After a successful week with John and I doing most of the loft and roofing, Sheralee and I headed up with some projects to complete. We wanted to finish the roof and loft sheathing, finish house wrap on the loft and roof, frame in the stair structure window and door wall, and sheath and wrap that. No pun intended, but lofty goals. I am pleased to report, all of those projects….COMPLETE!
We headed up Friday after work to find that the entire ranch had been recently drenched with rain. The evidence was everywhere. The ranch road had gotten worse, water collection areas everywhere, and the road to our property was a mess. We were tooling along and got to one of the low spots that definitely looked muddy, but I continued on in 2WD. Mistake. We soon were spinning tires and sunk in the wet mud. 4WD we went to only be able to barely back out to drier road. Whew…that could have gotten ugly. Thankfully, there is a back way in our property which is pretty much on either uphill or downhill roads so no standing water. We got there without further problems, just a muddy jeep, again! haha Unfortunately, no pictures of that road, I was too busy trying to get us out of there. We did go out that way yesterday, and the road was just a little soggy in that area, but no 4WD needed.
When we arrived, you could tell the entire property had been under a deluge of rain, everywhere. The most disappointing part was that our loft had water in it since there was a portion of the roof that wasn’t finished. It did dry out just fine over the weekend though. The better part of that rainfall, our tank is now about 900 gallons! woohoo! Wait until we start collecting from the roof. We might need that second tank before the schedule of next year.
We started Saturday morning early, up with the sun. After coffee, time to finish sheathing and wrapping the roof.
Again, I am lucky to have someone with me that does the height thing without blinking. whew. Saved again! Sheralee was a rock star this weekend. We were able to finish off the roof and just as soon as we were ready to house wrap the roof, of course a major thunderstorm started our way…nothing in rain, but the wind was horrible, which made that wrapping very very difficult.
Just a quick note on our new friends around the propery, the lovely praying mantis. Sheralee really doesn’t like these guys, but I find them so fascinating. Since we have hummingbird feeders, we now have these guys hanging out underneath them picking off the bumble bees as they come to try and get nectar. I mean, these guys can really eat. We saw some interesting things…first there was a brown colored one on one of our feeds. Later found out that they adapt their color to match their environment. I went back to look at him again, and guess what? A bigger green mantis was devouring the smaller brown guy. So, he was gone. Then another big green one was being devoured by an even bigger green one! wowza. These things will eat whatever they feel like.
This is a picture of that green one eating the other green one. It took him 2 days to eat the entire thing. Insane!!
Ok, back to the days. The first night we hung out in the yard taking in the sky and pending sunset. When I turned around, we had a great moon just over the Eastern horizon.
Of course pictures don’t do it justice. You can see one of cows in the lower picture. Oh this band of rebel bovine were crazy all night. We had them eating right outside the window…munching, huffing and puffing. They are insane. Moo’ing all damn night and making noises. I will have to double my trips to McDonald’s to help remedy this situation.
Sunday we wanted to finish sheathing and framing everything.
I was able to frame in the stair structure, both window wall and door wall. Then sheathed it and wrapped it. I had to have Sheralee help me wrap it as the wind was insane! hahaha. Not easy with a big time wind. While I was doing this, Sheralee was spray foaming and insulating the loft. It really looks amazing to see the progress.
And check out the views…so incredible. We truly have some wonderful views.
This coming weekend, great 3 day weekend, we are installing 3 windows, a front door, and sliding patio door in the loft. Wish us luck! It is a first for us both!