This won’t be a dolly blog post… it won’t be a sewing post… it won’t be a home decorating post… it won’t be a recipe post… it won’t be a painting post… it WILL be a short post just about my (our) day…
This day (FOR ME!) had to be one of the hardest, most frustrating, complicated, tedious, stressful days I have ever had… It was for my hubby too, but I think he was trying not to show it… We worked from 10:00 this morning until 7:30 this evening… and we STILL don’t have hot water… BUT we do have the pipe through the roof! :o)
My hubby knows what he’s doing when it comes to water heaters and measuring and safety and doing things excellently, but the pipes wouldn’t “click and lock” like they were supposed to… some of the tabs were pushed in so he had to use a screw driver to pry them up, then the 5 foot pipe sections were SO hard to snap together we realized we weren’t going to be able to snap and twist them together IN the chimney vent stack, so we had to put them together…3 of them.(this picture just shows 2… but we went outside and put them together using the bed of his truck to lay them on…)
Then go ahead and cut that hole in the roof, take that big long 15 foot pipe up a ladder and over to the hole, and he had to feed it down through the hole in the roof with me in the attic guiding it down to the basement…
Then when we got it all in and down to the basement, it was too heavy to hold up when he was attaching the elbow to where it has a 90 degree angle and comes out to meet the top of the water heater.
We had to stack a few buckets at the bottom of the chimney to “rest” the pipe on…
… and go back up to the attic to secure the “pipe” temporarily in place about where it was resting on the buckets below… then we went back to the basement to see if we could get it attached to the elbow…
We did, but I accidentally stepped off the bottom concrete step and fell on the floor… I had an imprint of the rough basement floor on my right elbow… and a few other bruises… but I was okay… I am okay, so we continued…
We must have made 25 trips up and down the stairs and to the roof… it was murder on his knees… I know…
Oh this is too much detail… I’ll just tell you we got the pipe flashing around the pipe, held in place with some temporary caulk (the roofers will take this up and place the shingles under it) and the cap on the top…
It’s taller than I thought it was going to be…and it’s not even as tall as my hubby says code is… it’s supposed to be 2 feet taller… it has something to do with the highest pitch on your roof and updraft… He says we can paint it black if we want, but we have to wait until the oily film wears off the finish first..
Anyway, I’ve had a “Little House on the Prairie” bath (boiled pots of water on the stove) and washed my hair… it felt so good… and I’m hoping maybe “tomorrow” we might have hot water coming out of the faucets!
So I haven’t gotten to your comments…again… and I can’t… this girl is heading to bed as soon as her hair dries…
I still have 10 good fingers for sewing with and my girls will be glad to see me when I get back in my sewing room… hope you’ll stick around for a few more days when things return to normal… :o)
Blessings, Jeanne
Oh, my goodness, Jeanne, what a day you had!! But at least that pipe is in place now, so you’re more than halfway there, anyway.
I’m sorry about your fall; doubtless in the next day or two you will discover “places” you didn’t know you had places, as the soreness shows up!!
Well, just carry on doing what you have to do for now; you know we will all be here for you when you are ready to start sewing or cobbling again!! Take care.
A little additional note. Tonight I was looking at canes online, and at their questions (how to measure for a new tip, etc.) and one question was why my cane doesn’t look like the one in the picture. Here is what they said: “While we do our best to capture the best image of our products, the process is not perfect. It is technically impossible to accurately reproduce some colors and patterns.” (from fashionablecanes.com)
So….that might have been the reason why you had so much trouble capturing that mint green so perfectly. Congratulations on the auction, by the way, and to whoever won that cute outfit!!
What a day you had, Jeanne! I feel for you, just seeing what you have been doing makes even MY bones ache! Good thing you are able to do this now, because I guarantee in 10 years, you will not! So glad you recovered after your fall! Maybe today there might be a bruise or two, but it looks like the pipe is in and things will go a lot smoothly from here on! Just the idea of lolling around in a tub full of hot water and soap suds might do the trick!
You mentioned that George would paint the silver pipe black, but maybe you could wait to see how it looks with your gray roof. If too silver, maybe gray instead of black would look better. Just a thought.
Oh no Jeanne! I’m so sorry… I had a funny feeling you were going to tell us someone had a fall or injury. I’m happy it wasn’t as bad as it could have been. Our Lord is watching over you both! I pray that today goes smoothly for you both. Everything looks great and very professionally done, you both have reason to be proud of a job well done and instant hot water is in sight! Yeah!
