So Halloween this year found us upstairs chasing out any remaining haunts and spooks. Pretty sure there aren't any hiding up in the attic space. But there is a lot more insulation that we thought at first. But it still looked pretty scary up there. The upstairs chimney came down today and the upper vent...well it had to wait a day until Ben could come and pull it out. But down it came and out it went.
Yep, out with the old and in with the new, lovely new electrical box that doesn't use fuses and real wiring is starting to go in. Even with this handy dandy helper kid the electrical is and was the slowest part. It's mid-December and it's still not all of the way done. But maybe if the designer would quit coming up with new bigger and better ideas...Nah that couldn't be the reason.
Well the house is secure, the downstairs interior walls are disappearing and now it's time to look downward, the floorboards are ready and waiting to be discovered. So you'd think that you'd just rip off the old and get ready for the new right? Wrong. Roger carefully removed and saved each and everyone of the sub-flooring pieces. He said that he'd need them again, remember the hole left in the floor upstairs where the stairs were? Right that's just one spot where they'd be used again. Nicole Curtis is beaming down on us.
So one morning when I showed up at the little house on center street Roger had his feet dangling over the side of the floor into a pit that he was digging out of the foundation (or lack of) under the house. He had a little shovel and one shovelful at a time he was filling up buckets and taking the dirt out to the trailer. I started helping, finally, and could barely keep up with him and that shovel. He had pulled out a rock, no, more of a boulder - that I had to have Ben take to the trailer because I could barely scooch it across the floor to get it out of the way. All of this in about a 3 x 3 foot space. He reached down into that hole and pulled out that rock. I do not know how he does the things he does, have I used the word amazing yet today?
Anyway this spot is the heart of the house. After it was all dug out Roger poured cement into a mold and secured a post to it to hold up the retaining wall. It sounds easey peasey when you read it here in a paragraph or two, but believe me this was a feat that no mere mortal would ever think of undertaking himself, but Roger did think it, and then he did it. I think that it was at this point that I began to realize what we had actually had the audacity to ask a neighbor to do to help us on this project. He'd been here before, he knew what we were asking and still he said yes. Sometimes there are just too many blessing to count and too much gratitude to express. It most likely would have been better if we'd just added another layer of wallpaper and coat of paint and waited for the little house to just disintegrate into the earth, but at this point (a month and a half down the road) I am so glad we didn't just do that because as it all starts to come together I can't tell you how excited I am to see this project coming to fruition.
This is in the little room on the ground floor, This wall was a retaining wall, it seemed to be the one wall that held the whole house up. See that stud that seems to be leaning up against the one on it's left? That gave the support needed to hold up the house. The little cross piece, about an 8 inch 2x4 braced the leaner and leanee. I felt so much better after Roger put up a sturdy post mounted in cement to make sure everything didn't come tumbling down. 
Every time we reveal a new layer I wonder how the lady of the house felt when her rooms got a facelift. Nothing makes you feel better than a fresh coat of paint or new curtains. But there are times that you just have to start again from scratch because carrying all that weight around can really start to weigh you down. But there were some really lovely wallpapers in the little house on center street. And then there were some that I'm pretty sure Erv and Sherley found at a garage sale at a wonderful price. Did I say hideous? No not me! All fresh and clean now thank heavens. Why did we ever think that wallpaper was a wonderful thing. Especially a wonderful thing if it was just added on top of the old stuff.
These kids are absolutely the best. They don't always like to hang out with grandma down at the little house on center street, but they entertain themselves one way or the other when I'm distracted with my fun projects for the day. This was really a good feeling once that old back porch was torn off. I don't know why it gave me the heebie jeebies so bad, but it was like a breath of fresh air. I love that old wood back there, I don't think it would hold up too good through the winter so we'll have to cover it over a bit until we decide what to do about siding.
