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Post by suedehead on Sept 27, 2007 18:28:52 GMT -5
John, question from ignorance:
As I follow this progress (with everyone else here), I can't help but keep wondering what you're planning to do with the walls. They're clearly cracked to heck. Are you just going to re-mud them? Add new sheet rock? Will you be putting in any new beams to reinforce them?
I know you're still working on the foundation and floor, so take your time responding. Oh, and thanks for the occasional pastoral photo of the flora, fauna, food, countryside, etc.. I really enjoy those.
It's funny. I think we all feel a little like we have a stake in this house. Maybe we should start calling you "Pah".
suede
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Post by sadgirl on Sept 27, 2007 19:52:43 GMT -5
I haven't been spending much time here the last couple of months, things have been awkward at home. But when I saw this thread again, and your amazing photos of the work you're doing, it made me smile. Thanks for that.
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kroc
Junior Member
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Post by kroc on Sept 28, 2007 23:08:29 GMT -5
JohnG, the window openings are so much bigger than the states. Looks great.
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Post by hurtmylove on Sept 29, 2007 1:38:43 GMT -5
It's for the sheep. This way when he can't sleep he opens the windows, the sheep jumps through, and he counts them.
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Post by JohnG on Sept 30, 2007 14:23:58 GMT -5
John, question from ignorance: As I follow this progress (with everyone else here), I can't help but keep wondering what you're planning to do with the walls. They're clearly cracked to heck. Are you just going to re-mud them? Add new sheet rock? Will you be putting in any new beams to reinforce them? I know you're still working on the foundation and floor, so take your time responding. Oh, and thanks for the occasional pastoral photo of the flora, fauna, food, countryside, etc.. I really enjoy those. It's funny. I think we all feel a little like we have a stake in this house. Maybe we should start calling you "Pah". suede Suede, The walls were, until now, load bearing. They are solid brick - about a foot thick. But the new footings and columns will support the new, much heavier, concrete floors on the second floor and in the attic. So there will be less weight on them than before. I believe that I am going to put up sheetrock over insulation, at least in parts of the house - such as the downstaris and the master bedroom... I will replaster of course any other areas. There are no cracks in the actual stucture of the walls - they are all in the plaster. Here are before (a couple of months ago) and after pictures of the downstairs looking first to the left and then to the right of the downstairs: Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/302.jpg[/IMG] Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/303.jpg[/IMG] Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/309.jpg[/IMG] Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/310.jpg[/IMG] Before and after - right rear corner of downstairs. This area has been loweved 50 cm, a hole excavated to the exterior grade level, support concrete poured, then a footing, and now the rebar has been installed for the column. This week I will finish the floor down here and begin to pour the columns: Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/307.jpg[/IMG] Yeserday I volunteered to help the neighbors pick grapes, along with some of their other neighbors. We picked and bagged about 1250 kilos (almost 3,000 lbs). I loaded ALL 33 bags into the truck. No one objected when I foolishly offered to do this. Today the grapes went through a machine that mashes them (I don't know the technical term for mashing). Then the stems get picked out and the mush goes into a press: Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/306.jpg[/IMG] Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/304.jpg[/IMG] Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/305.jpg[/IMG] Unrelated bonus pic for those sick of the concrete pictures: Here is a picture I took of an old mill in a small town in the Picos de Europa mountain range about 10 days ago. This town is called Potes and sits at the base of some spectacular peaks: Images temporarily disabled by webmaster.i59.photobucket.com/albums/g320/shanroche/308.jpg[/IMG] JohnG
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Post by smart1 on Oct 1, 2007 9:20:09 GMT -5
Wow! Thanks for all the great before/after photos of the house. You have done an amazing amount of work so far. Those grapes look delicious. It looks like the grapes plants are free standing. I am used to seeing them grow along some supports - fence line or something similar. How far away from your place is the grape fields? Excellent work JohnG. Your photos brightened a cloudy day here in the Windy City!
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kroc
Junior Member
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Post by kroc on Oct 1, 2007 10:46:50 GMT -5
John G, Great view from your windows. Beautiful looking town too.
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Post by JohnG on Oct 3, 2007 18:01:26 GMT -5
I poured the lower concrete slab today. I am totally wiped out. It took 9 batches from the mixer to do it. Yesterday I fisnished the prep for the slab - leveling the gravel, adding some more, measuring, cutting, and laying the plastic, measuring, cutting, and laying the reinforcing steel. Then today I just mixed, poured, and with a level and a trowel I spread and leveled the whole thing. It rained all day so I was as wet as a river rat when I came in. I stood in the shower for about 40 minutes.
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Yeah, I am straining. It is near the end of the day and my back is shot. It takes about 50 shovel fulls to fill the mixer:
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By the time I got done with cleanup it was late:
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Neighbor brought this over and I asked can you eat it? He said, "they say if it has this ring around the step you can eat it." I asked "they" who? He wasn't really sure, so I told him "you guys eat it and in the morning I will check to make sure you are both still alive:
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Anybody know if I can eat that thing?
JohnG
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Post by Mayberry on Oct 3, 2007 20:25:55 GMT -5
I worked for two summers as a field biologist, and all the (grown up) biologists always told me, "Never eat a mushroom that you find unless you're in the field with a mycologist and she eats it first."
***
Nice moss on the walls. Perhaps there's an emerging color scheme for your house, near the baseboards (or the Spanish equivalent?).
***
Off to prayer, singing, "The Rain, In Spain, Falls Mainly, On the Plain!"
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Post by hurtmylove on Oct 3, 2007 20:55:14 GMT -5
I have no doubt that you can.
Should? Heck no.
I ain't a mushroomologist, but please don't even hold it with bare hands if you can't positively ID it - safe ones in the USA might look similar to deadly ones where you are John.
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renate
Junior Member
Posts: 86
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Post by renate on Oct 3, 2007 20:56:29 GMT -5
you have a floor!!! That's so exciting ;D
If I knew how to do fancy things I'd make little dancing frogs or something to show how excited I am, but, you'll just have to settle for: how cool!
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Post by ursula on Oct 3, 2007 22:25:13 GMT -5
I sad. My laptop isn't showing me all these pictures! I'm missing good stuff here!
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Post by JohnG on Oct 4, 2007 4:03:54 GMT -5
Mayberry,
The moss is more like algae and comes from humidity that has invaded that wall. In that corner on the outside of the house the downspout has broken and for a long time water has dumped into the ground right outside that corner. I have fixed it but until I level the ground behind the house (there is earth piled up against the brick outside) I don't think it will dry out completely. Later it is my intention to dig a trench around three sides of the house - three feet deep - and install a liner and a perforated drain line and gravel, to remove ground water before it reaches the foundation walls. Also the terrace will be sloped away from the house and there will be a drainage channel where it intersects the hillside. The house will be dry when I am done. I can't afford any moisture coming up through that floor because the living room floor will be refinished old pine plank.
HML - that is not MY hand in the picture, so don't worry.
Ursula, keep trying. Although there are no little lambs or cute animals this time - just more concrete and a big mushroom. Not that as a woman you can't enjoy concrete - it is just that most people, men and women alike, seem to come for the National Geographic pics as opposed to the This Old House pics.
I got a huge amount of work done yesterday. A friend made me very happy a couple of days ago and it has helped my productivity.
JohnG
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Post by melodytwelve on Oct 4, 2007 4:42:53 GMT -5
It's lookin awesome JohnG. I just love watching the progress! Your neighbor seems like a really cool guy
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Post by JohnG on Oct 10, 2007 18:08:25 GMT -5
I have completed 4 of the 7 concrete columns that will support the new second floor:
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