Christmas Kitchen

Were you expecting more pictures of decorations? Nope, this is more of a state-of-the-kitchen-at-Christmas update.

Troy has begun reinforcing/building up the support beam across the ceiling. It was mentioned in the very first kitchen post. Here is the best picture I could find of it:

It sagged a lot. And it had no support at all on the north end. And it wasn't strong enough.

Troy started by filling in all the openings between each of the wall studs from the second floor. That stopped a lot of cold drafts from falling into the kitchen. He also had to trim off all the studs that were sticking out the bottom and cut the bottom of the boards level.

Once that was done, he could begin to rebuild it. He has started to apply 2x6s to the bottom of the beam with glue and nails. After each layer, the beam is jacked up to a slight arch shape.

I am so glad Isaac is around to help Troy! It would be quite a chore to do this on his own, which of course would mean that I would be helping him (ever the reluctant helper). They have to wait 24 hours between layers so they are progressing at the rate of one board per day.

Having the jacks up where the old wall was has given an insight into just how small and narrow the kitchen was before the addition onto the porch. I actually wonder if the foyer was part of the kitchen at that time because it's hard to believe a farmhouse kitchen would be that small. I sure would be interested in knowing the history of additions and modifications to this house.

Although Troy had already seen that there had been a fire in the kitchen at some point, this work has revealed just how much damage had been done. He thinks they're lucky the whole house didn't go. And it's made him wonder if that was when they decided to build out onto the porch. (If you have to replace part of the wall anyway...)

Who knows!?