Finished framing

Chris has been working so much at his regular job that the building process has almost come to a halt. The good news is he was able to take off a few days this past weekend and get the framing inside finished up so that we can talk to the HVAC installer and the electrician and they can take over for a bit. Those two items should be the only thing we pay someone else to do!

This is the framing upstairs in the Master bedroom. It will be a closet,bathroom( with the window) and another closet.

The framing on the side of the bedroom that leads downstairs. We go back and forth on if we will put windows in the wall to let the light in from the stairwell. If we leave them will will probably frost them.

The kitchen pantry door has been framed in and the cabinets for the kitchen have been laid out....the tape on the floor :) The fridge will go next to the pantry, the sink will go under the window and then closer to the bigger window at the right will be the stove. There will also be an island in the center of the room.

The large deck off the back has been started too! Like I said, Chris was busy this weekend!

All of the windows are now in and the exterior will stay much the same. Now that the framing inside is done Chris will switch to trimming out the outside until the electric and HVAC is completed and he has a bit more time. He has been working 7 days a week at work.

working on framing and another material auction

This little guy has been keeping us busy! We got a new bottle calf and taking care of him keeps us busy.

Chris has been working on the ceiling joists on the North grain bin. They are spaced on 16 inch centers at the wall and then taper up to be side by side at the top. We ended up buying all the 2x4's for the joists at a lumber yard that has a 20% off sale on the holidays.

What it looks like at the top of the ceiling. The ridge that holds all the panels of the roof together is helping support the joists. The joists are notched and then tied to the ridge and then nailed to the wall studs and screwed to the metal at the top of the circle. The walls on this side of the grain bin will not go all the way to the top. We wanted it open even though there are two bedrooms on this side. There is a loft area above the bathroom and it will have partial walls. We are thinking that the top grain door will have a skylight in it.

We went to a building material auction last weekend. We were able to get our kitchen cabinets. I wanted them to be quite plain because I want the old tin ceiling to really be the focal point.  We ended up getting 5 lower cabinets, 5 upper cabinets and the small 2 that go over the stove and over the fridge, for $1600. The only other thing that we bought that day, 3444 foot of cedar decking to finish the front porch and to build a back deck. We paid .65 cents a foot for it. Then we ended up having to order the rest of the flooring that we needed for the South grain bin upstairs. We are still waiting for it to come in. It cost us $12 a board and we needed 25 to finish out the floor where we ran short.

This weekend Chris and I were able to get one of the windows in on the south grain bin, the walls and  the ceiling half way framed. We can't do much else in there until we get the flooring and it is supposed to be here this week. We do have an electrician coming tomorrow to look at the house and figure out what he needs. He is a friend of the family and is coming from a long way away to do this for us. 

Finished up the roof and framing upstairs.

 This weekend was a bit longer than most. Two days worth of weekend for Chris to work on the house. He was able to get all of the back roof on. Thankfully, there will be no more shop vacuuming water out of the house! Chris started the framing of the outside of the upstairs and cutting the windows in. He was able to finish most of the framing, the ceiling and the loft area above the bathroom are what is left for this grain bin.

There is a window at the top of the stairs.

These are the windows in the front of the house. There is one in each of the bedrooms with a wall that splits them.

There is another window in the North bedroom. We were not able to put more than one in the South half of this grain bin because of the roof line. We are looking into skylights to put in the circle that are already in the roof.

The window at the top of the stairs.

The window in the North bedroom.

The front view. The other  grain bin will have the same windows in the front.
We did have to break down and buy a window, for the top of the stairs, from a store. It cost us $100...which is now the most expensive window in the house.

The work never seems to end

Before grout

For Mother's day my mom and I spent the day weedeating the lawn, pulling weeds out of flower beds, seeding the lawn and grouting the rock on the front of the house. Chris spent the day fixing a lawn mower and building walls in the upstairs for the girls' rooms.

After grout. I don't see a whole lot of difference.

Upstairs on the far side of what will be the hall looking toward the stairs.

Abi's room facing the closet door because it is tough to take pictures in a circular room.

Hannah's door way is not up yet but this is her room. Between the two bedrooms will be their shared bathroom.

The front with grouted stone. We are closer to paint now but Chris is also closer to his job deadline at work and only getting busier!!!! That means less time for our house.

Working on the roof

The last few weeks the weather has not cooperated very much. All last weekend the weather was horribly stormy. So bad, that a tornado was spotted less than 30 miles away and then a wall cloud that never touched the ground was about 5 miles away. This past weekend we worked on laying out the upstairs bedrooms and bath, the roof on the back side of the house and the front stone on the house.

Close up of the foam-1x material- and the Ondura roofing.

Chris working all on his own. I do not do well on heights.

Chris got quite a bit done...about 1/3.

Oh and we got pigs a week ago!

The front with the stone completed.

A closer picture.

Trying to finish the front

Chris and I have been able to get some work done on the house this week because the weather has been so much better. Well, it was better..until Sunday when it rained and got so cold that we got a dusting of snow!

We got the siding up on the front of the house this week. 

I was able to get all of the scratch coat on the lath below the siding so that Chris could start on the stone this weekend.

Chris started putting up the stone. We got this stone off of Craigslist for free three years ago. We have moved it twice now so, it is about time we get to use it on something!

Chris was able to get most of one side done but with all the rain we had to stop.

We also worked on the upstairs flooring for the South grain bin. We lacked 100 square feet to finish it. We will have to find some more of the same type of flooring before it can be done.

Trimming and finishing the front.

Chris only had one day this weekend again, so he decided that he would like to get the front of the house more finished. Considering we have at least 3 to 4 people a weekend that we see drive by and take pictures out their car windows, he thought he would at least give them something better to look at :)

This is how the windows looked at the start of the day.

Chris had to use two pieces stacked on atop of one another to get the correct height. Half way below the windows will be a decorative rock and above that will be the same shingle type siding that is on the back of the house. The trim boards came from a pile we had bought at an auction a long time ago. It is a concrete product and so is the siding.

This is the first half of the windows trimmed out.( Of course, the dogs were in the way. They love the porch)

Close up view.

Thankfully, Chris' brother Cale came over because this all goes so much faster with two people who know what they are doing. They framed the ceiling of the porch,trimmed the windows and got the front ready for siding and rock.

Another view of the framing for the ceiling of the porch.

We got a little bit of the siding up but it was starting to get dark.

It is hard to see much at this point.

Angus just thinks the whole process takes too long :)