How much have I mentioned about my house on my blog? I’m not sure. Well, near as I can figure, it was built in the 1890’s. There is newspaper glued to the wall, that I found underneath 7 other layers of wallpaper, from 1898. Its crazy to see an advertisement that says “3 pairs of pants, 15 cents”.
The house was built as a cabin in a small mining town called Fairfax. In the 1930’s, the town shut down and all the buildings were moved. The title to my house says 1936, when it was actually placed on my land in Buckley. Sometime after the original building was placed on my land, the owners added 3 rooms. My bedroom, the bathroom and the kitchen were all added later. Whomever built the additions did a terrible job with the foundation. By that I mean, they layed bricks on the ground, placed the beams on said bricks and built up. Most of the beams are now rotten from being right on the ground. A few years ago, I started on that project. Many different friends have come over to help thru the years, work parties have been arranged and I even had a roommate who worked on the house daily for free food/board.
The house never had any insulation. It was originally sold to me because the old lady who lived there before me would get too cold in the winter. I think about 2 years ago, we had a work party and insulated half the walls and most of the floor. The house has been in a terribly sad state since then. The original siding should have been saved and reused, but it would have taken a lot of effort. I’m sure the old paint was lead based and that wouldn’t have been fun to clean.
I am finally going to put some effort into my house, and get siding on it. Just to get us through the winter, we wrapped the house with Tyvek today. I have never used the stuff before. My friend and father figure Andy (aka “donkey”) came over and helped me with today’s project. I was reading the instructions online this morning about how to install Tyvek, so needless to say I was thankful for some professional help.
The house is looking a whole heck of a lot better today, I still have some wrapping left to do tomorrow. Hopefully now that the wind won’t come whistling thru the walls, we will be warmer inside.
I’m not kidding when I say my house gets cold inside. In January I just unplug the refrigerator. I learned that below 30 degrees, fridges cannot function. It’s cold enough inside the house that the food doesn’t go bad either way.
I guess its time to start a new category on my blog, because this house is definitely going to be a big part of my story. Today I was not the camera man. I didn’t even realize that my girlfriend took photos of us working, as I was laser focused on the project at hand. She even snuck in a selfie.
Thank you all for reading, until tomorrow.
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