Neverending Projects

Anytime that you move into a new house, there are projects and this house has been no different. Since this 1835 house got the whole "This Old House" overhaul (no, it wasn't on TV but it got a very major updating) in 2006, the things that we had to do were the same kinds of things that you might do to a newer house.

• We started by recarpeting the master bedroom (the only carpeted room in the house).
• We repainted the entire interior of the house.
• We replaced the bathroom mirrors and some of the light fixtures.
• We cut the cord with television cable back when we were in California. We still have internet so we're able to watch Hulu, Netflix, etc. The problem with that is that we still want local news. In California, we were too far from the antennas to have any reception so we had to go with a very unsatisfactory streaming option. Here, after experimenting with a number of options, we successfully installed a long-range antenna and booster in the attic. We receive 30+ Boston and Providence stations.
• Then we put tile back splashes in the kitchen. 
• We had MassSaves come out and evaluate the energy efficiency of the house. We passed with flying colors but they did leave us with new thermostats and they got us started on a now completed mission to replace every bulb in the house with LEDs.
• We had a pellet stove installed in the fireplace.
• The lighting in the basement, where I have my workshop, was dim so I installed several additional light fixtures and an outlet in my work area.
• We have a farmer's porch on the North side of the newer part of the house. The decking there is a composite wood that never needs painting. On the South side of that same part of the house, we have steps and a small porch. After last winter, we noticed that the paint was starting to come off. We removed the wood surface and replaced it with the composite.
• One of the notes that the building inspector made before we moved in concerned a large branch that hung out over the driveway and threatened the house. We had a tree guy come out to see about removing it. He found that the limb was part of a dead ash tree. He also found that a dead hickory was an even bigger threat. We had him remove both.

That's the little stuff. One major project loomed in our future from the minute that we bought the house.

The house is really in 2 pieces. The front part of the house is an 1835 colonial. It features post and beam construction, has the narrow, original staircase and has the original wide plank chestnut flooring on the 2nd floor and in the attic. The basement under this part of the house has about a 4' ceiling so we refer to it as the crouch space.

Pre-reconstruction, the house had a kitchen wing off the back of the front section. It must have been in really bad shape. It was demolished, the basement was redug (to a proper depth) and the wing was rebuilt with a 2 car garage added to the back. This new part of the house had kitchen and dining on the first floor and an unfinished stairway up to an unfinished 2nd floor. This new part of the house has a saltbox roof and 2 gables (one in the stairwell). The wall opposite the gables has 3 windows.

There's our project. That unfinished area is about 400-500 sq. ft. and it would make no sense to leave it unfinished. Here's what we've done s far:

• On the gable side of the room, the ceiling slope goes all the way to the floor, creating some unusable floor space. I've framed in a closet between the gables. I've also installed 48" tall bi-fold doors.

  

  The ceiling above the doors and the diagonal tape line in the gable illustrate how steeply pitched the ceiling in the closet is.

• The room had 2 bare light bulbs and a couple of outlets. I've installed a reasonable number of outlets, dimable can lighting for the room and separate lighting for the stairway. I also installed switched lighting in the closet. We want to use this a a TV/Family room so I've installed a cable outlet that is connected to the attic antenna.
  
• I've insulated the entire space.
• We had a plumber add a zone to our basement boiler and install a baseboard radiator in the new room.

  

  That's the radiator along the wall. The door at the end goes through to one of the upstairs bedrooms. The wall around the door is the old part of the house and ins post and beam construction. Getting the pegs flush and the posts even enough for drywalling was a real chore.

• We put a window air conditioner in the gable over the stairway.

  

  The air conditioner has been stored away for the winter but it sits in this window (I installed an outlet to the left of the window).

• I sheet rocked the entire space. The funny angles created by the saltbox roof, gables and stairway were brutal. I've just finished the taping so it's time to call out a plasterer.
  
  
  

  

  This knee wall had a bad wobble after I removed some bracing that wouldn't work in the finished space. I replaced the 2 2x4's on the end with this floor-to-ceiling post. No more wobble.

  
  

  

  Looking up from the stair landing.

I was moving full speed ahead until an outdoor project presented itself. It needs to be taken as far as possible before the snow hits so the upstairs room is currently on hold. Still to be done upstairs:

• Have a plasterer apply a skim coat to all surfaces.
• Paint.
• Install hardwood flooring.
• Install moldings on doors, windows, baseboards and stairs.

