Snow

We have been extremely fortunate with the weather so far this winter. Warm, dry days have, until recently, allowed us to make slow but steady progress on the project. While there are still numerous tasks to complete on the interior, we've been able to complete enough of the work to have a suitable place to relax on the weekends. For the last month or so, we have been picking away at odds and ends and making progress... think closets and storage. We are also beginning to make plans for the exterior... think roofs and siding.

But, the weather has been a little less than cooperative of late. Instead of setting up saws and planers on the deck, we've been shoveling snow...

The weather provided nearly twenty inches of snow this past weekend. Caren and I took turns shoveling decks and walkways. We are fortunate to have friendly neighbors. Tom, in particular, seems to enjoy snow removal, so we are more than happy to indulge him when he fires up his snowblower and clears our driveway and the walkway to the house. What would have taken us around an hour to clear with a shovel, he clears in five minutes or so...

Our eaves are particularly adept at creating icicles. Any type of gutter system would be destroyed by the snow over the course of a winter, so our little house lacks gutters. When the heat is on in the house, or when the sun hits the roof, snow becomes water, which, in turn, becomes ice. Icicles three and four feet long are not uncommon.

Speaking of icicles... If you look closely at the pictures, you will notice that the ice is forming on the inside of the facia. Whoever built the roof and added the facia didn't think the process though very clearly. Instead of placing the facia under the roof decking, it was butted up against it. Which means that, in combination with a roof that needs replacing, water finds its way down the inside of the facia. Some of the roof decking is rotting under the eaves and will need to be replaced when we re-roof. Fortunately, the only leaking seems to be occurring at the eaves. Near as I can tell, there aren't any leaks over the living space.

The bad thing about snow is that it slows down progress on the project. The good thing about snow is that we get to do more of...

this...

and this...

and even a little of this!