Still Winter

It has been very cool (not cold) and rainy most of the week. Mike finished up on Tuesday and assured us that the lumber yard would pick up the surplus lumber either Tuesday or Wednesday. It is now Friday and no one has shown up. I called Mike this morning and he was surprised. He called me back a little later in the morning and said they will be here Monday. I asked Mike what happened to the 2x12 board that was in the garage on Tuesday. It was 15' long and a very nice, untreated piece of lumber. I asked Mike if we could return that since I had no immediate plans to use it. Instead, Mike used about 2 feet of it to move the garage attic stairs and then loaded the remaining 12'-13' onto his truck and took it home. I asked Mike when I talked with him today about what happened to the board. He admitted it was behind his garage. I told him we wanted it returned. He said he would do so.

At least we got the door stops installed, the spa deck board replaced and the attic ladder re-re-installed. Also the electrical discrepancies were addressed.

The pond lost about 1/2" over Tuesday night and another 1/2" Wednesday night. On Thursday, I installed a tape measure so we could actually quantify the losses. I also sent John photos of the Junipers on the east side of the chess board. They seem to show a lot of dead branches.

This morning (Friday), we had lost another 1/4" of water. I sent John a note asking him to call us and explain the path forward. John called and told me that he has arranged for a different company to come out on Sunday to look at the pond with the potential for taking on the task to fix it. I was very relieved and told John I was contemplating a similar move.

Progress and Disappointment

First the progress.

"Our" Mike and Chris (electrician) arrived shortly after 7:00 am this morning. The first thing I did was to discuss the cupola exhaust fan situation. I explained to them what the original plan was and why the current set up did not satisfy that plan. After some discussion, Chris said that he could wire the fan to do what we wanted, not that he really liked the original plan. He subsequently did so and now the fan comes on, and the louver opens, when either the temperature or humidity exceeds their set points. As for the ability to select high or low speed on the fan, it seems we are just out of luck on that ability unless we opt to buy a different controller. The fan is set on high and will stay that way for now.

I showed Mike the warped board around the hot tub deck. He indicated he would look at it. I also asked him if he could make the wooden grill over the connecting porch louver so that we could remove it. This would allow it to be cleaned periodically and also we could, during the cold months, install a layer of insulation to cut down on drafts. He indicated he would do that.

I helped Mike gather up the excess Tiger wood decking and railing materials that can be returned to the lumber supplier for credit. Mike indicated the pick up would happen today.

Mike is re-installing (for the third time) the garage attic stairs. It will now be centered and hopefully usable. Chris is going to have to re-route some wiring to permit this relocation. Chris is also going to install three florescent light fixtures in the garage attic, along with a power outlet.

Chris finished and departed around 3:00 pm. The lights in the garage attic look good.

Mike finished the garage attic ladder, installed all the door stops and replaced the warped deck board. He did not address the wooden grill in the connecting porch, but we will take care of that ourselves. The lumber yard person did not show up but Mike said they would probably be here tomorrow.

This closes Mike portion of the project. It has taken much longer and cost much more than we thought it would, but we are happy with the final product. The quality of Mike's work has been outstanding.

Now the disappointment...the pond.

Per Todd's request, this morning I filled the pond up to the overflow line and put a mark on the inside of the skimmer box at 9:00 am. The initial level was great. The horizontal ledge on the east side of the pond was completely covered. I took some photos and sent them to John, telling him that if the pond level holds at this point, we would be very satisfied.

Level marked on inside of skimmer box at 0900 hours

Unfortunately, after only about 40 minutes, the level had already fallen over one inch.

Level at 0940 hours - HUGH DROP

Level marked at 1030 hours - A SMALLER DROP

Level at 1230 hours

Level at 1430 hours

Marked level at 1600 hours

By 4:00 pm, we have lost about 1-3/4", most of it within the first 30 minutes. But there is still a gradual drop. We'll check it again in the morning.

Pond Saga Continues

Todd is out again today to fix the leak in the pond. This marks at least the fifth time he has been here to fix the leak. The first time was back in December and the last time was last Tuesday (Feb 23). Each time we were told the problem was resolved only to find that was not the case.

