Recently, most of the work on the house has been done by professionals. The first floor is framed and the second floor is ready to roll, pending demolition of the existing upper story. This time, we're letting them do the demo. A first floor demo was enough, thanks.

We've been getting ready to shore up the first floor living room. There is a major structural beam with a crack in it. Someone put in some screw jacks for extra support and the beam was also resting on the vestiges of the old chimney. The chimney wasn't doing too much to help since it supported off center and has been crumbling.

To handle this, we've slowly raised the beam by turning the screw jacks over the past two weeks. Now with no support, we can take the old chimney out. I did the first half today, and this is what I looked like when I was done:

Yes, I was wearing a dust mask.

We also placed a concrete footing on the top of the foundation wall to help support some extra 2x8's we'll be sistering to the existing beam. When we're done it should be easier to sleep at night and the floor ought to be much sturdier.