So much for not getting uglier

Well, it did get uglier. When I drove up to the church last Saturday this is what I saw...

 

The ground was covered with tarps and it was a fairly muddy mess. I gingerly stepped around the muck to take a look at what was going on in the "basement" and this is what I saw...

It had a nice couple of inches of water covering the cement slab but at least the forms were in place so that they could pour the foundation walls as soon as it stopped raining. In the picture below you can see how the forms work. They pump the concrete into the opening in the top, wait a couple of days until it's dry and then pull the forms away leaving me with nice concrete walls for my basement.

Frankly, it was really looking like a bomb hit the place and I began to think that it would be a miracle if I really got the old girl back into fighting shape. But as I said in my post a few weeks back, that David is one smart guy. After I navigated my plank/tightrope walk into the church, I saw boxes and tons of tools and wood until I got to the back of the space and THIS is what I saw...

I squealed out loud, it was the first time that I felt progress was really being made. I opened one of the doors so I could feel the weight and how it operated. I walked around to the back of the church to see if I could remove the tarp that had been keeping out all the rain that had occurred earlier in the week...

 

But it was too daunting so I came back in and waited for David to arrive for our bi-weekly meeting. When he got there, I told him that it looked fantastic, amazing, I was super happy, if only I could see the light shining through... David said "I can make that happen" and proceeded to remove the tarp which he had secured in place. And THIS is what I saw...

So there was more squealing and some high fiving and I did a little dance around the living room. I completely forgot the fact that the church was still up in the air, LITERALLY.
David walked me around to the north side of the church and showed me that my mason Tom and he had cooked up this little scheme to address the bowing out that was happening there. I thought it was pretty ingenious...

By using the tree as a brace they were slowly pushing the church wall back in place. It's kind of like orthodontia for architecture.
I ordered the tongue and groove stained white pine for the ceiling which has now been completely removed. I could still see the remains of certain infestations and while I wasn't quite financially prepared for this ceiling replacement, I knew that it was the right thing and had to be done. I'm hoping that they will deliver the wood next week. Here's the ceiling now...

David explained that there is a simple order to renovation: Ceiling, walls, floor. Makes sense so we wait for the ceiling work to begin.
I'm staying in the city this weekend. I have some freelance work to do (gotta make the doughnuts for this reno) but when I go up next weekend I am hoping to see this...

replaced with THIS...

a triptych of casement windows that should really open up the bedroom and let the light and Hudson River views in.
And finally, you can't have all work and no play so Deb and I went junk stores, flea markets and yard sales...

Here's Deb doing some sword swallowing. She had scoped out a couple of stools that she thought I might like. Now, stools are one of the pieces of furniture that I KNOW I will need (breakfast bar near the woodstove) so we went to take a look at them. They were perfectly hand made, beautifully constructed of wrought iron, wood and leather. Here they are in front of my storage space where they will reside until the day the church can get some furniture...

 

Addendum: David just called, the forms have been removed, the casement windows installed, and Tom hopes to put in the curtain drains around the north and south sides as well as backfill the landscape this weekend into next. Should make for a good update the week of the 18th!