It’s funny – I used to be all careful coming up here, putting on a Tyvek suit and booties. Now, I just come up in jeans, a t-shirt, and a hoodie. Where I used to be super careful moving around, I’m literally just swimming in this stuff. I’m on my hands and knees, I’m on my back, on my belly. I’m hugging the dirty shop vac as I move it around – I don’t really care anymore. It’s like I’m taking a bath in all this muck, and it’s become normal now.
Liz would fill the mixer with 1.5 gallons of water. Then I’d dump in an 80 pound bag of cement. We’d mix that for a few seconds, and then I’d dump in another bag. That got mixed for about 4-5 minutes, and then poured into the ground. As Bob scooped the cement in to the hole, we repeated the process all over again.
We used a chalk line to mark where we needed to cut the concrete. When pouring in new concrete, we wanted to have a clean line. Bob had a grinder with him, but not the right blade. So we headed over to the nearby Ace Hardware for the blade. After we got back, I started to cut… and not 5 minutes go by before the grinder starts smoking and up and dies on us.
Sunday, Liz and I tackled the basement and back yard some more. While she continued to clean up the basement walls, I was working on hauling lots of sand back into the basement. We created this huge mound back in June, and it’s finally time to bring all this stuff back in to the house.
Tonight, I worked with Bob on setting up the base for a hefty column in the basement. The goal is to raise up the first floor a bit, as it’s sagging significantly in a few spots. But to do that, we need a substantive base to rest the column on.
One thing we are focusing on is getting the back basement area prepped and ready. We’re going to be installing a new security door in back, and filling in the back half of the large hole we dug. If we can get this back area cleared and cleaned away, and the floor poured, we could technically have the back basement area done!
This is the back bedroom (my unofficial office). Liz amd Julie cut through the wall here, to give the plumber access to the pipes feeding the shower. I think with this right here, every single room now has been touched by us since our arrival.
We went through a process of throwing in some sand, wetting it down with water, and then tamping it down. Repeated this for a while (though I have to say, having a spigot and working water again in the basement feels like a treat and a luxury).
Down in the basement, I got to see what our plumber had been up to. He’s successfully replaced our lead pipe, and things are markedly less dangerous/unstable. We were originally going to have to freeze the pipe to work on it, but he was able to do it without the freezing (and ended up saving us a few hundred dollars, as a result).
Long day of basement work with Bob today. Though Liz and I did some work yesterday, we still had tons to do today.
Our plan is to fill the area back in once we’re done working with the pipes, so we’re keeping all the dirt/sand nearby in a pile. Seems a little odd, but no sense in hauling this all outside when we’d have to haul it all back in again.
Today, Liz and I decided to brave some basement demo on our own. We talked a bit over the last week, in terms of us trying to take on more tasks ourselves. Even though we love Bob’s help, we found ourselves wanting to try to do more by ourselves.
For now, we’re in good shape with a lot of the area cleared away from the main waste pipe for the plumber to investigate. We’ll be looking to see if we can relocate this pipe closer to the wall, giving us a lot more walking room between the main basement and the back area.
Over the weekend, Bob and I opened up a part of the basement walls to take a look at the studs there. We’re planning on putting in an injector pump behind this large waste pipe. And if all goes well… we might even end up routing the waste pipe so that it’s not smack dab in the middle of the walkway here.
While we were planning, Liz had suited up in her work clothes and was tackling cleaning the basement area (below where we and been working all week, on the kitchen). It was a mess down there, but she really cleared the space up well!