When one door closes... Another one opens!

Today we are installing our brand spanking new door. I'm pumped. It has a dead bolt! Not that I'm all freaked out of having intruders, but I did watch Mr. Brooks a year ago... Creepy!

Besides having a dead bolt, it is an insulated, energy star door, as compared to the previous hollow, warped, wood and interior "front door". How it lasted 40+ years, I do not know.

I love Adam.

It's funny how when appearances can be deceiving when it comes to houses. Sure, the original door looked semi-brutal, but it worked. But when we took the trim down, we realized just how bad it was. Basically, the lack of insulation and sealing equated to about a square foot hole in the side of our house.
Conveniently located behind some fancy trim.

No wonder our heating bills were so high this winter! We had always felt a draft, so Adam had put in weather stripping, which definitely helped. But little did we know about the issue behind the trim.

When we got our energy assessment done on our house, the doors were one of the biggest heat losses. Now we know exactly why. Sometimes a little research will go a long way in uncovering some issues in your home.

Yes, I was excited to just have a prettier door, but finding this out really makes me excited. Two birds with one stone! And those who know me, know my issue with birds, so we're laughing now!

I love door.

Now that we've installed the door, we know it's done correctly when it comes to being insulated and sealed. It amazed me the things that "home builders" miss. If you look really closely at the picture above, you can see tiny pieces of pink insulation. That's ALL the insulation we had in our original door. Adam beefed that up just a little bit. (and by a little, I mean a lot) All that stuff that looks like clouds coming through the sides of the door is expanding spray foam to avoid the hole-in-the-wall scenario we had going on before behind the door trim.

I love insulation.

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Shrek: For your information, there's a lot more to ogres than people think.
Donkey: Example?
Shrek: Example... uh... ogres are like onions!
[holds up an onion, which Donkey sniffs]
Donkey: They stink?
Shrek: Yes... No! 
Donkey: Oh, they make you cry? 
Shrek: No! 
Donkey: Oh, you leave 'em out in the sun, they get all brown, start sproutin' little white hairs... 
Shrek: [peels an onion] NO! Layers. Onions have layers. Ogres have layers. Onions have
layers. You get it? We both have layers
(Shrek, 2001)

Did he say OGRES? He meant walls. Walls are like onions. Lots of layers.
If you are missing one of these layers, it could mean big problems. More of that to come.....

Quick sketch of the layers of a wall. Obviously not quite to scale :)

Thanks for reading! xo Jena