The Bridge | Part 7 |

This week they've been working on the foundation of the house. The rot is being removed and new boards are being put in....

| Kitchen: The floor was taken up and the rot was cut out. |

| Kitchen: Here's new joist being put in. |

| Kitchen: Yea!!! A level floor! |

|Bathrooms: Both bathrooms were cut out and new joist and sub-floor are being added. Because we've taken the bathrooms down to the studs, we moved the wall out to make both bathrooms 21" larger. We're also getting new plumbing because the pipes are all rusted. |

The Bridge | Part 6 |

Friday: Today was hopping, crazy, busy!!! We had five guys putting in the beam. This crew installed the two LVL 24" tall by 26' long. They were HUGE! I loved these guys, they were such hard workers. In addition to the beams, Mom and I scraped more paint, and Owen and Dad removed the remaining kitchen sub-floor. I'm so thankful that my parents worked so hard for us. I was excited they were able to be apart of this process and were able to meet some of the Lincoln Village people. I told Dad..."We know how to rock a house!" Today was a good, good day, and we celebrated the day's work with Cherry Lime-aides for all!!!

| Here's what was under the sub-floor in the kitchen. |

| Here's someone elses idea of "fixing" the problem. Small boards were added to keep the cabinets from falling through the floor. |

| Temporary walls were built before the joist were cut. |

| Here's the crew of guys. Did I mention they were hard workers? |

| These guys lifted the two beams into place. Did I mention they were hard workers? I can't remember. |

| Hector climbed a ladder that had been propped up against the wall. No fear. |

| At this point, Mark made me leave. I told him I was stressed so he made me go outside. I was so worried these guys were going to get hurt but Mark reminded me that these guys are good at what they do. I'm glad Owen took pictures so I could see the rest of the work. :) |

| Both beams installed. We were celebrating! |

| Mission Complete. That's the best looking beams I've ever seen! |

| When I was sweeping, I found these two nails. These were the only two nails like this in the thousands of nails we cleaned up. It reminded me of what Jesus did for us and why we're moving there. I'm going to find a special place for these at The Bridge. |

| My hard-working Dad and me. Mission complete! |

The Bridge | Part 5 |

Thursday: Today was a day of preparation. The kitchen had two layers of sheet rock so one layer had to be removed. We finished the bathroom demo and prepared for the wall removal!

| Notice the original ceiling is black from the smoke damage of the grease fire. Yuck! |

| The paint in the hallway and living room peeled off like plastic. It appears this is the result of painting latex paint over oil based paint. It was amazing how much dust can get on your bum...my backside has looked like that for five days now. |

| Lovely. |

| Here's Dad facing his nemisis...the concrete tile wall. |

| Here's me taking a crack at it. Dad went high and I went low. You have no idea how being short hinders using a sledge-hammer on tile. |

| Here's the final product when everything was removed. Did I mention there was rot? |

|Seriously...the pipe for the toilet is rusted. That means liquid was coming out and that is totally disgusting! |

The Bridge | Part 4 |

Wednesday: It was a good day today. Not really any surprises and we got to see the exciting vision taking shape. We removed the sub-floor in the living room and it appears to be in good shape (...from the top view, haven't seen under the house yet.) We'll be removing the wall between the kitchen and the living room to create an open space. Here's the result of all our hard work . . .

| The sub-floor in the Living Room is looking good. It's funny that you can see the Hall Bath toilet from the front door - ha! |

| Here's looking into the Living Room from the Kitchen. |

| Ditto. |

|Ditto. Again. |

The Bridge | Part 3 |

Tuesday: Our goals today were to finish taking down the burnt wood paneling in the kitchen. Also, we thought we would be productive and tackle the bathrooms while we were at it. The goal for the Hall Bath was to remove the cabinet since it was rotten.


| To finish Day 1 work, we took off the burnt paneling. The wood paneling was literally holding the pipe together in the laundry room. Once the pressure was removed, the pipe popped apart. Water spewed everywhere. Come to find out the only way to turn off the main water line is by turning off the church building's water. Go figure. This little surprise was also a God thing. We were not planning on removing the paneling from this wall but obviously we need to fix the pipe and the wood was rotted inside the wall. Are you catching on to a theme here? |

| Here's what the Hall Bath looked like when we began. |

| Since the cabinet was rotten and surrounded by tile and concrete, the tile on the wall had to be removed too. |

| Once we got the cabinet out, this was the wall beside the cabinet. Not good. More investigating to be done. |

| Looking productive!!! |

| Ok, not so much. When we got the cabinet out, the floor was also concrete. When we removed the concrete on the floor, we found out there wasn't a floor at all. |

| The tub was sitting on a rotten floor joist and no wood support. It's a God thing that we found it before it fell through the floor. |

| As if the Hall Bath wasn't enough, here's the Master Bath wall. More work to be done. |

| This was the shower wall. The reason the other bathroom wall was missing is because the Master Bath shower was leaking. |

The Bridge | Part 2 |

Monday: We decided to start the demolition in the kitchen. We removed the cabinets because the floor appeared to need work and the peach faux bricks had to go! Needless to say, it was an interesting day . . .

| Peach Brick Wall |

| Yikes, we quickly found out why the bricks were installed. |

| More fire damage on the walls. |

| Rat nest under the dishwasher. Luckily, everyone had moved out. |

| Rot, rot, and more rot. |

Ok, so that wrapped up day one - Whoo, Hoo! I just kept praying for God to reveal the secrets in the house. I'm thinking my prayers are being answered.

The Bridge | Part 1 |

Well, Owen has named our Lincoln Village House. He's calling it The Bridge which seems to be fitting. Here's some pictures before the remodelling begins . . .

| Outside |

| Kitchen |

|Living Room |

|Laundry Room |

| Master Suite |

|Maddie's Room|

| Hall Bath |