The progress to date
7 11 2007So living in the country with dial up and spending all you free time working on a house leaves little time for editing, resizing and uploading photos to your blog. I haven’t been updating the site with photos nearly enough and most likely they will all come in big waves like this! We are not as close to be done on the exterior as I would like but we are looking to get a stove in ASAP and some insulated tarps and get the stucco done. Here’s a pictorial of what we have been up to:
Laine unloading the first load of straw. (September 22)
Dad and Laine unloading straw.
The straw is loaded on the second floor and tarped so no wind driven rain can get at it.
Figuring out how to resize bales and tie baling twine tight enough to hold the bale together. (October 6)
Mom and Robyn precutting twine for the lengths we needed.
Dad and I using grinders with brush attachments to cut the notches for the framing into the bales.
First few bales are installed.
Keith tying in bales, his hay fever forced him to stay away from the rest of the bale work.
Hmmmm… How do I get this in around this stud??
Lisa pushing a bale into place.
Devon and Marla working on more bale retying.
The tired team at the end of the first day! Rosie’s ears are huge!
Bale raising day 2 and Laine is installing mesh to hold in loose straw at the second story electrical chase. (October 7)
Lots of work left to do!
Mom installs some resized bales above the windows.
Silva and Neb tie in bales on the second floor.
Thea’s impressed and ready to work!
Rowan gets in on he action, working hard!
Laine persuades a stubborn bale into place!
Robyn poses for the camera, Thea pretends she surfing….
Day 3 and we’re making progress, the north side is pretty much done. (October 8)
The south side is close to being done.
East side; the first window is installed! (October 13)
Everyone wants a photo of laine screening horse manure! (October 14)
Debbie spreads the adhesion coat on the wood surfaces. A mixture of flour paste, sand and horse manure. It sounds nasty but it gives the stucco something to key onto! (October 16)
The slip is sprayed onto the walls with our homemade sprayer. (October 19)
Clogs led us to installing a piece of mesh in the hopper to screen out any lumps.
Muddy boots! (October 21)
The stucco mixing pit is set up! (October 27)
Mixing the first batch. We mixed way too much and since reduced our batches by 75% making mixing bearable…
The first of the discovery coat is applied tot he east wall!
Working our way up!
End of first day of stuccoing.
Rosie helps make a new batch (October 28)
East wall is completed and dried a few days. (November 1)