I'll get to the outdoor project that has put the upstairs project on hold. Before that came along, another project added to that delay. A while back, on a whim, we bought a semi-antique piece of furniture that we think will be perfect upstairs. It looks like a dining room sideboard except that the front pulls out. It has 6 leaves that turn it into a 9' table. Our plan is to put it under the TV. It will be nice to have that long table if the need ever arises to seat 12. The problem was that it was in pretty rough shape and needed refinishing.

This was Kristen's project and was going to be completed in the basement. We soon realized that it was so heavy that we would probably rewreck the finish getting it upstairs. Since it would be a bad idea to refinish furniture in the completed new room, I disassembled the table as much as possible and got it upstairs so Kristen could work on it. It is now refinished and sitting in the upstairs bedroom that adjoins the new room.

OK. Now we get to the outdoor project. Our lot is 2.6 acres. Our house, driveway and lawn sit on about one of those acres. Much of the year, the rest of the property is impenetrable forest. Once the leaves fall, we can actually see our property and we get to dreaming about making it usable.

The main obstacle to making it usable is a pest plant called Rosa Multiflora. This weed is driving the corn farmers nuts in Iowa and Nebraska. It grows beautiful white flowers in Spring and Summer but it essentially covers the ground with a 10' tall wall of thorns (I'm sure that Sleeping Beauty's castle must have been surrounded by a wall of Rosa Multiflora).

My big outdoor project has been to get rid of the Multiflora. I'm out there almost every day with chainsaws, tree saws, loppers and machete. I'm making a lot of progress but this may be a multi year project.

Clearing out the Multiflora is giving me access to the trees. I'm finding that many have Bittersweet vine winding around them. Since Bittersweet will kill the trees (and undoubtedly already has killed some of them), I'm removing the Bittersweet as I have the opportunity. Some of the vines are as big around as my arm. One tree, that I had already marked for future elimination, actually fell down when I cut the vines that were holding it up.

This was when I was just getting started. It had been impossible to get past the edge of the lawn.

I'm up on a plateau area here that looks like it might make an interesting raised patio.

I'm in the same spot here as in the previous photo. Just a different angle.

Working in the tree's, I've found that some of the vines that I'm removing are all that's holding some of the tree's and branches in place. I was able to push one fairly large tree over after I'd removed the vines. After a close call with a large branch that broke off high above me and crashed next to me, we thought it prudent to invest in the following protective gear.

Hard had with flip up wire mesh face plate, flip up ear protection and neck protection.

As I clear the "back 40", I'm finding a lot of interesting things:

• The woman that we bought the house from (we see her regularly) has asked a couple times if we've found the fallen tree yet. When she was redoing the house, she had a hickory tree taken down because it was threatening the house. We've found the tree and the trunk is at least 4-5' thick. It was about 10' back from the lawn and it's amazing that we couldn't see it.
• She's also asked if we've found the foundation for the old goat barn. We can now report that the goat barn foundation has been found. It's construction is strange. It's concrete slab and is about 8'x12'. Over time, the soil has eroded from under it so it appears to be sitting on top of boulders.
• Still to be found is the old well that she says is out there some place.
• What we have found is stone walls ... everywhere. We discovered last year that the property is surrounded by low stone walls. We've found that there's one elevated area, surrounded by walls and just off the lawn that we think will make a beautiful patio. As I clear around the goat barn foundation, I'm finding more walls. It looks like the area may have been laid out in paddocks.

Obviously, this is going to be a continuous project. Still to be seen is how fast it's all going to want to grow back.

-J-

Oakham Living

We've been amazed to see all that goes on in a town this small.

Oakham has no business district. There's a packy down on Hwy. 148 near the new post office ('packy' is short for 'package store' which is what New Englanders call a liquor store / mini-mart). The 2 campgrounds each have a camp store which may or may not be open to non-campers. The only restaurant in town is at the Quail Hollow Country Club. That's it. No gas stations, no banks, no supermarket. Fortunately, we don't have to go far to find those things.

There's no shortage of services. Plumbers, electricians, landscapers, small engine repair, contractors, plasterers, tree cutters, snow blowers and pretty much anything that you can think of are here if you know where to find them. Fortunately, we know several life-long residents who seem to know everyone.

