Tag Archives: projects

A little drip now and then….

March 4, 2020 Rivergirl 21 Comments

Leaking roof saga continued.

Winter is the worst possible time in Maine for your roof to spring a leak … so of course, that’s exactly what’s happened.

Remember when I said I’d cringe every time it rains?

That’s the sound of me cringing.

It poured the other day… and so did our ceiling.

So much so I had to add another pan.

Which drove the husband nuts when he came home…. and because he’s a man and had to do something?

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Yeah. He decided to climb up into the attic to see where it was leaking.

Naturally this isn’t as easy as climbing a set of stairs… because no.

Here at Casa River, we like a challenge.

The den closet, home to an overflow of the husband’s ~~useless crap~~ treasure.

(Yes, he collects old wooden hangers. Don’t you?)

Half of one side had to be emptied and strewn all over the room….

Because the only way to access the crawl space we call an attic is to remove all the shelving and climb up a hole at the top of the closet.

A design paradigm we curse the builders for quite often.

It’s a bit of a nightmare getting up there.

And no, the husband didn’t appreciate me making a Kodak moment out of the experience.

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He wasn’t thrilled that I stuck my head up through the hole to offer advice either.

Men. There’s no pleasing you.

But look… I found an antenna from the 1970’s!

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Did I mention there’s no actual floor up there? Just a few scattered pieces of particle board that break when you kneel on them.

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So after scuttling around like a crab and lying on his back…

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And pointing his flashlight near the section of the roof of the addition you can’t access from the crawl space, he did find where the water was coming in. Halfway up the peak, and running down the beams…. which we can find absolutely no reason for.

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Doesn’t this look like fun?

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Especially since there’s not a damned thing you can do about it until spring when you can rip off the shingles to find the bad spot.

Meanwhile I’ll have this lovely and ever expanding wart to look at.

And every time I do?

I hear a cash register.

Ka-ching!

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The baby barn saga continues….

November 11, 2019 Rivergirl 27 Comments

Next up? Permanent walls for the third side.

As opposed to the numerous sets of temporary walls we’ve installed, uninstalled and installed again.

And it’s finally starting to take enough shape for the husband to hang up a few tools.

Of course…. a chain, a pick ax and a shovel might not bode well for me and my oh so helpful ideas.

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The floor is still 2 different levels of dirt thanks to the woodchucks and chipmunks….

But we haven’t had time to deal with it between rain storms.

The husband has also discovered that when I’m busy taking pictures… he can use his head for a brace. It works quite well.

So, walls and roof section on…

The tape was applied.

If you’ve never used the Zip wall and roofing system? Let me tell you… this stuff is golden. I don’t know what the hell they treat it with but once you tape up the seams it stays waterproof for a long time. I think they say 3 months open to the weather, but on our big barn we left it for over a year… through a Maine winter.. and it was fine.

You’re only supposed to use the tape with the Zip pieces, but baby barn has so many gaps and holes we taped everything we could find in preparation for a big upcoming storm.

Did the husband get a little happy with the tar paper caps? Probably, but we get some hellacious wind blowing across the fields.

So, three and half sides are done and it’s battened down for rain and wind.

Maybe it’s just me, but I swear it’s big brother is looking down in disgust.

Sadly, we may not have time or appropriate weather to finish it this year. I seriously wanted shingles on before the snow flies but my husband says the siding and trim have to go on first… something to do with flashing.

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Although what that has to do with anything….

I’m sure I don’t know.

So, fingers crossed we can at least remove that last rotted section soon.

It’s a little too split personality for my taste.

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Another baby barn update.

November 5, 2019 Rivergirl 40 Comments

Next step in the baby barn remodel was the removal of the addition the previous homeowner added.

This was easier said than done….

And at times required multiple beatings with a crowbar.

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Slowly but surely it came down.

And the temporary walls and roof were removed.

Which is when we noticed a wee bit of sag.

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A little lifting…

A little of me saying WTH?

A whole lot of digging….

And propping up later, it was level.

On that side…. which usually throws all the other sides off.

I swear this entire project has been so much work than it needed to be. We could have torn it all down and rebuilt an entire new one in half the time it’s taken us to get this far. Which I believe was my original idea.

Cold weather is fast approaching, and we’re no where near done.

News flash – yours truly will not be out there working in sub zero temps.

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Babies can be annoying.

October 21, 2019 Rivergirl 36 Comments

Let’s face it, there’s going to be a weekly baby barn update for the duration of the deconstruction/construction.

Which, at this point…. I figure will end sometime between Jesus, isn’t it done yet? and If I have to pry one more splinter out of my hand, I’ll shoot myself in the head and call it good.

Walls.

If you’re an immigrant during this administration? Not Good.

If you’re a rotting baby barn circa 1974? Very good.

Here’s a pic of the husband using his vintage (what feels like 50lb) saw.

You’ll notice he’s hunched over and applying pressure. That’s because the damn thing shimmies like a tilt a whirl on crack and might fly apart if you don’t.

