Drive Gate Picture

Just a quick posting of a couple of pictures of the drive through gate and the wall repointing in progress.

Brute Force and Ignorance Ironwerks (Ogre Myers)

Finshed, hung gate

Vernon and Kathy repointing (after some instruction)

Water water every-stinkin-where...!

Floods suck!
On the night of April 29-30, 2016, we experienced a flood.  7 1/2 inches of rain in less than an hour overwhelmed all drainage strategies and the water rose.  I saw cars floating around like ducks on a pond.  The water ended up about 4 feet deep in the basement.  It was devastating, but not so devastating as the loss of life across town. A grandmother and her four grandchildren were drowned in her home, and another man was drowned trying to save someone else.  For us, it was just stuff.
I was so tired already and was up most of the night with the flood.  Still dealing with the damage and other effects.  My security cameras didn't stop recording until the water reached the mid level plugs so we got video of the water coming in.  Downloaded the video, edited by speeding up the frame-rate, and posted it to YouTube as "Nickel Flood Video".  Below is the link.

https://youtu.be/DNa9RMGYTgU

We lost tools, materials, and a big tree.  There was lots of damage including some pretty tough structural stuff.  Then the community came together.  A couple of hundred people showed up to Old Town and in Westwood to help with clean-up.  Without help, none of us would be dug out even yet.
We'll be a while getting back to where we were, and longer than expected to get moved in. We'll be fine.

Flooded basement

Vehicles stacked up by the water

Community comes together

Better late than never...I guess

yes...yes...I know-  It's been 10 months since I posted anything here.  Mea culpa.  Been a little busy lazy about writing.  That said, I have not been lazy about the work.

Updates:

• I retired from teaching over New Year's Day, so now I can devote more time to the work.
• We have also now hosted 3 weddings at the Manor (and I presided over a 4th offsite).
• HVAC is installed upstairs with a "zoned unit" so that individual areas can be controlled separately. 
• The kitchen cabinets are built and installed; they just need sanding and painting.  The appliances are there, just not installed yet.
• The Guest Bath/ Kathy's bath is done. (see pics below)
• The shower in the Master Bath is built, although the rest of the bathroom is not.
• I have cut a roof access point in the upstairs hall with a cupola on the roof to cool the attic.
• For now, a large window unit is cooling the Main Hall pretty well.
• The Main Hall is also scraped and painted and has turned out nicely. 
• We found that the old baptistry was still there, lined with copper sheets.  Removed the copper for sale and readied the area for other things.
• I'm going to start my Accessible Restroom in June.  I'll also be adding a shower to the existing restroom.  Things are looking up.
• The drive gate is hung in the back ready for the opener next week.  The rest of that fence area will be done then, too.
• I have built the basic retaining wall for leveling the garden area, with the facade to come later.
• Brick mortar has been repointed on the lower north wall helping to seal off the basement from seepage.

However...
A couple of week ago, we had a huge flood.  The whole of Old Town was flooded, and we got about 4 1/2 feet of water in the basement and back yard.  Cars floating by, etc.  Everything had to come out of the basement.  Much was ruined.  Much more was damaged but reclaimable.  There was some structural damage that will set us back quite a bit of time and $$$$, but that's life.  (No flood insurance.)
We'll just keep on keeping on.  I will attach some pics below to illustrate our progress and maybe have to spill some over to another post.

 Main Hall

Guest bath

Master shower (the window is reflection)

retaining wall part 1