Pouring A Crawl Space Floor

In winter weather, we have managed with the help of a dear friend and best mason ever, to pour Christian's crawl space floor. This job entails pouring between existing joists, mixing concrete batches ourselves, and Lou leveling the surface with much maneuvering. Bless Lou Beck for coming to help us on his day off to deliver, and form 60 bags of extra strength cement from Home Depot! Left-over cement was used to fill a basement hole from an old furnace foundation pad we removed.

I remember my father mixing cement with Bill on holidays; teaching him to undermine our clay basement 18" deeper with newly formed 4' extension walls and a floor Lou Beck came to pour. It's a skill now passed on from a wonderful man and engineer. Several tie-rods are used to bind the walls together.

Shoveling Stone

This New Year's Day we are shoveling two ton of 3/4 clean stone onto the dirt floor of Christian's crawl space below his kitchen. The 8' X 18' floor needs a 3" layer of stone before a vapor barrier of construction plastic is laid down and cement poured on that. Luckily it is a warm day and the rain has stopped.

 Happy New Year!

Concrete For Christmas

Bill filling cement behind the form to create a new wall.

We have purchased a pallet of concrete for Christmas this year, to create a dry kitchen crawl space under Christian's farmhouse. The cement mixer is out of the barn and luckily all of the forms will be filled from inside the house, while Bill, Alex and Leif are around to help with the work. Christmas day a long wall was built using 13 bags of Sakrete poured behind staked/ braced; plastic lined forms made of plywood and 2" X 4" wood. The hammer is used to tap out air bubbles in the concrete. 

Merry Christmas!

Crawl Space Dig Done

A proper crawl space beneath a house is important because 40%-70% of the air you breath in the house originates from there. The idea of cross venting this space awhile back actually compounded mold issues and trapped poor air feeding into the house. We will build forms to pour cement walls filling in vents and shoring-up old stone foundation walls. Deeper excavation of this space by hand digging has allowed for a cement floor as well and easier access to the kitchen plumbing.

Digging Out A Crawl Space

Alex is down from Boston this week and we are digging out a crawl space beneath the kitchen of Christian's farmhouse. First the center floor boards were pulled with plywood boards cut to cover the hole between digging sessions. Debris and old insulation cleared next so the hot water line could be made smaller for faster delivery to the kitchen sink. Now we are digging the clay out deeper so that new concrete walls and floor can be poured.   

This project is the last big challenge in saving Christian's farmhouse and I bless the boys for their concerted efforts in such cold weather! We are burning the old sub-floor boards in the wood stove to help heat the house in the process. 

Metal Shed Roof

The boys managed to hand trailer an Ideal Pocket Ribbed custom cut roof into the big barn a night before our first winter snow. Early Saturday, the cool down shed roof Titanium Underlayment was cleared of snow and blown dry with a leaf blower, before panels were centered on it and screwed down. An insulated (black rubber strips) ridge cap was installed last and several inch overhang/drip edge custom cut with aviation shears. The lifetime of this light weight Canadian roof is about 50 years, cost $2.35 a sq. ft., and took a day for Alex, Bill and Christian to install.

Sanding Walls

Christian is sanding the spackled and repaired plaster walls here by hand with 120 grit paper and I've hung a drop cloth in the doorway to contain dust. The ceiling beam joints are being cleaned with a paint scraper. Although the walls and baseboard trim will be painted "White Dove", the lower half may later be painted "Linen White" to warm the room and add interest.

The french doors opening to the enclosed front porch needed a fixed knob inside and this black coated solid brass oval one came from discontinued inventory at our local hardware store. It was $12.00 as were the parts we needed for an old porcelain door knob nearby. Both finish the room beautifully.

The wall below is painted two colors with a line dividing them instead of a chair rail; as we may do. Bottom images via Pinterest.

 Green in a dining room is lovely and I'm anxious to finish painting the fireplace surround a deep green shade.