Walls.

They’re a good thing. But sometimes…

You see where I’m going with this?

From the outside all looks well.

From the inside, things went a little squirrelly on the right.

Crooked?

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Do we care?

We do not.

Do we wait for the wife to bring the dust pan during clean up?

So, another weekend done.

Another section framed and ready for siding.

Did I mention that the husband’s plan of starting at the halfway point on the front and working his way around makes it look a bit odd?

Rather like a schizophrenic.

Perhaps I shall name her Sybil….

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This is not what you want to find when rebuilding….

October 15, 2019 Rivergirl 42 Comments

Our old baby barn/shed has a dirt floor with heavy duty rubber mats on top. Due to numerous woodchuck holes and tunnels, we had to drag all the mats out. That sounded easy enough until I realized each one of them weighed the equivalent of an African elephant…

Seriously.

A pregnant, morbidly obese African elephant carrying a suitcase I packed for an overnight trip.

Did I mention they were all covered in pounds of dirt as well?

So as we’re moving the next to last mat…..

This.

A chipmunk burrow with tiny scraps of paper, plastic and leaves.

Upon further examination…

A maze of tunnels, which I thought was pretty cool, until… it moved.

Do you see the leg?

Yeah.

Not a tunnel.

A nursery…

Which means we had to find the other end of the tunnel and relocate them. Not an easy task.

Five minutes after we found them?

Momma found us.

And she wasn’t happy.

She ran around squawking and chirping and looking for her babies.

After a while I think she found them, because she stopped searching and started stuffing.

Stuffing her little cheek pouches full of all those little scraps of paper….

And scurrying back for more.

Within minutes she’d cleaned up the whole lot.

Watch her cram a dried leaf that’s almost bigger than she is below.

(And please pardon my husband’s cursing. Things were not going well with the rebuild at this point…)

After we wasted time relocating chipmunks, we realized we had to relocate a bird’s nest as well.

So many evictions.

I felt like an evil slumlord.

Back to work…. and things did not go well.

Which was completely the husband’s fault.

He had the crazy idea he could square the building properly (After 40 plus years of Maine frost heaves? Madness!) and changed the original footprint….. which in turn threw everything off kilter.

More good times.

Did I mention he uses tools from the 1950’s picked up at a yard sale or the dump?

This little jewel feels like it weighs 50 lbs.

But he has the original box… and vintage lube.

So it’s special.

P.S. For those of you who pay attention, this post is actually out of sequence. That back wall is gone now. Apparently my blog scheduling has run amok.

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Another weekend, another wall.

October 9, 2019 Rivergirl 26 Comments

Work on the baby barn project graduated from glacially slow to slow as molasses last weekend…. and we managed to frame a wall in 3 days.

Though to be fair, ripping off that old rotted pressboard is like Chinese water torture.

It literally shreds in your hands.

But slowly… we saw daylight.

And by Saturday afternoon we had open space and a center post that was barely hanging on.

And by barely?

I mean barely.

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The husband did the usual dirt shuffle in his ongoing attempt to level the building. A pipe dream at best as it was built in the mid 70’s… and it’s Maine.

Frost heave central.

Measuring is fun.

Ripping out posts that were nailed in with spikes?

Not so much.

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Pardon the sun glare and bad manicure… but damn.

Talk about overkill.

Framing started Sunday, with a new window taking center stage.

And continued when the husband decided to dig out all the dirt underneath the structure…

And lay paving stones in yet another attempt to level it.

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Then came the rain… and a mad dash to put everything away before it got soaked.

And then?

Then… the baby barn got a rainbow.

And I found my honey at the other end.

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Can I get an awwww?

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And so it goes….

October 3, 2019 Rivergirl 37 Comments

Work on the baby barn continues, albeit slowly.

My husband’s master plan involves a serious amount of temporary screwing, refitting, removing and replacing. He’s not a huge fan of measuring… but he’s a man.

This is not surprising.

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Of course this means 3 times as much work.

I think one planned demolition and rebuild would suffice…. but I’m a woman.

What do I know?

There’s also a good deal of shifting the husband’s ~~crap we don’t need now, nor will we ever need again~~ stuff from one place to another. Like the hurricane generator we bought in 1992 when we lived down south and haven’t used since.

Or the wheel weights for the tractor we no longer own.

Or the numerous tires for the cars we no longer own.

Or the table that went with the chairs we no longer own….

Right beside the small refrigerator I had no earthly idea we owned.

All of these things are heavy and filthy and must be moved over and over again because he can’t be convinced to throw them out.

Good times.

There was hammering.

And crowbar-ing …. and yes. A good deal of cursing because the structure is 45 years old and not exactly plumb.

There was also a good deal of displaced dirt.

Thanks to numerous woodchuck tunnels…

Which undermined our attempt to simply re-side and re-shingle the damned thing.

Now we have to completely dig up the hard packed floor and smooth it all out.

Doesn’t that sound like fun?

