Be ready for the next 100 years

the sofa coming....

2012-01-11T14:19:00.001-06:00

we order that at 28 September, and its coming today.... i will do some review later today..

Windows…..

2011-12-29T14:28:00.000-06:00

We’re done with the foundation, and we don’t worry about our house falling down…

But winter’s close and the biggest problem that we have, are the windows.

The winds walking from room to room. And autumn, so the geese are here. Thousands of geese are coming and with old windows every evening we heard the geese’s news. Its sound like we have geese inside our house! Winters almost here, we have no money, and the windows must be replaced before winter. Or we’ll have big, big bill for heating.

So we start researching…..

Local hydro company have loan program for upgrade house for safe power. That gives us 5000 dollars…

Estimate from one local contractor ask around 15 000 for all windows… we have not much time for asking other companies.

And we cut couple room out from estimate.

1 room have some newer windows…

Second room, it’s the sunroom, it has big windows in one half of the room. We just glued these windows with plastic film, to not let the wind in.

Estimate going down for 5000, but still too high for our budget.

And first idea the contractor has, is to install normal plastic windows inside the old wood frames. I see that on few old houses and that looks not to pretty, form my opinion. You have old ugly wood frame around very white plastic …. Looks like patchwork.

And we asking for estimate just triple glass package. And that package will install inside old wood frame on silicone. Exactly on place where the normal second windows frame would stay…. That gives us time to think what we what to do with windows… and one way we can renew the outside frame, install this frame back over triple glass package and keep the house’s old look…

On that estimate we’re going little over 5000 and we can pay different from own pocket.

New glass coming in end of October…

Questions

2011-10-29T19:36:00.001-05:00

Week passed, busy with my project of heat upgrading before winter will come. I wanted that all painting will be done before installation of heating system and hardwood…. But all step by step…

I had few questions about last post.
I used old stones, mean same stone what I took off from the wall, it has to be cleaned very nice from old mortar.
And some people asked about how it’s going step by step.
First, you prepare room where you will reinstall your stones. Take out all pieces what shake or moved. Brush all dust. Find stones what stay firm.
Prepare your stones. You need big stones for start.
Mix mortar.
Make you stones wet. Really wet.
Start from corners. Bring couple shovel mortar and install big stones on corners.
When your corners sit right, you can take rope between for seeing of the outside line,
Now you need to find right size stones what you will install between corners and these stones must not be bigger than your outside rope. Put more water on stones, few shovels mortar mix and install big stones between corners. Only one line.
Give time to dry mortar and your line of stones sit strong.
After, you can install next line of stones in the same way. Use level for installation of corners .
Don’t worry about gaps between big stones in your new wall. You will fill up them later with mortar and small stones.
When you come to line where your bricks must start, you need to mark your bottom brick line and play with mortar and stones size, do close to street line.
Hard to explain in words how install bricks. But its the same idea what we used with stone. Build corners and fill up between. Install rope for each brick line. And use measurement tape for checking mortar seems between bricks

announcement

2011-10-24T23:40:00.000-05:00

short video, for keep my readers

i be back shortly, sorry.

The choice

2011-10-14T13:35:00.000-05:00

It is hard to choose what to fix first. But roof and windows can wait, because if we will lose foundation, we lose whole house. Short research about who can help to fix foundation gave funny result, closer guy who may be will interesting to fix foundation is 200 km away and price will be probably from 15000 CAD and up. Little bit too much.

One guy (he told that he is a construction engineer with a lot of years of experience) said - I must take oil paint and mix it with cement , and paint all my foundation over. This will give me other 2-3 years.
I was shocked. Now I look scare when come into big buildings. If some Canadian engineers have ideas like this, we lucky no one building fell down yet.

I decided to do all by myself. Examined foundation all around and found it built in 2 lines stones. Mean, if I will wash out old concrete in small section just from outside, house won’t fall down and I can fill this space with new mortar mix. And do section by section all house around. Biggest thing that you must wet all stones inside for nice sticky to mortar.

We had one part of wall already on the ground.

We took all that by part, keeping old bricks and clean up them from old mortar. Little dig down to check a part of foundation underground and start to build this wall back.

Some days I had help from my family.

Because I had not much tools for doing that project. And did all mortar mix by hands. Hard work.

