Memorial day weekend is for grilling and sweating, or just sweating

After last week's post, I got some comments off the blog worried that we had been duped into buying a house with a terrible roof. Good news is that we KNEW we were buying a house with a terrible roof and did the thing anyways. There must be a way to phrase that which makes us seem smarter...  But we knew about it from the very first time we saw it - right after the terrible wind storm that hit the DC region at the beginning of March and the lawn was covered with shingles that were blown off the roof as we first stepped out to walk up to it. That feels like forever ago!  But yes, we knew it leaked and in some places probably leaked for a while based on stains of some of the ceilings, and we arranged financing for a new roof with the mortgage company ahead of time.

And great news as we went into what was a drizzly weekend - we have a new roof!  The contractor had his guys come out last week between Tuesday and Wednesday and it looks great, no more leaks, but it's nearly impossible to take a picture of, so you'll have to take our word for it. Now, we just need them to do the HVAC and we'll be right as rain and just down to all the rest of the work that we need to take care of.

This weekend was one of some frustrations and the house starting to really fight back, and also our bodies coming up to their natural limitations. Cursed human bodies!

On Friday I spoke with the contractor who mentioned some valid concerns about the fire protection of having open joists in the kitchen, so we had to back pedal on that and reconfigure. Did you know that a big reason for using drywall on ceilings is that it can slow down a fire from spreading to upper floors so that you have some more time to escape to safety? I didn't realize that either. Morris did an insane job of getting the drywall up while I was out doing dancer stuff. I was shocked to see this photo come in on Saturday evening.

For those who haven't had the opportunity to learn - DRYWALL IS FREAKING HEAVY AS ALL GET OUT! So for Morris to do this on his own while I was gallivanting with glamorous dancers, that was totally unexpected. Even though we had rented a drywall hoist, that is still a hell of a thing. So that meant that I got a chance to spend most of my Sunday painting the ceiling. When the temperature is in the upper 80s, low 90s with 500% humidity, working on anything in the ceiling is murder. I don't remember sweating that much outside of saunas and ill-advised hikes in Virginia during August. We decided to go with a tomato red (actually called red tomato) as a background for the lattice, because like hell were we giving up on the lattice! It only looked a little like a murder scene. Ok, more than a little.

That is a bright ceiling, and the little splatter bits all over me made me look like I had some sort of mildly concerning skin condition. Since the last time I dyed my hair, I went a little redder than usual, it didn't seem to show up there, or I just got the speckles only on my arms. We may never know.  While I was doing that, Morris worked on the living room floors, the electrical switches, and whatnot, including his next big project - see below!

Once the ceiling dried and the lattice was stained, it was time to put some panels back up!  We have a little more left to go because we didn't have enough room to stain all the panels at once. But here's how it looks, this time with a lot more fire protection!

Morris got justifiably excited when he saw some videos of people embedding funky wood in epoxy to create truly magical table tops and such.

They look super magical and so Morris decided that's how he wanted to set up the top for the island in the kitchen. And it has turned out so magical!  Part of the magic does seem to be exactly what ridiculous quantities of epoxy resin are required, but still.

First he set up the 2 large slabs of blood wood next to each other with a channel down the middle, set up a frame on the ends starting with contrasting pours playing together of shimmering black and red, which really highlights the red of the blood wood.

Here is the first frame setup that he made:

And here is the result of the first pour!

I think it looks like lava!  The red looks like lava and the black looks like the ropy pahoehoe lava rocks. I've confirmed that we'll need to have at least one Game of Thrones party when the house is ready because this is some serious Targaryan decorating.  Next came a clear layer to show off the texture and color of the existing pour.

One of the major tasks is to go over the poured epoxy with a torch to melt out any air bubbles which came from the mixing process, and it was fun watching Morris go over it with such delicate care to make sure he heated it enough to melt the bubble but not enough to burn anything.

Next was the process of the over pour - so that the entire top of the surface could be sealed with the epoxy to finish off the wood and level the whole thing. This required a new, bigger frame (which sprung some new, bigger leaks onto the basement floor - hooray for adventures!) and a lot more using the torch.

Here you can see Morris tenderly melting the air bubbles over the wood slabs and you can see how smooth and glassy the epoxy coat is with reflections of the basement walls and ceiling!

This view shows a bit more of the depth of the center channel, though sadly it no longer pops as much on the camera as it does in real life. I guess that just means everyone will have to visit and see it in person!

I also got a chance to rip up more of that heinous carpet from the front sitting room, previously known as the room where we were storing tools and supplies while we worked on the rest of the first floor.  We've got the deep, warm brown paint that will make the walls look cozy and old school library-ish, so it will be the perfect place to curl up with a book. Don't worry about light - those giant windows let in more than enough to keep it bright!

Since we were only working about 8-10 hours each day, Morris certainly was feeling "lazy". I keep reminding him that he keeps using that word, but I don't think it means what he thinks it means. It may feel like we don't have a lot to show for it because the list of projects still to do doesn't feel like it's getting shorter, but it is. We both were super exhausted all weekend, and I think all the work is catching up to us physically. Hopefully a few days of "rest" during the work week mean that we can tackle the rest of the to do list with renewed vigor next weekend!