Barn door shenanigans

Apologies for the ridiculous break in posting but we have good reasons! 1. We went on a mini vacation with Mr. Nick's family to Utah, 2. We're still hanging T-111. It's just not that interesting.

But, I finally found time to wrap up Part 1 of the barn door segment. Part 2 of how we actually hung it to come (once we finish, we're going to go back to T-111 and install the bottom part later).

We thought it was a great idea to build the barn door inside the barn because our surface is so flat (if you missed us pouring our concrete floor, check it out here) but what we didn't count on was the door being so heavy we couldn't just muscle it out the opening (the door is 12.6' wide x 13' high and the opening is 12' wide and 12'6 high). What follows is nothing more than shenanigans. If you're unable to view the video, click here.

Here's Mr. Nick hanging our door a couple nights before we went on vacation ... I'll tell you how he did it next!

Put a roof over your head

Over the past two weekends we've been working pretty hard to get a good stable roof over our heads and this weekend we finished it! Side Note: We only did as far as the roof joists and sheathing. We're 99% sure we're going to have a professional do the tar paper and shingles for a few reasons:

• We're on a pretty short deadline to get watertight and we don't really have the time to give to the roof.
• Mr. Nick won't let me on the steep incline for long periods of time to help him because he says I'm dangerous. I told him, "Ha! I laugh in the face of danger" and he replied, "No, you laugh as danger's hitting you in the face."
• We're not professionals and, let's face it, this is our roof.
• Did I mention how steep it is?

The roof in general was a big task, one that I was mildly de-motivated by on the first day (we used 2"x6"x24' for our roof joists, just getting them from the ground to the top was a big task, not to mention cutting two bird's mouths and two angles out of each of them). But, then Mr. Nick told me to just think of it as 16" at a time (the distance between roof joists) and that helped a lot. Either way. Here's the big steps.

Hurricane ties on both the tops of the walls and the tops of the beams.

We made these little "bird houses" in order to make sure our roof joists all lined up properly. There is a bird house on each side sandwiching the 2"x4"x24's. 16" at time ... 

Finished! That's our cute little shed dormer poking out the side (the only part I was allowed to nail the sheathing on top of). The rest Mr. Nick did, isn't he amazing!?

Raising the beams, higher and higher

This weekend we finished what Mr. Nick started and raised the eight middle beams (yes he's amazing but even he needed a second set of hands to get those big ones up). I think even our poor tractor was happy when it was done being asked to haul those big beams, but let the record show good ol' Kubota made it happen! It was pretty uneventful with only one "Oh S*$!, that beam is falling," but we managed to secure it and no one was hurt (but notice we have on our hard hats!)




There were three sizes of beams:

The smallest went along the two sides, Mr. Nick cut this little shelf out and then bolted them into place (these are the ones he raised by himself on Friday)

The medium ones are the two top ones (the highest). One side was pre-made with the "L" and once the beam was in place Mr. Nick made secured it in with the other two 2" x 6"s. The little 2" x 6" running horizontal is to keep the two beams together (it's over 24' up, they want to naturally splay out a little).

And the biggest are the ones that run as the ceiling of the first floor. They were 19.5" wide! Here's a start of what Mr. Nick did for them to rest on. He used the leftover tops that we chopped off of the beams to make them all the same size (in order to determine where to cut off we measured from our "common point" that we made with the laser level).

Mr. Nick securing the beams in.

Finished product!

Song Credit: Passion Pit, "Little Secrets". If you haven't heard of them, check them out. They're pretty amazing.

When husbands moonlight as superheroes

My husband never ceases to amaze me. I'm still not quite sure how he did it, but I think I figured out how the Egyptian's built the pyramids ... they must have had about 50 Mr. Nick's on their service.



So this weekend it's our job to get the rest of them up!

If the video isn't loading for you, click here.

Concrete slab in seven hours or less

We poured our concrete slab this weekend and it was a huge success. If you want to watch the video click here.



Here's some key things that we did in order to prep the space for a seamless pour:

On the Tuesday night before the Saturday pour we marked where we wanted the four loads of gravel to go. This was important for us since we both have full time jobs we knew we probably weren't going to be able to leave to be there for the crushed gravel drop-off.

And it worked! Here's the four piles, just like we wanted.

After we installed the concrete forms we reinforced each board with two 3' steel stakes to make sure they didn't "blow out".

We wrapped each post in tar paper to keep the concrete from sticking to the post. If the concrete were to stick to the post, when it settled, it would most likely crack.

We used duplex nails to help with the prying off of our form boards.

We plan for this barn to be a 2 horse barn so we didn't lay concrete in the stall portion (it's really bad for their legs). We used 2" x 6" for these and reinforced with steel stakes again.

We dug out the area along the edge in order to reinforce (less gravel and more concrete equals stronger edge). This was especially important to do on the lips we plan on driving over to get into the barn.

