Another New Window

We recently installed another window, this time we put one in where our old front door used to be. The window we used was our old kitchen window, that now opens completely into the living room adding extra air flow and a good place for looking in on the children while making dinner. When Jason framed in the old door  last fall, he framed  it to fit the window. So all we had to do was cut out the hole and add the window. That is a little simplified, but you get the idea.

New Window

We installed a window into our addition, giving us a lot more light and a better view of the world. When we built our addition we used the former living room window location and header for a door way from the old living room area (now our dinning room) into our  new living room in the addition. We were getting all to close to winter when we were finishing the addition. In fact is was already snowing. So we removed that window at he last moment possible keeping all our heat. A location in the addition had already been picked for the window to be relocated to, but it was now to cold to do so. We framed in the header and window opening and placed insulation in the hole and sheathed over it from the outside, as if there was no window. Then we put the window up for safe keeping. That catches you up to where we are in this post.

We laid the window out on the kitchen table and used our pocket knifes to trim all the spay foam, caulking and wood chips from the edges of the window where it had previously been installed. This took a bit of doing.  Anna, Judah and I all helped trim it all off and Mercy Fire help with the garbage can and picking up.

Next I cut the plastic vapor barrier and removed the insulation from the window opening. With the “Saws-All” reciprocating saw I cut the sheathing revealing our new view for the first time (above). We all had to pose for the picture below as Anna took our picture. The children all thought this was great.

We added a few more nails to the window opening, and tapped them all in real good with hammers so the window would install nice and flush. Judah got to use his hammer and help He love to help build any thing. He will be a good builder before he is grown.

Next we dry fitted the window making sure the window fit well in the opening. Then it was time to caulk the opening and place the window. Anna did a great job climbing the ladder and helping to place the window with me, and holding it in place as I got it secured into place with screws. I am very thankful for help in all of our building projects.

Judah helped staple the vapor barrier (plastic) back into place around the window. Here are a few more picture of the new window from inside and out. There is also a picture of vision crawling around as worked and one of Serenity Rose playing outside. The new window is the one by the ladder, lol.

Sewing Area

We now have the wood stove moved into the addition (but not hooked up yet). We hope to get it hooked up soon. We took the area where the wood stove was and removed the platform we built that it sat on. Some pounding and pulling and we were back to the original floor. The we had to weave the laminate flooring in to the existing flooring, and reworking the flooring back over that corner so you could never tell that the wood stove was ever there. We had 3 boxes of laminate flooring left from when we did the flooring originally. When we got done patching in the new flooring you couldn’t tell the old from new. So we figure the cheap brand of laminate has stood a pretty good test.  We plan to put a desk and some shelves in this corner of the dinning room and it will be a new area for sewing. We wish it were a whole room for sewing but this is a great first start.

New Dinning Room

Well the night of the sixth we “broke on through to the other side”. We finished all of our insulation and vapor barrier.  We took out what was the old living room window and cut down and made it a door to the other side, “our addition” has now become HOUSE space! There is still no sheet rock but it will happen piece at a time if need be.  But in the mean time we have a new living room where you can walk by without stepping on someone’s toes. And our old living room is now our new dinning room!  We ate our first dinner there tonight. We had some delicious corned beef and cabbage. MMmm.   Here is a picture or two of our first dinner in the new dinning room also there is a picture of the three oldest girls wearing their coverings. We will have more pictures coming soon of the inside of the new space.

Progress On Our Building Project

Ok, I know it has been a while since we have updated you all on our building progress.  It has been very busy to say the least (under statement of the year!).

We finished the rafters, and got the roofing finished as snow was coming down! We got one window in. Then we got the heater running, and did all of our insulating. Then several days later we got our second window in and the third is framed (we are waiting to remove it from our original house to put it in the third hole, it is temporarily filled with insulation). We are now running wiring then we will put the vapor barrier up over the insulation that is so needed here in Alaska.

Here is a picture that Jason took from way up in the air when he had a fork lift here to do some work. He got a lift up (a great ride!) to take this picture. We have the little porch finished and the stairs are on.

Walls Going Up!

The walls went up very fast compared to the the other steps. Here you can see the first wall up and then we had to go get some more wood from the local saw mill. The load of wood was nearly to much for our small trailer. But we made it home only dragging the ground a little.

We finished the rest of the walls, and have them mostly covered. We even have some of the rafters going up in this picture. This is pretty much caught up with where we are now. We built a small deck – landing (4′x10′) on the addition, and only need to add stairs to it for easier access.

Here are a couple of pictures that are bigger so you can see better where we are at.

Floor Joist & Decking~

As promised here is another post on our building project. I hope to do one more tomorrow, and have you caught up to where we are now. In this picture you can see the floor joist brackets on the left. You can also see the first of two beams at the far end (the other will be at the other end) each replacing one floor joist, so it will be thick and add insulation to the end walls (also adding strength).

Here you can see the first picture of the floor joist on with the beam on the right side, with the first piece of decking (sub floor) sliding on.

Mercy Fire and the other kids found it great fun playing on the new floor.

Here is a picture mix of the decking going on. In the top picture you can see the floor joist, and how we inset our “rim joist” to allow for 2 inches of foam to add more insulation. With this setting on a 2×8 plate there was more than enough room.

Foundation Walls

It is time to play catch-up, and let you all know what we have been doing! As many of you know from reading our blog, we are building on to our home (as seen in our blog category “Building Our House Part 2″. It has been a busy time, trying to get this new addition going before it snows (in October). I will try to put what we have done, into a couple post over the next couple days so you can see our progress.

We are framing our hose with 2×8 construction for extra warmth on those -60 to -70 days. Here you can see Judah and Destiny helping to bolt down our foundation walls.

Here is Judah standing next to the foundation walls that we had finished up to that night.

And last for this post, you can see the framing, of the foundation walls finished. Serenity is in this picture. You can also see in this picture, the brackets for hanging the floor joist all mounted on the side of the finished house. The “Deck” (floor) is ready to be put on!

Discount Lumber

We were off again to one of the local lumber mills to pick through their “seconds pile” stuff left over from their cutting last year. They have a lot of wood out there to sort through. Every board is $2.00, it doesn’t matter the size. Since we are framing our house out of 2×8’s, we were looking for as much 2×8 material as we could get. We found about ten that were longer than 16′.  Since we need 8′ boards, we can cut them in half. That means we got twice as much lumber for the money. Many of them for only $1 a board. Plus we got a bunch of 8′ and 10′ boards too. For $60 we got a majority of the material we will use on the building of our walls. What a blessing.

Stripping Forms ~ Fitting Base Plates

The next day after the concrete was dry on our foundation, we began the exciting process of stripping all the forms. Judah helped a bunch, as he has become an expert at pulling nails. Everyone got to help out, even baby Vision got to do some supervising as seen in the top picture. All the nuts and washers had to come off to pull off the form boards. Then we screwed them back on loosely as not to lose them. You can see Anna doing this on the left. Then we were able to start pulling off the big boards on the sides, and see the “bare footers” (bare feet..lol ) for the first time.

After the forms were stripped, we swept them clean. Then we were able to measure and place some marks, that we could snap our chalk lines to. These chalk lines would set the placement for the building of our addition. Then we were able to start placing our base plates that are treated 2×8’s. We marked the alignment for the bolt holes we had to drill. Then we drilled and trimmed the plates, and placed them according to our chalk lines. Then we were able to put the nuts and washers back on to hold the plates in place while we finished the rest. Now we have them all in place. Next we will take them off one last time and put some sill seal under them but we will cover this in a future post on the continuation of our building story.