catching up

Friday morning 20 March

I like it also. The window frames are going to be white but Everyone wants some kind of borders and color around the windows and of course along the edges of the roof. The edge is called fascia and the area under the eves, soffett.
Yes, multi-colors are very "in" right now and I like it better than monochrome.. The fascia and even the corners of the house is covered in a color coated aluminum called coil. The variety of colors is amazing. Skys the limit. I will get a picture of the houses on the street so you can see how ours might look. Our siding is called "shiplap" and the new siding will be 2 to 3 lines horizonal instead of one. Dutch lap is the triple . I need to spend some time mocking up color choics for the fascia and maybe the corners of the house. We could also cover the beams on the porch and the front door frame. I have not even thought about the door but I may want to at least replace the frame so we can get it covered with coil. Yes. I wanted to wait on the door as it could get expensive. That will be easy to do in the summer.
Yesterday, we fixed up the plumbing in the downstairs bathroom. I still need to cover the wall but got most of the stains out of the tub. The tub is steel and has at least one all the way thruSt ding. Not going to be fixed this trip and too big a replacement project for now. Kerry and Robert and a machine called a ditchwitch cut a trench from the water tank to the house. I was going around with another siding installer. This morning early we will use it to dig a trench for the electrical cable to the Robert's garage workshop aka the ManCave. Electrical contractor will show up today and start on that. Painting is complete for now. YEA! Just the inside painting, I'm sure has made a HUGE difference. Pictures coming soon.Pictures coming soon.

a note from Margaret on things in Garmisch
Well, almost all of the snow had melted, even in the corners of the yards. Tiny snow drop flowers are coming up in the flower bed between the drive and the kitchen.

And then it started snowing yesterday evening. It snowed about 2 inches over night. And it snowed about 4 inches between 6 & 8 am this morning. The prediction is for a foot, this week-end. The sun was out from 8-10 and now it is snowing so that you can not see the mountains across the street.

Margaret

Thursday
having trouble getting to the website to post....grr
I am trying to finish the the trench from the water tank up to the house. We have set up the pump and pressure tank and finished the plumbing to the house. The shower downstairs was removed and replaced with a new setup. The steel bathtub cleaned up pretty well but will need replacement eventually. I will still need to refinish the walls, replace the broken sheet rock and set up the backing for tile.

Wednesday night
we had music in the gazebo up on top of the hill, lots of old country and blues from JW and occasionally something Robert and the rest of us.

wednesday

Robert and I worked a bit more on the water system. got about 10 feet or trench dug out from the tank, more then 30 feet to go. Decided we will split the 102$ fee and get a ditchwitch to finish the trench at our house and also to bury the electric cable to Roberts new construction, now dubbed the "ManCave". The name beats the "garage"
Paid some bills and got the windows deposit sent out. Got new shower head and spout for the downstairs bathroom. this one will have a knob to turn to switch from bathtub to shower. Its easier then trying to pull a little lever on the spout into the bathtub. Picked up a regular hookup incase we can't make the fancy one work. Looks like it will be just fine. Karen and Robert headed off to a birhtday dinner from Kerry, Laura and Baby Marilyn. I finished off with the Amazing siding contractor, great warranty, transferable and permanent for everything. Easily twice the money of his nearest competitor. Oh well at least he has a competitor and some references. Will look some more. At least I have the windows started. It will be less then two weeks before they arrive and they can start the install. One more day on the painting and its done. Everyone wants the windows in first. Mean s I have two weeks to finishup and watch the oprogtesss. Also 2 weeka to find another siding bid.
went up to the gazebo and traded storys with the locales for a while . It continued on for an hour and slimme down. JW starte singiing the blues and continueded for awhie. gotta craSH SEE ya 'l tomorrow.

Here are the photos

Thats the new tank for the Chalet water. After several false starts we got hooked up at Tractor Supply with a 3000 gal tank thats about enough for two months in the summer. Its 8 feet tall and 8.5' wide with a hatch on the top probably too small to fit anyone in. It is light now maybe 250 lbs and huge but without handles. When it's full "a pints a pound" and it weighs in at more the a ton. That means it needs a comfortable bed made of pea gravel not a rock or cement block which will pock a hole in the bottom.
Robert found a good spot under the trees next to the house and fortunately not far from a good supply of pea gravel. Trees and dead branches were cleared . First we put together a 9 foot square frame with cross braces to hold the gravel. Then you level it and start filling it with smooth gravel (if its not level, your ton of water heads down the hill!).
After the frame is full it's leveled and graded smooth. Then it's time to get a bit of help from the neighbors to get it down the hill and onto the pad. JW and his visiting son-in-law came and gave us a hand getting it set upright and facing toward the house. Tomorrow, we start the plumbing up to the house. And now we're headed for the showers.....

