Mike and Jeff's New House

This week the guys installed the roof above the second floor cantilivered overhang shown on the right in the pic below. They also installed the facsia on the roofline, the metal shear straps between the second and third floors and started to install the roof sheathing. Framing was supposed to take 6 weeks....We are now at the end of week 9...... Draw your own conclusions......

The stairs from the 2nd to the 3rd floor are finally done! There will be a skylight at the top of the staircase and the landing between the 2nd and 3rd floor will have a one foot wide steel grate that will let natural light filter down to the first floor landing.

This pic shows the holes in the roof where two skylights will be installed. The one on the left will be above the bathtub/shower on the 3rd floor bathroom. The one on the right will be above the staircase....

The plumbers showed up unexpectedly on Friday, they stared installing the cast iron waste lines and vents......Sadly one of them cut through a joist and put a 4 inch hole in the wrong place.....We are getting good at rolling with the punches and just saying `Oh well, fix it'....

Today the guys arrived early and used a giant forklift to lift the big roof beams into place. They got about 2/3 of the roof trusses installed and tried to finish the toungue in groove over the living room.....unfortunaly they didn't have enough boards and they need to get more... Will it be another week delay? Breathe gin, breathe out, breathe gin, breath out...

Late on Tuesday the long-awaited tongue in groove boards that were custom milled for our job finally arrived (who knew it was so precious?) ...Today they started to install it....It was HOT up there....(104 degrees in the shade at ground level on Wed.) Construction tip of the day: If you buy your crew a case of Gatorade, a case of bottled water and 40 lbs. of ice on the days it hits 100 degees, everyone is happier.....

Carlos and his mystery man helper came back today and finished up the interior walls for the third floor....It was a very nice surprise after being told last week that nothing would happen till Tuesday of this week.... Here is a pic of us that was taken close to Sunset, we're standing on the third floor of the house...the beams are hopefully going in tomorrow!

Saturday was a big day here. Carlos and his quiet mystery man helper showed up and put the framing in for the end walls of the third floor.... Cool!! The third floor will have three windows at each end, the one pictured below faces the alley and has brilliant views of 8 lanes of freeway. On a clear day, the Sierra Nevada Mountains and the Lake Tahoe Basin are visible. The north side of the 3rd floor will have two big windows that look into the redwoods and the freeway beyond. The south side of the 3rd floor will have no windows but it will have two large sky-lights, one over the shower in the bathroom and one over the stairway...

All of the pics I've published so far have been exterior shots..here's an interior view...It is shot from the entrance to the master suite and shows the edge of the balcony that will overlook the living room...Also visible are the heavy beams over the living room that will soon be covered by 2x6 tounge-in-groove lumber. Note: This photo is OSHA approved and I was wearing appropriate safety gear while inside the structure... (flip-flops are OK.... right?)

The more accuate title for this entry should be `Patience is a virtue'.... Our lumber supply place has been terrible.....Sorry, let me take some deep breaths..... After countless contractor and supply side delays, the framing was supposed to be done by tomorrow.....yet another lumber delivery problem came up this week......Now we are not expecting the final delivery until Tuesday of next week and supposedly they'll be done framing by next Friday.... breathe in...breathe out....breathe in...breathe out..... Here is a shot taken first thing this AM...The third floor walls are up but they don't have all the lumber they need so the framers were here for an hour and then went to one of their other projects....We don't expect to see anyone here until next Tuesday when the missing lumber is supposed to arrive....

In order to avoid installing a second staircase to a third floor, state fire laws mandates that one can have no more than 500 Sq. Ft. of space on a 3rd floor. We have 495 sq. ft.... Sacramento building code allows homes to be built up to a height of 35 feet without a variance...Due to the side yard utility easement we are dealing with, the buildable space on this lot is very narrow so we are pushing the limit at 33 feet... This picture shows the July 7th view from the alley at the rear of the house...The south facing wall will be only 4 feet high before the roof starts....The ridge of the roof line will be off center and the two rooms up there will be 12 feet wide and 20 feet long.

Today the guys started at 6:30 in the AM and left at 8:30 PM....In that time they were able to hang all the rafters and install the subfloor for the third floor. They also hoisted the beams over the living room into place.......So far so good, we like the flow of the rooms on both the first and second floors, one more floor to go.....

Our master bedroom will overlook the living room. Some people have Elvis impersonators come to their house-warming parties...With a balcony like the one shown below, we will have to find an Evita Peron impersonator to show up and sing `Don't cry for me Sacramento' from the balcony..... (This view if from the front of the lot. )

The framing crew installed the second floor framing in two days, it is really starting to take shape. And WOW are those big windows looking down into our current garden.....

These big beams will hold up our cantilevered balcony... They are amazingly heavy and so far the guys have lifted everything into place by hand....I suspect that will change when they go up to the third floor.. It rained here most of the day today. (June 8th)....Very, very odd... Hopefully the rain will stay away tomorrow so they can finish putting the subfloor on for the second floor....

The joists shown below are above the garage and will hold up the second floor. They are designed to minimize squeaky floors......We'll get back to you in about 3 months to report on the results......

As you can in the pic below, the window into our living room is going to be rather dramatic.....Something tells me that the Christmas tree is going to be a whopper this year.......

The rain finally let up.... The crew descended... Mud was slung... We are now the proud owners of a beautifully smooth concrete slab!

Radiant heating has come a long way since Roman times when it was first attempted. This orange tubing is a three layer material that has aluminum tubing sandwiched between two layers of PEX. Unlike the early Romans, we are seldom seen in those short togas. Shown here is our dining room and kitchen area..

The exterior footings are in.. The Gravel is in... The vapor barrier is in... The sand is in.... The remesh is in.... Tomorrow, if the rain stays away, the guys from our HVAC supplier will be here to install the PEX tubing into the remesh...... See the link below for more info on radiant heat and PEX. http://www.wirsbo.com/main.php?pm=1&mm=2&sm=2&pc=homeowner/ho_mm2sm2.php If we are REAL lucky, the inspectors will OK it all on Wed and we'll pour the slab on Thursday.... We are crossing our Xanax stained fingers.....