I’ve been thinking about the shoe lasts you are looking for and came up with this idea. What if you took one of your girls wrapped her feet and legs with cling wrap, took the clay covering her feet and legs with it. Let it dry somewhat then using a plastic sculpting tool or perhaps a butter knife press down through the clay as if cutting the mold in half. Let it dry some more until you can remove the clay mold and it holds its shape. Now you have a two part mold of our girls feet. Once the parts are baked its pretty strong. I’d use cling wrap to line the 2 part molds filling both sides with clay, you’ll be able to work the clay to get what I believe will be a pretty good impression of your girls feet and after baking tada home made shoe lasts. Of course it’s all theory but certainly worth a try IMHO.
Happy Friday
Hugs
Ingrd
Oh gosh, what a job. That must have been an awful day for both of you. I will say, though, that your husband is quite clever at coming up with ways to make things work. Hopefully, you have a working water heater now. And, I hope neither of you is too sore today. It’s too late to remind you to take a couple of Aleve before you go to bed!
My goodness, what a day. I hope after all the work and a fall you didn’t have to cook dinner and clean that up.
All I could think of while I read the last few days if my father would have loved to be there. He was amazing with home repairs and I’ll never forget the time my husband and I rented a beautiful stone home that was built in the 1800’s. We knew the owner very well so we got the rent very very cheap. The house was huge, 4 stories and a glass enclosed sitting room. It had been vacant for about 5 years so it needed some tender loving care. One project that I couldn’t handle was it needed a new heater and hot water tank. Like your house it was no easy task. Everyday after work my father would arrive, go down to the basement and call out a list of thing he needed. I got very good at going to the plumbing supply store and getting what was needed. By trip 3 I would walk in and they would ask what I needed and I said I know where they are. It took about 2 weeks with no hot water which wasn’t easy with 2 toddlers. Our camping stoves came in handy for boiling water so there was always a few pots on each stove. Then came the day to turn on the hot water and the heater, fingers crossed and a loud cheer went out. His job was perfect. Your husband reminds me of my Dad.
It a wonderful you and your husband can get out of bed no less walk. Hope everything goes smoothly today.
Please tell George that the job looks professionally done to me. I like the bracing and how the pipe is not located too close to the wood house structure. Should you wish to climb up on the roof, you can wipe the flu down with vinegar and then it will be ready to paint. Ha ha. Most roofing companies will paint any vent extrusions for you as part of the job though. And the pipe looks straight as an arrow to me. I like it and painted black, it will disappear and not be noticed at all. As I’m looking at all of the metal brackets involved, I’m seeing dollar signs. We had to pick up a few simple L brackets to fix our raised beds and were astonished at the current prices which have gone up dramatically. With that and the extreme increase in the price of wood and all building materials, it’s crazy expensive around here right now. With all of the fires, rebuilding, and demand, thereby the price increases. You wouldn’t believe the price of a 2X4 or a 2X6. Awful for any building projects around here.
So sorry you took a tumble, but very glad nothing was broken. Hope you guys can finish up today and have that hot water luxury. Then another successful project can be checked off the list. 🙂
My dad was like Sandra’s, and like George — if something needed fixing, he could fix it — if it needed installing, he could install it. One of his favorite stories about himself was when he was in his late 30’s and building our house above our heads while we lived in the basement, one of Boulder’s famous winds came up. Dad was on the roof, so he quickly spread-eagled himself over the area he was working on to hold everything down. He later realized that he could have easily been blown off and killed, which would not have helped anyone.
Years later he did fall off a roof, breaking ribs, his shoulder blade, pelvis, and both wrists. He had been trying to keep someone else from overbalancing — a natural reaction. He never said he was sorry he had done it.
My mom would know how you feel, since she was Dad’s preferred helper. Here’s a horrible story. They had a house they rented out. One tenant family left it so dirty that when my mom disturbed the refrigerator, bugs crawled out. My parents looked them up in World Book — cockroaches — they are uncommon in Colorado. After that, we’d have dinner, my parents would put on their freshly washed work clothes and go clean and repair at the rental, walk home in the dark, take their clothes off on the back yard, shake the clothes out, sneak inside, put the clothes in the washer and start it, take hot showers, and go to bed.
Soon now you’ll have the hot water for a nice long soak. and a little later you’ll have a new roof. One step at a time, your house gets better and better.