The day after last week's repair, I brought the level back up to where it was showing leakage before and it seemed to hold that level over night. On Thursday, Feb 25, I added another three inches of level. Each morning I put a mark on the door of the skimmer to show the level. It fell consistently about 1/2" each day so that by this morning, we had lost at least two full inches

Todd was very apologetic and assure me this is not normal. I hope he sensed that my patience is wearing thin, but I did not take him to task as I keep reminding myself that Todd was hired by John (landscaping). Therefore, John is responsible for Todd's work. I believe John has already paid Todd, but I have not paid all the money I owe John. In fact, John knows he will not be paid any more until the entire job (including the pond) is finished to our satisfaction. Todd showed me where they had applied tape to the seams of the skimmer box last week. Today, they removed the tape and applied silicon caulk. Todd asked that we let it sit over night and then fill it tomorrow.

I am still uncomfortable with the pond pump that Todd pulled out of the skimmer several weeks ago. He said it is a 8,000 GPH Monsoon made by Anjon, a local company. While it physically looks like the pumps on the Anjon web site, it does not have the Anjon name on the pump, there is no serial number to be found and the "model" number is GPM-8000. The model number on the Anjon web site for their 8000 GPH pump is MS8000. The label on the pump does say "Made in China". There was also a heavy gauge wire threaded through the cover to hold the cover on the head. All of this led me to question John whether or not this was a new pump and where it came from. John told me he subsequently talked with Todd and was told it was a new pump. Todd told him that he installed the wire because the cover falling off was a common problem. Still suspicious, I asked John to have Todd provide me with the receipt or proof of purchase. According to the Anjon web site, there is a two year warranty on the pump if you have a proof of purchase. I have also sent an email to Anjon describing the pump and asking if they believe it was sold by them.

We talked with Bob (cabinetry) last Thursday. The previous Thursday, he had sent his man around to look at our bar cabinet door since it did not close properly. Bob's man said the door was warped but he would take it back to the shop and put it in a vice to see if he could straighten it. If that did not work, they would have to make a new one. He promised that he would let us know what to expect and, if necessary, bring the old door back until the new one was made. Of course a week went by without anyone calling, so we called Bob last Thursday. Bob said the door was irretrievably warped and a new was was being made. I told him that we have guests arriving in a couple of weeks. Bob assured us that the new door would be to us before then.

We also called "Our" Mike last Thursday to see if and when he might be back to finish his work. He responded saying he would be here (with the electrician) on Tuesday (tomorrow).

We have not seen Wally (irrigation and lighting) since he dropped off a different pond light last week. The light he brought cast an unacceptable blue light. We told this to Wally and he said he would continue working on it. I also noticed Wally has never moved the sprinkler head in the southwest corner of the yard. The head is outside the fence (Wally said they installed the fence in the wrong spot). I pointed this out to Wally before and he said he would move the head, but it is not yet done.

John called shortly after Todd left today. I told John what Todd said and did and that we would fill up the pond tomorrow to watch for leakage. John said he would be talking with Joe (concrete) as soon as Joe returns from Hawaii regarding washing and sealing the walkways.

Todd

Both Todd and John showed up today to look at the pond. The pump has been off since last Friday when it started to lose suction. After I went over the history of the pond level since I refilled it the Sunday before last, there was a lot of speculation regarding where the leak might be. The consensus was for John to bring a pump out tomorrow (Saturday) and the level will be pump out to a point below the skimmer level. It will then be allowed to sit to see if the level falls any further. This should help identify where the problem is.

I got the mini-blinds installed on the garage doors.

T has not yet consented to my standing offer to a game of chess.

Chess Anyone?

T has finally got her chess set for the patio. It arrived today and it looks good. The king is 37" tall. The pieces are made of plastic. We could not afford the teak set.

Wally was here last Friday and again on Monday and Tuesday. He has finished the lighting and we have gotten the extension cord to the pond pump off the chess board. The pond still leaks and I shut down the pump last Friday when it began to lose suction. I sent John a note earlier this week reminding him that the pond needs to be fixed so that we can pay him the remainder of his money. He responded quickly but made no promises other than he would come visit us before the end of the week. The aggregate walkways still need to be acid washed and sealed.

Today, finally, we received the mini-blinds for the garage doors.