I've mentioned before that our house is in the town center. The Center is near the top of the hill in this hill town. The center is built around a commons that includes a beautiful bandstand. The library is across Maple Street from the commons. The old Congregational Church and Town Hall are across Coldbrook Road from the commons. At the side of the commons on Coldbrook Road is the old Post Office (now a residence, it's in pretty rough shape). On the Maple Street side of the commons is a vacant lot that was the home of a hotel/tavern/general store until it burned down.

Library

Bandstand and the Old (retired) Post Office

Congregational Church

Town Hall

Behind the Congregational Church is a cemetery that date back to the Revolutionary War and doesn't have any graves newer than about 1830. Moving toward our house from the church and cemetery is a level spot that is currently the site of the town ice rink when it gets cold enough. The cite used to be the home of  Methodist Church that was moved up from Coldbrook Springs. Later, the building housed the Methodist Cheese Factory.

Cemetery

Ice Rink (that's our house between Briar and Maya)

Behind the Methodist Church was a blacksmith shop that was owned and operated by one of the early residents of our house. Beside the Methodist Church (and across the street from our next door neighbor) is the ruin of a building that, according to the historical marker, used to be a carriage and sleigh factory.

Carriage and Sleigh Factory

Across Coldbrook Road from us is a small house called Rose Cottage. The woman who lived there died back in 2006 and no one has lived there since. The neighbors say very matter-of-factly that the house is haunted and that no one has been able to stay there. We've encountered a number of people back here that take their ghosts very seriously.

Rose Cottage

We live on what might be the only block in Oakham. The Commons is on our block and Maple Road and Coldbrook Road meet at the Commons. Maple goes up hill and takes a right turn at the top of the hill. We're at the corner of Coldbrook Road and Barre Road. Barre Road goes up the hill beside us to meet Maple Street. Maple Street continues as Barre Road at that corner and Oakham Center School and the Police Station / Fire Station / Town Maintenance Yard are just up Barre Road.

Blue pointer indicates our lot

Looking down Maple Street towards the Church and Town Hall

Oakham Center School

Police Station / Fire Station / Town Maintenance Yard

Oakham Center School goes through from Barre Road to Coldbrook Road. Near the school on Coldbrook Road is a gated stone paddock called a pound. In the old days, there were several of these around town. When your livestock got loose, they impounded them and you had to pay a fine to get it back.

Pound

The most of the structures around Town Center, down to and including the pound are about to be named a National Historic Site. Apparently, we'll be able to order a plaque or something for the house.

I kind of got away from what goes on in Oakham.

In the summer time, the town sponsors a number of Thursday night concerts at the bandstand in the commons. Most of the bands consist of guys in their 50's or 60's who have probably been playing together since high school. They're not great but it's free, good fun and it's just up the block.

In alternating years, the town hosts Oaktoberfest (in October if you can believe that) and the Town Block Party (mid-summer).

Oaktoberest includes food, music, carnival games, a bonfire and a ball roll to benefit the library (participants buy numbered balls, several thousand of which are then rolled down Maple Street into a shoot at the bottom with winners receiving donated prizes).

Niko and Maya enjoyed the magic show.

We all went for a very fast (35-40 mph) hay ride.

The Ball Role (left is looking uphill, right is looking down)

It was a cold day so we needed some hot chocolate.

The bonfire

The Town Block Party also has food and music but has a car show, softball game and a burn-out competition (this crazy competition has cars sitting between the library and town hall and burning most of the rubber off their tires).

The burnout

Several times per year, including Oaktoberfest and Town Block Party, there are 5k / 10k / 1 mile races that start and end at the commons. We've sat on our front porch and cheered them on (particularly the kids) a number of times.

Halloween is different here. All of the towns in the area seem to designate the date and time when trick-or-treating will take place. Our block is the only concentration of houses in town so we are trick-or-treat central. The town takes in donations of candy and distributes the candy to the houses in the area. Interestingly enough, last year they brought us candy and we had maybe 60 trick-or-treaters. This year, they didn't bring us candy and we probably had a couple of hundred.

