The House is No Longer Falling Down...

on the west side, at least. Today, a mason started the job of shoring up the exterior walls and inserting the Helifix ties to secure it.

They shored up the wall by applying pressure with 4 wide planks of wood.


Then, they drove 4x4's between these planks and posts buried in the ground across the driveway:


They carefully hammered the 4x4's down until they had moved the wall 3/4 of an inch and back in a relatively good position.

After moving the wall, the masons needed to secure it using Helifix ties:

This tie is 3/8 inch thick and 8 inches long.

First a pilot hole is driven; then, the tie is countersunk into the wall with a special driver. Here's what is visible from the outside:



A little patch of mortar and it should be hard to see where they are!

The New Front Door- Side One

Over the last few days, I have taken this door from this:



to THIS:



Any guesses on wood type? I was assuming pine when I bought it; that doesn't look like pine to me, though.

Still have to remove the paint from here (around each inset panel)...



and here (around each of six windows)...



We are debating painting or staining. This is the interior side of the door; the rest of our doors will all be natural wood. We would love to keep this door natural on the inside, too... but there are a few imperfections. Here is the largest gauge:



It is about 1/4 inch deep, and about 2 inches wide and 4 inches tall. The rest are mostly holes, or small scratches. Thoughts on my ability to hide or patch imperfections like this?

Environmentally Safe Draino

Our bathroom sink clogged again. Instead of using Draino, a very caustic chemical, I used an all natural method of clearing the drain.

Ingredients:
Baking Soda
Vinegar

First, pour a little baking soda into the sink around the drain:



Then, pour a little vinegar into the sink:



Pour it quickly, so that the force of the pouring carries the baking soda down into the drain.

Repeat 4 or 5 times, or until vinegar immediately runs down the drain.

This works great as a clog preventer, too (if you remember).

Bought a Heat Gun...

did try to buy used, but every shop had the same answer:

"Heat Gun? We get those all the time. Don't have any right now, but check back!"

That didn't help my impulsive nature; I wanted one NOW. Plus, I've never used one, and wasn't sure that it would be suitable for my needs.

Enter the $20 Milwaukee Heat Gun:


Using the heat gun and the special triangular scraper, I was able to strip the latex paint from about half of this door. It works quite well, and was much easier than the orange chemical stripper I used on the other side.



Puzzling me, of course, is the paint UNDER the latex:


It is white and chalky, and thick. Is it paint? Could it be a primer? Milk paint? Pure lead?

The biggest question, of course, is whether we need to take it off to repaint or whether we can simply sand it smooth. It seems to be VERY intact, and very bonded to the door.

The Puppy is Just Fine

Got the call back from the vet... the lump turned out to be a MASSIVE inflammation of the cuticle that manifested itself in a VERY odd way! YEAH! He probably stepped on one of the wasps that keep trying to make nests in our yard (on the ground) or stepped on a stick.

I never thought I would celebrate a massive inflamation. Guess there's a time for everything. And, at least it's gone? Though, surgical removal does seem a little bit overkill...

Thank you all SO much for all your kind words and thoughts as we worried about this this week!

Here's a quick picture of the puppy, with his anti-chewing sock:



Five more days of light walks until we can remove the bandage for good and let the pup run!

A (mostly) Finished Windowsill

After two more Bondo applications, and a thorough sanding, we have a presentable window sill:



For those of you who don't remember, here's the "before":



It needs primed and painted now; this will wait until we decide what color/brand to use on the rest of the house. I'm not convinced that the original color (the dark brown on the window) is what I want... I'd prefer something with a little more "color".

Finally a project COMPLETED! (First one for this blog?) Off to work on the front door today, which had been neglected in the last few months. It's slow going... not a lot to show for my work!

Bondo... Part 2

An update on the window sill that I was fixing with Bondo....



I sanded the excess Bondo down with 60 grit sand paper on a random orbit sander. Here's how it looked after I was done:


A few spots left to fill, but overall a pretty good first try! A stiff bristle paint brush is excellent for removing all dust and dirt from the crevices of a repair such as this; important because Bondo needs a clean, dust free surface to adhere to.

This time, I had learned a few things about Bondo. I used an (old) spoon to mix and apply it instead of a putty knife, which allowed greater control. I mixed smaller batches of Bondo, and waited for them to hit "prime" spreading time... about 1 minute in. This is the result:



A little more sanding, and I think we will have it!