Bedroom part 2: wailing walls and ceilings

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As previously mentioned, the walls of the house are not at all insulated. Since re-siding wasn't an option (money, money, money...), blown-in insulation looked like the way to go. Well, the house has been settling for about 80 years and, not surprisingly, there were cracks in the ceiling and the walls of the bedroom. Might as well just do the

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[ritchie_dagger]

So, um, that's like, um, a bearing wall, with no stud-to-stud blocking anywhere? Like even for diagonal wind-bracing at the corners? [shudder] Whew, no wonder there were cracks that big! I'm surprised you don't go through windows on a regular basis or have to shovel out plaster with every snowfall! Ay, carumba! Thank goodness for the actual 2x4s they used back then, eh?

I LOVE the drywall cookies!

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Drywall cookies with mud frosting... mmmm.....

Yes, load-bearing exterior walls with no stud-to-stud blocking (just framework around the windows). The house had some weird short-cuts in construction that we've found since renovation involved a little deconstruction - doorways that don't line up, creative shimming, etc. I do agree on the goodness-thanking for the extra-beefy dimensional lumber they used, or the entire thing would have collapsed years ago!

Oddly enough, the exterior walls aren't the ones that were cracked - it's the interior walls. The center of the house sank more than the exterior. The poor house seems to have been built on backfill of some sort. When I did some digging in the yard I found that at about 3' of depth there's a stratum of clinker & gravel. It also goes a long way in explaining why the basement leaks regularly - it's in a drain tile.

But that's for future repairs