Demo Time

It's time to wrap up this door install. Next steps are to finish the inside of the door, hang the ledger board for the deck, and demolition the rest of the backyard. Should be easy, right?

Supplies have been acquired

Drywall starts to go up, insulation is in there

Drywall is installed

There's mud on them walls

Kelley got the insulation installed and I hung the drywall that night. It took a pretty good sized Lowe's run to get the 2 sheets of drywall, mud, and all of the molding/paint/trimmings to keep going. Mudding and sanding drywall to prep for paint is one of the worst parts of these jobs for us. Kelley and I both hate it. But if that's what you have to do to get a smooth wall....

Time to get back outside while we wait for the mud to dry.

The first ledger board is installed and flashed!

 I sized the height of the board to fit one floorboard below the door frame, that's the sample floorboard leaning up against the house. In retrospect, this would be a bit shortsighted - I wish I had lowered that first board by a few inches at least.

This is the existing pergola after all of the greenery around it had been cut down

 The pergola was originally one of the features that drew us in to buy this house. It was surrounded on three sides by azaleas and a few other shrubs, and had an English Ivy growing up from two of the corners. We expected this ivy to fill in the roof and create a more shaded effect but it didn't grow in the pattern we expected so we added a wisteria vine that popped up. Pretty soon the entire thing was out of control.

I wish I had gotten some better "before" pictures. But the azaleas took up about three feet on the side with the door, about eight feet on the back side, and a full row of them on the far side as well. They had grown from small, compact shrubs that accented the pergola into large choking bushes that killed the grass and overtook everything else planted nearby. That angel statue was completely hidden by shrubs.

Inside the pergola the furniture we had used on our last screened-in porch was completely rotten out and unusable. The stone patio had sunken in place into an uneven tripping hazard, but since it was completely covered in rotting leaves and dirt that was ok. It was completely unusable because we didn't take very good care of it. The pergola had to go

 

 

back side, note the angel statue

Almost gone, note the stacked chairs that are rotten

The poles came down and there's a fresh stack of pressure treated lumber there now

Got the steps crumbled only to find a rotten floor joist behind that concrete

Rotten wood is replaced and the entire ledger board is hung & flashed

The contractor we used to renovate a bathroom (thanks to rotten floor joists) last year was able to make a quick trip over to replace that rotten floor joist under the door while I was at work on the day before the July 4th holiday.

This is how I left it on June 30. The first couple of stairs were down, that rain barrel was gone. Chris got the rotten wood replaced in the morning, the office closed down early for the holiday so I got to hang the entire ledger board for level 1 and level 2, the only parts that attached directly to the house.

Funny thing was the level 1 board was attached to the dining room door, and level 2 was attached to the kitchen door. They are on the same floor of the house, yet you have to take one step down between levels of the deck. crazy!

Day 1 of the July 4th build out is coming up next.