House Dedication

This past Saturday was our Dedication Ceremony for our Northrop / Sandtown Habitat house at 1606 North Gilmor Street. The dedication was originally scheduled for December 19th, and so we had been working every weekend since October 17th (except for Thanksgiving weekend) to prepare the house for its ceremony. For the dedication isn't just about declaring the house finished, it's all about celebrating the workers who worked on it, Sandtown Habitat for getting one more house refurbished, the local community to see the work accomplished, . . . but most importantly it is about handing the house keys over to its new owners.



Despite all our hard work to get everything ready for the 19th, Mother Nature had other plans, big plans in fact. At first the weathermen were calling for an inch or two of snow, no big deal. Then that turned into four to eight inches, okay well over a day that's not too bad. By Thursday morning they were calling for around a foot of snow, and by Thursday afternoon even that had grown to a forecast of around two feet. Now that's a problem. Maryland comes to a stand still sometimes even with just a little snow, but two feet would definitely be impossible to overcome, so we had to quickly cancel the dedication for the 19th. This was the first time a dedication ceremony was ever cancelled by Sandtown, so we weren't sure what the plan would be. Normally Leticia Smith and her family (the family chosen by Habitat to be the home owners) would begin to move in right after the ceremony. Thankfully, Sandtown decided to allow Leticia and her family to move in late Friday and early Saturday and the dedication would be postponed. January 23rd turned out to be that day. It was a good decision, since the last forecasts turned out to be correct. We got over two feet of snow. Here is a picture out of my house looking at a few cars totally covered.




The weather was quite nice, especially compared to December 19th, it was sunny but still a little crisp. Still we had the ceremony outside as is the custom, until the ribbon cutting ceremony after which folks are allowed inside for an open house. Leticia was graceous enough to let folks in her home, even with all her stuff already moved inside.

The ceremony itself was wonderful. Folks were present from the Sandtown Habitat board of directors, New Song Urban Ministries and New Song Community Church (backers of Sandtown Habitat and located in Sandtown), Northrop Grumman, and friends and family of the Smiths, to make a rather large gathering outside Leticia's new home. Jim Pitts, the President of Northrop Grumman Electronic Systems, and Ted Imes, the Director of Community and Educational Outreach were present and helped Kurt and I and everyone involved give the house over Leticia.

Leticia and her family were very greatful for all the hard work we had put into the house and for showing her, Paula, Jerome, and Stephanie how to work with us on the house. It truly was a magical moment especially for Kurt and myself. Not only did we get to help cut the ribbon, but we got to see Northrop get the credit it deserved for sponsering the house and labor that went into refurbishing it. We had to jump through a few hoops to coordinate between Northrop and Habitat, which required a bunch of volunteer time outside of constructing the house, but it paid off with a big dividend.

We also found out by Jim Pitts and Ted Imes, that another 50,000 dollars has been allocated for a new house for 2010! So come back soon to follow our progress on that house.

Here are two photos from the ceremony. The first is of Leticia giving her remarks about receiving the house, with her family off to the right. The second is of the actual ribbon cutting ceremony, note the giant yellow scissors.




Here are some photos of the house including a bathroom with nice tile, a bedroom and the back yard. The kitchen looks great too, as do all the other rooms, but the house was soooo full of people we couldn't get any good photographs.






A special thanks to all of the folks who volunteered on 1606 North Gilmor, but I want to give a big shout out to the following folk:

Danny Waid and Bo - our Habitat construction managers
Mike Barb - our Habitat point of contact for press releases and public relations

and to:
Holly Bennett
Tim Bernadzikowski
Craig Cambias
Andrew Clark
Eric Fenelon
Randy Kuning
Michael Lean
Liz Reigel
Robert Reyes
Dana Rittermann
Eric Rittermann

All of which had over 30 hours of manual labor volunteer time. Thanks again.

