Putting it back down was just the beginning. Now we have to repair all the flood damage. We were not allowed to do any repairs until the house was elevated (township regulations) and the potential for cracking drywall and bowing the new windows and doors made it a bonehead idea anyway.

First let me introduce you to the crew. This guy has been behind the scenes advising me all the way. Also did the drawings for the building permit - electrical, mechanical, plumbing everything but the foundation drawing.

He doesn't like limelight or attention; he prefers to let the work do the talking. That makes writing about him hard so we'll call him - Ren. For modern day renaissance man. Ren because I always liked the name from the (original) Footloose movie and because Ren Man leads to obvious jokes.

He is truly a modern day renaissance man. Wood, metal, mechanics, paint, drafting and art. He did all the work to the Airstream - metal, mechancial (heat, power, plumbing), custom cabinets. Custom furniture for our living room, paint work for our bikes and scooters. I could go on but it would just piss him off.

I will say one more thing. His ability to see how the systems interact and what will happen when you put stuff together sets him apart.

The floor was spongy from jamming the house straight when we lowered it. The solution was to build up the cross beams by sandwiching them between new wood and bolting the assembly together.

We had a rotted beam and rotted floor. This was particularly bad because right above it was a support post for a second floor beam.

Ren built this crazy contraption to lift the weight of the wall off of the beams so he could put 4x4 sister beams in around the rot. To finish he replaced the flooring.

The office was built after the floor had sunk. In the picture you can see how much the floor sank down by the size of the gap in the wall now that it's back in place. If that doesn't seem to make sense, think he lifted the support post which then lifted the ceiling. The floor below the office stayed at it's original level but the whole ceiling went up with the beam.

Next up. Headers across the garage doors so we can get the doors in. We used (2) 2"x9.5" LVL beams for each garage opening.