#3 - Demolition
You know how it all goes! The first step of any home renovation is always the demolition!
We rented a dumpster on Friday and started filling it up on Saturday! The first order of business was to remove a portion of our patio. Matt started with a saw, but quickly realized that a jackhammer would make things go a lot more quickly. It took the better part of the morning and early afternoon to get the patio busted up into small enough pieces to lift. (Mine had to be extra small.)
***Ever since I read the book Cleaning House by Kay Wyma (read it! It's a good one!), I have become more convinced that little kids participating in grown up work is a REALLY good thing. So, seeing our little neighbor chucking concrete block was exciting. We're also thrilled that this big project is happening in the summertime, because we fully intend to immerse the kids in the project as much as possible. There won't be much work for them to do, but they will be doing a lot of watching. It's such good life experience and wisdom.***
So we hauled and hauled and hauled. Filled and hauled and tossed over the side of the dumpster (see how high the sides are? They're taller than me!). The sound it made when we tossed chunk after chunk into the metal dumpster was thunderous! And each chunk was h-e-a-v-y. Guys, concrete is heavy. This was an intense arm work out! I happened to be the one to empty the first load into the dumpster. I could only wheel about 10-15 chunks in my wheelbarrow. I threw them in, and looked over the edge...and it looked absolutely pathetic. The dumpster is enormous. It seemed like that first load of concrete was enormous...but inside the dumpster it looked so minimal...and daunting knowing how much effort it took to get those first pieces in there. But, we kept at it, and once we got momentum going, it really went fast.
Later that evening, Matt was talking to his brother and his brother says something along the lines of, "Oh yeah...that type of dumpster is great! You just open up the door and wheel everything right in."
What. THERE'S A DOOR ON THE DUMPSTER. We could've used that door all along. (I saw the bolts an hinges, and investigated a little bit, but I'm not curious enough to investigate fully when there's work to be done and my experience with big construction things like this is minimal and I didn't want to tug and pull at any bolts and break a dumpster and owe someone 40 million dollars.)
Next up in demolition is getting the brick off the house, which is almost finished too.
These two parts-- busting up the patio (that we purchased in 2013...the concrete is so fresh and new it hurt ever so slightly to tear it out.) and ripping off the brick should have been the most scary. Because, there really is no turning back after that. At least, if you do decide to turn back, it'll be costly! But, really, once we started it didn't even cause any knots in either of our guts. That's a good sign, right?
Matt is the general contractor of this project, and is doing the work he wants to do, or enjoys doing, or can do easily do to save money. The rest of the work will be done by people we hire. The foundation guy came to our house tonight to talk things over, Matt worked on tearing off more brick, and he's been working on digging a hole in our yard to find our water line so the plumber can tie into that. That's where things currently stand.
Also, Ezra and Camilla love the dumpster. They came home from church Sunday saying, "Come on! Get your Legos! Let's go play in the dumpster!"
And I've heard a lot of, "Mom! I'm going to play in the dumpster!" and, "But I want to go play in the dumpster!" and "Well, when I'm done eating can I go back into the dumpster?"
Okay kids...have a great time. They'll remember playing in the dumpster forever.
We rented a dumpster on Friday and started filling it up on Saturday! The first order of business was to remove a portion of our patio. Matt started with a saw, but quickly realized that a jackhammer would make things go a lot more quickly. It took the better part of the morning and early afternoon to get the patio busted up into small enough pieces to lift. (Mine had to be extra small.)
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| The Beginning |
As we were hauling wheelbarrow load by wheelbarrow load to the dumpster we rented, our neighbor and his 4 year old little boy came by to help us! Once they joined us we had a fleet of an old rusty small wheelbarrow (ours), a nice deep wheelbarrow (his), and a little red wagon (his son's.) And, let me tell you, work went SO FAST after they got here! I had just finished telling Matt that we needed about 10 more friends and 5 more wheelbarrows (I think wheelbarrow is the most annoying word in the English language), when lo and behold there they were!
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| Patio is completely demolished and hauled away! Go Team! |
***Ever since I read the book Cleaning House by Kay Wyma (read it! It's a good one!), I have become more convinced that little kids participating in grown up work is a REALLY good thing. So, seeing our little neighbor chucking concrete block was exciting. We're also thrilled that this big project is happening in the summertime, because we fully intend to immerse the kids in the project as much as possible. There won't be much work for them to do, but they will be doing a lot of watching. It's such good life experience and wisdom.***
Later that evening, Matt was talking to his brother and his brother says something along the lines of, "Oh yeah...that type of dumpster is great! You just open up the door and wheel everything right in."
 |
What. THERE'S A DOOR ON THE DUMPSTER. We could've used that door all along. (I saw the bolts an hinges, and investigated a little bit, but I'm not curious enough to investigate fully when there's work to be done and my experience with big construction things like this is minimal and I didn't want to tug and pull at any bolts and break a dumpster and owe someone 40 million dollars.)
Next up in demolition is getting the brick off the house, which is almost finished too.
These two parts-- busting up the patio (that we purchased in 2013...the concrete is so fresh and new it hurt ever so slightly to tear it out.) and ripping off the brick should have been the most scary. Because, there really is no turning back after that. At least, if you do decide to turn back, it'll be costly! But, really, once we started it didn't even cause any knots in either of our guts. That's a good sign, right?
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| The white line indicates the location of the foundation. All of the brick from the edge of the house to the white line is almost gone! Matt will cover it in house wrap and it'll stay like that for a while. |
Also, Ezra and Camilla love the dumpster. They came home from church Sunday saying, "Come on! Get your Legos! Let's go play in the dumpster!"
And I've heard a lot of, "Mom! I'm going to play in the dumpster!" and, "But I want to go play in the dumpster!" and "Well, when I'm done eating can I go back into the dumpster?"
Okay kids...have a great time. They'll remember playing in the dumpster forever.
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