An Old Friend comes to visit and Week #5 of the Reno

More Reno stuff .... feel free to not read further. lol

Sunday morning we woke to grey skies and rain. Definitely an inside day.  It will be nice to have one day of peace and quiet before the crew comes back tomorrow and starts sawing and hammering again. :)

Monday was cloudy but no heavy rain, just a few sprinkles. The rain did fall pretty heavily all through the night though. The lake level is up at least a foot.

Had the guys move the old fridge downstairs before they started working. Only a few scrapes at the bottom of the stairs in the gyproc. Oh well it can be fixed when other gyproc work is done later. The lake was absolutely flat and calm this morning, reflecting the fall colours. Gorgeous even when cloudy. Roger, the site foreman said the concrete won't be done this week either.  The concrete crews are so backed up with all the new construction. :( I hate waiting as we have to carry all our groceries down our neighbours driveway to get into the house and anything else we purchase. Oh well it will happen when it can... before they lose their good weather window I hope. At least the deck work is still ongoing.

After loading up all the scaffolding today, the crew put up some more 8 x 8 treated posts, the rest of the ledger boards drilled and screwed into the house (very noisy!) The beams were raised on the far side of the deck. There is a lot of arithmetic in the figuring out of everything to include the slope of the deck. Lots of measuring to cut once. lol

Ray was a little choked at one of the workers as he was doing more sitting than working every time we looked. We have noticed this over the last 2 weeks with this particular guy. This afternoon Ray called the supervisor, Roger, who was not on site (since the late morning) and that person will not be here tomorrow! The other two were doing all the work anyway. As this is a cost plus reno ... they better keep their butts moving. Fortunately we are on site to keep track of the work. Hopefully tomorrow we start to see decking. The new design allows for a bunch more room on the deck with the stairs moved to the end.

The yellow LVL Beams to support the weight of the gazebo.

Tuesday, cloudy but breezy. The two-man crew arrived at 7:30 am and Roger arrived at 9am. Another day of drilling, sawing etc to get more laminated beams up before installing the stringers. Noise, noise, noise. Fortunately our neighbours on both sides are either working or staying in Victoria at their other house so they are missing all of this noise.

Ray had a morning meeting with Roger updating the time line for work. The decking should be finished by early next week for the torch on guys. The concrete is supposed to come next Wednesday for the driveway.  Another load of trim ends and the old railings were taken out today as well. Good thing as we heard from the neighbours who came home this afternoon that their driveway we are using, is going to be prepped shortly for concrete as well so we won't be able to use it.

Cliff and Luke, the dock guys, were here in the afternoon to install the chain between the landing and the ramp, the hoops for the 2 pilings, as well as install the ramp transitions. The 2 new pilings should be put in the next couple of weeks.

See how wavy the water is. It was quite breezy.

Wednesday morning was cold and clear of 3 C.  Glad we are snug and warm in the house! Well today not too much happened. The dock guys came with the boat to pick up all the junk and put in the remaining bolts for the piling hoops and our old ladder. An environmentally friendly preservative coating was applied to the boards around the dock and on top. At the end, they took all their tools and towed the old log out of here.

The other 2 man crew worked all day until 2 pm with the blocking of the stringers and topping them with sloped strips that were glued and nailed to keep the water run-off angle. Seemed to take forever ..... still not done after 5 1/2 hours. Sigh....  Hopefully tomorrow we start to see plywood.

You can hardly tell in the above picture  anything was done. Anyways I spent the morning getting ready for our Thanksgiving Dinner tomorrow night. Turkey being brined! Dressing made, cranberry sauce done and in the fridge. I also made a homemade pumpkin pie so tomorrow won't be so busy.

Turkey having a salt bath in the cooler!

An old friend of ours, Mike Folk and his son are coming for an overnight visit. They are from Red Deer Alberta and Lisa, Mike's wife, had to stay home with the dogs. She breeds and shows Golden Retrievers. One of her dogs was in the movie Air Bud.

I was a bridesmaid at Mike and Lisa's wedding 35 plus years ago. Me on the far left. (I was 3 months pregnant with Garrett.

Ray and Mike did a bunch of hiking together years ago. We managed to catch up with them both after many years when we started our snowbird trip last fall and stopped in to see them in Red Deer. It's amazing that it seemed like we had only seen them a few years ago instead of about 25 years. Below is a picture of Ray back in the days hiking with Mike.

The Black Tusk at Mount Garibaldi Provincial Park

Here is a picture of Mike and Lisa with Garrett.

Today was cold and clear again once the sun rose and fog dissipated.  A glorious still day on the lake. Ray and I managed to sit down there for 1/2 an hour in between our chores and preparing an early Thanksgiving Dinner. 

The crew arrived at 7:30 am with the new guy Rich, in tow. He worked on the siding all day. While doing that he took off the window trim and caulked all the window joints and replaced the trim. The top window was not even secured properly and was tipping out! OMG! Now fixed properly.

They also brought in the framing 2x4's for the basement that the crew will work on tomorrow as it is going to rain so they cannot put the plywood on the deck. Fortunately with the window, not put in yet, they were able to remove the plywood and get the 2x4's moved in easily.

Our gardeners arrived around 1 pm to do a little pruning over our wood stove/firepit in the back yard and give our new grass it's first mow. 

Will showing Cindy all the work he did placing those stones.

Proof that Ray does not do the work ... he points others to take care of  the pruning.

Mike and James arrived at 2 pm. What a lovely sunny day. We were able to sit down at the dock for an hour or so and catch up.

Absolutely gorgeous day on the lake.

James helped me with the final dishes for the dinner. Thanks James. Our turkey turned out beautiful. Brining it sure made quite a difference. After stuffing our faces we spent the next few hours gabbing some more.  A lovely visit. 

James, my helper.

James, Mike and Ray

Friday morning Mike and James left about 7 am after coffee. They were heading back to Victoria to return their rental car and take the ferry back to Tsawwassen where they parked their car. They will be making tracks back to Alberta today as James has to work on Monday. The weather report for the Coquihalla Summit is good for today so a great day to make tracks home without any snow.

As it is raining this morning, the plywood is not going down on the deck as they need to keep it dry for the torch-on guys. So, they finished up the edges of the deck, replaced the post on the gazebo and then started the framing work in the basement. 

Yeah a bedroom framed with a closet! 

Ray will also encourage Roger, the supervisor, to check all of our other windows to make sure they are sealed and installed correctly because we have no faith that they were caulked in.

That's a wrap for this week.