Sunday, February 23, 2020

The Project That Would Not End!

What a great week! Do you know what it is like to start your day with a smile in your heart each and every day of the week? That is what my week was like as I woke up each morning, turned on the computer and opened our blog just to read those three special words “I was right” That is why I waited two weeks before writing this next post. As it will replace the previous one like it never happened. Oh well, it had to happen sometime and I prolonged it as long as I could…..

But first a picture of Daisy staring down at me from the loft....
What's going on down there?
These past two weeks has been like a movie. Remember the movie Ground Hogs day with Bill Murray where he wakes up every day to the same thing day after day after day. Or how about the saying; “the definition of stupidity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result”.

Those two things come to mind when I think over our progress on the house the past two weeks. Monday, February 10th, the day after Kevin and Cheryl left Barb and I got busy with the tongue and groove on the ceiling. The first three days we got up a total of 3 rows. Three rows, 5 inches wide and 38 feet long. To be honest we had more up but we kept ripping it down. We spent almost two frustrating days trying to get the first row straight. The last thing Kevin said before he left was “Make sure the first two rows are dead straight”. So we ran a string line from one end to the other and started putting up the first row. Do you know how hard it is to keep a line of tongue and groove dead straight over 38 feet? Finally on the 3rd frustrating day I called Kevin and said I am ¼” off over the 38 feet. “Perfect”, he said, “With the variation of the wall, the variation of the tongue and groove, ¼” over 38‘ is pretty darn good, you will never notice it”. So away we went….

Once we got going we were averaging a whopping 1 row per hour. Our patience level was about 4-5 hours and given there are a total of 66 rows total, this is going to take us…. FOREVER! Or at least that is what it seems like.

But before we start to hang it Barb has to varnish and sand each board twice to get the proper sheen on it. But the varnishing is not included in the 1 row per hour scenario. That is done all before we start to hang it.

Why is it taking so long you ask? Well when you are married to a self-admitted over thinker things are bound to take a lot longer than they should. One would think that you put up a board, grab the next one in the stack, and put it up and so on…. No…. Once we put up a board, we have to step back and look at it, admire it and then go through each board in the stack to determine which board would look best next to the one we just put up. Not only the characteristics of the board, but also the color and knot orientation. 


We used a 16ga finish nailer to secure them to the trusses
Once the board was selected Barb had to determine the perfect length of each board and where the seam will be in the entire scheme of things. Painful! Then there is Kevin….. We just can’t put a board up and butt the ends of the boards together. No, we have to make each one pretty by taking a block planer and beveling each of the butt ends so they are nice and pretty. A block planer? Really? Who uses those anymore? Apparently I do, on each and every board. 
I thought I would go my entire life without using a block planer


The perfect bevel
Okay,  maybe it looks better then two straight edges....
I will have to admit, the end result of both the over thinker and the perfectionist is incredible but it will take like… FOREVER!

On day 13 we finally made it to the bathroom wall. A momentous moment as this shortened our ceiling runs but just over 9’ which really sped things up. Once we get to the guest bedroom wall it will shorten it but another 3’ or so!
Almost to the peak!
We did take a couple days off. One day to run to Rapid City and another day because we had some very special visitors. Farmer Bob and DeAnne were in Utah last week on vacation and stopped by on their way back home! This was a very special event as we had not seen them in quite a long time since we did not make it up there at all for our regular spring or fall trips in 2019.
Thanks for stopping guys!
We did not do a whole lot except visit but it was really great to see them.

When we were in Rapid we were able to find a new to us couch and love seat for the living room. We have been looking for a couple of weeks but everything we were finding was either too much, too worn or already sold. But on this day we were in the right place at the right time and drove away with a nice set of furniture. We were really tired of sitting on our camping chairs!
So much more comfortable than our camping chairs!

The weather has been in the 30’s, 40’s and even 50’s in the past two weeks. This fair weather has really brought out the wildlife. Kevin had brought us out a large grass/alfalfa hay bale that the deer absolutely love! 
I put a trail camera up to see who was visiting


Nice little buck showed up the other day
Action shot!
We have a variety of birds visiting our feeders every day; woodpeckers, nuthatches, juncos and chickadees are our most frequent visitors providing for some entertainment and great photo ops. 

Nuthatch
And the turkeys have left their winter range and returned to our area two days ago and now hang out under the bird feeder a couple times a day to pick up the seeds cast aside by some of the messier birds. They are so aggressive they will try and run the deer off. Sometimes it works, sometimes the deer chase them off. 

And sometimes they all get along just fine. 
They certainly are ugly birds!
So if you are wondering what we are up to this week we will be watching the der and turkeys and plugging away on the other side of the ceiling. One board at a time. After time, after time, after time....

39 comments:

  1. Way to go guys and I understand Barb's attention to detail. You will be looking at that ceiling for years and as our son-in-law Jason says, it will bug you forever that you did not fix it if you put the boards in haphazardly. lol Probably the only thing you will notice is the spot you didn't fix and forget about the rest of the beautiful ceiling. He's a carpenter by trade so he knows. :)

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    1. We are very happy with the end results. Some of the things are important while others I don't think you would ever notice or find again even if you tried.