We had Kennedy Painting in to repair the plaster in the conservator of the main house. The plaster ceiling fell in last fall. They finished on Monday. Looks good. They also added anchors to the remaining keyed plaster to ensure it does not fall in the future.

Before

After

 While we had a rain day on Tuesday, the weather has been relatively mild. Last weekend I got out the lawn chairs and sat amiably on the south patio taking in the view of our back yard.

A Little Here, A Little There

To my surprise, the slate people showed up this morning to address the piece of slate that had fallen off the west gable of the garage last fall. This item was on the list of outstanding items we gave to Our Mike early last December before we departed on our Caribbean cruise. Since we have never gotten a response from Mike as to when/if he intended to finish the items on the list, I was therefore pleasantly surprised when these guys showed up. The task took only a few minutes and they were gone. It looks fine...we'll see how long it lasts.

Mike still has a couple of ladders in the garage and his lock box on the basement door. These are indications (but not proof) that he intends to return. Of the other items on the list of Mike's "things-to-do", the major ones are moving the attic ladder in the garage and fixing the electrical stuff that still does not work in the sunroom. We have already made arrangements with a different company to repair the conservatory ceiling in the main house (should be done later this week). We were going to have them also do the repair to the powder room dry wall  (on Mike's "to-do" list), which was damaged during the plumbing part of the project, but T decided to let that go for now. This left only three items on Mike's list to complete. Other than relocating the garage attic access ladder (so that we can actually use it), we have, or will, finish the others ourselves. The electrical work still is an irritation however.

Still have unfinished exterior lighting, irrigation and landscaping. The pond continued running through the freezing weather we had last week. I had to add water several times, but it never stopped flowing. While the ice got pretty thick, you could still hear the water flowing over the falls, underneath the ice.

Over the weekend, I installed mini-blinds on the eight garage windows. This will give us some control of the amount of light coming in, a sense of privacy when we want it and also improve security. Mini-blinds for the three french door windows should be arriving today. I also installed a rope n' pulley hanging system for our 30' extension ladder so we could get it up off the floor. Being 15' long (unextended), we could not hang it on a wall without interfering with one of the doors. I also have a shelving system on-order so that we can start moving stuff from the basement to the garage.

We got an email from the glass roof people yesterday asking if we would be willing to send them some photos of the finished project for their gallery. The snow from last week is all gone, so I took some photos this morning and sent them (it is very overcast today). I also told them we are very happy with how the glass roof turned out. To think our architect's original plan was to have a solid flat (non-glass) roof over the hot tub. It was going to be less than 8' high! That would have been a mistake and I am glad we insisted on the vaulted glass roof.

Let It Snow, We Are Still Moving Forward

Yesterday we had our first significant snow fall of the season. The accumulation over night was probably only about 2", but it has been very cold. The pond is still flowing, at least I can hear the water flowing. It is covered with snow and ice.

Last week I bought a pond deicer. It was not meant to keep ice off the pond, but only to keep a hole in the ice. However, it did not work and I sent it back. It was rated at 500W and had great reviews. Unfortunately, the one sent to me did not work at all. We may try it again, but for this season, we will observe how the pond gets along with just sustained water flow. We still have a leak in the pond somewhere which makes it more difficult to keep the water level sufficient to maintain the pump flow. This leakage, plus the amount of water being turned into ice, has forced us to add water a couple of times.

Having never heard back from Our Mike about when/if he intends to return to work on the list of items still remaining to finish the project, we have started making other arrangements. On Monday, we had a painting company come in and give us an estimate on repairing dry wall that was removed during the project. Yesterday, T finished staining the quarter-round trim surrounding the stained glass above the south door of the sunroom. We also bought some tinted wood putty, which I used yesterday to fill all the nail holes in the sunroom casement window frames. I would show a picture, but, thankfully, you cannot see the filled holes.

The cold weather (wind chills down as low as -15F) has again demonstrated that, while we had Frank (AC) out last fall to increase the duty, the floor heating still cannot maintain the sunroom temperature without assistance. That assistance has been supplied by the fireplace. We have the fireplace place on thermostat control and it puts out a lot of heat. We may contact Frank to see if the floor heating duty can be further increased. I believe it can.

