Tuesday, February 18, 2014

This is a bummer...

 We've been shoveling a place so we can get out of our 'studio' apartment, every time it snows.
 And apparently....
 all of this snow was too heavy for our patio.
 The other day I was sitting at the table, on my computer, and I heard the oddest noise....
 Twas the patio, cracking in half.
 Dave said, "well you like the Tuscan look, you got it."
I said, "Bummer"
Cindy

Monday, February 3, 2014

Working on framing....still

We've been working on the house on days that it isn't freezing upstairs, which isn't much!  But Dave did get all of the supports (collar ties?)finished as you can see in this pic.
 And yesterday he asked me to help.  First I handed stuff up to him from the main level, so he could store it in the attic rafters for now.  Stuff like nice wood and extra siding and such.  So in a few years when I'm wondering, "now what did we do with that extra siding?"  tell me, it's in the attic!
 He also got this walkway thingy done.  See that thick wood bolted down to the rafters.  It's to walk on when the attic is finished and full of insulation.  He had me walking across this stuff yesterday to help him with another project.  I stayed on the wide OSB boards!  I was afraid to walk on that skinny wood with nothing but open rafters below me!  Can you see the bolts with washers screwed into the ends of the wood.
 There was about a dozen or so of them that needed done. 
 I did them! 
 He walks around up there like he's walking on the ground.  Not me.

Here's a good picture of the attic above the kitchen area.  This will just be used for storage, but if someone ever wanted to build a bunch of bedrooms upstairs they could sure do it!  You can also see where he got the support finished on the right side, to match the left side.

 Here is an example of what I was doing.  See how the framing is pulling apart?  Below pics.  There are only a couple of nails holding these pieces together.

 So my job is to put bolts with washers on each piece that is pulling away from each other, so they will snug up against each other and be stronger.  We need strong framing with the wind we get up here and we need good support with all of the heavy snow we got this year.
We have also been checking into getting a pole barn built.  We need a place to store a tractor, a lawn mower, beekeeping equipment, and an extra vehicle.  We do have a two car garage, but it's full of all of the aforementioned, plus a truck. 

Cindy