Friday, July 19, 2013

Plan B... C...D?

The reason we bought this smelly, small, old, house was the attic.  We tried to buy other, more suitable houses in this small town in the middle of nowhere Saskatchewan, but alas we settled on this one.  We KNEW that we (being extremely talented and perhaps a little insane) could transform the attic into a cool and fun place for the kids to get out of our hair.  

If you have been following the saga of awesome (endless) renovations you would know that this particular project got put on the back burner in lieu of The Studio.  But we are back to the Big House (800 square feet).  
Here is a photo of the attic last fall when we bought this ugly, dated, dusty, house.  It's not hard to see the potential here in adding almost 2/3 more space to the house.  We spent hours in this decrepit, disgusting, spider-infested, attic.  Discussing potential floor plans, heating/cooling options, insulation, plumbing, electrical, and access.   

The Stair hole (stage 1)
We had a plan, a good one.  Too bad nothing ever works out.  Jeremy actually framed half of the attic in preparation of insulating.  We had decided that the best way to go was spray foam.  We don't have a lot of room but you don't need a lot for spray foam, plus all the air tight benefits etc...  
Well unfortunately for us, we (Jeremy) always get a head of ourselves (Jeremy).  Turns out the spray foam guys wouldn't drop their price below $4400!  Our house is pretty small, and the attic even smaller.  That was our entire budget for the attic and stairs.  It just wasn't going to happen. 

Lucky for me, Jeremy (get so far ahead of myself, no wonder that I have to take 3 steps back) is a pseudo-genius and came up with another idea.  The plan goes thus:
  • Buy entire truck full of fancy rigid foam
  • Cut foam to size and fit between joists
  • Bump joists using 2x2's 



  •  Create air tight seal using cans of low expanding spray foam

Most seam's were not this pretty 

  •  Try desperately not to die of heat stroke or dehydration (turns out beer is not a good hydrater... who knew?)



  •  Add fiberglass R-20 on top of foam, and try not to destroy lungs in process. 


Well, that pretty much covers the basics of the plan.  As per any secondary plan, more things went wrong and have had to be adjusted (like taking down all of Jeremy's carefully and meticulously built walls).  

I like to think sometimes that we have learned enough to take on these projects. But the more we do, the more it appears that we have no idea what the can of worms holds... this time I believe it was maggots.  Things like tongue-and-groove planks under the drywall on both outside walls and ceiling.  Not realizing that our insulation caused us to loose too many inches on the ceiling of the attic, so if your over 5 ft 6 inches you have to duck for the last 3 steps.  How exactly do we do this... or that... well, shit.  

Jeremy is presently on days-off (the kids are back in BC for the time being), and we have been working on this big, bloody, messy job for the past 5 days.  We figured out a plan for the stairs to make them a little more comfortable for an adult to go up them, but it's pretty involved.  So, off the mark, we are so far behind I feel like my name is Jeremy (who is destroying my kitchen as I type). 

The in home nightmare has begun I can only hope that we don't loose our minds.