More Winter - And More Progress

Here we are 2 weeks before Christmas! The house is pretty well done. And even better, the water passed the lab tests with flying colours! Here is the first result, for coliform bacteria - ND = None Detected. Now for you city folk, this may not seem like a big deal, but when a well has been drilled and it's your only source of water, and when your bank's final property evaluation depends on the water being good, this is a big deal! So this is a very large load off my mind, to have good, clean water. The second test was for Arsenic and Uranium, standard tests, I'm told. There was no arsenic and only 2.5 ppm of uranium - the allowable limit for uranium is somewhere around 20 ppm, so all is good!




















Dave got the taller stair balusters installed, Eric the plumber got the water sediment filter installed in the basement and the carbon filter on the kitchen drinking water all in too. So the water tastes and looks pretty good now.






In closing for today, here is a bird that was around my feeder briefly today - never seen one before, but I'm told it's a pine grosbeak. It was about the size of an evening grosbeak but instead of yellow and black and white, it was red and black and white.



































Here are 2 short videos of the pine grosbeak - click on the arrow in the bottom left of the picture to play the videos.



And one last video - down by the river on Saturday morning, around 8 am -

Winter Has Arrived On The Wallace River

After a tough week I needed some peace, so headed up to the Wallace River, and was planning to head back to Halifax the next day for the office Christmas Dinner. These videos show what the weather looked like that developed throughout that day, so needless to say I stayed put for the weekend. The wind stayed quite high all night but Sunday was bright and sunny and the wind had died down nicely. Still cold though.

Details, Details

The end is near! The bank inspector has been in and declared the house 100% complete. However the county building inspector had a few things he wanted corrected before he would issue the "Occupancy Certificate", which is required for the final bank payment to be issued.

Issues that require final completion and correction include : (1) higher handrail on the stairway from the main floor to the second floor; (2) handrails on the basement steps; (3) handrails on the steps to the 2 porches from the front door and the deck; (3) more strapping and bracing here and there; (4) and a couple more small items I can't remember.

I also need to get a copy of the final septic certificate from the installer, and a water test.

Al seems OK. Here are a few recent pictures :

Living and dining rooms, taken from the kitchen.














Master Bedroom, taken from the doorway to the deck.












Master ensuite, taken from the doorway to the shower.














Powder room off the main front hallway, near the front door.
















Guest bedroom on the second floor.















Main entry of the house, with the handrails installed from the porch and from the deck.











All for now!

We have Water! (that means all the conveniences!)

Have you ever considered what a pleasure it is to have indoor plumbing? Try staying in a building with none for entire weeks at a time and see ! The good news is that Eric the plumber showed up today to get the water running and the heat turned on. The water is somewhat "murky" yet, but it already started to clear up just by running the taps and flushing the toilets and running the hose outside for a half hour or so. Here are 2 videos - the first was taken at 10:30 am, and the second one was taken at 11:30 am. Quite the difference!









I thought I'd throw in a few sunset photos taken today, from the deck off the bedroom. This is 1 of 3.
















This is 2 of 3.


















And this is 3 of 3. These were all taken around 5:00 pm.

Only days to go ---------

November is here and so is snow - just a bit of snow, but snow nonetheless. The house is still just being heated by a little construction heater that's plugged into my welder outlet in the garage with a long heavy cord. Makes me wonder why I paid so much for in-floor heat, as this little heater makes it quite comfortable inside.

So this past week, Eric the plumber was in doing some work installing toilets and faucets, but no running water yet. Mike the Electrician was in finishing some stuff up (inspection this week coming). No sign of Dave though, so the final trim, door handles, stairs treads and handrail, etc are still waiting - I hear me may do some of that work this week.

Here are a few shots taken this past weekend - outside temp about -2C.

The ensuite bathroom, with vessel sink, waterfall faucet, and tile work done! And the toilet is in! There's a story behind this toilet. It's Spanish, and I bought it several years ago when I was living in Richmond Hill. I have moved it (in its original carton) from Richmond Hill, then to Aurora, and then to Halifax, and now to Wallace, where it has finally been installed! I hope it's worth the effort.





The master bedroom, with ceiling fan now installed. Looks great, and works well with the fancy dimmer and wireless controller.

The living room is slowly getting usable. I took up the easy chair from my home in Fall River.

This sink is in the kitchen, and the faucet was installed this past week.













This is the door to the basement. I wanted a French door there for the look, but I didn't want to be able to see down the stair. So I bought this wisteria-patterned window film and put it in this weekend. It does the job, especially when the lights are on in the basement!












This is looking into the kitchen from the dining area, showing the bar and the 2 new bar stools located at the bar.












