Week 31 is here and Chunkers is as a big as a coconut, and all 5 of his senses are fully developed. Maybe after this weekend he now has a 6th sense for detecting brick under drywall because we now officially have uncovered the maximum amount of brick possible on the first floor. Bump pic with our newly finished brick:
We discussed the plan with a contractor and Zach and I hid upstairs on our room with masks and the windows open (even though we had turned off the heat to prevent air and dust transfer upstairs) on while he went to work. We felt like we were stuck in a hotel room all day because Zach got us takeout and we ate it at my work desk like you would in a hotel. Since we've done other brick work in the house I'm pretty comfortable with the process and didn't feel that I needed to monitor too much and could for the most part keep a safe distance. He had the right historic lime mortar, we talked about the color, which bricks needed to be replaced, the acid wash, etc. I wasn't using my preferred contractor since they weren't available- we had to use one of their subs they recommended which I wasn't super stoked about since I didn't know their work and this is a pretty big project for us. I found the guy who owned the company, Oscar, not quite my style but ultimately they did a good job. He would always go through the scope of work like a hurricane and ultimately got it wrong several times, including the day of when work was starting and he was looking at the brick he kept saying "diablo, diablo" and I heard him counting how many bricks needed to be replaced in Spanish, because it was more than he thought. He had seen the condition of the brick before so I had 0 sympathy when he tried to change the price on us to go higher, which I kind of just ignored and said it's the same number of bricks that it has always been. We even removed all of this cement off of the brick ourselves to get it ready for them which required a start and stop in the middle of the project. He did have to run around getting some special bricks from other jobs because the historic bricks are longer and shallower than the bricks we think of today, but to me that was his problem and he just needs to get himself together. Like I said, his guy Victor did do a good job and I do have sympathy for him because I know this work is back breaking having done it a bit, so when Victor went outside I gave him an orange that my parents had sent us from Florida, and Zach got him a coffee earlier in the day 😃 And I made sure to let Oscar know we were very happy with the work in the end.
Here's the brick column after taking the drywall off but only half of the "crazy cement" off. That stuff was really hard to get off of this face, but Zach and I did it together. It was a little harder than usual for me to do this kind of work. When this was in use it would have been for the exhaust for a wood burning kitchen stove. The house is so old..
Process pic after they got that worthless part of the wall down. Don't have pictures of it but this room got hermetically sealed off to prevent dust from the mortar removal and more equipment was brought in.
Coming back downstairs again after they left to inspect our new space. It's not much but after living here for 8 years with that stupid arch in the doorway and tight circulation this new view took my breath away. I really wanted from the dining room to be able to get a glimpse of the brick around the corner in the kitchen for "architectural interest"(can't totally shake off that arch degree). That way when you walk in hopefully this will be the focal point now and you can ignore the amateur drywall job in this room...and also be able to better see Zach in the kitchen who is inevitably whipping up something good. We didn't think about this too much until afterwards but it will also have the added benefit of being able to put Chunkers in the doorway of the kitchen so we can see him while we're in there but not be stepping over him.
We still have some work to do to fix the flooring and we're going to put a small pantry in the gap here that Zach and I are designing together but we are well on our way. All the finishing work will be done by our favorite contractor, Eli, this Israeli guy who isn't always the cheapest but has a great eye for detail and isn't just one of those guys who is like "tell me what to do", he'll actually provide ideas and suggestions too. Although when he first saw the brick after I had taken the drywall off he kind of freaked Zach out because after talking about it for a while he told us to just close the whole thing up and forget about it essentially because the brick column has a slight lean that will be a little visible with the wall finishing, fixing the floor is going to look a little quirky, the drywall isn't square, etc. and his perfectionist mind couldn't handle the detailing issues. So then Zach started calling me Icarus and saying I had flown too close to the sun with the brick 😄 However, I know Eli and Zach are two peas in a pod when it comes to this kind of caution so I did not feel too deterred but I did get a little nervous that the heat is on for this project since I'm dealing with a tough customer. Ultimately, these projects are about a little experimentation, working through problems, and having some fun though :)
We've really come a long way in our renovation skills- I didn't realize until the end of the work that the proposal did not include sealing the brick (I'm cursing Oscar for this) which to me is a standard part of brick work and I didn't notice that it wasn't in the proposal. I was going to make a deal of it to Oscar but then I remembered that we sealed the brick wall on the stairwell together after repointing it and we still have a lot of sealant left, so it's annoying but we got this. So I am going to contract Zach to do this work instead so we can just move forward and I don't have to breathe the fumes. So feeling good in what we've learned and accomplished over the years.
I guess I was feeling pretty good afterwards because I made Zach take these pictures of me lol. Be thankful that I am not pregnant during the summer because I would be wearing this phases of the moon crop top all the time.
I got Zach to take a pic but he refused to pose. But then I realized it was perfect because this photo unintentionally captured his true self- Peg Leg. I luv this guy.
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