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The old wooden fence is gone. Long live the vinyl fence.

Never again will I worry about parts of my fence falling down. In the end, there were at least four sections held up by rope, twine and pure momentum.

For comparison, I give you before and after, looking from the house to the back of our lot. And the reverse view: before; after.

If you look closely in the second set you will also see some of the patio work I did this Spring. For a better idea, here is the old cistern that was outside our backdoor. We had concrete work done last summer and I have now finished the landscaping.

And for good measure, I helped my neighbor add a matching section of fence at the front of our houses.

Project Totals:

• 35 posts (and holes)
• 33 fence panels
• 2 gates
• 45 80lbs bags of concrete

A big thanks goes to Sarah, she helped with a couple of large sections, kept the house running, Olivia entertained, etc.; my Dad; Jack; my father-in-law; and my neighbor. They all pitched in to tear down the old fence, dig some holes and install the new fencing.

That’d be the current in a lightning bolt. We been discovering exactly what that does to stuff in your house.

OK, we didn’t get hit directly — as there is no evidence of a strike on or near our home — however Tuesday night there was the flash and thunder at the same time. Essentially a strike right on top of us. (more…)

Back in January we ordered a new dining room set from The Amish Barn — a local Amish furniture dealer. Yesterday it arrived. (more…)

Yesterday I finished installing the stair treads for the basement stairs. Because of the width of the Flor tiles and the width of the stair treads, there was a lot of cutting.

Each step is roughly 38″ wide with a 9″ tread. The Flor tiles are 19.7″ square. The resulting math meant that one tile could be cut to cover one step. Each tile had three cuts: one to trim to the correct width (removing 3 3/8″) to center the seam, and two cuts to get the 8 1/2″ tread depth. This results in two pieces that are 8 1/2″ X 16 5/8″. Put them together and you have a 8 1/2″ X 33 1/4″ stair tread.

The rug for the dining room has been installed. I’m really pleased with the final product — which looks better in person than in the photos. I’m almost finished with the stair runners for the basement steps as well. Those require a lot of cutting (each tile is getting cut into 4 pieces), but I’m nearly finished.

Another batch of Flor arrived yesterday. Some Morning Coffeeâ„¢ – Dark Roast will be going on the stairs to the basement in much the fashion of the upstairs treads. Meanwhile, the dining room will receive a Tonal Poemâ„¢ in red.

I’m not entirely excited by all of the cutting I’ll need to do for the stair treads, although it will look great when finished. And the dining room is just going to be fun. I think Olivia is going to help.

After power washing, scrapping, sanding and caulking, the house is painted. I’m really glad I didn’t attempt to do it myself — a professional crew of three spent the better part of three days working on it. I would have spent a month of weekends and wouldn’t have done nearly as nice a job. (more…)

The painters were to the house Friday and Saturday last week and got a ton of work done. They didn’t work Monday, which I am completely OK with, or Tuesday (rain). Yesterday they did most of the trim. Hopefully it will be finished today. It’s looking really nice.