Fencing

This weekend we replaced the fence that separates my yard from my neighbor Greg's yard. Our old fence had to be 20 years old. All the posts were totally rotted and the fence was held up in one spot by the vines that grew all over it. We struggled for a bit on Saturday morning trying to get the fence to come down but when we found the vine that was holding it together it came down very easily. Here is the old fence in a huge pile on the street:

We cleared out the old fence and started digging post holes. Collin, Mike (Dad) and Greg manhandled the post hole auger that we rented from home depot. They struggled through roots and left over concrete from the old fence:

Some of the old concrete was in the way and it was pretty brutal getting it all out. Collin, Greg and Mike went at the concrete with picks, sledge hammers and digging bars. None of them ever want to see a digging bar again...

After we had the holes in all the right places we placed the posts and poured the concrete. When Saturday came to an end we had all the posts in place and we had gone to the lumber yard and bought all our supplies.
A full truck bed, what a pretty sight:

Sunday, all we had to do was frame it and nail up the fence boards so we went out that night and had a couple beers downtown retiring early because we were beat from a long day of tearing down and digging holes.
Sunday morning we woke up bright and early to a little food and handfuls of Ibuprofen. There were 4 extra people in my 900 sq. ft. house so Dad slept on a cot in the dining room, he's hardcore:

We figured the hard part was over and we would finish in 4 hours...Not a chance. We did not run into any major hang ups during the day but framing took a lot more time and thought than we expected. We worked for about 8 hours today and finished before dark. Here are some of the activities from the day:
Cutting a post down to size:

Leveling and nailing boards:

We borrowed that nail gun from a friend, Mike McKelvey. The gun made all our work much easier and I bet we saved a few hours because of it. Thanks Mike!
While I am discussing tools, I have to mention my brother. Collin has every tool known to man and we always give him a hard time for it because it seems a little excessive. However, I think we used every tool that he owns today. We used his chop saw, table saw, sawzall, air compressor...all of his tools were very useful so maybe I will have to lay off with the comments about how he owns too many tools.

We spent 2 8 hour days on this fence but in the end it looks great. I am so glad that the old one is gone! Collin, Dad, thanks for all the hard work.

Dad, Big Collin, Little Colin, Greg, Me

Work, work, work

Hi there, its been a while and the house has transformed quite a bit since I got back from my trip (rideataxia.org).

The first thing that was repaired was the floors. This place has sweet red oak floors but they were a disaster when I got here:

Termites, and rotten wood damaged portions of the floor.

So I got Doug to come in and resurface the whole house. He and his crew did a great Job and the floors now look fantastic.


At the same time, I had the house treated for termites (so they wouldnt come back and eat the floors again). I have no pictures of this, basically the dude came over, drilled holes all around the house and injected termite juice in them.

The next huge undertaking is the yard. As you can see in previous posts, the yard was a mess and it needed major work.

The first thing I did was hire some guys to build me a concrete patio in the back. So I called up a friend (Jim Dobrinski) and we made a sketch of what we thought the patio should look like. Jim called up a guy that he had worked with before and he got started right away. I called Jim on a thursday and by the next monday, work had started and the patio was finished by the end of the week.

Gravel Delivery


The boys, gettin' jiggy with it...what?

So the patio was in but it looked kinda out of place because it was this brand new, huge concrete structure surrounded by a small Jungle. So some of my best friends organized a day where we all got together and did a major overhaul of my back yard. We had 11 people and we worked for about six hours straight and got an amazing amount of work done.


Kele and Justin Digging up some stubborn roots


Jim, wrestling with a tree.


Kristina and Cole making a dent in the 7 yard pile of dirt that was wheeled to the back yard.


The crew. Thanks guys.

In six hours we cleaned out the jungle, did some minor concrete work, took out a tree and 3 stumps, took out the old clothes line posts, created two immense piles of green waste and spread 7 yards of top soil.


This is a snapshot of what it looks like now. Looking out from the patio to the clean slate of a backyard. It feels like a completely different place now. I have been sitting on the patio a lot lately, drinking, eating, sitting...hell ya.

One last order of bujsiness. Uncle Steve requested a view of the surroundings so here is my street in the winter time:

Fresh Paint

I finally got the keys...So we started on the interior. First, Dad, Andy and I painted one of the bedrooms green while the ladies (Mom and Kristine) tore apart the bathroom...Then we showed Kristine the electric sander...she spent the rest of the day sanding the old paint drips in the bathroom, literally all day. We tore out a bunch of stuff in the bathroom (Cole is good with a pry bar) including some old tile, an old shelf and the shower curtain thing. All of this left holes in the walls that we had to repair.

Cole, Kristine and Andy working it in the bathroom...

While all of this was going on, Mom was busy in the backyard stripping 50 years of paint off of the woodwork that we tore out of the bathroom.


Kitchen:
Tore all of the wallpaper off the walls and repaired the wall that was under the paper, then painted. This was some hideous paper: Yellow with a brown lattice pattern and orange flowers...sweet.

Dad and Cole repairing the mess in the kitchen.

Saturday was all prep work: Sanding, taping, repairing holes, prying things out of the walls, and some painting.

Scott, stoked to be crouching behind the fridge...

Today it was just Me, Mom, Dad and Andy and we painted like crazy.



Now the bedroom is green, the bathroom is light blue and the kitchen is off white waiting on a gold color for the trim, we did not paint any trim this weekend, we will save that fun for another time.

Side note: found extensive termite damage in the floor of the dining room, a pest guy is coming out tomorrow to see what can be done...hooray.

This Old House

Hi there, this blog is mainly for my Mother so she can keep tabs on me and my home, however anyone who wants to see how the house is coming along, feel free to browse...

The house that I chose was built in 1948 at 51st and A in East Sacramento, CA. This house has been owned by the same guy since it was built, however for at least the past ten years, this house was occupied by renters who did not take care of it very well. Particularly, the occupants of the house did not do any yard work for ten years...this was our first project over the Thanksgiving holiday. My Mom, Dad and brother came down to do some yard work for a few hours. After a couple of days, about 8 hours of work, and only one truckload to the dump, we made some progress:

Before:


After:


Before:


After:


Mom and Collin fighting the ivy:


Dad, standing proud of our full load, representing the Bryant family traditional DUMP RUN:



Next project is re-finishing the wood floors and painting some walls...stay tuned.