Henry Comes Home

I spent yesterday morning cleaning up and organizing the remanent wood pile left by Mike in our east bay. I had sent a note to Mike a week or so ago asking if we were going to be sending some of this wood (mostly very expensive Tiger wood) back for credit. Not surprisingly, I got no response. He also did not respond to my questions regarding when he might be back to finish up the remaining items on the project. So, we will move ahead without him.

Once I got the garage cleaned up, I was ready to move the Model A from Carol's garage (where it has been for the past 18 months) into its new home. I then realized I did not have a key (not to the garage, but to the car itself). I could not remember if we had given all or some of the keys to Carol. T and I spent a considerable amount of time searching the house to no avail. The reason I really wanted to move the car today was that John (landscaping) had his crew here finishing up their work. They said they would be happy to help push the car into the new garage (it is not yet self powered). Carol works during the day and, most of the time, does not come home until 5:00 pm or 6:00 pm. Finally, just after lunch, I decided to call AAA and did so, telling them that I had lost my keys (totally true) and needed a locksmith. No problem, they arranged to have a locksmith come out around 4:00 pm. Unfortunately, John's crew left around 3:00 pm. To my delight, around 3:30 pm, Carol arrived home. She confirmed she had keys to the car and, it turns out, she had all the keys. I retrieved them and canceled the locksmith. Morgan (neighbor) offered to help me push the car. While strenuous, we were successful and Henry is now in his new home.

John's crew finished the back patio and worked around the pond. I don't believe they are done yet with the pond. I believe we still have a leak. Earlier in the week, I had sent John a note stating that I do not believe our exposed aggregate walkways had ever been acid washed and sealed. Since we are getting close to finishing this phase of the landscaping, I did not want this to be overlooked. John stopped by yesterday to assure me that the acid wash had been done, but not the sealing. I took issue with him regarding the acid wash and showed him several areas that did not look good. He brought Rodriquez over to confirm the acid washing had been done. Unfortunately for John, Rodriquez confirmed my belief that the acid wash had been not. John was not happy and apologized.

Wally also came by yesterday and resumed work on the irrigation and lighting systems. The lights are installed but all the electrical is not finished yet. He attempted to demonstrate the irrigation system to me, but several of the zones were frozen.

Today, it rained and is turning colder. Wally showed up today at 2:00 pm (a little early for him).

End of First Week of 2016

We expected a lot of people to show up today and a lot to happen. Everyone expected did show up, but most arrived so late that not as much got done as hoped.

Joe, the woodwork finisher arrived at 8:00 am. He asked what the problem was. Recall that Joe spent an entire day (December 15) filling in nail holes. I told him that he had missed numerous nail holes plus several gouges. I also asked if he would do the nail holes in the window frames. These should have been addressed by Jerry (painter) when he stained the window frames. But, for some reason, it was not done. As for the nail holes he missed, Joe wanted me to point out some. I did, even though they were hard to see in the dim morning light. I commented that he really needed a strong light to see the holes. Joe admitted he did not use a light when he was here back in December. He also said that he did not know he was supposed to address gouges in the woodwork. He said he could do the window frame holes if I wanted him to do so.

Joe did use a light this time and spent an additional six hours filling nail holes and gouges in the woodwork. Around 2:30 pm, he called me out and said he was finished and wanted me to look things over and agree all was complete. I easily found six gouges or flaws in the finishing that needed to be addressed. As I pointed these out, Joe agreed each needed to be fixed, and he did. Bottom line is that, while Joe did a good job, he was not diligent in his effort. He said he did not have enough time today to fill the holes in the window frame, but would come back if I wanted him to do so. I told him I would call him if we did. He said he thought it would take another one-half day to do the window frames. I think we may do them ourselves.

Steve (fencing) showed up this morning as well to trim the southeast gate. He came and went without communication. It seems that he did want needed to be done.

No one else showed up until 2:30 pm when Wally (irrigation and lighting), Todd (pond guy) and some of John's landscaping guys arrived. Wally worked until 6:00 pm and complained that he "just ran out of daylight". I had to bite my tongue not to suggest he show up a little bit earlier next time. Todd was here to see if he could stop the leak in the pond. He did not talk to me and did not stay long. It appears he lowered the skimmer so that the level in the pond will not be so high before the overflow is reached. He also pulled up the rubber liner around the skimmer. When John showed up, Todd had left. Not knowing exactly what Todd did, we don't know if it fixed the problem. We filled the pond to the overflow and we will watch it for a few days.