At the end of trick-or-treating (5-7pm this year) the Fire and Police Departments sponsor a parade to to the Fire Station where they have a party. Last year there were 2 kids in the parade and they didn't pass our house. This year, the parade was well attended. They passed our house and went up Barre Road where costumed firefighters leaped out of our woods and attempted to scare the kids.

We decorated the town Christmas tree last year and are on tap to do it again. The tree is inside the bandstand. The decorating is followed by an official lighting with carols, refreshments and some sort of play that the church puts on.

The Christmas Tree

This is the 2016 tree. We had been trying to sell 8 strings of large LED lights (4 red strings and 4 blue strings) online and had had no success. The tree needed something to make it pop so we donated them to the town.

We even made it into the Barre Gazette this year. We enjoyed the last line about Yetta Willard not being pictured. Yetta is the dog and she is definitely pictured. Brian Huard took the picture and is the person not pictured. We've been teasing him about how easy it is to confuse him with Yetta.

Also in the Christmas theme, the Church holds a Christmas crafts sale each year.

Late each summer, the Historical Society promotes a Town wide Yard Sale. They promote it and charge $15 to list your sale in the flyer/map that they pass out at all of the entrances to town.

Government is run a bit differently here. Most local decisions are made via a show of hands at Town Meetings rather than at the polls. Town Meetings usually take place twice a year at the Oakham Center School auditorium (they used to be held in the upstairs auditorium at the Town Hall but it isn't wheelchair accessible). When we do need to go to the polls, we vote at the town hall and use ballots that look like they were made on a copying machine. We mark our ballots with a pencil and then feed them into a wooden box by turning a crank.

The the town offices seem to have very limited hours but we've come to realize that the Tax Collector and her husband own the packy. We can just about always get our questions answered there.

It's also been interesting to live in a town where the postmaster knows your address without being told.

Oakham Center School is the only school in town. Kindergartners and 1st Graders are all bussed to a school in New Braintree. New Braintree's 2nd through 6th graders are bussed to Oakham Center School. After the 6th grade, they all attend the regional schools in Barre.

One of the historical landmarks around town is a one room schoolhouse (there were several). I guess that I never quite understood why they had one room schoolhouses. There may have been as many children back then as there are now but, in the absence of automobiles, getting them all to a centrally located school with multiple grades and classrooms wasn't practical. The alternative was to scatter one room schools around town.

I've mentioned the Historical Society. They have a museum that is open one Sunday afternoon each month. I've mentioned that they support themselves through the town wide yard sale. This year, they also had a dinner at the country club (which we attended). They own an old hearse that has been on loan to Old Sturbridge Village. Sturbridge recently returned the hearse and the dinner was to raise money to add a barn at the museum to garage it.

Our local library is a bit different from what I've been used to. A while back, I was looking for a book to complete a series that I'd been reading. Boston Library didn't have it available as an ebook so I attempted to have a copy shipped to Oakham from another library in their network. When that failed, I mentioned it to the librarian. She ordered the book from the library and then, when it came in, delivered it to our front door.

-J-

About Oakham

Living in Oakham has been a real education for this pair of lifelong Californians. We are still discovering how wrong some of our misconceptions are.

I believe that I've blogged before about the heavy woods that are everywhere and that, in spite of that, there are old stone walls everywhere that you look in those woods. Obviously, farming was pretty extensive at one time and the woods have filled back in. We recently learned that, by the mid 17th century (1850 or so), Massachusetts was almost completely clear cut to make way for farms. Everything that we have now has grown back since then.

That gibes with something that we read at the library. Prospect Hill, just above us, is the highest point in Oakham. We read that, in the mid 1800's, a large number of church steeples (eight? ten?) were visible from the top of the hill. I'm sure that there are fewer steeples than there used to be but, these days, trees are all that you can see from the top of Prospect Hill.

Prospect Hill

The woods these days have extensive undergrowth. Much of that is wild roses (multiflora) and poison ivy. We've speculated about how difficult it must have been for the original settlers to get around and come to the conclusion that the original old-growth forest probably didn't have a lot of undergrowth.

I was discussing this with one of the neighbors and mentioned how difficult it must have been to move armies through during the revolution. He laughed and said that they used the roads. They apparently already had an extensive network of roads by that time.

