Day Four

Now the wall has been sheathed in builder's felt and partially

sided. Unfortunately, it started raining and Rick and I were

forced to leave the rest for tomorrow.

Once I braced the plumb wall, I removed the cables and

used them to make sure the wall was square. Placed at

the exact same height and length along the floor, the

cable length should be exactly the same.

These short chains make sure that as I push the wall up,

I don't push it right over the edge.

These cable braces have two functions: they keep me from

pushing the wall too far and once the wall is braced, the turnbuckles

help to plumb the wall.

You may not be able to tell, but this wall

is actually braced in five places.

And the wall is up!

Here is the north wall, framed up and laid out on the floor.

No windows in this wall since prevailing winter winds come from

that direction.

Rookie carpenter's hands. Note the blister on my ring

finger. Ricky, lacking opposable thumbs left most of the

hammering to me.

Here we are on the newly finished subfloor. Ricky tracked
mud all over it.

I would like to have been a little further along, but I am not all that disappointed. Finishing up the subfloor took considerably longer than I had expected and what followed proved to be the most exciting project yet. Raising walls is absolutely nerve-racking and exhilirating. Finally three dimensions. Several pictures follow, many of which show some tools and techniques I developed, (or at least I think I did), for dealing with this difficult task alone. They worked surprisingly well.