Here's what I carved into the pad. I didn't want to write something like Rachael loves Nick because this house is an investment and should we sell it I highly doubt someone is going to want that on their garage floor. But, I had to personalize it a little. This is a totally side note but when Mr. Nick designed my engagement rink (really designed it, drew it on a piece of paper had a mold cast and everything) he drew an infinity in the side that is filled with purple sapphires. I think it's especially cool because his engineering homework from the Academy has little infinity signs on it ... practice does make perfect!

The other thing we did, which we haven't done before, was pay for help. Mr. Nick put a craigslist add up for a skilled concrete pourer and Joe answered. He was only $200 for the whole day and provided invaluable expertise, not to mention his tools. We did rent the compactor, one come-along (the thing that looks like a rake), and the power trowel, but he provided everything else. It took 26 yards of concrete to fill our 36' x 48' space (minus the two horse stalls). We scheduled the three trucks for 30 minutes apart which provided the perfect amount of overlap (again, had we not had Joe this probably would have been to close together). We started early (first truck arrived at 7:30 but we were there at 6:30) which was also smart since the Pacific Northwest is in a bit of a heat wave right now hitting the upper 90s, reinforcing the adage, concrete waits for no one ... it will dry whether you're ready for it or not.  Thankfully, we were ready!

Song Credit: Discovery "So Insane". We love them. If you want to hear their other song we've done a video to check out our Conduit Loop Line video from laying our power cable.

Setting your concrete forms

We decided to move forward with putting the concrete pad in because we knew we would have to do it at some point and by doing it now it gives us a stable base for doing all our vertical construction (rather than having to work on top of dirt, which becomes an especially big factor in the Pacific Northwest when we get into the rainy season).

*Boring Alert*
You will probably only enjoy these videos if you happen to be in the market for learning about a laser level, want to know how to put concrete forms up or just really enjoy looking at Mr. Nick.

Power dance with special guest appearance by pink blowdryer

Success! The first major milestone since we bought the land...we have power!

Conduit loop line, wrapping up the front trench

This weekend we finished up laying the power from the front of the property halfway down to the site where the transformer will go...about 350 feet of trench.

Now that the conduit is buried with the rope running all we have to do is give the power company the go ahead to pull their cable through.

The power company would have done all the trenching ... for a fee, of course. We estimate that by doing it ourselves we saved around $1,000 ... not to mention all the great bonding time that you just can't put a price tag on <3



Song Credit: Discovery performing "Osaka Loop Line"...how much do I love that they aren't one of those lame artists who mutes your music on youtube...rock on Discovery!

Nick cracks the whip and saves the day

What a weekend! I left town for a great bonding weekend with my niece and nephew but Mr. Nick stayed home to work on the land. He dug over 600 feet of trench with our new tractor and supervised the excavation and grading of the back acre for preparation of the barn site (more on that tomorrow).

We had a busy night tonight so it's a two-fer with videos...a closer look at his trenches and the very small part I played in them and then the second situation we've been in where our tractor saved the day.

Enjoy!

How not to chop down a tree

This weekend we are hiring a big excavator and dozer to come help us clear the back acre (we did the math and it was cheaper for the guy to come out and level the barn site then it was for us to rent the equipment, etc.).

The one place we can save money in the whole equation is by taking down two trees ourselves. I think it's important to mention that we're sad about losing two trees, especially the maple, but we spent a lot of time laying out the barn to take advantage of the pre-existing space...and this is the best case scenario.

We promise to plant AT LEAST two trees for every one we lost (including the accidental one).

She thinks his tractor's sexy

Yesterday we made the 3 hour drive down to Hood River, Oregon to purchase our very own Kubota Tractor (Mr. Nick called up and down the coast and Sheppard's Tractors had the cheapest price by far).

We thought about it for a long time, deciding whether or not we needed to purchase one, and finally decided that yes, as owner builders having a tractor will enable us to do many things on our own. (digging the trenching for the electrical, cable, and well; digging the septic system; hauling tree stumps; leveling areas for building; digging our pond; the list goes on).

To rent the tractor for a day is upwards of $250. Kubota is offering a great deal right now: 0% down, 0% interest for 60 months. So our monthly payments are less than the price to rent it once per month--that means all we need to do is use it once a month for the next five years and we'll have come out on top.

As my mother pointed out, living on 5+ acres you will ALWAYS find a use for a tractor/backhoe. Plus, I kind of like the way Mr. Nick looks on it...I guess Kenny Chesney was right, she does think his tractor's sexy!

Amateur land surveyors, inc.

We rented a transit today to shoot the lines between our property corners so Nick could finish up our septic design and so we could determine our new well site.

Mythbusting: It's nearly impossible to move a recorded well site.

Nick went to the County yesterday and got great news about moving the well. That was one myth worth busting. I'm not sure where the rumor got started that moving a well was hard, as our well driller seemed to be pretty adamant about it being an "act of congress" but it's good to know that we can move it!

Clearing the Barn