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  2. Wow...that ceiling looks great! Keep plugging away and soon the work will be a memory. Then you get to start the siding!

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    1. Gee thanks for reminding me about the siding, I am ordering that today!

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  3. Wow! The ceiling is awesome but what a HUGE project. I'm from the world of "hire someone." It must be so very satisfying to sit down in the evening (especially on the new furniture) and look at all you've accomplished by yourselves. Great work! The perfectionist is leading the way correctly.

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    1. We do find ourselves looking up at the ceiling as we relax in the evenings. At first it seems like we would never get done now it seems like that we just might get there!

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  4. You have SO much more patience than I. Slap that stuff up there and nail it down!!! LOL

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    1. You are obviously talking to Barb as I am more of the slap that stuff up there and nail it down type!

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  5. What a gorgeous ceiling! Love your new to you living room furniture!

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    1. Thanks, I dont know if we will keep this furiture forever but it will do for now.

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  6. OMG I was getting tired just reading about that ceiling...looks great though. Great wildlife shots...especially the venison herd. We just had that venison tenderloin you left us and it was soooo goood...thanks! Your place is looking great...stay safe!

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    1. Glad you enjoyed the steaks. We brought way too much down there with us but then again we had no idea when and if we would sell the rig.

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  7. Ours are shaved on the end to, Kevin's idea also and we like it.
    On the picture of your new couch I can see one of your friends out the window
    Bob

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    1. Good eye! They come and go throughout the day. In fact if we just go outside to let the dogs out or start the grill they will walk up to see what we are up to!

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  8. The ceiling looks great. Good job. I don't know if anyone has told you but you can pay people to do that and it would be done in like a day. Make sure all of that is finished in case we were to stop by. I hate messes and clutter.

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    1. Well, don't even think about hiring us when you do your place. We are REALLY expensive!

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  9. The ceiling looks great and if you are going to to it doing it right the first time is what matters. I can understand the Groundhog Feeling.
    Be Safe and Enjoy!

    It's about time.

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    1. Day after day after day....we cannot wait until this part of the project is done!

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  10. Good job! A+ for the patience of doing it the way you did. You must have got a deal on the t&g unfinished cypress. I've run miles of that stuff. What would have helped speed things along would be purchasing prefinished material (I've seen very similar coloring) and with v groove end joints. They come with a t&g end to end setup that makes it super easy, without the necessity of landing on a truss or joist, it floats right on by. Congrats though, looking good!

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    1. We priced everything out including the end-matched material. It gets pretty spendy when you start looking at the finished and end-matched with the T&G on the ends. But that would have made it a lot easier!

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  11. Absolutely amazing ceiling! The color and grain of the wood looks so great and good for you two for the patience to do it right. Very cool. Love the pic of Daisy looking down and the deer close up lol. You two should wear capes, super heroes!

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    1. Daisy is such a goofball. She will just go up there and stare down at us whatever we are doing.

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  12. Lookin’ good! All that work will pay off soon enough and you’ll have so much time on your hands!

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    1. Looking forward to the day when we look around and have nothing to do!

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  13. I (Sue) realize more everyday how much I have in common with Barb! While she may cause you extra work, when the project is completed and it looks outstanding, you will be thanking her and saying "you were right"! Love the wildlife pics!

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    1. I say that to her every day as I know what it takes to survive in this enviroment!

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  14. What a lot of work. But it sure looks great.
    I had to laugh out loud reading about laying out the boards.
    When we did our hard wood floors in our house it was like that. Sonia and my two daughters would lay it all out like a big puzzle before I could nail it down. And that would be a lot worse on a ceiling. It will be really really great when it is all done.

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    1. I feel for what you went through. All her over-thinking of each board is paying off and it does look pretty nice!

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  15. Ugh, I feel for you guys on all this, but it's all gonna look SO incredible when it's done. It's all so unique and beautiful! It'll be worth it, no question. Great wildlife pics too. It really has been a pretty mild winter, I guess.

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    1. Anything in the 30's is pretty comfortable. The 20's can even be nice if there is no wind!

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  16. Replies
    1. Thanks Ellen, as much as we are enjoying this we would not mind being in Florida like you and Mario!

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  17. You two are quite the construction crew! Excellent workmanship and you can be proud when all is done. I wondered if a laser beam would have helped in the set-up of the first ceiling board, but maybe you used one. No-one will know how long it took you to finish the ceiling, but everyone will admire the great job.

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    1. Laser level probably would have worked as well. We will try that on the next house we build!

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  18. It's a beautiful job and the effort is worth it, I have no doubt. It pays to do it right the first time as it is not something you can change easily after you've finished. Perfection is a good thing, but thing again a few flaws makes for interesting conversations.

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  19. I got dizzy and fell off my chair 3 times just reading and thinking about working over my head at that height that long.

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    1. There have been more than a few times when we have gotten dizzy ourselves looking up and working over our heads as well!

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  20. Great job!! We put tongue and groove pine on our vaulted MBR ceiling, since we didn't take the time you are, 15 years later I could still pick out the "wrong" boards.

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