John's guys modified the back patio and laid out the stepping stones from the mound to the patio. They also were going to glue down the caps on the patio wall and pour sand in between the patio pavers. They did neither of these last two items due to the wet conditions. They did put more mulch down along the northeast fence line and along the walkway on the south side of the sunroom. Less mud!!

Landscaping Almost Complete - Phase I

We returned from our December voyage on December 28. Not much had been done on the landscaping since we left on December 1. The yard was still mostly mud, no additional plantings had been done, no lighting or irrigation work and the pond still leaked and was full of mud. The area got a lot of rain during the previous week. Not surprised, just disappointed.

While we were gone, we were informed that Steve (fencing) was installing our new fences. Sure enough, the fences were up, but no gates. Steve showed back up last Monday to install the gates. It did not take long. I did notice that the southeast gate needs to be trimmed so that it cannot scrap the walkway. Steve said he would be out Friday to do that.

Mike got the railings on the second floor deck and on the west sunroom porch. Look good.

Once the weather warms back up, we will stain them.

We took inventory of what else had been accomplished inside.

Mike got the following accomplished:

• one of the five door stops was installed (on the garage north door)
• the trash and debris removed from the garage and the basement
• the Tiger wood plugs sanded on the hot tub deck (need to re-stain),
• the ice maker has been shimmed so that it does not move around
• the bottle rack on the bar has been secured

Mike has the following still to complete:

• Move the garage attic access ladder
• Patch the hole behind the mirror in the main house first floor half bath
• Slate repair on the garage west gable
• Cutting "windows" into main house dormers
• Help move the Model A into the east bay of garage
• Install remaining door stops

Electrically, the following was accomplished:

• Garbage disposal wired
• Repair outlets on either side of the hot tub deck
• Repair exterior outlet on sunroom west porch
• Get Cupola exhaust fan to start
• Install garage to basement power cable for generator

Electrical still to be completed:

• Install a couple of florescent fixtures in the garage attic
• The Cupola exhaust fan does now run, but not as it should. This still needs to be resolved.
• We need to have the power outlet above the south door of the Sunroom taken off the wall switch

We have a very livable sunroom. I hope we can get the remaining items resolved before too long.

As for the landscaping, yesterday, John (landscaping) showed back up with a large crew. They did a lot, including starting to figure out we still seem to have a leak in the pond. Today they are back to finish putting in sod, mulch, compost and gravel (alley). It now looks so much better than the mud. They also planted the Japanese Zelkova and Japanese Red Maple trees and planted the shrubs which have been sitting around in pots since we left over a month ago.

This is essentially the end of the landscaping until later this year. The pond is still not fixed. John said Todd (the pond installer) will be here tomorrow to work on it. Since it is supposed to start raining again this afternoon, I will not hold my breath.

Yesterday Wally also finally showed up to do some work on the irrigation system. He ran the plumbing in the basement and installed the back-flow preventer. He told me as he was leaving last night that he would be here early today to test the irrigation system, install the electronics for it and get a start on the lighting system. He did not show up until 1:30 pm.

The other major event while we were gone was that Bob (cabinetry) had his expert finisher (Joe) come out to fill nail holes and repair gouges, including the mantel, which had a large "dent" in it. On December 15, when were were in Panama City, I actually saw Joe working in the sunroom on our security camera. I only saw him working that one day however. I sent a note to Bob to see if the job was complete. Bob assured me that, while he had not personally inspected the work, he was confident that we would be delighted with Joe's work. Bob has repeated told us that Joe was a perfectionist, almost to a fault. 

When I finally got around to inspecting the work, on New Year's day, it was disappointing to find numerous nail holes and gouges that were not filled and overall, the work seemed sloppy. The repair to the mantel was OK, but overall, not an impressive job. I called Bob on Monday and told him I was disappointed. Bob was very surprised and came out that afternoon. We looked it over together and Bob agreed it was not satisfactory. Joe is scheduled to be here tomorrow (Friday) to do some more.