I remember when I first moved from Delaware to Texas we moved into an apartment. Apartments in Texas have cockroach problems because you have to deal with the things people in other apartments do. Apartments are usually exterminated before you move in but evidently the first one we moved into wasn’t. I never saw a cockroach in my life and my first encounter with a cockroach was not one of the small food roaches but the big ones that come in from outside. Wasn’t one of my finer moments. In one apartment I hired my own exterminator. He was a friend of a friend of mine and did a great job. I didn’t see a roach after he did it the whole time I lived there. The only roaches I see in my house these days are the tree roaches that come in from outside and that’s rare. The 3-way I put on my lawn kills fire ants and it keeps the roaches away too.
Dear Jeanne, I am so glad that you are alright.
I think you could start a YouTube Channel entitled: Fixing Our Vintage Home.
I hope that today things get worked out and you can have hot water.
I’m so sorry you had a fall, Jeanne, but glad to hear you are alright. George sounds like my grandfather, he could build or fix just about anything.
I hope you get the hot water running over the weekend. We had a few days of the LHOTP life years ago when a pipe up the street was damaged and we had a boil alert.. You either had to use bottled water for cooking, brushing teeth washing dishes or you had to boil it for bathing.
Try to have a bit of a rest this weekend.
Jeanne what a day. I hope you feel ok today after your fall. I wasn’t even doing any work, just walking and I tripped over the top step of the deck (you’d think I’d know how far to lift my feet after using it for 10 years lol). I had no way of saving myself so landed splat, mainly on my knees and arms but fortunately no actual damage but ached for the rest of the day! So I do hope the hot bath did the trick for you. What a great guy your hubby is. My ex was very DIY challenged. He was also a perfectionist without the ability to be one so nothing ever looked quite good enough to him! my Dad would always have a go at fixing something, sometimes it worked but he was a great believer in tape and glue so we had a lot of things that still worked but looked dangerous lol.
Joy, I feel your pain. We grow the timber and export it then have to import the finished product! In fact we have very little manufacturing here so when prices go up overseas they increase here too. (All about economy of scale, With only 5,000,000 population it is hard to make stuff competitively and couldn’t compete with China etc in the export market). Add that to 3 big earthquake incidents in different parts of the country and new regulations requiring all old buildings to be brought up to higher codes and the building situation is dire. We don’t have enough housing for everyone now and so far 40,000 people have returned from overseas due to covid so it is only getting worse. House prices are going through the roof, especially in Auckland.
Jeanne I really hope you have hot water very soon, it can’t be fun boiling all that water for a bath, not to mention having to lift the pans! Good luck
Oh Jeanne you poor thing and your husband as well. I know how it feels falling on cement and asphalt and concrete. I took a bad fall in 2019 in August one month after having breast cancer surgery and I fell in my street getting my trash can on wheels, ours, not the sanitation company’s one. I tilted it toward myself because it blew into the street and I fell on top of it and bashing my poor left knee and having water on it for over 40 days finally decided to go to the doctor and he sent me to the hospital where they took out all the liquid. My maniskis on my knee is tore a little (CAN’T SPELL THAT WORD). It still hurts me. I have MS, so falling is in my nature and balance issues I have to deal with all the time. I have been super careful the last few years and have been trying not to fall and mess up my knee too bad. I hope you are feeling better and it doesn’t hurt or swell up too badly. Your husband is like mine, he works and works and loses track of time and soon it is time for Dinner and bed. He climbs on roofs and trees and has no fear of falling. Not me! NO way, Jose!!! I really hope you are feeling better and you get Hot Water Soon. It looks real good from the outside on the roof. He did a fantastic job.
I can’t believe you didn’t hurt yourself, especially falling on concrete. But I’m very glad you didn’t. But a good soak in the tub will probably seem like a good idea in a couple days. You should be good to go with hot water by then. The job your are doing is really intense. I second what Linda D. said about you will not even want to think about doing this kind of job in ten years. I used to be David’s right-hand gal because Sean was working and Jason was living away from here. I’m so glad they’re here to help these days because at 74 I just can’t do some of the things that seemed so easy even at 64. Playing with dolls takes all the strength I have these days.
I don’t have anything on the dolly clothes sewing drawing board these days but my next project is to make the baby quilt for my new grandson. I hesitated starting it while I still had that leak in my sewing room. That’s been fixed so I need to get going on it.