21 Elm is no longer ours

It's been a really crazy and tiring week, as we moved out of Charlestown.  Not being able to move into our Milton home made the packing a little more tricky.  We had to separate all the things that we'll need from now through the summer and pack the rest away for the movers to take to storage.

A ramp from the truck floor to the door made it possible to skip the stairs all together! (But completely blocked the sidewalk unless pedestrians wanted to do the limbo).

This dresser (and the Queen bed and sleep sofa from the third floor) couldn't fit down the curved staircase, so it all came out Cameron's window.  A little nerve-wracking to observe!

I lived in this house longer than I've lived anywhere in my life (13 1/2 years).  Isabelle was born here, (Cameron was born a few blocks over on Mead Street, where we were for 3 years).  It was bittersweet to walk out the door for the final time. (Although I then had to have my awesome neighbor Howie go back in for me TWICE because I forgot to do two things and was already at the Cape).


These photos and floor plans were on the listing sheet when we sold our home.  The website has already been taken down, so I want to preserve access to these records so we can remember our years spent here.

There was a two cars packed in front of the house the day the photographer came, so the outside shot starts at the top of our entry stairs.  You can see how high it is compared to our neighbors front door.

Floor Plans

Moving along...

I took this photo on Thursday.  What it doesn't show is that along the edge of the driveway was a patch of peonies that were starting to come up and it was at least six feet long.  I love peonies, so was very pleased to see so many of them emerge through the dirt. I had visions of bouquets filling endless mason jars.

Today we went by with a truck load of our outdoor stuff (snow shovels, patio furniture, garden tools, etc) to empty out our current yard in preparation for our move next week and discovered the peonies are now under this giant pile of dirt!  ARGH!

The hole that was being dug for the new support beam had so many boulders that Maurice could no longer take them out by hand once the hole was more than a few feet deep, so he had an excavator come to dig 14 feet and they put all the dirt on the flowers.  I'm slightly tempted to try to uncover them, but that mound is more than six feet high!

The hole is about 3 feet deeper than the top of the water line. You can also see the bottom of the original beam and where it used to end.

In this photo you can see an old stone foundation that was under the garage.

My favorite flowers lie under that massive pile!

In happier news (to me), the third floor now has a sub-floor.  Previously, you'd balance on joists to walk across the floor.  You can see the HVAC is installed and a new wall was framed in front of the duct work to hide it.

Just a random view looking down the main staircase.

Digging deep and Windows!

Power tools will be much more difficult to steal now that they're secured with a large chain!

The old garage doors came off and the digging down process has begun.  They need to go about 10 feet down so that steel beam (brown line in the center of the photo) can be extended and secured.

They have a long way to go and were hitting a lot of boulders.

All of the new windows have arrived!

More than 70 windows will be installed starting next week.

They are taking up almost the entire mudroom!

Milton's Finest

On my to-do list today was to pay a visit to the Milton Police Station.

And after I stopped in to see them, they came by the house to investigate.  Unfortunately, someone broke into the house the other night and stole about $3000 worth of Maurice's tools and we wanted to file a report.  

Entry was gained by smashing in a basement door in the rear of the house.  That door has since been screwed shut.  The thieves left some bigger tools behind, so Maurice is thinking they ran out of room in their car.  In case they were planning on returning to get what they left behind, he has since secured his bigger things with a giant chain and will keep smaller things in the trailer that is just visible in the left of this photo.  The trailer is securely locked stays put in the driveway.

(An interesting side note -- the house across the street that you can see over the police car's hood is where President Bush (the elder) was born.)

A quick visit and a few photos...

Just a couple of quick updates...

This lift was in the garage.  Fortunately, the key wasn't in it, so Joe couldn't take it for a ride.

Joe wanted to check the water table under the house since we're on the river and Milton is known to have a high table.  Lots of water!

Perhaps we can build a little spa-room for mud baths??

 Isabelle isn't highly impressed with what her room looks like now.