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Baby barn work continues.

September 29, 2019 Rivergirl 27 Comments

If there’s one thing I’ve learned about my husband during our long and happy marriage, it’s that he doesn’t like to rush things.

Projects that should take a day, take a week. Projects that should take a week, take a month. Projects that should take a month, well… you get the idea. He’s been working on our big barn for what seems like forever and it’s still not finished.

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So our baby barn/shed needs to be torn down and rebuilt. Husband decided the frame of the building and the existing wood on the roof were sound, and is attempting to tear down the rotten parts and rebuild around them.

First off is the old shingles.

There’s no real reason for this picture other than the fact I love to see a man sweeping.

It’s porn for women.

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But I digress…..

Shingles off the front side, tar paper off the lower half.

Section of roof off… so he can remove the section of wall below.

It was at this point he decided to level the building.

And that involved stomping all my flowers into the dirt, which made me….

And run for a trowel.

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Flowers dug up…

Potted and moved to the relative safety of the big barn porch.

Of course by the time I’d turned around, he’d stolen bricks and edgers from my garden beds to raise the building.

Which made me….

And run to gather them up before I was left borderless.

One new section of wall in place, old section of roof replaced.

If you’re wondering how long this operation took?

An entire 4 day holiday weekend.

Yes, 4 friggin’ days!

Reason being, my husband is the least organized man on earth and had none of the materials he needed when he started this project and kept having to run to the store… a half an hour away. He can also never find any of his tools and spends 20 minutes cursing and kicking things over looking for them until he gives up and asks me.

Of course he also had to get a haircut, have breakfast with the boys, hit a yard sale, drive an hour to complain to the man who painted his truck last year because it’s already starting to chip, visit his brother, sharpen the lawn mower blades, stop at the pub for a beer and wash his car. Did he have to do all that while trying to rebuild the baby barn?

No. He did not.

But now you see why weekend projects take months.

Fast forward to Monday afternoon. We lay out and cut tar paper…

While a storm moves in.

Have you ever tried to lay tar paper on a roof in the wind and rain?

It’s not fun. Yours truly was on the other ladder and had to put her phone inside so there aren’t any pictures of me soaking wet and wind blown…. laying across the paper as it was ripping off the roof in a deluge.

Good times.

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At this rate, I think the project will be done by the time Elon Musk reaches Mars….

Or Richard Simmons stages a comeback.

Stay tuned.

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So…. this is happening.

September 14, 2019 Rivergirl 49 Comments

You may remember me posting pictures of our little red barn/shed.

We use it as a shed, but it was originally a small barn complete with horse. The horse is long gone…. and 40 odd years later?

The barn/shed is almost gone as well.

Falling apart?

You could say that…

Rotted wood?

The mere fact that it’s still standing never ceases to amaze me.

It’s horrible. An eye sore on our otherwise lovely property. The bane of my existence for a long, long time.

It’s state of disrepair is the main reason we spent $50,000 and 7 years of nights and weekends building a new and much larger barn.

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The plan? All the mowers and weed whackers, the snow blower, the tractor and assorted yard tools that were in the shed/barn were supposed to go into the new barn…. and the eyesore would be torn down.

But that never happened, and now the husband….. who has already filled the new barn ~~with CRAP~~ wants to rebuild the shed/barn to continue housing the mowers, tractor etc.

So this is happening.

Husband deemed part of the interior framing sound, and started what I thought was deconstruction of the back half…. which needs to be completely rebuilt..

Now my idea of deconstruction consists of ripping off the roof, then the walls. The husband’s?

I’m not quite sure.

He put up a new piece of wood…

Ostensibly to brace the roof… though why you need to brace something you’re tearing down is beyond me.

But look at the piece he’s bracing! Rotted doesn’t begin to describe it…

Then…

Yeah. He trimmed it…

The rotted piece of wood.

He sawed off a section of wall… by hand, even though the chainsaw was right there.

And made a bigger hole.

He elongated the brace….

And added wood running along the bottom.

He was supposed to be tearing it down…. so WTH?

Naturally I had to ask.

And naturally, he wouldn’t answer.

It was hot, he was cranky and I dared to question his technique.

Silly me.

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Because when Rustoleum says red? They mean red.

July 13, 2019 Rivergirl 46 Comments

Every few years it’s time to repaint the bulkhead doors.

They’re metal and tend to see a lot of abuse.

Rain, snow, and baking sun all take their toll… and since the husband disappears every time the paint brushes come out?

The job falls to me.

I usually go out with some sandpaper to smooth and remove the flakes… but this spring the husband bought an old sander at a yard sale. Old.. with a capital O.

So he tossed it at me and said it would be much easier than my sandpaper.

From the look of the cord it was from the 1950’s…. and I think that was the poundage as well because just lifting it hurt my wrist. So when he came back to check my progress? I was using the sandpaper again.

Which… because he’s a man and can never be wrong… made him determined to prove his $5 purchase was worth while.