When the siding was delivered almost a year ago I knew the weather was going to impact its installation, but I did not realize how much! The rain, sun, wind and high humidity and temperatures were all big factors in the installation and painting of the siding and trim. That is especially true on the south (back) side of the building which is flooded with sunlight for a good part of the day, unless of course its not cloudy and raining. But, despite all that, it's finally done and the building exterior nearly complete. There are still a few details to take care of, like some painting on the windows and the installation of some trim work around the top of the basement, but those are relatively minor in the grand scheme of things.

It sure is nice to no longer see any house wrap!

Topics: Siding

The view of the building from the street is taking shape and approaching that 1909 look that is being sought by the restoration project. All the siding and trim work is now installed and painted on the front of the building. That includes the door and window for the coal shed (east lean-to). A front deck was also built to match the original one. And, modern eave troughs were installed protect and extend the life of the building exterior. Those eave troughs did not exist in the early days, so an attempt was made to conceal them by matching them to the color of the exterior trim.

Fill was finally delivered for what will eventually be a garage pad in the back yard.

Topics: East Lean-To, Shop/Barn, Siding

Good progress is finally being made on the siding. Between the rains that is!

The siding install is somewhat of a slow process. Partly because all boards are being back-primed before installation. Research indicates priming the back side of the siding will extend the life of the paint so the extra effort now should save time and money in the long run.

The 3 side walls are all done, including paint, and back-priming of the boards for the big front wall is underway. The building is starting to really show it original look.

The last couple days were extremely hot and the forecast is for more heat and plenty of sunshine, so I built some shading next to my containers to make the priming of the siding a bit easier.

By the way, the garden and new front lawn are growing good!

Topics: Siding

We are finally done with winter, but now is seems we are into a rainy season with more frequent periods of rain then is normal. As such, I've only been able to do limited work on the outside of the building. Most of the corner boards and flashing are in place so the installation of the siding will begin soon.

All is not lost with the wet weather outside as good progress is being made with the drywall work in the basement.

Between the rains there was also time to plant a small garden and many opportunities to use the fire pit to cook up some awesome burgers!

Topics: Basement, Interior Reconstruction, Siding

Spring has arrived ... well, not quite. For the last couple days it's looking more like winter with the return of snow. Prior to that the weather was quite good allowing me to spend lots of the time out in the yard.

Plenty of dead branches were pruned from the trees. A couple of old garage pads were removed (one of gravel and one of concrete) to make way for some landscaping and improve drainage for the backyard. Work has also started on the base for new garage. The top soil from that area was use to fill in the hole left by the old garage pads and to finish leveling the backyard near the house. Some grass was seeded in the front yard but it still hasn't come up yet and the recent snow fall will delay that a bit longer. The front driveway entrance was widened slightly to make easier to get in and out of.

On those days when the weather isn't co-operating my time is spend inside. A few weeks ago I built the shelves for the upper kitchen cabinets. I also starting to get the basement ready for drywall and am in the process of anchoring the interior partitions to the floor. The temporary basement stairs will likely live on for quite some time to come, hover I did rework the upper flight to get a better feel for what the final stairs should look like.

I'm in the process of acquiring doors for the interior of the building. A couple weeks ago I got several doors from an old house in town just before it was demolished. Some of them just happened to be the right size for the second floor so they were installed for now. The originals will need some TLC before they can go back in.

I'm looking forward to getting started on the siding, but overnight temperatures are still too low for painting. That's ok because there are plenty of other things to do.

Topics: Basement, Driveway, Interior Reconstruction, Landscaping, Shop/Barn