The inside

2011-10-10T13:44:00.000-05:00

Inside the house it look not so bad, if we compare with outside.
We have 2 wood fireplaces , 1 in dinning room, 1 in master bedroom

Sunroom

big living room

Some rooms have some strange wall color. One rooms walls looked like if you had no depression ,then you come in and you'll will have a depression in a few minutes.
3 bedroom, big attic with few room

of course, kitchen

funny basement

and 3 bathrooms

and 800 sq ft attachment house

About

2011-10-07T16:13:00.000-05:00

Looks like some renovation almost finished and I had a visit to furniture shop today. Just for browsing around, may be to find some ideas ….I was looking for a couple chairs what we can place in front of a fireplace…
Think about massive and old style… and of course comfortable to sit, to relax, to watch the fire and may be to dream in winter time. Found one that looked very close to what I was imaging.

But when I looked closer….

I called sale person and asked about these strange holes..
She looked at me like I’m guy from small village and have first time to see cultured furniture.

- THAT, SPEACIAL DESIGN!!! AND ALL THAT CHAIRS MADE THE SAME WAY!!!!

I was shocked. To make circle holes and put square pieces of wood inside… these pieces not tide inside? 1000 bucks chair, has 8 holes and technically I understand why these holes were made for, but on practice I don’t understand why they fixed so bad?

For me it looks like
- Bill, what we will do with this pile of garbage at front of the house?
- Nothing Bob, we have no time to clean up, say to the customer its new landscape design.

First look

2011-10-06T11:17:00.000-05:00

Ok, lets go …

We bought that house over 4 years ago. And we have all trouble included
We have bad windows,

Bad, its not much really what I want to say about windows…. Some windows had no glass… they had plywood instead…. I understand that plywood has more high insulation rating than glass… but on my taste it is little over..

We have roof leaking,

Normally, it was leaking in one room only, but when we had strong wind outside… then it was leaking on all second floor from ceiling…. A lot of fun for all my family..

We have no main entrance, all wood rotten and broken down…

We have serious problem with foundation.

So seriously, one wall fell down… previous owner covered that wall with some wood pieces.

We have hot water radiators for heating with old boiler.

When we asked before buying how much does this house cost for heating? We had answer , that around 450 bucks for cold months…. But in first winter, we saw real price for heating… up to 1500$ per month… we were shocked…

And good thing…This house is big! Has high ceiling! Nice big holes (actual its must be windows here) in wall, was bringing a lot of light inside. House is located in quiet area, has lake and park in 100 meters down the hill. House has its own character and soul. And house soul looks like a friendly cat, it happy for new family. And what is more important for me, when I first time stepped in I felt like I passed a long-long way and now I came back home.

introduce

2011-10-06T10:00:00.001-05:00

I did a little research in internet and found a lot of blogs about old houses. Mostly these blogs have 3 post..
1. We bought BIG OLD HOUSE!
2. We moved in. WOOOOW. So beautiful house. So much character… woooow.. wooow
3. bip….We got trouble… water pipe broken.. biiiiiiip… roof is leaking… ceiling fell down….. biiip… biiip… biiiip….
And epic fail, no more post in blog…
So, I will try to keep posting more than 3 post…

Prologue

2011-10-05T13:35:00.001-05:00

This blog is about a 120 year old house. This house already has its own history. And I will tell you how I prepare this house to make its history continued for at least another 100 years. About problems with repair and their solutions, about new technologies and materials, about application of these technologies and materials. And my opinion about all of this.
Tips and tricks, as well as questions are welcome.
It is also encouraging companies that see the use these technologies in their work to bring the houses in order.
Write, discuss and analyze everything!

The Time

2011-10-05T13:00:00.000-05:00

The time still going,

and all still changed

years clicks and clicks

more and more close to today

and almost here

History of The House

2011-10-05T11:44:00.000-05:00

Build in 1893 by land speculator James Roberts, this large two-storey house of buff-coloured brick veneer commands a good view of Park Lake. Like many of the substantial Neepawa houses of the period, its design incorporates elements of various styles. The palladian windows in the east and west dormers are typical of the Queen Ann Revival, while the projecting bay with its round-headed windows, intended to take advantage of the lake view, is Italianate in character. The Brick dogtooth course and the woodwork surrounding the porch emphasize the craftsmanship of the Victorian builder. after 1909 this was the home of the Honorable James
Howden, Neepawa Mayor, Province Secretary, an later, Attorney-General of Manitoba.
(C) From Neepawa: an architectural walking tour, 1987