Progress Since Moving Day

Before the excavating company left me to my own devices, they leveled up the JayBee on stacks of cinder blocks.

They finished burying the electric lines that run from the pole to both the new shop and to the JayBee.

They also finished up the top of the driveway and made a nice little walkway to the front door.

After they left, I tweaked the leveling a bit to fix a low corner. Since I don't plan to ever move this house, I want it right before I anchor the house to the slab!

The electrician came and finished bringing the power from the power pole to the panel in the JayBee. 

I only have one working outlet inside the house at the moment because the prior electrician did not label a single wire he installed. I have a bit of work to do to get everything labeled before the panel can be all hooked up.

I found a plumber who said he could do the rest of the plumbing during Thanksgiving week, so I scrambled to get things ready for him. I stacked the tires more compactly under the JayBee to help give the plumber some maneuvering room.

Next came removing the axles and springs. Honestly, this had not even been on my radar. I just figured I'd leave the axles and springs attached--hanging out under the house. Once the plumber showed me, however, it was obvious there was no way he could plumb to the septic line under the house because the axles and springs were in the way. I could not find anyone who could do this work in the timeframe I needed it done, so I decided to do it myself. The thought of taking this on scared the livin' daylights out of me but, once I figured out how to disconnect the brake wiring from each axle end, I was on a roll. I bought an air impact wrench and a new face shield, and got all set up to start dismantling.

The air impact wrench worked great on all the nuts connecting the springs, but I could not maneuver it to reach the nuts holding on the u-bolts. For those, my arthritic hands had to make do with hand wrenches. It took me almost three hours to get the first one completely dismantled, but I did it!

Before letting all the axles drop to the ground, I propped them on boards and bricks so I could roll them to the correct side of the waste line while they were still up above it.

Finally, I got all the axles and springs off. The axles are stored up off the concrete, on pieces of plywood. I coated all the various nuts and bolts in a thick layer of grease and stored them away. See how the plumber can now access the waste line under here?

While I was sitting inside the JayBee, listening to a podcast and greasing up trailer parts, look who came to visit! I don't know his name, but he regularly wanders over from the neighbor's yard. Makes me wish George and Bear were still here to move into the JayBee with me.

I moved everything out of the end of the JayBee that has plumbing runs to make it easy for the plumber to get to things.

I installed the bathroom faucet and hung the sink on the wall...

 

...and hung the on-demand water heater.

I also installed the front steps--to make getting in and out of the house a whole lot easier. Railings and the rest of the deck to come--but probably not until spring.

Here's the bad news: The plumber did not show up, and he has not been in touch. The one phone number I have for him rings forever and then disconnects, so I have not been able to leave him a voice message. <sigh> I'm beginning to think I might end up buying some plumbing tools and doing this work myself. Stay tuned...

Catch-Up 3: Moving Day!

This was the day of the big move. The JayBee only had to be moved a few dozen feet; so close, yet so far.

Lots of planning, and checking, and adjusting, and hemming and hawing. I just stood back and let these guys figure things out. I had wondered if I would be too nervous to watch this process...

It turned out that these guys were very careful, and thoughtful, and gentle--so I trusted them to do a good job and was pretty relaxed during the move.

While I waited for the plans to become fully formed, I wandered around and took pictures of ducks.

I had wondered if I might need to buy new tires for the JayBee's move. They had sat in the same spot, buried in mud, for nine years, and they had no air in them. Did I ever get lucky, though! It took a lot of work but, eventually, all six tires held air again for the move.

Starting to move. The excavator was used to move the JayBee because it made pivoting in tight quarters much easier.

Starting the jackknife turn towards the new foundation...

Doesn't look like those tires are going to make it up onto the slab, does it?!

A number of boards wedged this way and that...

And there she goes.

Lots of assessing and tweaking the final position.

And, there she is. The JayBee in her new home. Ta da!

Catch-Up 2: New Foundations & Driveway

 I now have a driveway that sheds rainwater instead of collecting it! Revolutionary.

Here are the forms for the slab foundations being built...

Then the new foundations were poured. First, for the new shop.

Then, for the JayBee.

Here's the JayBee's new home--complete with tie downs, water line, and septic line.

Catch-Up 1: First Came Demolition

Just when you think I won't finish my tiny house in my lifetime (or in anyone else's lifetime, for that matter), I actually have progress to report.

Up until now, I have been too busy to blog. I decided months ago to sacrifice reporting on my progress in order to make a lot of steady progress. At some point in the spring, I decided this had to be the year I tore down my wreck of a house and replaced it with the JayBee. The JayBee was too far out of level and it couldn't be easily leveled back up, so I didn't feel I could work on it where it was. I had limped the wreck of a house through yet another winter, but it was so clearly beyond its useful life, I knew it had to be put out of its misery.

All of my non-working time in the spring and summer went into packing and organizing stuff, selling and giving away loads of stuff, and endlessly moving stuff from one location to another. Summer here was unseasonably wet, which added to the challenge of moving so much stuff around. I managed to sell 25 pieces of furniture and appliances by advertising on Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace. While it all went relatively smoothly, it took a lot of time. For many weeks, I continuously put a steady stream of things at the end of my driveway under a "free stuff" sign, and most of it magically disappeared! I filled my car multiple times with things I donated to Goodwill. And, thankfully, I live near a fabric recycling bin, because I loaded that thing up three or four times. I am blowing by these months of labor with this brief description because it's the boring part. But! I've said this before, and I'll say it again: The downsizing part of this project was the hardest part for me--harder than anything I've encountered during the construction process. I got so burned out on it; I thought it might kill me. (No joke.) I had the last stuff moved out of the house only one hour before demolition began. (Phew!)

Now for the more interesting stuff...

The river was quiet and pretty before 7:00AM on demo day.

I walked around the house and thanked it for its years of service and for all the life lived and memories created there.

All of my remaining belongings (and the things not yet installed in the JayBee) were stored in these U-HAUL U-BOXES lining the driveway.

There wasn't a lot of space to work with, so the dumpster ended up really close to the JayBee.

The first thing the excavator took was the ramshackle addition on the side of the house that I had used to store wood and tools.

The garage went next.

I had to go to work as the tear-down of the main house started, so I missed that part.

At the end of the day, this is what was left:

I loved watching the skill with which the driver maneuvered the excavator. All of the pieces of foundation wall were carefully laid down in the crawl space--to minimize the waste that had to be hauled off, and to minimize the amount of fill that had to be brought in.

Hard to believe there was ever a house here!

Mounds of fill was brought in to raise up where the new shop/office will be. That's right: I'm having a wood shop/office space built on the site of the old garage.

No small blessing during the demo and excavation days: It didn't rain! Miracles do occur.