Attic Insulation Lessons Learned

After doing 2 types of insulation (foam and batting) in my attic, I have some experienced advice.
1. Removing old insulation is one of the worst projects. Don't bother.
2. Because of #1, foam insulation is only worth it for new construction.
3. Plan to do attic insulation in cool weather (70 degrees or less).
4. If doing batting insulation, arm yourself with a few 2x4s (a/b 4 ft long was good for me)... I used a couple of them to sit on and then used one to push the insulation where it needed to be.
5. Wear long sleeves, long pants, a mask, eye wear, and gloves.
6. Have an exacto knife available and some plywood to cut on b/c you may need to cut the insulation bats into pieces.
7. Solicit help. You'll at least want 1 person to hand insulation bats up to you and it's really not a good idea to climb ladders and do projects that involve balancing on beams by yourself. Heaven forbid you fall through the ceiling. We found an awesome trio worked really well... 2 in the attic to move stuff around and one to hand insulation up.
8. Borrow a truck/SUV to transport insulation. I could only fit 4 bundles in my car (and I needed 6-7 for my small attic).

Green with Truck Envy

If you ever want to be surrounded by all LOT of pickup trucks... situate yourself on a military base. When visiting a friend of mine who lives on a base, I had some overwhelming truck envy. There are so many times it would be great to have my own truck, but I can't justify two vehicles. Besides I'm super lucky to have great friends with trucks who are willing to help me when I really need it... and for those times that I don't have help, delivery costs aren't high enough to justify buying a truck. So I rationalized my envy away and will continue to make due without.

Broke AND bruised a nail

While doing some deck building, my thumb got slammed between a 4x4 and a 6x6. It was painful and left quite a bruise. I can use my thumb again without it hurting, but for a while there... it was all sorts of painful.

Anyway this is evidence that I named my blog well.

Guess I could put on some nail polish again to hide my boo boo. [Can you tell I've been hanging out with a 4 year old and an almost-2 year old?]

Area 51?

After showing my co-worker my attic insulation outfit he wondered if I was actually doing work in Area 51 instead of my neighbor's attic. Always jokes about my house projects :)
For the record, I don't suspect any supernatural activity in my neighborhood, however we found a 1979 newspaper in my neighbor's attic. Her attic was definitely due for some new insulation... or at least some cleaning out.

Payback

For so many projects, I've had to make my house worse before it gets better. Well, my house teamed up with my neighbor's house to pay me back for all of those times.

I had to do some acts of contortion in order to balance on ceiling joists for insulating our attics, which resulted in an absurd number of bruises on my arms and legs. They're healing pretty quickly though.

Adventures in Attic Insulation: Phase We're old pros now

It may have taken us 3 hours to do my neighbor's attic insulation, but two evenings later we did mine in less than an hour. We're quick learners! The three of us (my neighbor's friend is super cool and came to help insulate at my house too!) had a system down and I made some other adjustments in my attic to make it more bearable so we didn't need to take any breaks (post on that coming soon). I was flabbergasted a/b how efficient we were. I was so excited about it that I probably said "I can't believe how quickly we are getting this done" enough times to make my neighbor think, "Yeah, yeah. I get your point." Although she was probably equally excited and relieved since she was in the hot attic with me.
So glad that is done and I don't have to deal with fiberglass again... or at least for a while. My house will stay cooler this summer and warmer this winter.

Adventures in insulation - Phase 3-hour-workout

My neighbor's next-to-nothing insulation looked like this across her attic:

The temperature dropped to the 80s so we decided to tackle the insulation in her attic. It was still really hot up there and took some contortion in order to get the bundles in the back of the small angled portion of the attic, but we did it with the help of one of her friends in about three hours. Like many sports, we took time-outs and water breaks; we had our endurance tested and sprinted at the end; we had to think out strategy and execute; and got very very sweaty. I mean... check out my oompa loompa get-up.

Anyway, I'm pleased to post this picture of her newly insulated attic! We're exhausted, sore, and even itchy, but have planned to do this to my attic on Wednesday night. We feel like we have a good system down and are hoping to be able to do it in 2 hours this time! Wish us luck.