Catching up, part II

The front wall of the house was the second to be completed finished (after the gable wall). With all of the soffit, facia, and siding installed, the house looks basically finished from the front (except for the window stickers, various construction items and lack of landscaping/shutters).
We had been accessing the addition from the outside by leaving the last small window (as wells as the sill and crip) uninstalled. In order to get to a point where we were ready to close up that access and break through the old gable wall, the insulation for the addition had to be installed. The rough electrical for the two bedrooms was also completed and cuts were made for the new heat/air conditioning vents in the two bedrooms. The rough wiring for phone jacks is even completed.

Deciding on the placement for the outlets and vent meant a lot of time spent bent over the plans, staring at them and trying to envision possible furniture arrangements (with many breaks while I ran to measure a piece of furniture). It was reminiscent of when I made the decision on what windows I wanted and where.

Once the rough electrical and insulation inspections were passed, the last window (the small one to the right of the scaffold in the picture below) was installed and the back wall was finished.

Landscaping and shutters will probably not happen until the Spring. Landscaping for obvious weather reasons, and the shutters because we're still debating color. I had originally suggested the idea of blue (a darker blue, but not as dark as navy), but Chuck wasn't sure how that would look. So I suggested black, and he was amicable to that. Unfortunately, his mind reading powers weren't working that day, and he didn't realize that I intended to match the color of the front door to the shutters. As it turns out, he doesn't like the idea of a black front door. So we're back to blue. Which means I have to find the shade of blue that I have in my head that's available for shutters and a door that I like. That could take a while.

Soffit and Siding

The siding and soffit on the new gable wall is more than halfway done.

In the picture below, you can see that there is just a small space at the top of the new gable wall that still needs siding. The good news about being this high up the wall is that it's above the living space so there's no need to put insulation between the tar paper and the siding. However, almost every piece needs an angle cut on one end of the other (both when we get high enough), which takes a little longer.

You can't see much of the finished soffit in the picture above (just a tiny bit at the bottom near the front yard), but the one below shows that one entire side is complete. Solid and ventilated pieces are alternated for better ventilation in the attic.

Sheathing is halfway done on the walls

Dad came up here three days last week and worked on the framing for the two shorter walls of the addition, so today we finished the last of the framing on the front wall and installed about half of the sheathing on the exterior walls.

You can see where the new front window will go below (circled in orange). The window that's circled in blue below will be removed (the other half of it is already gone). The window that's not circled is going to stay in the location it is, but we will be replacing it with a new and more efficient one.

When we put siding back up on the front of the house, I plan to use white siding. It has always bothered me that all the siding on the house what white except for the front, which was green. I also want to put in a new front door in black and repaint the shudders black. The other option was dark blue (not quite navy, but close) door and shudders, but ultimately Chuck and I decided on black.