Giant Steps Forward

Our home is almost whole again. There is still lots and lots of cleaning to do, and we have to get the furniture cleaned up and back into place. And, oh, while we're at it, maybe we'll change a few things. But it sure feels good to see things mostly whole again.

Here is our new friend, Albert, who handled most of the painting chores. He painted the entryway hall, stairway, and upstairs hall in a slightly warmer, slightly darker color than was there before.


Next, he primed and painted all the new drywall, including the new living room ceiling. We have to give Mark high marks (!) for getting this ceiling so perfect. He told us this was the first truly flat ceiling he had done--they usually texture them. The painter had expressed some concern that if it was not perfect, the paint would bring out the imperfections. Not to worry! It looks terrific!


We had been considering putting a darker color of paint on the living room walls anyway, though this is a heck of a way to get that done. We really like the way it has turned out. The whole room feels much warmer.




Following the painting, it was time for new floors. The first step was to replace all the underlayment with sheets of 3/4" plywood.


The rolls of carpet and padding came in next.


The dining room was the first room to see the new carpet.


Meanwhile, upstairs, new linoleum went into the bathroom (the original "scene of the crime", as you may recall).


Then it was back to the living room, where the pad was put down and then the carpet rolled out and seams taped and glued up.



The carpet will be shedding for awhile. A first vacuuming pulled up several canisters full of loose ends.


And here at last is the finished product.



We are slowly getting each piece of furniture cleaned and back into place. The house has been full of dust from the water residue and the construction efforts, and all those fans kept it all moving. Some furniture is showing significant wear and tear from the high humidity, the drying, and some unfortunate bumps and nicks due to all the moving. But we are making progress. It is good to be reclaiming our personal space, and in a couple more weeks, maybe we will have everything set once again. Oh, except maybe for those changes we are still considering with the furniture configuration in the living room. We're waiting for our dining room table and chairs to be returned too--we decided to have them refinished while all of this has been going on.

Hawkeye Basketball

Kathie and I haven't purchased basketball tickets for the last few seasons. We were not enamored of the prior coach, and it had seemed like we could see all the games on TV anyway, and trekking out into cold weather wasn't always high on our list. Then the Big 10 got greedy and formed the Big 10 Network and Mediacom got greedy and wouldn't carry the new network on our cable, and so now we see no basketball games.

However, a good friend gave us two tickets to last night's game against Northwestern. So we did trek out into the cold, and we did enjoy one game this season. We were two of maybe 4,000 fans present. Attendance was undoubtedly affected by the poor recent weather, but the state Alford left our team in has made this rebuilding season a little less than exciting. The new coach seems like a great guy, though, so maybe things will improve. Last night was fun.

Just for the record, here is the scene while the players were being introduced.


The band was in good form, and the student "Hawks Nest" was lively.


Here's the opening tip!


The Hawks go on offense.


The cheerleaders are still cheering.


And the final score was a good one!

Slowly Getting Back to Normal

Thank goodness, the drying is flying over. While I was away last week, the last of the fans were finally packed up and removed. The carpet and underlayment were removed from the dining room, and the house has been declared dry, although we still think the humidity level is about 10% above normal.


Mark and his crew were here last week to begin rebuilding the living room. They began with insulation.


And then quickly moved on to putting drywall back up on the ceiling and walls.



Seams were taped and mudded, and then on subsequent days, the seams were further developed, the crown molding was installed, and the baseboard and other trim were put back.


There is still some cleaning to be done, and pursed lips help.


But things are slowly getting back to normal. Painters will be here on Monday!!

Making Progress

While we don't have any additional pictures to post just now, we can share a little information about the recovery situation following our unfortunate water damage.

The basement and upstairs areas are now completely dry. Carpet and underlayment have been removed from the dining room, and the sheeting in that area is now dry. Two walls in the living room still show some moisture levels, and so they remain the object of some fan and dehumidifier action, although most of that equipment is now out of the house. Perhaps those walls will be dry by early next week. That will be two weeks after the problem was discovered and the water was shut off!

A contractor is lined up to rebuild the living room ceiling and wall. New baseboard and crown molding will also be installed. A painter is lined up for the next steps, and paint colors have been picked out. Kathie has chosen carpet for the dining and living rooms and new linoleum for the upstairs bathroom. We will have some repair to do on the vanity in that bathroom as well, but we will likely undertake that ourselves. New baseboard will need to be installed in a couple bedrooms, a closet, and the bathroom upstairs.

After that, some general cleaning will be in order and furniture will need to be put back. We might even rethink the arrangement of the furniture (or maybe not).

Damaged personal items have been inventoried and reported, and some of them are being replaced.

I would hope that by March we can be essentially restored.

Living Room Demo (as in Demolish)

At about 9AM this morning, a ServiceMaster crew showed up to finish demoing the small wall area below the big window, to fully demolish the ceiling, and to remove the carpet/pad and the 3/4" particle board underlayment between the pad and the sheeting over the floor joists. Similar work related to the carpet and floor will be done in the dining room soon. I guess the pictures here will mostly speak for themselves.


Demolishing plaster ceilings or walls is a much dustier job than sheetrock (drywall). Note the "powdered" worker here.


