April Come She Will

April has definitely had a mind of her own. The first breath of spring was felt three weeks ago, with stunning weather,with high 70s and beautiful sunshine. Wahoo! Get the paint! So we broke out the rollers, the sunscreen and the hats and got to work.

The trick is to paint these trim pieces before putting them up, thus significantly reducing time and risk on scaffold that is very high. Remember when Every Mom said "Get out of that tree, you're gonna fall and break your neck!" This is way beyond that.

After we made this stack, we made another just like it. It was so warm that by the end of the day, the paint was sufficiently dry that we could bring the boards in and stack them in the garage.

But spring can be a bit capricious, and Easter weekend was cold and wet. The Monday after Easter, it hailed and rained all day...mostly hail. Tuesday wasn't much better. Ed managed to get some of his seedlings planted though. Every year we get several hundred seedling native trees from the conservation district and plant them. We like the cedars but the elk eat them like I eat sunflower seeds. Spruce are also native, but are very stickery. The good news is that most of the animals leave them alone, so Ed has planted a lot of spruce.

This last weekend it was stunningly beautiful all weekend. Sunny...warm...green...it would have been easy to just laze about and soak it in, but the list of things to do is growing exponentially. Ed put in the furring strips..is that the right term?..for the flare at the bottom of the wall. You can see the TV satellite dish right behind Ed. What you don't see is the old satellite dish for the internet that he had to take down. Who would have ever guessed that this year's wasps had decided that the hollow insides was a good place to start a nest... fortunately for Ed they aren't ravenously vicious this time of year. I hate wasps and stood far far away.

After the furring strips went up, we put plywood sheathing over it. Once we put the shingles on, it will give the exterior walls a nice soft flare.

I will be the shingler (shinglette.. shinglee..) at least for the first 15' or so, depending on how comfortable I get on the scaffolding. Between shingles, insulation and sheetrock, our spring and summer is pretty much full. I don't see myself getting much stained glass done any time soon.

But I also know this is the part where things start moving faster. Friday I drive to Portland to Lumber Liquidators pick up hardwood flooring. Soon, I'll need to find tile. Blink, and it'll be September and we'll be moving in.