OMG ! I stopped by expecting (at most) to see the excavating equipment dropped off in the yard. It turns out these guys don’t kid around. The tree stumps are laying on the front yard and the “East” end of the house has been dug out. The panoramic view shows the progress as of about 3:00 pm.
The demolition of the existing house is complete!
The crew loaded the last remains of the house into a dumpster, cleaned up a little, and left well before noon (too bad…today’s 69 degree temp and 51 degree dew point made for perfect working conditions). The panoramic view below shows the foundation walls and old well room. We also get our first glimpse of Paul Winters (our camera shy JLM construction supervisor) heading for the dumpster.
Hello internet world… I hope you’ve noticed that demo has begun (because if you haven’t you need to get your eyes checked). A new foundation is getting put under our feet. Yes, a new beginning, but I believe my parents are leaving me out of the loop. I mean every time I talk to them about it they say something like “you’re to young to make decisions about the house”or “look on the blog” like i want to make decisions or their mouths are useless. Such as… I didn’t find out we had a building permit until my dad was telling someone else about it, or my mom picked me up from camp at 3 on Friday mentioned nothing. So is it time we got a new family foundation before we start thinking about the new actual foundation?
This week the excavating around the West end of the house will start and the end wall in the basement will be removed to make room for the family room and guest bedroom. The sketches below show the scope of this work.
A photo showing the property before we started, and the property after the trees and house have been removed. We will soon arrive at the point in the project where the tearing down ends and the building up begins.
No work crew today (Saturday) but these shots taken at noon show the progress to the end of Friday. The floor joists have all been removed and the basement is basking in the sunlight for the first time in 68 years (well its not so sunny today…light rain, 80 degrees, 68 degree dew point). It looks like there will be just one more dumpster load.
There's not much left of the house. Noon on day five brings 84 degrees and a 50 degree dew point…much more pleasant. The house is down to the first floor. The guys were just starting to lift off the first sections of the floor. They should be pretty close to being done late this afternoon.
The guys just keep plugging along. Today’s noon report goes like this…Mid 80’s (and rising) temps combined with a dew point of 62 make for more misery on the tear down.
The house keeps looking smaller and smaller. The entryway on the West and the screen porch to the East made the house look a lot bigger than the 880 (sq ft) footprint of the existing foundation. Its amazing that there were four bedrooms in only 1400 square feet of house…we’ll be nowhere near that efficient !
Noon on day three finds the house a whole bunch smaller. The light rain and 74 degree temperature has the demolition crew feeling a whole lot cooler.
A front and back view of the house taken at noon on day two of the demolition. It is really HOT and humid today…high temperature 94 with a dew point of 60. These guys looked absolutely miserable.
Getting the building permit approved by the City of Minnetonka and having it in hand brings forth a whole variety of feelings. We are very happy to get started with the building process but a little anxious about what lies ahead. The process for getting a permit has been frustrating…primarily because the City is not good at communicating with applicants. The plan was submitted on May 1st…approved by the zoning department June 1st…made available for “pick up” at the city desk June 12th.
Mike Kloti’s house plans, the grading and erosion plan, and the survey have all been checked and approved. The process forward should work something like this..
So…the permit was approved the end of last week (more on that later). The demolition crew started bright and early this morning. The plan is to cut the house up into little pieces and haul it away in roll-off dumpsters (no kidding). By noon the crew had about 1/2 of the roof off and were starting to dismantle the upstairs rooms. They expect that the process will take about five days.
Removing the trees is really gut wrenching. The two maple trees were 48” and 50” in diameter and stood 70-80’ high. They provided a lot of shade and greenery. The lot looks naked with out them standing tall. Unfortunately both trees had substantial rot in their trunks. One half of tree to the right was hollow almost 40’ up. The tree to the left was split down the middle to the ground with a large rotten section in-between. The arborist we consulted advised that both trees were at the end of their lives. It makes me wish that whoever planted them had chosen to plant oaks instead of silver maples.
The tree service folks got to work on the four trees that will be removed as a part of the new home building. The two maple trees were in really bad shape. Each had large hollow sections running from the ground far up the trunks. The birch in the front and the ash out back would probably not have survived the excavation operations slated for early next week.
We engaged Katie Hunsley of miller dunwiddie Architecture to develop an Interior Design plan for the “L” shaped house. Deb and Katie have been been sorting through countless paint chits, carpet samples, ceramic tiles, faucets, sinks, cabinets, you name it… A detailed plan has risen from the chaotic pile of samples that will please and surprise almost everyone!
Katie has added the interior design details to Mike Kloti’s drawings and delivered a detailed spreadsheet with specifications for all of the products. Katie will continue to work with JLM as the “L” shaped house is built to ensure that the design elements are both available and practical. Both Deb and I have enjoyed working with Katie throughout this process. She has helped to make this sometimes contentious topic a really fun exercise.
We engaged Katie Hunsley of miller dunwiddie Architecture to develop an Interior Design plan for the “L” shaped house. Deb and Katie have been been sorting through countless paint chits, carpet samples, ceramic tiles, faucets, sinks, cabinets, you name it… A detailed plan has risen from the chaotic pile of samples that will please and surprise almost everyone!
Katie has added the interior design details to Mike Kloti’s drawings and delivered a detailed spreadsheet with specifications for all of the products. Katie will continue to work with JLM as the “L” shaped house is built to ensure that the design elements are both available and practical. Both Deb and I have enjoyed working with Katie throughout this process. She has helped to make this sometimes contentious topic a really fun exercise.
The Natural Resources folks at the City of Minnetonka have finally approved the grading, erosion control, and silt fencing plan. The fence was installed yesterday. The protection around the trees we are “saving” goes in today. The city will (hopefully) inspect the fencing and then will move on to the rest of the building permit process (zoning and plan checking).
A panoramic view of the front showing the silt fence and the “abandoned” gas connection…
The silt fence making it’s way into our neighbors yard and around the back…
The protection around the trees…
