As for the bathroom, nice going, you 2.
Fit, form and function at work.
Not to mention common sense!
You 2 are doing great, nice to see!
Pepe
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If you make the old exterior storm windows for your old single panel windows they actually come very close to modern double windows. It is less money then replacement windows but a pain in the butt to install and remove every year. The exterior windows for my farm house are mostly junk as they got left in the basement a rotted on the bottom. I haven’t taken the time to rebuild them with new wood. Too many projects and I seem willing to just burn more wood and be a little colder.
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Thanks for he update and pictures . Look like yall are making good progress. 
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Looking good Chris!
I did not know about the baby congrats!
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Hi Dan,
If the bottom rot is only like an inch or so of the sill (bottom of window frame)
you might be able to cut it off and replace it. Clamp and glue replacement sill filler
strip on the bottom. Then screw them together as well. Don’t forget that the
bottom of the window frame sill has to be angled to fit the bottom of the sill frame,
so make it long enough to accommodate the angle. Counter sink the screws to
accommodate the fitting of the bottom angle so you don’t run your plane into a screw.
Yeah, it’s a bit of a pita, but easier than a total rebuild. Just a thought. You might be
able to do the same for rot on the sides if it’s not too rotted.
Oh yeah, mate the windows to the openings and mark both before you begin.
Sounds like you might have to rake out all the old caulking also. Darn, this is turning
into a real project.
I worked with my painter Dad for years. Guess who did all the caulk removal,etc!
Pepe
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Pepe I was planning to do just what you describe but the entire bottom piece of wood needs to be replaced it is just too far gone. Which is where I stopped as I decided the cuts for the window glass was slightly more complex than I wanted to take the time to make last fall. Plus I need to measure each window I have and figure out where it fits and the snow was already comming down when I dug them out. I will have to make it a priority for this comming summer though it is one many projects on my list but honestly as Garry keeps telling me fixing the house would save me a ton of labor cutting wood.
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Dan, How far are you from Burlington, Vt? I’m about 1 1/4 hrs or so
to the west across Lake Champlain in Mooers Forks, NY. We get to the coast
once or twice a year, maybe we could stop by for a short chat on our way through.
I haven’t met anyone else around here that even knows what a gasifier is.
Pepe
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Sounds like you got a good one Chris. Was “Loves to do laundry by hand” on your litany of prerequisites?. As I recall you had a pretty specific list. By the way, the living room thing will work while it’s cold, but don’t forget what I said about a porch swing.
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A little update, no pics today though - I keep forgetting to take them. Maybe I’ll add some later. I finally installed the big slow ceiling fan that SeveU mentioned. Shelves between the kitchen cabinets. More hardwood flooring is going down every day.
Rainwater harvesting system is finally getting an upgrade. At some point I should write about our very simple and effective rainwater collection, consisting of a dozen 5 gallon buckets under the dripping roof edge (no gutters yet). I carry the buckets to a water tank and pour them through a gauze fabric stretched over the opening. But, I need more collection capacity than 60 gallons per rainfall.
First I’m installing gutters, which is surprisingly easy. Plumbing them all into a tank is more of a challenge.
Here’s the coolest part, the WISY WFF100 roof washer. This guy is not cheap, but will be the heart of my rainwater collection system:
Check out how it works:
The driveway is in seriously bad shape. I can’t go beyond the house in anything but a 4WD or a tractor. I’ve been reading about geotextiles and how well they work on muddy substrates. Seems like a simple enough solution, I’ll try it first on a little parking pull-out around the side of the house. Gravel isn’t cheap, but the fabric will keep it from sinking into the mud.
Some road-work reading I’ve been doing:
Drainage is another project. Every time it rains heavily, water gets right into the basement. This should not be the case since the basement is at ground level on three sides. But the surface flow is so fast and poorly graded, it just runs up against the house and inside. There is a drainage ditch we can send the water to, although it gets very full.
Here’s a short video I took last year showing what happens in a heavy rain. Note the standing water.
