Outside Wall of Our House

[Edwin]

Bricks on side of the house 10-12 003reduced.jpg

This is a corner picture showing part of the North end of the house, and what I have gotten finished along the wall of the house in Scooby's yard. I think he likes it because he peed on one the the blocks, so he was taking possession of that block, and he may mark that wall too!

[Edwin]

This is the corner of the house facing the road. It is what people will see as they drive by, and drive in to our place. It is just started, and when we move the water system I will have enought blocks to go about another 30 feet, so that will be a serious gain!

[Edwin]

Bricks on side of the house 10-12 001reduced.jpg

This is the North end of our house. This is the end of the house that gets hit with the really severely cold wind and drifting snow. When the wind is blowing the hardest, and the air temperature is the lowest the bedroom and bathroom on that end of the house is severely cold even inside and with the pellet stove heating the place. I am hoping to change that a little bit at at time. Before we had metal roofing for skirting, and some boards above it to try to seal the gap. It worked, but not when the weather was the most severe! Now there is an 8 inch thick wall with dead air space, and plastic between that and the house, a little bit of which you can see. I will be so thrilled when I get this wall build all the way around our house. Our daughter informed me this evening that she thinks they will get the water system in the cellar in the next 2 days, which means I have enough blocks to lay another 30 feet, which with what I already have will cover most of the front side. Then shortly after I will be doing more insulating under the floor, which I have already done part of it, and I am just waiting to make sure I won't insulate where they want to run wires, or where temporary pipe will need to be removed. We are way behind on this project, but better late than never applies here, and soon we will be warm, cozy, have running water all through the house, and my bathroom will be beautiful!!!! I guess you know I am feeling very happy!

[red]

Wow Sir Ed, you work hard on that house.

[Edwin]

You are right about the hard work. We are working hard on the cellar now, and putting water in our entire house. I have already taken part of that wall down to get lumber out from under the house! Now it has snowed on everything that I have scattered around! Such is life. I had to get all kinds of lumber out so that the guys helping me could see what they need. It got 14 degrees F. last night, and now we have no water; it was all frozen, even under my protective walls. So we took all the water system loose to put it in the cellar/basement. Now we only have water sitting around in gallon jugs, just like we used to; not running water in the house, not even the kitchen sink, not even the dishwasher. We put up tarps, and are running a space propane heater. Boy, the cold has interrupted things this time. We will manage, but it is just a little harder when everything is freezing up! We have the pressure tank and hot water heater sitting in the cellar, and the pump and some of the other water parts sitting in the house. Our house looks terrible again in disaray! But it will be nice when it is all fixed!

[Edwin]

You can see 7 concrete blocks sitting stacked in Scooby's yard. I guess he thinks they are his, because he has been peeing on them!!!! I really don't care, and it is okay as he is not hurting them at all, and that just goes to prove that he really likes those concrete blocks!

[Edwin]

You see the picture above with the dog house in it, well now I am right at the dog house with my wall. I had a number of concrete blocks that I brought up from town, and I stacked them in the the back yard until I could get around to laying them. Day before yesterday I used those blocks to build the wall, and now I am right up to the dog house, so I have most of that side finished as well as the entire north end of our house.

[Edwin]

You see the picture above with the window in the upper right hand corner of the picture? On that side of the house I got busy a few days ago, and in the dark with it raining, and dripping on me from the roof of the house I worked on that wall. Also the wind was blowing, so it was a pain to put that plastic behind those blocks, and being in the dark made it really difficult as well, but I got that wall completed right up to our front door. There are blocks that we mortored in along the house behind the cellar, about 8 feet worth, so there isn't much left to finish that wall. I now just have the south end, and a few feet on both sides, which is a quite a bit, but not much in comparison with what I have done already. I think it looks really nice, and it was keep us warmer this winter! If our house calapses, I will take those blocks and build another house! I am just being funny, but the blocks that I have along that wall would build about one third of a wall high on the house! It is funny to think about though. I have more plans to make things more comfortable, but one thing at a time, I will only think about them, and not even talk about them until the time comes! It is all fun though. Next is the replacement of the roof! After that who knows, maybe renewing of the siding above my block wall!

[Edwin]

I have finished building the wall all around the house, except for about 3 feet or so! When I got home with the blocks I put some of them on top of the wall for completion. It is five blocks high with the 5th block laid on its side to cover the holes in the other blocks to keep the rain and snow out. I have 4 or 5 junk blocks that need to be replaced, more to put on for the 5th layer, and one set of steps to build. After doing what I did to the wall tonight I have 18 blocks left. I will come up a little short, but it will be close. I had them hold 30 more blocks for me as they are getting low on them, and I have been the reason they are running out! I will get them Wednesday and then make a little more progress! I will get some pictures on here in a few days, and from pictures you seen before, you will be amazed!

[Edwin]

Front of House

Ourside the house @ different angles 003reduced.jpg (40.49 KiB) Viewed 6272 times

This picture was taken on a dark and dismal day, so its exposure was a little dark. I will try to get a better one later. If you remember my other pictures of the house, there was a huge hole there, and now you can see the cellar roof, which I am going to leave the tarp on until spring then I will roof it correctly. You can also see this front side of the house with the blocks five layers deep to keep the cold, freezing wind out from under our house. It has to be making a difference now because it is all around the house with plastic behind the blocks to keep the wind from passing through. Then the 8 inch block with a dead air space is great also. I like this idea for skirting for our house. I think it needs to be resided, but replacing the roof is next!