Picture taken from the driveway. The garage is just out of the shot on the right, and the roadway down to the river is just out of the shot on the left.








This is looking from the path down to the river, looking westward though the poplar trees at the deck on the east side of the house.










From "below" the house, looking northward. The stairway from the deck is done, and the lights have been installed on both sides of the door into the basement.












This is the view you get as you drive in the driveway from the dirt road, and turn right toward the house and garage. Just off to the left is where you would drive down to the river where I keep the boat in the summertime.




This video is just a pan from inside the living room, ending out on the screen porch. If you're on a slow internet connection, sorry about that, it's a biggish file.

View from below the House

95% + Done !

It's the first weekend of November, and construction is pretty much done. It has taken Dave Gullens and crew 4 months of hard work, and some inventive processes, to get to this point. Dave's crew is ready to start their next project, and about all that's left is a day's work for the tile guy to finish, and a day or two of finish trim work, plus installing the stair treads and balusters, then the carpet guy to lay the broadloom upstairs, and the stair runner, then the plumber will need a day or 2 (Dave says it's just a day's work, but........) to install all the sinks and faucet, plus the outside shower, and get the water system connected and running. And THEN - - -we're done! Whew!

On top of all this, the tail end of Hurricane Noel blew through last night, causing some power outages cross the entire province (although not at my new house), trees down, etc. Here are a couple of videos from this morning after the rain had stopped, and the wind was still quite high. For some reason though it doesn't seem as dramatic here on video as it was in person! Winds were gusting to 135 kph and I'm sure some of that was around my area. I heard a loud "crack!!" at about 4 am that sound like a rifle shot, but was more likely a tree snapping.






Also this weekend I took up a love seat and a dresser plus a couple of TVs from my home in Halifax, to start making the new house look a little more lived-in. I also moved an oak table and 6 chairs in from the garage and set them up in the dining room, and here is what all that looks like now - also note that most of the light fixtures have been installed, and the electrician has another day or two of work left.






















On the left is the finished screen porch, with the screening in and the wood ceiling in as well.

And on the right, is the walk-in closet with the racks and shelves installed.







And this is the almost-finished shower in the master ensuite, with just a bit of grouting left to do to finish the shower tile.

Stairs From Deck + 2nd Floor Insulation

The last full week of October saw some progress, but it is now seeming slowwwwww as I await completion. The stairway from the back of the house down to the yard were started.

I got the bed set up in the master bedroom, along with a small stereo system and a reading lamp, plus a couple of night tables, and I spent my first night in the new house!!











Toward the end of the day on October 26, a load of cellulose insulation arrived on a truck, along with the machine to blow it into the attic space above the second floor. Gerald was the lucky one to go up in the attic with the hose, and Steve kept the hopper loaded with insulation as it was blown in.

A Windy Fall Day

Nothing much to report on today. It was a warm Autumn day today and yesterday, very windy yet still colourful. Not many leaves left, but these yellow ones on the poplars (called "popples" here) alongside my new house are still hanging on- (the garden bench is new-to-me - - - got it for $15.00!!







>>>>>and this shot of the road looking north-east from the end of my driveway.








and 3 small pics if the fall scenery around the Wallace River property!

Kitchen and Hardwood Floors

This will be a series of pictures without much commentary. The progress now is rapid. The kitchen is mostly in except for some trim (all maple cabinets), the hardwood floors are complete and look great (they're hickory), and the bathroom vanity is in.

The kitchen sink is a bit different (round bowls). Next week, we'll see the return of Mike the electrician, plus I have to deliver some more tile for the master shower and some mirrors and medicine cabinets for the bathrooms. So, here we go!

This mosaic tile (below) is about 3 feet across and it's inset into the tile in the front hallway. I'll get a better shot of it after the cardboard is taken up.

Hardwood and Tile

Tuesday October 16 saw me make an unplanned trip up to the house - it seems I ordered insufficient tile for the main hallway and powder room areas- I guess maybe they were bigger than I understood from the plans. Anyway, I got lucky and the store I bought the tile from still had a supply of the same tile and all I needed was one more box. So, off I went and thoroughly enjoyed the drive up in the blue sky and beautiful fall colours.

















When I got up there, everyone was in full hardwood installation mode.



















Dave Reedy, the tile installer, was also on site and has the ensuite shower almost ready for tile. The blue stuff (below) is applied as a liquid and hardens into a pliable rubbery substrate that is supposed be totally leak-proof.

Above, Dave R. is seen on the porch cutting a piece of tile on his wet saw.























Dave Gullens has most if not all the window trim done. This is the guest bedroom upstairs.

















.......and this is the upstairs office/den.

And this shot is a nicely sunlit in-later-afternoon shot from below the house.