All this will start up once it gets warmer. For the time being, we’re focused on getting the house to a usable finish level for our new arrival. Flooring, paint, insulation, etc. I’ll do a video walkaround once it’s about done.
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I would look into a French drain here is a good discussion of drainage.
Just wondering with ground which gets so wet when it rains why are you collecting rain water? Normally that is something people do in dry climates.
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I’m collecting rainwater exactly because the ground is so wet. We get a lot of rain here. Surface water is contaminated. Wells here have to be pretty deep to get past the surface runoff, and that costs money. There is an existing shallow well which has brackish water. Possibly something could be done to improve it but I’d rather invest in a solid rainwater system. Nearly everyone back on our road has a cistern, not a well.
Water from the sky has some other advantages. It’s clean and soft. It comes (at least here) in regular doses all year long, so I don’t need to store a 6-month supply. Conversely, you can refill it with hauled water in a dry spell (unlike a well).
And remember, if I collect it off the roof that’s a bit less water I have to drain out of my yard.
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Interesting I have not heard of rain water used for drinking water it is normally consided for plants in the reading I have done on it because of bacterial concerns.
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I agree with your logic Chris, especially regarding the advantages of the softness. Dan is also correct regarding bird poop and such. Should be addressable with a sufficient filter system. I am going to employ a similar rain water system on my land, thinking a sand bed followed by a charcoal bed should (might) provide adequate filtration?..
Isn’t it amazing that rain can just filter through the ground in most places, and be perfectly fit to drink?
As a final safeguard, I intend to use a ceramic filter cartridge, guaranteed no microbes pass.
The roof itself is a concern for me. Asphalt shingles are a bit suspect, though the literature mostly rates them as safe. PAH’s seem to be the concern, along with formaldehyde leaching. I hope you have a corrugated steel roof with a bake on polyester resin painted surface. I am biased anyways, having worked with sheet metal for a career, but it truly is by far the superior roofing material. Can’t catch fire, and should last 50 years plus with no maintenance given the superiority of the new paints, and chemically inert.
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Yep. Although it’s at the far end of it’s usable life, and was repainted unsuccessfully (with latex house paint) a few years ago. The folks who came before were not the brightest bunch. The peeling paint flakes are large enough I can easily filter them out.
A new roof is in the cards, and I will stick with steel, I like it a lot.
By the way we don’t drink the water, it’s used for washing / showering / laundry. Bottled water for drinking and cooking. Once I have a bulletproof filtration system I’ll consider drinking the collected rainwater.
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Not bright bulbs, no doubt. It’s hilarious what passes for “good enough” with many people. 
The new silicone formulated paints (ISO 9002) are waranteed for 50 years at manufacturer level. And with a galvalume substrate below, still quite inert. To maximize the life span, I recommend a white or grey, the less it heats, the longer it will last. My one building and workshop now have 20 years under the sun, regent grey, still shine. The most I will have to do with them is maybe change the rubber washers under the screws.
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Hi Chris did you have a well or cistern on the property at one time? I noticed the back of the property in the pictures has some high ground. May be there is a spring hiding on your property. Just look for the first green area after the winter months.
Bob
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There are whole house UV systems also that work very well.
Keep in mind when using rain water for primary drinking supply: There are some real horror stories in development work history of well meaning folks introducing different kinds of stills (usually solar) to purify water supplies. Great for getting the critters out, but Turns out it can also cause some pretty serious mineral deficiencies. Probably not an issue for most American diets or for short term use but it can be for pregnant and nursing women especially, and children at different growth stages. Also, most Americans are very mobile and drink from many sources, so I don’t think you’re in any kind of danger. But something to keep in mind.
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My old farmhouse has a cistern, it is too close to the foundation of the house and may be a structural weakness in that corner. I have been advised to fill it in. I started to do just that, throwing broken brick and stuff in there. Lately, I am wondering why fill it in. There are no current structural issues, and hey, its water, could at least be used for toilet flushing!! 
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