page 5

in the summer of '03 the szuplats purchased property on 12 vacation lane.

found here will be details of putting a structure up

written mostly by erica and photographed a lot by ben, however like most things in life there are exceptions....

for instance ben wrote that last useless sentence.

 

week beginning Sun. Nov. 30

(top) looking up the stairs through what will become the roof. hard to tell, i know, but it's a nice composition.

the framing crew worked like crazy and finished the house on friday, dec 5. in 9 working days they built us two stories (one story and a loft? with two dormers)--framed and plywood shell--, three sets of stairs---one set of stairs going to the loft, one going to the basement, and one in the bulkhead/basmement. they installed all 21 windows and almost all of the trim around the windows and exterior of the house. phew...

 

saturday dec. 6; nor'easter

(above) looking from the loft into the cathedral ceiling side of the house.

(above)looking toward the breakfast nook from the liv. rm area

we had scheduled our roofing and siding delivery for this morning. we were up and at 'em at the site and waiting for the delivery by 8 a.m.. because we live on cape cod, the snow that had been coming down for the past 16 hours changed to rain. we checked the phone messages and discovered a call from falmouh lumber inquiring about whether we still wanted the delivery. we figured we did and so we waited until about 11 o'clock. due to the weather they hadn't loaded the order until they were sure we still wanted it today.

(left) ben and clayton at the ready. don't think they shoveled all that driveway though-- our kindly landscaper neighbor plowed it for us in one fell swoop! peter and clayton showed up to help with any unloading or moving around of materials. but the boom truck (right) made the delivery and unloaded all the pallettes off the truck; the driver used the crane to place the materials in the back of the house. ben and i made trip #10000 to home depot this week to get paint and paint supplies for the trim (factory primed) and paint for the outside of the clawfoot tub. now we wait for everything (and everyone) to thaw.

 

dec 10th- as we wait for the snow (above) to thaw (rain tomorrow), we hope to have a productive weekend roofing ect.....all are still invited (of course)

 

meanwhile erica has been making headway on the tub...

stach sand blasted the tub feets and erica has gotten the tub primed up .....

 

we also took some time to have fun with sam what with the weather and all

 

 

ben here, december 11

speaking of feets....erica has pulled off one this week (ouch?) she has managed to get the "official paper work" signed, notarized, sealed and delivered to the proper "authority" at the water dept. buried deep deep within town hall. this makes way for the hiring of cavossa to trench and pipe the street up from john parker for our water line, fill the trench back in after attaching all the appropriate pipes and what not, and then pave the street back up. which is no small feet. erica was told that lawrence lynch-- you know the "pavement people" -- shut down for the season at xmas, but cavossa hopes! they can get us in before... jeesh and wow!!!....this seems unusually tight for contractors doesn't it......i mean really; here we are on the 11th booking the job that must be done by 24th and since they have to wait to hear from DigSafe, they won't even have started by the 15th... keep your toes crossed on this one!!! it will be nip and tuck.....no wonder we are hoppin around on one foot.

 

sat., dec. 13

A BIG THANK YOU!!!!

goes out to all who came to help with roofing and siding!

rain on thursday proved essential for melting the rest of the snow we incurred last weekend. on friday, ben did mucho preparation for this weekend's events. among other things, he drilled lots of holes for staging, put up some initial staging and got some tyvek around. tyvek goes under the cedar shingles (siding.) he prepared rain and ice (goes under asphalt roofing shingles) and prepped shingles (slicing them to appropriate sizes for perfect staggering.)

(above) the "back" side of the house. we haven't cut through the tyvek yet around the windows.

(above) the "back"side of some of our roofers! [we might have to start censoring this site's bad puns! -ed.]

the super kickass team of shinglers included jim, clayton, don c, and peter. man, were they efficient; fast and furious! i'd say they finished over half of the roofing in this one day. jen fay and erica mostly cut the shingles to their respective sizes and also hauled them up ladders and rooves along with ben and peggy. stach and jen p. graciously lended a hand to cleaning up the job site. it looks much better after its first facelift! (or am i confusing extreme makeover with trading spaces!?) ben was an all-around eveywhere go-to guy. peggy also debuted in her honorable role as supplier of the many boxes o' joe and dunkin donuts to the caffeine-hungry workers. jen fay, erica, and peggy put up more tyvek. stach also worked on the east side crew, also comprised of josh and dub, the only ones to brave the cedar shingles. they were exacting, and here they can be seen in deep contemplation over...well, something.

 

we had many people lending tools and time to what is quickly becoming our home. kim and geoff even came by with pizza lunch!

we cannot thank you all enough for your time and energy.

(especially on these cold days!)

 

sun., dec. 14

Richtfest!

(above) in the tradition of bavarian carpenters, jim places an evergreen on the soon-to-be-completed rooftop! My brief research finds that tradition also dictates that the owner(s) of the roof will pay for a celebration for those who erected it! We certainly can't go against tradition now! thanks continue-- as does the snow ( a few inches so far tonight)-- to our hearty crew of stach, peggy, clayton, jen, peter, and jim.

 

dec17

sorry no new pictures today....however news on the street is that cavossa will begin bringing the water up the street tomorrow... also erica purchased our front door at the home depot. sorry thats it for words too........

 

dec19

sorry still no new pictures.....we purchased the exterior window sill at falmouth lumber yesterday and some primer. erica plans on primin up the 8 foot lengths in her pops garage today. we also met the guys from cavossa.... pop quiz what are they doing? ding ding ding ding - thats right bringing the water up the street. this plan seems to be going pretty well. they have carved the pavement off the street and await a town officials arrival for inspections before they begin digging on monday! they were real nice and agreed to not harm or even mind the trees we wanted to keep. they might be our favorites so far! the plan for the weekend is to finish up the last little bit of roofin and move on to siding. we will lose most if not all of sunday to little elanors 1st birthday extravaganza and the annual xmas party with the marins (is that how its spelled? (this is erica's boston family)) erica has the digital camera today and is planning pictures of the tub progress, so maybe something to look at soon. by the way for those of you following the web page's progress. we have been getting a lot of hits lately and our average has jumped to 6.3 a day, again i wonder who this .3 of a person is (must be the nuclear families kid). we had 16 hits yesterday!!!! i am not sure we even know 16 people.......jeesh. lastly we are in negotiations for a fridge. details to come

 

 

page 6

see the details of h20 in and h2o out getting flushed out

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

bens first attempt at inserting a counter.....provided by http://www.digits.com/