-Rob and Kurt

12/05/09

A lot of people say it's is the small things that make a house a home, well thankfully our house is in that stage where we are doing small things to finish out 1606 North Gilmor. Great news considering the dedication and handover to the family is in two weeks. The habitat staff installed kitchen cabinets during last week so that we could focus on finishing some little details: grouting the last tile sections, hanging medicine cabinets in the bathrooms, painting, and so forth. It is really coming together now. Check out some photos.

Here is a view of one of the bathrooms, complete with tile, trim and even a toilet and sink.

Here is a view of the first floor stairs, complete with paint, and stained wood banisters and covers.

For the peice de resistance, a view of the kitchen with tile, cabinets, and countertops. Sweet!

11/21/09 Workday

The weeks keep rolling by and the dedication date of December 19th keeps getting closer and closer. Good thing the house is almost ready. In the last two weekends we finally managed to get all the tiling done. This included finishing the diagonal tile in the kitchen, powder room, and basement landing, as well as the two upstairs bathrooms and the foyer walkin area. All in all I estimate around 320 square feet of tile that was laid down. It looks great now that the pain of tiling it all is over =). We grouted some of the tile that was laid the week before, and got a lot of other little jobs done too. Hand rails were hung, linen closets were finished and painted, and we cleaned and poly uthathaned the exposed brick wall in the foyer area. It's starting to look real good. We even have a few outlets installed so we don't need a generator anymore. By next week the plumbing and lights will be done too by professionals.

Here's a pic of the kitchen floor being grouted in the back area, and just finishing the front. Below that is an image of a bedroom with finished window sills.

Our 11/07/09 Workday

How much do we love tiling? Well, at the start of this workday, we all loved it. The tile we put down last Saturday was fixed to the floor, and it looked gorgeous. So we were all pumped to get started on finishing the areas that weren't done yet on the kitchen floor. Not too many Northrop people showed up this time, in part because of the short notice of our new every-weekend schedule, but thankfully Matt, Alex, and Tina showed up since they had been there the week before and were now also tiling experts. =) Sandtown threw a bunch of University of Maryland folk in our backyard in order to give our house some sod, and to finish the deck stairs and fence while the rest of us tiled our little butts off. The kitchen floor area is now finished, and the "foyer" connecting the kitchen, powder room, and basement landing is underway. We also got some more work done on the closet shelves and window sills. We will be back next weekend for more tiling, so I hope we get more tiling experts, if not we should have a bunch by the end of the workday.


Below are a few pictures. The first is the kitchen floor at the beginning of the day, while the second is at the end, after lots of tile cutting and placing. The last pic is of the beautiful backyard.

10/31 Workday

Another successful Saturday on our house. We had lots of volunteers both from Northrop and from LaTisha and her family. The main goal of our workday was to get started laying tile down onto the kitchen floor. I know this would be a daunting task and managed to get Mike and Craig to help me Friday finish laying the cement backerboard in the kitchen and figure out where the keystone tile would go. The keystone tile sets the pattern for the whole floor and should make the pattern be balanced across the floor, i.e. if only a third of a tile is needed one the left wall, a third of a tile should be at the right wall as well. We decided to lay a diagonal pattern for the kitchen floor which made finding the keystone a little harder. But once Saturday was underway, we just started mortaring tiles next to the keystone tile and moved out from it. Having the keystone tile in the center of the floor allowed several tile layers to work in their own directions and avoided having too many people in one spot. A bunch of people preped the tile by slapping mortar on the tile back, while still others worked on cleaning the tile and spacing between the tiles. The kitchen was a very busy place, but we successfully laid about 130 tile, or 130 square feet. It is going to look great when it is all finished. The rest of the volunteer team on Saturday worked on getting window sills made as well as handling lots of other smaller tasks. Here is a picture of the kitchen pattern laid out. Unfortunately I forgot to take a photo of the tile mortared down, but I'll get one next Saturday.

-Rob

Oct 17th and Oct 24th

Another two weeks of working on the house have gone by, and the house is really taking shape. Paint appeared on the walls when we finished on the 17th, and caulking all the trim and doors and various other places continued on the 24th. It is amazing how many things need a dab of caulk to finish their look. Can't see all the nails and holes we made in the trim doors and the like.

