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the attic, part 1 -- work begins
clearing out the bats in the belfry
Imagine our happy
surprise when we first looked at the house and discovered the door in one of the bedrooms that
opened not onto a closet, but onto a narrow flight of stairs to the attic.
And upstairs was a huge unused space that demanded something special. It
had a beautiful hardwood floor needing just a little sanding and
finishing, a wide dormer on one side, and plenty of potential storage
space under the eaves. We started planning the renovation of that space
into a master suite before we even closed on the house.
Well it's been two years,
but better late than never. Dad and Malinda were on their way to help us
get started on the electrical wiring and drywalling so we needed to get
everything ready in time for their visit. Which mean tearing out the paneling that was covering the walls, cleaning out all the junk the
previous owners had left behind under the eaves, ripping out the
insulation and replacing it with newer stuff that met building codes, and
building storage spaces under the eaves (putting down a sub-floor and
building kneewalls).
We decided to reuse the
paneling for finishing out the storage spaces when we get to that point since
it's actually good quality stuff and there's plenty of it. Which meant hauling
it all downstairs and finding a place to store it until we need it. There
was also a lot of unfinished plywood (not good quality stuff) they were
apparently using for a makeshift floor under the eaves for storing
miscellaneous crap -- so much that we had to rent a large dumpster to have
it hauled off. Most of the insulation was the original wool (yes, wool)
insulation from when the house was first built, which also had to go.
And then there was the junk. A broken plastic playpen. A horrible blue
glass globe table lamp, circa 1965, with fake gold feet and a huge dirty
lampshade. A four-foot red and white stuffed bear, probably won at a
carnival somewhere. Three room-size scraps of yellow and green shag
carpet, no doubt infested with heaven-only-knows-what. We would've
preferred HazMat suits, but we got by with goggles, gloves,
and dust masks.
There were treasures, too.
A box of books, a box of vinyl records, probably a few valuables in both.
Some pennies, a couple of stamps. An old, nearly disintegrated apple wrapper. But absolutely
the biggest treasures were two sets of framed pictures. They each
have five very old 5x7" photos in them, one set with a baby in various
poses, the other set with a little boy (presumably the baby a few years
later) in various poses. Judging from the clothes, the photo sets are
probably from the 'teens, maybe 1915 or thereabouts? Possibly even as
early as 1909, which is when we speculate the house was built. There's no
indication of who he is so we've named the little boy Christopher Robin.
One of these days, we'll try to find out his real name.
But first, we have an
attic to renovate.
It took almost four full
days to clear out the attic. When we were done, Every square inch had to
be cleaned (not even haunted houses have that many cobwebs, not mention
the old wool insulation, which stuck to everything). But when we
were done, it was probably the cleanest it's been since the house was
first built, even if it was basically gutted.
Before we could start
insulating, we had to put up the Styrofoam vent baffles for attic
ventilation. Because although the previous owners had been smart enough to
have attic vents cut in when the new roof was put on they a) didn't have
ventilation channels put in to let air circulate between the eaves and the
vents; and b) didn't clear out any of the insulation around the vents
themselves to make them actually, you know, useful. Color me so surprised.
The baffles were easy to
put up but made it harder to fit the insulation in (a fact that came up
later during the drywalling phase). And as with every project that we
start came the point when we had to figure out how to haul certain
materials from the hardware store to the house. (About the only time we
ever regret not having a truck.) This time, it was 15 rolls of insulation
in the Subaru, which might as well have been trying to cram 15
pro-football players in the Subaru (bulk-wise, not weight-wise). But we've gotten pretty creative with
this kind of thing in the last couple of years and compared to the time we
hauled all the lumber for the porch -- without the benefit of rope...and
on the freeway, no less -- it was actually kind of funny instead of
outright terrifying.
Next came the loose-fill
insulation between the floor joists. Which sucked, by the way, but
we'll save you the boring story about why we ended up breaking it up by
hand, every square effing inch of it. (Though I will say that all this
insulation better pay off in the winter, dammit.)
Finally -- finally
-- we were ready to put down the sub-floors for the three storage spaces
and start roughing in the framing for them. This part was without doubt
the easiest and fastest part of the project so far. Once the plywood
sheets were nailed down, Sal put together the frames while I cut the studs
for the next one. Which means I got to learn how to use a compound miter
saw (borrowed from Marshall, Coolest Boss Ever™), thus expanding my power
tool repertoire. And can I just say that I? Am a compound miter saw
badass. Forty-three custom studs cut at an angle varying from 28 to 32
degrees and not a single screw-up in the bunch. Okay, one mistake,
but Sal was totally distracting me with his "Corky
Thatcher does Homestar Runner"
routine so it doesn't really count.
Up next on a Very Special Episode of The Hallway:
The Halls learn that drywalling does not belong in the "beginners" section
of the
Newly Updated Better Homes & Gardens Home Improvement & Repair Guide. "Newly
Updated" my sweet Aunt Josephine....
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