Cedar day!
Not much to say except it was a long day of work. It took considerably more time to install the cedar in the apartment living room than I expected. Part of that was due to my inefficiency. I will be better on the master bedroom tomorrow. For starters I already cut all of my pieces. I’ll also bring a bunch of them up on the scaffolding with me to reduce trips up and down. I was also disappointed that I couldn’t get the pieces at the peak to fit together properly. I will need to cover with some trim. My dad did a lot more drywall sanding and painting today. That is looking good. We worked until dark then ran some errands in town. Now I’m at McDonald’s using their internet on my Chromebook to order a bunch of house components. The weather is very pleasant for November.
Airless paint sprayer to the rescue.
We bought an airless paint sprayer on Friday night, but only started to use it this morning. All I can say is…WOW! What an awesome piece of equipment. I actually bought the cheaper model than I was planning on, but didn’t realize it until I was assembling it. That wasn’t a big deal though. There was a little bit of a leaving curve, but once I got adjusted it was fantastic. I sprayed primer and the finish coat on a lot of shiplap. It went very quickly and looks great. The only downside is that the reservoir is only 32 ounces, and that doesn’t last very long. Refilling is a bit slow and tedious. So I am thinking of getting another one with a hose that goes down into the five gallon bucket of paint. Then I will really fly! My dad painted the drywall in the apartment, Luke’s room, and the spare room with a roller. They look great. We moved all of the cedar inside because it’s supposed to storm this evening. Tomorrow I’ll install it on the vaulted ceilings in the apartment and master bedroom. After dinner we went to Lowe’s for more paint. I went to Lowe’s twice and Home Depot once today. It got dark super early. Now it is very windy but not cold. I actually wish it was a little cooler. Tomorrow should be a good day.
Little Man’s rough “fall back”.
Daylight savings ended in the wee hours of this morning, and Luke was pretty caught off guard. He did not enjoy an extra hour of sleep. Bit once he got settled he had a great day of relaxing.
The Little Inspector pays a visit.
I awoke this morning to the sound of drywall being sanded. It was a little chilly so I didn’t exactly jump out of bed. After messing around a bit I went to Home Depot to get my dad an electric sander for the drywall. It is a cordless Ryobi, and uses the same batteries that I already have. Back at the house I did a lot more spackling. I am basically finished with everything but the highest reaches of the walls and vaulted ceiling in the kitchen/dining room. Liz and Luke came in the afternoon. She brought seven (7!!!) samples of white (or close) paint, which I proceeded to put at various spots around the house and apartment. She decided on one of the not so white options. It will be used on the walls, trim, and vaulted ceilings. I finished up the day and daylight by installing most of our last old siding accent wall in the spare bedroom.
Priming.
Another kind of slow day. I started off the morning by going to the bank up in Franklin, then visiting two Lowe’s stores, the same number of Home Depots, and a Sherwin Williams. All trying to get some reliable information about paint. I also bought some chisels and a protractor at Home Depot. After lunch I went by Big Box and ordered more cabinets and vanities. Back at the house I uncovered my cedar and ogled it for a while. They are pretty nice boards. I installed a couple more deadbolts using my new chisels and mortising device. The latter is very neat. When my dad arrived we started priming the shiplap in the apartment. I really wasn’t happy with the quality that we were getting from brushes and rollers, so we drove down to Pulaski and got a sprayer at Home Depot. We also bought the tile for two bathrooms. We had dinner at a buffet there in town before driving back to the farm.
Slogging through Thursday.
It was a fairly discouraging day. The issues actually started during the middle of the night. It was very windy and the French doors kept blowing open. I set some of our new interior doors in front of them, and then they got blown over and damaged. That scared the hell out of me. I woke up at 1:30 and it took hours to fall back asleep. My dad arrived at eight, and I was still in bed. I got up shortly thereafter though. It rained hard all morning. I don’t even remember what we worked on before eating a very late breakfast at Cracker Barrel. Next we went to Lowe’s for some painting supplies and primer. We started in the apartment – my dad sanding drywall and me spackling the nail holes on the shiplap. Talk about tedious! But I finished the living room at least. My dad moved on to the spare bedroom while I tried to do more cleaning and organizing around the house. I really need to haul some stuff to the dump soon. I did manage to install a couple of deadbolt locks. I like the door hardware we bought.
The leaves are really starting to change, and that is nice. I would like to drive around to see more, but really need to focus on finishing the house. We close on the condo four weeks from today. Little Man turns seven months tomorrow. Busy times.
Strike up the band.
It was a disjointed, but still productive day. The interior door were delivered first thing this morning. They look good. Next we put our pressure treated 2×12 band around the house where the deck is going to go. I’m getting really excited about the deck. It will be fun to build and should be a great addition to the living space. It started raining just as we were finishing that up, so I went over to Chapel Hill to buy some cedar lumber. I bought about 750 square feet of v-groove 1×6 in 3-5 foot lengths. It looks pretty good and will be the ceiling for the porch. At least about a third of it will be anyways. I’m not sure what I’ll do with the remainder. It would be great if I could lift the whole bundle up onto the porch with my tractor. I also pressure washed the green corrugated roofing metal that we will put on the vaulted ceiling in the apartment. Lastly, I knocked out the accent wall in the apartment bedroom. We used the siding from the old house for that. I think it looks pretty good. My dad continued his heroic efforts on the drywall mud. It is supposed to storm all day tomorrow. I hope to get the last accent wall done and complete the aforementioned sheet metal ceiling. I was just at Lowe’s browsing around. They started their Black Friday appliance sale, and have some good deals. Now I’m about to order a few things of the Home Depot and Amazon websites. But first, dinner.
Slip-siding away.
Well we finished up the last of the siding and all but one piece of soffit. That took most of the day. After that my did work on some sheetrock mudding and I organized around the site and worked to get prepared for tomorrow. Now they are saying that it isn’t going to rain. After dinner I went to Home Depot and bought some lumber for the deck band and all of our exterior door knobs along with some for the apartment’s interior. I bought more expensive ones than I was planning on, but they are really nice. It was another lovely fall day. The leaves are starting to change and it is so relaxing. I need to take some pictures.
Riding the siding.
It was a rather miserable, but still fairly productive day. We were back on the ladders trying to finish up the siding. But before that I went to check up on my door order and get (the other) front tractor tire repaired. It was a beautiful and sunny fall day despite starting off on the cool side. We did make good progress on the siding despite it being rather tedious due to the height. We are on the last two gable ends. I am hoping that we will finish the siding and most of the trim tomorrow. It is supposed to start raining on Wednesday afternoon. If by the time the rain starts we have the siding done, the 1×4 trim complete, and the deck band installed and caulked, I will be quite happy. Bonus points if we get the exterior door knobs installed as well, but that would require Liz to make a decision about which ones she wants. It is supposed to be even warmer tomorrow, around 75 degrees. I’m not looking forward to ladder time, but it sure will be nice when we are finished.
