chimbley swept

The stairway dormer is framed out now - here's what it looks like from inside:


And from the outside:


We decided to get a new, direct-vent water heater (our existing water heater was purchased very quickly under emergency situations for not much money: I'm surprised it's lasted as long as it did), which meant that venting the water heating via the chimney was no longer necessary. And as convenience turns out, the chimney chase proved to be the perfect place to run some new heating/AC ducts - or rather, nearly perfect, since it's too small. In combination these facts mean that the existing chimney's being torn down. From its top above the roof down to the top of the second floor, it's gone:


Knowing that it was going, its location is actually the middle of the new hallway. What's left of it, down to the basement, will be going out Monday. Meanwhile, it's created a hellmouth - fortunately, one easily blocked by a piece of plywood:


The other nice aspect of this work is that, since it's made it necessary to rip out a bit of wall in our kitchen to access the new HVAC chase, we decided to take advantage of this fact to restructure that area of our kitchen, which will allow the refrigerator to be in a more logical location and the heating vent not to be tucked, pointlessly, behind the refrigerator. So: minor kitchen remodel along the way.