Our Newest Guardian Angel

Luckily for us we've been taken under the wing by a local contractor and all around good guy named Donny.  He lives up the street and has a stellar reputation, with good reason - he does amazing work, he knows everybody in the area, everybody knows him, and he knows where to get the best deals on materials.  Long story short - I think he feels for us, a couple of newbies who just may have gotten in over their heads by renovating an old 8,100 square foot building. 

We contacted Donny about building a handicap ramp in the front and replacing the front doors, which led to a discussion about our water problem in the basement.  In a matter of one week, Donny had taken part of the front fence down, pulled a very stubborn and huge stump out of the front corner of the property whose roots were so deep and embedded, it was probably allowing water to seep down into the basement, then had a buddy of his drop 18 TONS of stone on the front lawn and use a small dozer to grade it properly so the water flows away from the building and not into it.  Donny doesn't mess around - he gets stuff done and he gets it done right!

In the last couple of days we also:

* Got 3 dehumidifiers and put them in the basement.  They are supposed to pull 70 pints of water from the air per day.  Their containers have been filling pretty rapidly, and the stones on the walls already appear to be drying.  Success!
* Continued the sanding of the floors - 2 passes with the heavier grade sandpaper and one pass with the lighter grade.  After we got all of the grime off, we found out they are not oak as we thought, but actually maple.  They look beautiful!  See pictures below.

This is what one ton of top soil looks like...

...and this is what 18 TONS of stone looks like! 



It may not look pretty, but the handicap ramp will be built over it,
and Donny left a strip of grass in the front so we can plant
something there.  The guy thinks of everything!

 

It's graded so the water will run off into the side yard and
away from the building.

The giant stump and fence are gone!

The gallery area floor after being sanded 3 times -
2 passes with heavy grade paper and once with lighter
grade

 

Our working conditions for the past 3 days.  We can't turn the
air on because we're sanding.  It's pretty bad when you have to
go outside to cool off...during a heat wave.