Walls

The late June weekend before Tom’s operation was a mad rush to raise the exterior and interior walls on the first floor.

This is a long post, more for us than for anyone else, so click away now if you’re not keen on lumber. I wanted something to remember this special time, especially because a few days later Tom had such a difficult time having to set down his tool belt and hammer for several months.

Here you can see some of the stamped concrete from the porch (done a week or so prior), and some of the completed walls to be erected; Davy rolled out the foam that went underneath the walls,

Putting up/pulling up the very first wall, Friday after supper, June 27th,

The view through the very first wall, with Daniel running the telehandler,

Up, up, and away,

The front of the house, with the entryway, adjacent to the “tower room” off the living room,

Joining the two walls,

Part of the front of the house — from left, the front door, entry hall window, tower sitting area off the living room,

The entire front, with, from left, bathroom (full barrier-free bathroom with shower, not a powder room), office/home school room, front door, entry hall window, tower sitting area,

From left, tower sitting room (off the living room), entry hall window, front door, office/home school room, bathroom,

Readying one of the interior walls (the wall between the office/home school room and the entry hall),

 

 

 

Standing up the second interior wall, between the entry hall and the living room,

 

Bracing the interior walls,

The windowed dining room, to the left of the kitchen,

The dining room again, with the windows and French door to the porch,

The kitchen and, beyond that (if you look carefully you can see a post marking where the wall goes), the pantry; the door in the centre is to the garage; the window at far right is in the bathroom,

Dining room at far left (beyond the orange ladder), kitchen window (to the  left of the yellow ladder), and pantry window; we decided to make a smaller kitchen, easier to navigate, with a good size pantry nearby,

Tom taking measurements in the pantry,

Kitchen, pantry, and garage entry,

Dining room from the outside,

Insulating the garage and basement foundation and backfilling,

A visitor to the work site,

Now that we’re done with the second cut of hay and our greenfeed, Tom and crew are back at work on the house, floors and the second story before the snow flies. Onward and upward…

Grow where you are planted

Most years I plant sunflowers, though there are always a number of volunteers, thanks to all of Laura’s bird feeders around the yard. This spring there were even more, despite the cool spring temperatures but maybe because of all the rain we had until the end of July. I transplanted a bunch to the former strawberry beds south of the house, so there were several rows of beautiful sunflowers.

We realized last week that, thanks to the birds, some of the sunflowers made it beyond our yard — one is blooming across the road, in the neighbor’s pasture, where the pipeline project still has some soil to re-grade. It makes me smile every time I go by.

And completely unrelated, we’re off to see the RCMP Musical Ride. It’s our third time — the provinces are all on a four-year rotation (much like The Well-Trained Mind), and next time they come around, we may be madly off in all directions…