bring sidewalks and concrete pad for the back of the house until then it is skids!  On a lighter note, I did get the sealer in the basement started.  It will be so bright down there when I am done.  Tomorrow the ceilings in there get painted and it will be ready for a stove to be installed so we will have the ability to cook when we are over there without a camp stove.  This is the week to move out of our home, in just 4 days we will need to be finished and on to the rest of the journey in broadwell.

mud and lots of mud

sealing the basement walls

operation basement

Yesterday I worked in the basement all day.  It was great to have the ventless gas heater in and running when we got there so we didn't have to wait for the wood stove to get warmed up before going to work.  I finished scraping the steel beams that the house is built on and painted them with rust-o-leum primer so they can be painted with the ceiling in a couple of days.  Once the ceiling is painted, I can move things in there without the fear of things falling from there.  Cooking and eating will become much simpler.  LOL  Jonathan finished vacuuming every board in the ceiling of the basement in preparation for the paint.  He also helped David get the back door put on.  Today will be the dead bolt put in and I will feel "safe" in the basement!  :-)  I  will work on cleaning up the camper and getting it all closed up so we can move all the tools into the garage.  We have 6 days left to be completely out of this house.  WOW!  Can't believe it!  Today will be our last day of house renovation until we are moved out of here.  I think I am going to recoat the beams with another light coat of primer and then work on a few cracks in the walls to prepare them for being sealed.  We want to seal things up right so hopefully we won't have too many leaks if any in the basement while we try to function there and work on the upstairs. David and Jonathan are going to work on getting the back steps fixed and set up properly so when we move things that need to be moved there, we won't have any problems.   We are going to be moving into a basment of a couple in our church while they are gone for a few weeks.  That will be a huge blessing just because it will make things much simpler for a little bit.  I think we will probably take a few days off and do something fun with the kids after the move.  They have worked so hard this past month or so.  It is about time we take a little "family" time and have some fun!  Don't know what will be "fun" to them but we will see! 

heat

steel beams before

steel beams after



back door entry to laundry room

operation visitor from the past

Yesterday we had been working for a while when a gray truck pulled up.  In it was the man who lived in this house as a little boy.  As a matter of fact, his dad was the one who built this house.  He moved into the house in 1941.  We knew the house was built from the wood of an old church but today we found out that it was the wood from an old Baptist church in town. He walked around with my husband telling him different things about the house.  The basement was added after the house was built.  The house was lifted up somehow and then the basement added.  Interesting.  He remembers the well out back and that it was hand dug about 30' deep and had the best water.  He said they never run out of water and that it was great water.  That was good to know as we may attempt to use that well again someday as out water supply.  He is excited that we have the house and are renovating it.  Can't wait to invite them over when we are further along!  Other than that, the guys worked on the dormer getting it closed up.  David added the gas line and put in a ventless gas heater so it will have some steady heat in the basement.  He also added some sides to the stairwell and we re-hung the blanket at the bottom of the steps so that our heat would quit going up the stairs.  It stayed much warmer in there yesterday.  I powerwashed the whole basement and the underground pantry.  By the way, we found out today, that pantry was the old coal room!  The basement walls  are ready to be wirebrushed and sealed.  I will start on that tomorrow.  I also wire brushed all the steel beams in the basement.  Tomorrow, I will paint them with rustoleum paint to seal them up too.  I am thinking it will make them look so much better!  LOL  I ment to take some photos of the basement today and forgot again.  Will try to do that tomorrow too!

operation home stretch for moving

Well, it is early as usual and I have not been able to sleep very well lately.  My mind seems to race constantly with all that has to be done in the next 8 days.  We are on the home stretch as far as moving goes.  I am hoping that in 8 days there will be less to think about and maybe I can get a good nights sleep!  We are so thankful that a couple in our church have offered to allow us to stay in their home while they are away for three weeks.  What a HUGE blessing that will be.  We will continue to have the modern conveniences in life for a bit longer. Who knows, just maybe in that length of time we can have indoor plumbing at least in one bathroom!  I will have to say that I am thankful for but will not miss the port a potty that sits in my yard at this point.  Yes, I know that all around the world there are people that just have a hole in the ground, but this is America and we are spoiled rotten when it comes to such things.  Today we will shop for some "odds and ends" for the house and David will be able to go hunting.  We get to play catch up on some school work.  Tomorrow we will start over again and go back to work!

operation broken water line

The house is almost sealed up. I say almost because we are probably a full day or so away from having everything sealed up on the outside. Last week we had to run a new water line out to the meter. Wow! What a job. Derek came one day last week and helped finish digging up the pipe out to the drain. He also boarded up the upstairs window so it wouldn't rain in any more and helped my husband do a few other little odds and ends. Chris came over and helped spot my husband while he dug with the mini backhoe. All was going well until POOF went a loud noise. LOL Yes, they hit the main power line and had to call Cilco to turn it off and fix it. So many roots they couldn't feel the line until it was too late. Wonder how much that one will cost us! Oh well over and done. They were able to get the drain tile in. Today the McCanne family, Vince and Jeremy came to help out. They were able to get the rest of the insulation board on the sides that were ready for it. Bro. McCanne did an outstanding job cleaning up the junk upstairs and pulling nails. My husband was so excited to walk in and have that done. Makes it easier for him to work. One more outside wall to tear off and seal with insulation board and we will be ready to go inside for the winter. Can't wait to be done out in the cold. Jonathan and I have been working on the basement, trying to get it ready to paint so we can move in a makeshift kitchen and place to sleep. We need to be out of our current home in about 12 days. That is not a long time! Jonathan has pulled everything out of the ceiling that is there. All the nails, pipes and metal hangers. Nathan came a couple of days last week and they were able to get the old basement wall down and carried out. What a HUGE job that was. It looks so roomy down there now. Won't be such a bad place to stay for a while. Much better than 90% of the world lives in. I didn't get any photos there yet but will do that next time I go. We so appreciate all the help we had this week. Those men have no idea what a HUGE blessing they were to my husband who can get discouraged a bit as to how slow things go when it is just our family. Having even just one other man there is so much more help.

