Habitat for Humanity East Bay

Week 16

We get closer to completion each week and you can really start to feel and see it at the house now.

Miriam, Armando, Rafeal, and Alex started Friday working in the back yard with Women’s crew members Lee and Jan. They pulled all the weeds and trimmed the redwood tree root ball. It looks great out there again! They also re-dug the ditch along the side of the house to the back yard and dry fit the drain pipe. What an amazing team! The final digging project was what we thought was a big one. Dig a 3 foot by 3 foot by 3 foot hole that will be used for the French Drain. They knocked it out in no time. Very impressive!

Meanwhile, inside we find Chuck working on the entry from kitchen to the garage. He installed the threshold, door sweep, and weather stripping. He also build the step to replace the temporary cement block and plank step we’ve been using. Lian and Flor worked on installing the porch light and the light at the back garage door. They also had to do a bit of re-stuccoing around the light bases. Turns out they needed longer screws to actually mount the lights so that will wait till next week. Bobbie headed under the house once again to get the final Romex run.

First was to the Bathroom GFI outlet. As luck would have it this outlet was right above a vent that lead to the crawl space. So, working with Monica up top, we tried everything possible to get a new hole drilled and get that Romex in. But of course, that would have been too easy and Bonifacio just doesn’t roll that way. No problem, plan B…there was an old water pipe in the same wall cavity. Break out the sawzall and get that thing out of the way. Now we have a large hole, shouldn’t be a problem getting that Romex in now. Um, wait a minute…now we’re getting stuck on insulation. No matter how I push or twist it’s not going. What’s up with that, we haven’t run into insulation in any of the walls so far. OK, deep breath, no problem, we still have plan C up our sleeve. Monica heads inside and cuts a 3 inch access hole in the bathroom wall below the outlet hole. She starts pulling out insulation and finds that it was only about 6 inches deep. With the path now clear, we have free access and the Romex goes in easily. Bobbie tacks this into place from the outlet back to the service panel area of the garage. Then she moves onto the kitchen where there was suppose to be a Romex from the kitchen wall outlet that was suppose to extend over to the peninsula outlet. Alright then, anyone have some Romex stretcher? We’re about 5 feet short. Bobbie come out from under and gathers all the parts so she can install a junction box under the house. When she emerges this time we all celebrate because we are done under the house! Or so we thought (see tomorrow).

While this fun was going on Chris was repairing some ceiling register attachments and painting the bathroom register. She also patched and mudded all the holes in the house that had been patched by last Saturdays crew with drywall. She then joined Bobbie in the kitchen to install junction boxes in the peninsula. Monica wired the Telephone/Cable TV jacks in the living room and one bedroom as well as the 3 way switches in the living room and dining room.

According to the weather report, it was suppose to rain all day Saturday. With the inside work winding down, Mike cancelled half the volunteers for Saturday since no outside work could be done. Just 4 of us and Mike on Saturday. Kathy is finally home!! She stopped by to see the progress and was impressed with the changes. She’s very much looking forward to getting back to it, she missed it. Monica danced a jig because she can hand over the blog duty back to Kathy. Woo Hoo!!

Chris sanded and applied a second coat of mud on all the patches. They should be ready for paint next week. Diane, the walls are calling you! Monica started to wire the last Telephone/Cable TV jack in the bedroom only to discover that the wrong kind of wire had been run. The outlet was within 2 feet of the garage where the cable was run to, but it was staples under the house so…Oh Bobbie…yes, we asked Bobbie to head back under for what we hoped would be the last time. We got that replaced and Bobbie was out again.

Monica finished wiring that faceplate and then moved to the kitchen to wire some more outlets. Bobbie and Jennie worked on wiring up the 2 outlets on the peninsula using the BX cable. All 4 of us installed the faceplates to as many outlets and switches as we had covers for including the 3 outside outlets. Monica and Bobbie moved to the garage to install the last 2 BX runs. Then Chris joined in to learn the art of wiring outlets. We got the fan wired up as well. Chris and Jennie measured and cut the trim for the kitchen window and got it painted.

View the photos now!

Lots of little tasks finished this weekend. We’re hoping that all the misc. parts we need will be available next weekend so we can knock this out. We’re so close.

This blogger (Monica Mack) is very happy that Kathy is back.

Photos are posted in the online scrapbook (newest photos are always at the end, so scroll down.) Check back here next week for another chapter in the Bonifacio Project Blog!

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