Howdy folks,

Well, it's been a while, but we're finally getting somewhere with reconstruction! State Farm, our insurance company, has been fantastic - they've given us the money to get started with replacing contents and to get the builder going. Climate Guard, our contractor, has had the place cleaned up and ready to go for two months now. However, I'm sorry to say that Countrywide, our lien holder, has been slower than molasses in a cold snap in January in northern Michigan about releasing the funds to the contractor so he could get going. I think we'll be looking for another lender when all this is done.

Any way, on to the pix! I'll spare you all the debris The gist of the story is, that things have to move in a particular sequence, due to the way the garage roof is saddled to the main house roof. The stone wall (which gave it's life for ours) between the garage and the kitchen needed to be replaced first (all the concrete has been removed as well). This picture shows the shape it was in post-fire:


This shot doesn't show how bad the stones were - they were pretty much reduced to bleached rubble in the garage area, and quite scorched in the area that was just outside the garage area. You can see the charred posts from the garage, and the cement (after cleaning- ha..).

The stone guys had to remove all this wall, and surprisingly the stone and mortar were quite solid nearer the corners. This was fortunate, because there was some concern early on about how much of the wall would need to come down, and how that would affect the rest of the house structure. Here's the wall... no, wait, it's gone What you can see is the stud wall for the inside. They used this as a guide to block in the new wall.



The guys got the back side of the new wall blocked in today, and they'll be back tomorrow to do the stone part (the exterior). They shifted the window and door around for me a bit, which will be a nice tweak. I won't have to bend over now to see out of the window.



You can see the belfry in the background. When they took it off the roof, I was amazed at how easily it just lifted off. The understructure had been burned out more badly than was obvious from the ground. And to think I was under that thing pulling stuff out of the kitchen! It will be rebuilt and remounted with the same bell (it's fine). While we have it down, we're going to add a mini-weather station (anemometer, etc.) to the top, so we can track our micro climate

So, we're making progress, and I'm extremely happy about that. The psychological relief is amazing

Will keep you posted as things go, and I'm quite serious about that party to celebrate when it's all done!

ttfn,
Sherry