Catching Up

Been wondering what we've been up to? I can tell you Troy's been busy with plywood. The south side of the roof is done except for the final pieces along the east side. He still has to add the overhang for the eave on that side and he can't do the plywood until that is done.
Troy did cut off the plywood on the west side over the eave so that side is looking very finished now.

I don't know if this picture will convey the feeling I had the other day, but I was walking to the compost pile and glanced over to the shop and thought, "Wow! That looks like a room now." I guess it was the trusses making a ceiling, even if an incomplete ceiling.

Troy has also made the frame for both windows in the shop. There will be one on each of the north and south walls.

As for other little projects around the house, the upstairs sink is now working again. (Super YEAH! Especially since we are expecting company soon.) And while we were having the super deluge of rain a couple weekends ago, I mentioned to Troy that it would be really nice if he could find the time to fix our chimney since rain was falling into it and making our stove and pipes rust inside. Not nice. (You may recall that the chimney topper and top section of pipe were ripped off in a big wind storm last winter.) Troy found time in short 

order, and the chimney is now working splendidly.

I tested it today with a nice roasty fire. The air is getting

 chilly, that is for sure; this is the second fire for us for this season. (The first one I insisted Troy make for me after helping him outside on a cold drizzly day.) Currently I am absolutely cooking in the living room, even with all the fans running. As soon as this is done, I will seek cover in another room.

I think this is all for now. I tried to do shingles today, telling Troy I had a whole day free to offer him. But (alas) the work must be inspected before we can continue to shingles. So I was off the hook. (I'll try not to "yippee!" too loud.) Troy said he needed to finish the plywood on the roof (including the east eave and leveling the east gable) and then it's inspection time. Let's hope nice (but still crazy) Inspector shows up instead of his other personality, evil and crazy.

Take care of you and the ones you love,

christina

Labour Weekend

We have been steadily and faithfully doing work on the shop. All the trusses are off of the driveway and up on the walls. 20 are erect and installed in place. Most have their hurricane fasteners to keep them attached to the walls.

The other 23 are hanging upside down waiting to be installed. We had to get them up while we still had room to maneuver.

The cap piece will go up next at the east end (the open end) and then we will move the rest in place, flip them over, etc, in whatever order seems best at the time. Before the cap can go in place, however, the walls on the east end will need to go up, including the massive header over the garage door opening. (You can see the header standing on the left side of the shop in the above picture--it's the thing that looks like an extremely neat pile of 2x4s, which it kind of is.)

While we were hanging the trusses, we thought we should check for any sagging in the walls. Especially before we added (23 x 140lbs=) 3,220 lbs of weight right in the middle. When we had two trusses hanging (280 lbs), the walls were bulging about an inch. So we braced the two walls with a comealong and some rope and brought it right back in line.

We had a little excitement as we were bringing in the walls when the two trusses decided to do a massive shift at the same time. They didn't actually fall and no one was hurt, but it was a good reminder to always be aware and cautious. And speaking of which, here's a little sampling of what it may feel like to be walking on a 12" board 14 feet up.


And finally a closeup of Troy's plywood hoist (ramp? I forget what Troy called it...). You could see it in the first picture of this post too. It works very simply: you shove the plywood onto the brace from below and then climb up to the roof and haul it up from above. So it's possible to do this on your own--granted it's not the most efficient with just one person--and even with two people it makes the task more manageable.

We need to put up some more fascia boards before we can continue with plywood. Troy and I may be doing that this morning before Joel shows up this afternoon to give us some help. I think Julie, Natalie and I will be going to the neighbour's to pick some of the pears they're giving away. It's going to be over 90* and humid so wish us luck!

What are you labouring on on your Labour Day?

-christina