But our focus on the 24th was to get started on the kitchen floor. Through some luck and graces of an actual interior designer, we obtained a bunch of ceramic tile. So we are tiling the kitchen, powder room and upstairs bathrooms with the tile. The only problem with that is the fact that laying tile takes a lot more time and effort than most other surfaces. So on the 24th we began laying cement backerboard on the kitchen subfloor. The backerboard acts as a stabilizer to keep the tile floor from flexing as you walk across it. This prevents tiles from cracking and the grout from being pushed out too.

Here are two pics. One is of the a few of us installing the backerboard, and the other is one of the upperstairs bedrooms looking sharp with paint and everything.

Major Update - 8/8/09 through 10/03/09

So our blog has not been updated in a while, and it is my fault. As summer was coming to a close I ran to the beach, to the mountains, and out to sea to enjoy the last days of my twenties and of the closing summer, leaving Kurt and the crew to work on the house without me. A lot got accomplished but no one had a camera to capture all the progress.

When I last wrote, the roof was ready for tarring. Thankfully, Habitat has a professional on hire to complete this task since it is a messy and very stinky job. Professionals also used a chemical striping agent to remove the pink paint off the front of the house to expose the quality brick underneath.

We were also very focused on the framing of interior walls when I last posted, and that effort continued nicely through the summer. A team build activity took place on 8/13 where during a standard work-day a bunch of Norhtrop folk from the same group came to work on the house and learn how they can better work together as a team. What a great way to get out of the normal day-day of the rat race! Here are some of the folk raising a bathroom wall upstairs, as well as the working crew for the team build.

After the workday on Aug 23rd, framing was done, and the Habitat folk hired drywall professionals to come in and drywall the whole house. HVAC people also came in to install everything but the furnace, and plumbers and electricians also added their talents to include the plumbing and electrical frameworks.

September 19th was a rough day for volunteers, and is one of my least favorite tasks of restoring a house - installing insulation. It is a nasty job requiring full garb and face masks to keep the fiber glass insulation from scratching you up. I'm secretly a little glad that I missed it, but don't tell anyone. =)

Here Mike poses for his picture. Nice job Mike on stapling the insulation to the ceiling joists, and for duct taping over the seem between your gloves and your shirt. After this workday and some help from some U of Maryland volunteers during the week, the insulation was complete.

With so much work accomplished, and the process moving forward so nicely, Kurt and I decided to throw a little party. All the Habitat staff we work with were invited as were all Northrop volunteers. But most importantly the family that will inherit the house came as well. Latisha or Tisha for short and her four kids came for the short workday and the picnic. We did a bunch of trim work on the house as well as installed a bunch of doors before the picnic - which consisted of burgers and hot dogs. My suspicion about these picnics turned out to be true too - that condiments make the picnic. We had three different kinds of cheese for the burgers, grilled onion, tomatoe, pickles, avacado, lettuce, ketchup, mustard, and relish plus grapes, chips, cookies, and brownies. All these choices plus some descent sunny weather made the picnic great. A bunch of alumni volunteers from this house and past ones showed up to meet the family and enjoy the day. It was great.

Check out everyone who showed up: Tisha, the future home owner is wearing the light blue shirt in the front row surrounded by some of her family and friends. I also want to give a shout out to Danny and Bo - two Habitat guys who are critical to us getting the house built to code - seen waiting for their burgers to be cooked. Did I mention we had turkey, beef, and veggie burgers? LOL that makes for a lot of burget / hot dog and condiment combinations. My dad also made an appearance at habitat since my family was in town to celebrate my 30th birthday. Seen next to me while Kurt mans the grill - man that food looks good.

And as some final photos of this large post - here is the house as we left it on October 3rd.

Photo 1 is taken from the kitchen looking towards the front of the house, while photo 2 is from within the master bedroom on the third floor.