----------------this post was out of order
13 march 09
Its still raining and pretty cold.  Robert and I charted out which plugs go to which
equipment/plugs/light switches.  We are still unsure about one top floor bedroom, but
we have all the other rooms mapped out. The electrician will start on Tuesday changing
out the breaker panel and replacing all the inside plugs  and switches. The aluminum wire
will be pigtailed for safety and GFI ; protected plugs will be added in the bathrooms
and kitchen.
 We  headed into Cedarpark to get a special shovel for trenching in the new water plumbing
we are adding ( the  old plumbing has even Robert stumped) .  We stopped at the Tractor and
Supply store and found a complete pump and pressure tank kit for 274$ +49$ for a 5 year
warranty+ a black 3000 gal tank in  their back lot for 1100$.  To be perfectly safe, we will
add a sediment filter and an ultraviolet filter before it enters the house.  The water tank
will be filled by the Chinatown Water Works 2000 gallon truck with genuine Cedar Park
water at 65$ per load.  They can come up on a couple hours notice. The hardness will be  about
the  same as Garmisch water.  Tomorrow we will build a pad for the tank over in the trees and
do some more plumbing up to the house and out to the street.

12 March 2009
am sorry I didn't think of this before.

Here is the picture of the house with a scan of the color swatch next to it. Resolution is a bit low. If you have a good high resolution photo, Liz can you send it to me. I will need to reprocess it but then I can get better detail.

After 2 more window estimators I changed a few minor things which will add to possible fire safety and bring us a bit closer to building codes.
I will work on a new version of the siding picture. I will do it with new names.

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11 March 2009
for much of the house remodeling , is the fascia thats the end of the roof before you go to the walls. Fascia is the vertical portion ( it holds the drip edge under the edge of the roof shingles, and when intact holds the gutter. when its broken the squirrels crawl in and make nests in the insulation) and the soffet the horizonal portion of wood under the eves. It allows some ventilation to the attic but ostly just covers to prevent squirrels and pests.
When the fascia decays or rots, the rafters underneath are exposed to the elementsand when those ends rot, you need to "scab" 2 by 4s onto the sides of the rotten board. Then when all the rafters are repaired, you replace the 1x4 fascia and a 1x2 edge that supports the metal flange of the drip edge. Now that everything is strong, you can attach the gutters so the water drips off the roof into the gutters. All the work has to be done on ladders or on a scaffolding. Typical costs are 17$ a foot, we need it. Estimators hate to estimate it as you never know what you will find until all the pieces are removed and exposed.
Our roof is only 2 layers thick and dark brown in color. Changing the color will decrease heat gain 10% or more, adding a metal roof on top would be even better then just white shingles or reflective paint. (google studies on roofs in Florida and California). A metal roof also increases the rainwater harvesting. Todays heavy rain could have supplied us with a full 2000 gals of rain water. Sent thru the proposed carbon filter and ultra violet filter of our water system would given us better (mineral free) water then Cedar Park or Austin water services.
While we are on the subject of water, Chinatown Water will deliver 2000 gals for 65$ usually in less than 24 hours. All designs for the water system plan for about 2 months of water. Agricultural water being supplied by rainwater harvesting. They have been supplying our mountain with water for years. Certified by the BBB (Better Business Bureau) also. They use water directly supplied by Cedar Park. The price is regulated by the state and they are really just charging for the delivery. We will install an extra 10 feet of 2 inch pipe to make it easy for them to fill up from the street in front of the house.
There is a third water proposal coming in later today, another windows estimate(BBB this time) and the painting starts. The window has stopped and with it the rain. will go upstairs and see much we got.
bye for now more news as the day goes by
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10 March 2009
tell me what u want. There is chance we can get the roof included with the soffets,facia, and gutters. I will do that in the next batch of photos
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anyway its real hard to get the exact match to the samples. hopefully your color chips will arrive soon.

we really haven't added trim and there could be some around the windows and along the eves and soffets. I will do a house in Antique parchment and the adobe cream too. I may get a good deal for doing the soffets and fascia and the roof in seamless metal. The roof alone will increase the energy savings by 10% ( according to people other then roofers in both California and Florida) and increase the rainwater harvesting. We could get half our more of our water from rainwater harvesting even in Central Texas. The simpler water system I am putting in would still treat it adequately. Right now the water from each system would be stored seperately

Reply to all

13 march 09
 Its still raining and pretty cold.  Robert and I charted out which plugs go to which
equipment/plugs/light switches.  We are still unsure about one top floor bedroom, but
we have all the other rooms mapped out. The electrician will start on Tuesday changing
out the breaker panel and replacing all the inside plugs  and switches. The aluminum wire
will be pigtailed for safety and GFI ; protected plugs will be added in the bathrooms
and kitchen. 
  We  headed into Cedarpark to get a special shovel for trenching in the new water plumbing
 we are adding ( the  old plumbing has even Robert stumped) .  We stopped at the Tractor and
Supply store and found a complete pump and pressure tank kit for 274$ +49$ for a 5 year
warranty+ a black 3000 gal tank in  their back lot for 1100$.  To be perfectly safe, we will
add a sediment filter and an ultraviolet filter before it enters the house.  The water tank
will be filled by the Chinatown Water Works 2000 gallon truck with genuine Cedar Park
water at 65$ per load.  They can come up on a couple hours notice. The hardness will be  about
the  same as Garmisch water.  Tomorrow we will build a pad for the tank over in the trees and
do some more plumbing up to the house and out to the street.


     
       
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26 Feb Thursday
27 Feb Friday
28Feb Saturday
Sunday  0600
poem from Doubleplay