Chimney Work Day 1

I am working from home today and tomorrow while Hearth and Stove is here to work on repairing my front chimney and make it so that I will have 3 working fireplaces at the end of it.  The first floor will be a wood burning fireplace and the 2nd and 3rd floor front rooms will have vented gas units.  Here is the work that Hearth and Stove will be doing over Thursday and Friday:

• Place 3 liners into the front chimney - a large one for the 1st floor wood burning fireplace and 2 smaller ones to lead to the 2nd and 3rd floor gas units.
• Install and damper and flue for the 1st floor fireplace.
• Run gas lines from the basement to the 2nd and 3rd floor fireplaces with shut off valves, etc.
• Patch up anything they have to tear apart for the sake of install.

I was up bright and early to get the pets settled.  Jali went to Ruff Life (day care) for the day and Elora got to spend the day in the 3rd floor bathroom suite.  (She still hasn't forgiven me and peed about 12 times - all outside her very conveniently placed litter box).  

The guys arrived at around 7:30am as I was making coffee and they got to work.  Since we are on design #15 for the approach, we went over the work again, and once I was sure we were all on the same page, I left them to it and went to the 2nd floor office to work.  

So far, I'm really happy with the work.  Today they were able to run the gas lines and the 2 shut off valves.  They also measured the liners they need for the chimneys.  They guys are all great to work with.

I put more descriptions of the work itself in the album of pictures for today.  Some other cool things that happened today:

- When they did a review with me of the shut off valves, they didn't assume I didn't know what I was doing.  In fact they said, "I'm sure you know this from the work you are already doing here, but if the valve is a "T" to the pipe, it is off.", etc.   That means a lot to me.  It is hard to navigate these types of projects alone without people to bounce ideas off of or make sure I'm getting quality work.  I like to be respected.

- I ordered lunch for the guys, which to me was just what you do when you have a big crew working all day at your house.  I don't think this happened often, though, from their reaction.  They were so sweet and thankful!  I don't think I ordered enough though.  Tomorrow I'll get sandwiches.

- I have a neighbor at the end of the block who constantly tells me to let my husband take care of x, y, or z whenever she seems me doing anything manual.  I've told her at least 30 times I don't have a husband.  I'll tell her 30 more times, I'm sure.  I just smile.

Well... more tomorrow!  I'm not eager for the summer to be over.  I love the summer, and I haven't enjoyed near enough of this one.  But I am excited for fires this fall and winter!