10/06/2022
Hello Everyone! I know it’s been a while since you’ve seen a post from us:) So here’s a download of what we’ve been up to and photos (in chronological order) of why we haven’t been posting much.
Since the spring, we’ve been working very hard on the largest project we’ve ever taken on; building an addition and attached garage on our own house.
Our house is 115 years old (the existing green siding structure), so the build was challenging architecturally because we have to build the addition without actually attaching it to the original house. The old building moves around a lot and the new building won’t.
Foundation: helical posts, insulated and heated crawl space under the house, and floating concrete pad for the garage.
Roof: built a new flat roof on top of the existing house and extended it over the rear addition. It is a fired on roof with a flex joint between the two separate structures to allow for movement. We managed to get engineered trusses despite supply shortages. The garage has a cathedral ceiling that has a nice, gentle slope, with asphalt shingles.
Exterior: The walls are insulated, both inside and outside, with Roxul. And we went with a plywood siding in panels 4’x8’, which we painted to match the trim colour on the original house. We are using PVC trim mounding for the corners, tops and seams. We may eventually add battens, but not this year.
New spaces: besides the garage (which will obviously be a wood shop, not a place we park the cars), we will have an entry, powder room, laundry room and utility room (we are adding natural gas forced air heating and cooling to the whole house), and upstairs we will have a new primary bedroom and en-suite bath, and the smallest of the current bedrooms will become our walk-in closet.
We subbed out the foundation posts, HVAC, plumbing, electrical connections, flat roof, concrete, and drywall mudding/sanding (when we get there). We had 3 days of help from a framer, on-going help from another skilled laborer we met more recently, and great help from Dusty Workbench Canada (shout out to our good friends Brenda and Paul💕). And, of course, the help and support of family.
Oh, and we also finally had the driveway paved. Been waiting for that to happen for 7 years………
We’re not close to done, but as we close in on finishing the exterior of the addition, we’ll move into the finishing stages, which is where Dave and I are in our element.
Every week I think about doing a post and sharing updates, but honestly, with a full time job and this…who has the time or energy🤷🏻♀️
We hope to come up for air by Xmas! See ya then!!