The ceiling is about half done here.


Big chunks of drywall-backed plaster could be carried out.


Then the particle board was removed.




You may be able to see here how wet the plywood sheeting still is.


All done, except for some additional drying. We hope construction can start soon, although the dining room floor needs to be cleared first.

Something Happy for a Change

I can hardly believe we were able to pull this off, but we have managed to get everyone's schedules worked out so that we can have a reunion of the first cousins (and spouses, of course) on the Sonnemaker side of my family. Everyone is coming to join Kathie and me at the lake in early June for a long weekend. I'm very excited about this and am thinking up a number of fun ways for us to reminisce when we gather. In the meantime, Here are the cousins at various points in time.

Janice is the only one who seems happy in this picture, although Rex may have been approaching a smile. I'm not sure when this was taken, but 1961 seems like a good bet.


Here we all are a few years later with our grandmother, including young Billy, who, sadly, passed away a couple of years ago. He and an infant brother, Thomas, are both gone and will not be with us, but we will think of them when we gather. Rex, I have another shot of this same pose that was taken at the same time, but all of us had our eyes closed in that one.


I have always liked the following picture, which has us arranged by age. This may have been taken in 1960 or so. Janice has that "real live doll" pose going. Can you say "pedal pushers", "tennies", "crew cut", or "rolled up sleeves?" Signs of the times.


When Kathie and I were married in 1990, all the cousins attended. I think that was the last time we were all together. Obviously, we posed in a similar fashion to the prior picture. Except maybe for the guy with the beard, I think they are a good looking bunch!

Day 4

Today is the fourth full day since January 28th, when ServiceMaster first arrived to begin helping us recover from our water disaster. Some progress continues to be made, though a bit more slowly. The insurance company is doing a good job of working with us, and we have reconstruction lined up and ready to go when we clear the drying stage.

Drying is not happening very fast in the living room or in the affected upstairs areas. This house has plaster walls, and with latex paint over plaster, the drying times can evidently be longer than with drywall. A decision was made this afternoon to demo most of the ceiling in the living room first thing Monday morning. Also, the head guy at ServiceMaster is now doubtful about saving the carpet, since he thinks the stains may be too severe and odors are starting to build. They will do test cleanings early next week to see what is possible.

This afternoon he removed six fans and one dehumidifier, all from the shop area. That part of the basement is quite dry now. The east half still has fans operating on it. He also slowed the speeds on the living room fans, and so we have a drop in noise level, though we are still very tired of the constant sounds. That will continue through the weekend.

Kathie and I have been cleaning, examining personal items, logging damaged items, and repacking and storing our possessions. I have the shop almost back to normal. I really don't mean to give it priority, but I do have to find out what is damaged, and at the moment, there is little I can do in the upper levels. In thoroughly going through things I have found a number of other tool accessories that will need to be replaced, but all-in-all, not too bad. I still have to unstack and sort out all the lumber that is too warped or damaged. That too can be claimed as a loss.

Thank you to all of our many friends who have called to wish us well and to express their sympathies. Two of Kathie's investment club members brought us a "care package" this afternoon. We are grateful to you all for everything from your good wishes, to care packages, to checking in on us, and to offering us places to escape from time to time. We even have an invitation to watch the Super Bowl in the peace and quiet of a friend's home.

Finally, for this Day 4 posting, let me share some additional "looking back" pictures. ServiceMaster just sent me the 60 pictures they took when they first arrived. No, I won't bore you with all of them, but here is a glimpse of what the first impressions were. (The ServiceMaster person who sent these to me is a Frink! I'm trying to learn if we are related!)

This shot from the outside is interesting because of the clearly visible water line on the brick facia. I could still see this several days later, though it is now only visible in the five or six layers of brick just above the ground. Notice the arc it has from just below the upstairs area where the break occurred in our bathroom.


This was an area of the living room ceiling that had originally been opened some years ago to repair the drain in our bathroom shower. Quite a lot of water probably came through here onto one of our best chairs. Also, the patching plaster that covered this square broke free and fell all over the chair and floor--see a later picture.


We think this is the heavily saturated carpet in the living room.


Water was beading on the ceiling and brought with it color from the floor joists. That discoloration continues on the ceiling and also on the carpet, perhaps bleeding both up and down.


Here is the bathroom where the problem began. They had pulled things out of the vanity storage area. The linoleum was eventually torn out to permit better drying of the subfloor.


Here is how my table saw looked. It looked worse by the time I got home. Lots of elbow grease and steel wool has gotten it back pretty much to normal, thank goodness.


Here is the lathe, which sits below the dining room. Quite a bit of stained water made its way into the dining room as well.


The drill press got its share, and its table will have to be replaced. It was only a month old! Also notice all the soaked, stacked wood.


Basement ceilings were very wet. This is the sheeting beneath living room and dining room floors.


In a line descending directly down below the ceiling hole in the first picture and the chair in the living room was an area containing lots of stored boxes of Christmas decorations, electric trains, and other important personal items.


This is the chair that sat directly below the patched ceiling area mentioned above. You can see how soaked it is and how much of the patching plaster got all over it.


Finally, here is a water-stained and now dead laptop computer.