Oakham is located in an area that the TV weather reporters refer to as the Worchester (pronounced Wooster) Hills. Many of the local towns are referred to as "hill towns", meaning that the town centers are perched on top of a hill. The highways, railways (current and former) rivers and ponds wend their ways through the plains between the hills.

The towns that aren't hill towns look like they used to be industrial towns. They were able to take advantage of the river power and railroad transportation.

Some towns in the area have both characteristics. The town of Hardwick includes a beautiful hilltop village also called Hardwick. It also includes a very industrial village called Gilbertville and two other villages called Wheelwright and Old Furnace.

Oakham at one time include the villages of Oakham and Coldbrook Springs. Coldbrook Springs no longer exists but, from its location, it might have been an industrial area. Coldbrook Springs had two railroads and two railroad stations. We've read that Calvin Coolidge, when he was governor, lived nearby and used to ride the train from Coldbrook Springs to Boston a couple of times a week.

So what happened to Coldbrook Springs? When the Quabbin Reservoir was built in the early 1900's, Coldbrook Springs was removed to make way for the aqueduct system that eventually moves the Quabbin waters to Boston. Extensive tracts of land that used to be in Coldbrook Springs are now state forest.

Many of the structures that used to be in Coldbrook Springs were moved to other locations in Oakham. It's interesting to explore the state forest lands and see the old basements and railroad stations.

A little demographic data: Oakham was first settled 1749 and then incorporated 1775. It's current population is about 1900 living in about 600 households. Oakham's land area is about 21.1 sq. miles so there's a lot of land to go around. Current zoning requires that residential properties be at least 6 acres (we have 2.6 acres so we are either grandfathered or the requirements are different in town center).

-JC-

Travel

Living on a new coast, the opportunities to visit new places is very appealing but, so far, we've stayed pretty close to home. Our experience with the changing seasons is very limited and we wanted to experience them in our new home.

We live in an area that people travel to to camp in the summertime (there are 3 campgrounds within a 5 mile radius). They come to ski in the winter (Wachusett Mountain is nearby). Nearby Hwy. 122 is a designated "Scenic Byway" and people throng to the area to see the Fall foliage (and it only gets better when you leave the highway). Spring is also beautiful. We haven't regretted for a moment our decision to stay close to home.

We did work in some short side trips, some of which were reported in our previous blog.

• We spent a couple of nights in Boston when we went to see the Redsox game that Briar & Family gave me for Father's Day, 2015.
  
• In December, 2015 we visited my Mom in the SF Bay Area and then visited SoCal to attend grandson Cooper's 1st birthday party (spending several days with Grant, Melissa and the kids in the process.
  
• In April 2016, we spent a couple of nights in Stowe, Vermont.
• In June 2016, we spent a couple of nights Boothbay Harbor, Maine.
• In August 2016, Grant and Family visited and we all spent a week with Briar and Family in a cabin that she'd rented in the White Mountains in New Hampshire (more to come on Grant's visit in a separate post).
  
• In October 2016, we spent a couple of nights on Cape Cod.
  
  
  

  

  Spotted a couple of horseshoe crab shells on the beach. We'd never seen these before and thought that they'd be in Florida

  
  
  

One thing that we've found interesting is that it's so beautiful here at home that we usually can't wait to get back. We visited Stowe before and remembered it as very rural. Compared to Oakham, Stowe was like the big city.

I can't see that we'll ever need to go anywhere else for the Fall foliage. Reservations need to be made way in advance and it's next to impossible to hit peak foliage. We can stay at home and watch the entire show.

At the Revolutionary War era cemetary (visable from our kitchen window)

I'm sure that we'll be getting away in our trailer to explore more of the Eastern USA. The Caribbean is accessible and Europe is a much shorter flight. We'll have to see when we're ready for that. Now, we're starting to see that there can be interesting differences in the seasons from year to year.

-J-

Back by popular demand!

Yes, we had a request!

Our previous blog, "Cross Country Move 2015", described the sale of our house in Murrieta, CA, the cross country trip in our trailer, the search for a house in Massachusetts, moving in and our first year in Oakham. That's taken us way beyond our cross country move so it would seem to be a good time to transition to something new.

We won't promise to post here as frequently as we have with our past blogs. We will attempt to share what's going on in our lives. To start with, we'll play a bit of catch up with the things that have been going on in our lives.

-J-