Gable is Gone

The first major wall came down today - the South living room wall. They did this after taking out all the interior stud walls in the front part of the house - living room, dining room, kitchen, etc. The tool of choice, naturally, was a sledge hammer.

The girls think the new house is a bit breezy...

Here's the opposite gable end, where the kitchen used to be:

So far the "house recycling" isn't all that impressive - these guys are clearly paid to take the thing down, not save stuff. They only take the easy stuff - doors, windows, fixtures. We were under the impression that they'd be reycling/reusing much more of the framing lumber.

They clearly are saving some, but so far, the dumpster is winning. Here are the "save" piles:



Oh, and the demo guys are clearly not trained on subtlety - we've got some work ahead to undo some of their less-than-cool oversights. Downspout drain full of stucco. I guess we probably won't be re-using this anyway...but...they didn't know that.

They also smashed the corner of my nice Redwood gate. I think the lesson here is "if you don't want it smashed, don't leave it within 20 feet of the house". I'm even more concerned about the 2 bathrooms now...the odds are not great for those.

Some slides, including a few new pix.