Nawkaw Stone and brick staining

Nawkaw has come and gone and they've left an amazing piece of work on the exterior.  The brick and stone has been transformed to a consistent grey that really brings out the stonecutter colour on the garage doors and windows.  What a great way to update older masonry; the product covers great, and because it allows the masonry to breath, it doesn't deteriorate like paint - thus the 20 year warranty on their work.

Trim and door painting continues

While Thom's forming lumber arrived (the weather will determine when we can get started on the exterior planter walls), Mick and his trusty helpers keep going on the trim and doors inside.

Busy day

Another busy day at the house.  Tom finished off the stone, with the exception of a few patches; George's guys finished the central vac and the cool camera setup; and Mick was back after Adriano finished up to begin the interior trim painting.

Stone and tech

Thom has started patching up the stone in the front... it's going to look as good as old very soon!

Meanwhile, AIM Security was in to start the tech finishing tasks.

Prepping stone

As Kevin and now George (technology stuff) continue their rough-in inside, Kimmy arrived to clean up and stack the old stone that will be used once we have the windows in place and can finish the front stone facade.

Working together

A multi-trade day again... we had the HVAC guys continuing inside...

....while Thom and his guys patched the brick areas and missing sills on the back and South side...

...while Virgilio finished up the skylight flashing and the chimney waterproofing on the roof.

Busy day at 955

If my trades don't like working with each other, they sure have me fooled.  Today was a model of how, with careful planning and communication, you can have different trades who respect one another, pitch and in keep the job moving forward.  On site today we had John from A&J Windows to manage the window and door installation, Kim from BHM to do more brick cutouts (yes...more #@&* demo!), and Miguel's team.... 

Everybody had to pitch in at different moments, but Kim - so versatile, smart and strong - was the lifesaver today.  Don't have 3 guys to hold a window while it's being put in?  Just insert one Kim and Bob's your uncle.  Miguel was also a big help, moving the Zoom Boom machine all over the place and lending a guy or two when needed.  Thank you team!

Demo continues?!?

Yay, more demo!  It was a busy day today.  Thom's guys were here continuing concrete prep, and taking breaks cutting and cleaning block and stone away from some of the openings.  The steel was put in place, bolted together and used to support the old roof, then the front door section of stone was torn down.

Hopefully the weather cooperates tomorrow and allows us to continue to get the window openings framed out.

Setting up the back

There's a ton of work to do this week.  We'll have the framers scrambling to meet the deadline of getting the roof and window openings ready for the end of the week.  Yikes!  Luckily, I'm not worried (even if Miguel has to work in the dark!).

We set up the scaffold and even started a little exterior concrete pad work today.  It's important to have some of Thom's guys close this week, as we'll have to do more cutting and demo (yes, you read that right) for some of the window openings.

Demo and prep

Demo continued today... I know - "I thought demolition was done?", but with a large renovation like this, we will actually not be finished demolition until the framing stage is complete.  It's complicated, ok!

Today, Rocco was taking down the cement ceiling in the former cold room that will now be a conditioned space.

He also took down some of the little partitions at the south end of the house to make way for Miguel's crew next week.

By the end of the day, he'd installed all of the rebar.  After we get Lawrence on site tomorrow, we should be able to pour the remaining foundation areas.

Inspection Day

We met with Mario, the local building inspector, today.  He wanted to review the "preparation work" we had already done, and make sure we're all on the same page (ie HIS page) on work going forward.  It was a good meeting and I already like him so that's good too.

Meanwhile, Rocco was downstairs and working in the back yard, preparing the footings for inspection. 

Ready for concrete

It's amazing what we've taken out of this house (and that's not over, by the way!).  The boys managed to fill an entire masonry bin to the rim over the last couple of days, and we're now ready for the concrete channels and other small areas to be filled up.  Carpentry will most likely start the week of August 22nd, so we have a bit of a waiting period until then.

Block wall work

One of the oddities of this house was the way the front porch ran over the cold room, then right over the basement for 2-3 feet.  It ended up resulting in quite a bit of mold/mildew and structural breakdown in and around the cold room entrance.  Well that room is no more, as we've blocked it up and it had now become the outside foundation wall for upper Sangria Street!

Block wall madness!

Thom was nice enough to squeeze this foundation work in this week, and he's done an awesome job. In just 4 days, we have excavated, formed, poured and now completed laying over 600 blocks for the foundation.  The foundation items are largely for "Sangria Street" (the patio out front where Karen will purportedly live most of the Spring/Summer/Fall) but also for some structural and steel decorative elements.  Thanks Thom!

Footings formed and poured

Thom's guys finished forming the footings this morning and he was able to schedule the pour for the afternoon.  Our Engineer came to inspect the size, depth and location of the footings, and all is good.  We should be ready to do block work tomorrow.

Foundation work starts

Tom from BHM was in today, laying the groundwork for the mostly landscaping features that encapsulate the front of the house.  It's a pretty big excavation, even though these are for non-structural patio walls... they won't be moving any time soon!

I had Tony in today to do camera inspections of the drains, and we were left wondering if the house uses an old septic system or not.  With some investigation with the very helpful Peel region building department, they are coming out to do a dye test tomorrow to confirm whether the collapsed/full sewage drain is draining to the city main or not... stay tuned!