Let There Be Light!

Things are getting brighter at the Little Blue House. I mean that quite literally, as financially speaking, things are not looking brighter... On that front, it seems a little scary. On a positive note, we've had some trees removed though, bringing more light into our tiny Victorian house.

The tree removal continues the work that we started after we bought the house last July, when we cleared much of the small weed trees that were choking up the place. You can see how that looked by clicking here.

The removal of these deciduous trees is a prerequisite for the upcoming excavation. We are going ahead with it! We are, however, not going to proceed with the entire foundation repair plan this summer. We discussed the plans with our contractor, and we suggested that we do "Phase 1" this summer. He agreed, and thought it was a good idea to excavate and to raise the front of the house (the original 1898 part) as it's actually falling down! He will put cribbing underneath the house, bringing it as close to level as possible, and that is where the work will stop... for now. Next year, we can proceed with more work on the foundation.

Bay Window Room, After Tree Removal

The picture below shows the front of the house, underneath the kitchen, after the skirting was removed last week. When I stood in that part of the kitchen afterwards, I noticed the china cabinet swaying slightly for several moments, as if on the end of a diving board at the pool.

I mentioned this to our contractor and he nodded, adding, "When we removed the skirting, we realized that it had been partially supporting that part of the house." Ack!!! It is indeed true, since the posts under that part of the house wiggle when you nudge them with your foot. :( The beams along the outside edge of the house appear to be rotten also. The beams underneath the house are dry, which is a small beacon of light.

The last remaining tree that is in our way (you can see it near the house there) is all tangled up in the power distribution line. The hydro company sent someone down to Atlin  in late May to disconnect the electricity so we could take those trees on that corner out. However, they didn't have a bucket truck with them so they couldn't disconnect the power! Really?? I've been playing phone tag with BC Hydro for the last week, and they kindly agreed to contract the work out to a Yukon company; hopefully, that will occur next week so we can get the last, and biggest, tree out of there.

Next step: excavation! I promise to post lots of pictures. It will be messy work, with a 2-foot perimeter dug up all round the LBH. Who knows what we may find? Buried treasure? Rotten posts and beams? Mice? Gold Rush artifacts? Ants? Brothel memorabilia, buried for decades? Oooooh, and lots of spiders. What fun!

Front of LBH After Skirting Removal