(Jan 24) Some Progress On Siding

Over the past week or so we've accomplished a few small project. They all add up, right?

First of all, we got the framing done around the air conditioner. More obvious difference now that winter has sort of arrived. (It's supposed to be in the 70s this next weekend!) Still, there were some pretty big gaps before that were letting in cold air and critters (scorpions and spiders namely). We'll get around to painting it soon. Nothing fancy until then. :) We just ripped down some of the leftover beetle-kill pine that we put on the north wall.

8,000 BTU AC window unit mounted over the fridge

We had our grandson with us and also had a visit on Saturday from our good friends Cory & Rob. They brought some great turkey burgers to grill. We spent some time assembling our new IKEA broom closet and then worked on a woodworking project for Cory. Great to have friends out and share our Tiny! :)

We put it in the corner of the living area kind of tucked behind our hanging drawers. I'm not thrilled with the walnut color of the cabinet itself so we'll be looking into painting it at some point to match the door more closely. It's 90" tall. We put in a divider shelf at 60" and will use the taller bottom partition to store the vacuum, broom, mop, etc. The upper section got a couple of shelves and will store some kitchen appliances and such. Had to make space for the blender! Wasn't about to leave it behind.

Storage Closet in living area

The next day, we set our efforts at using up some of the Hardi board we had laying around. The weather was perfect and it seemed like the time! :) We started by ripping down a piece of soffit to fit under the roof. Went up nicely. It took us a while to get all of the air gun equipment out and get the compressor outfitted with the high volume hose. Made all of the difference in the world when we were shooting the 2" pins through the concrete board into steel roof joists.

Undreside of soffit on South wall.

Like all of the other projects this week, we'll end up painting everything later. Especially the Hardi. We had originally painted it before we installed it. Too much trouble. Hang it. Paint it all at once. Done. :) We finished installing the planks on the South wall. Now it just needs battens and window trim.

Hardi board on South side. 

We came up just 3' shy of getting about 1/2 of the North side done. Some stains on it but that's the beauty of concrete board, it'll clean up and paint like new.

Hardi board on North side. 

Really glad to make some progress on the walls. We got wrapped up in working on the interior through the summer and just never got back to it. We'll take some more soffit out next week as well as some planks to finish the North wall. Then we can start on the window trim. Hope the weather holds. It was so nice working outside in the 60° temps.

Just a brief word on safety. I had left a hammer on top of the 8' ladder pictured above. After lunch, I forgot it was up there and went to move the ladder. Nearly got beaned by it. Not tall enough for a fatal blow but it could have been a nasty cut. Not the way you want to spend what's left of your weekend, sitting in an ER room leaking bodily fluids. Slow down and keep safety in mind, ALWAYS!

Have a great week! I look forward to your comments. :)