digging the new water line

what you "don't" want to see when digging a new water line

sealing up the outside

insulated

Jeremy helping

Athena came to work day too!

operation packing

I guess this is as much a part of Operation Broadwell as working on the house itself is.  Our house is supposedly sold (inspection will be next week) if they don't find anything too major wrong with it.  They should't, because we have renovated this one pretty much all the way from ground up.  Anyway, so yesterday started the packing.  I did all the Christmas tubs and clothing tubs in the basement.  They are already moved over to the new house.  Later on I did all the wall hanging things on the bottom floor of the house.  Those things will go to the storage rental.  Anything that I will not need until I get totally moved in will go there.  For those of you who know me very well, you will know that I am a very organized person so this will probably make me crazy.  I hate all the mess all over.  But I guess you have to have a mess so that you can get it all done.  Fun times!!!  We also were able to purchase a good used refrigerator yesterday from Craigslist.  It will go in the basement of the other house so we can have some food over there and not have to carry it back and forth. 

operation house sold ~ rooftop

It has been a while since I last blogged.  It seems the past couple of weeks are a blur.  Our house in Emden appears to be sold with the inspection being scheduled for January 3rd and closing scheduled for January 18th.  If all goes as planned, we have exactly 25 days to be moved.....somewhere!  No, I have no idea where we will go.  I am hoping for a miracle and that we will be able to move into the basement of the Broadwell house while we continue to renovate.  What an adventure!  So, as if the race was not already on to get the house completely sealed up, it is now.  We will need to completely seal and paint the basement to be ready to move in there.  Of course there will be no water, so we will still have the port-a-potty outside, which will be interesting.  I opened the door the other day to find about two inches of snow in there.  Exciting times ahead!  So on to what we have been up to.  We have finished the floors and walls to the additions.  The roof is on and mostly covered.  Hopefully this week we will have the house totally sealed up where the snow and rain will be kept out completely.  Did I mention that my living room has snow in it from the blowing blizzard we had last week?  :-)  Anyway, once it is sealed up, David will order the steal for the roof and put the windows in so we have some light to work by.   We also took the wood stove we bought back and exchanged it for another.  Something was definately wrong with it.  Every time we closed the door completely, the fire would go out.  The new one works great and we can get it up to 500 degrees within a half hour to forty-five minutes.  It is toasty warm in the basement now and a huge blessing to be able to go there to get warm.  In one of my many trips to Menards, I found a great tool.  A contractor's pencil that does not have to be sharpened.  It is quickly becoming one of my favorite things.  It does not dull very fast at all and stays sharp.  At this point there is not a lot for the girls to do but take trash to the burn pile as we tear out things.  They spend their days getting muddy, riding their bikes or just drawing and reading in the camper.  I often find one of them asleep in there when I go to look for them.  Oh, I forgot to mention that David bought me an interesting torch thing to dry block with so that Jonathan could tar the basement outside.  What a job, but it is done and we can now lay pipe and get the dirt back in. I was really hoping to get some grass planeted before the ground got frozen solid.  We will see how that goes for me.  LOL




bedroom addition floors

bedroom addition roof

basement addition floor

putting on floor joists

adding faceboard

helpers

preparing for roof

wall being built

more walls

walls about done



sheeting going on

walls almost done

roof going on

partially covered

drying the block

taring the block

still coals after 14 hours!  YEAH!!!

one of my favorite tools

 

sleeping beauty

 

operation back to work

It seems like forever since we worked on the house.  David had knee surgery and is just now getting back to where he can move around a little bit. I really think he is trying to do too much but guess you can't keep a good man down.  On Monday, we went out to the property after school and set the camper back up in the outbuilding so we would have a place to sit when we are there and the girls can do their homework.  Reese spent the afternoon with us playing with the girls. David got the chimney top put on and then fired up the wood stove for the first time.  Didn't have dry enough wood in it so it only got up to about 250.  He went back yesterday and fired it up again and was able to get it to over 500 with no problem so I guess that is done.  Now to seal the house up so we can use it!  The kids and I stayed home yesterday but David went over and finished the block pieces around the window so he can start on the floor today.  Today will be a very long day for all of us!  I have to get supplies and the men folk will be working to get the floor joist started so maybe tomorrow we will have floors and be ready for walls!  Exciting times!  Oh, and my glass block window photo... that was from a couple of weeks ago but I forgot to upload it!

Reese spent the afternoon playing with the girls

my first block window in the crawl space

the first fire

the chimney cap

 

 

operation "finished concrete" YEAH!!!

We finished the concrete work today!  The basement floors are done!  I will have to say it was incredible watching my husband finish the basement floor.  Amazing how the cream comes to the top leaving a smooth finish.  It took all day to pour and finish that.  I put clear block in the two basement crawl spaces while they were doing that and also hung a tire swing for the girls.  The girls worked on pulling metal out of the burn pile so we can take it to the metal man.  The rest of the day they spent riding bicycles and swinging along with  playing up in the loft.  It is so much fun to round the corner at the wood shed to hear them singing and playing up there. Fun times!  This will be the last update for a bit as David will be having knee surgery tomorrow and will hopefully sit around and relax for a couple of weeks like he should!  :-)

here comes the concrete

leveling

finishing

extra space

almost done

hanging the swing

a little too high

fun times

a great time