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Archive of posts filed under the Exterior category.

Columbus Half Day

Due to the continuation of great weather I took a half day today off of work to continue the window panels.  Around lunch time I did the final sanding of the diningroom panels and then primed them.

Diningroom panels primed!

Another view

Once those were done, it was time to paint the cupola panels yellow (first coat)!  Just as it was getting dark we got the last part of the cupola painted!

Cupola has first coat!

And just to see what it will look like, once the second coat is on we’ll be installing this red trim inside the panels.  We’re trying out all yellow with red trim but haven’t ruled out having the recessed part of the panels be green yet.  I think at this point there is a concern that the red won’t ‘pop’ on the green as much though.

A look with the red trim to get an idea

I finished up the night (after getting a few hours of work in) by getting the second coat of paint on the window sashes so tomorrow they’ll be all dry and can be put back in the diningroom since it’s getting cold out.  It would be nice to get a few more windows done, maybe the next 2 on the cupola which are more exposed to the sunlight.  Since they’re under the porch I can keep the sashes out even if it’s raining but not if it gets too cold.

2 more sashes to paint then it’s off to bed!

Beautiful Weather Weekend!

Wow, October and it was in the 80′s!  Perfect for finishing up window panels!  So Ryan and I worked hard this weekend!

Friday night Ryan got home and started right away working on the built-ins!  He got the box for one of the bookcases put together so we could see what they’d look like installed – it will be so great to have the storage when those are done.  I know he wanted to work cabinets all weekend but due to weather he was compelled to get the outdoor work done before it got cold out.

Saturday we started by getting the rest of the panels installed, it was just a few vertical panels and we were done just after lunch!

Diningroom panels finished!

 

Back side of diningroom panels

Once they were installed Ryan got to work on finishing up the sanding of the cupola panels.  He was able to sand the last 2 of the cupola windows, the large diningroom window panel and we got the cupola windows all caulked.  We ‘ended’ the light hours of saturday by priming the first 3 windows of panels (it was pretty dark when we finally stopped).

Cupola windows - all sanded and caulked!

Main diningroom window all sanded

First 3 window's panels all primed!

We didn’t stop there though, we stayed up until midnight priming (inside and outside) of the 3 diningroom windows themselves!  They are exposed unlike the cupola so it was important we get these ones painted.  It  would be great to get all the windows painted but the cupola ones are at least under the porch during the winter and have been primed.

Sunday it was back to windows!  I finished hand sanding the last 2 cupola windows while Ryan finished sanding the diningroom windows and got the panels all caulked and ready to go.

Diningroom window panels, ready for primer

Before lunch I got the last 2 cupola window panels primed, including the post against the house which came out great after a good sand.

Cupola - primed!

After lunch we had some surprise company!  Ryan’s sister and her husband came up with the nieces for a few hours!  The girls were a lot of fun, after a tour of the house progress we went to the park down the road while the guys watched football :)

After they left we finished up the outside work, Ryan finished caulking the diningroom window panels and I put the second coat of trim paint on the front of the house (so that is FINALLY done).  I continued painting until dark, after dark moving inside to get a coat of paint on the diningroom windows.

Front of the house finally done! (window panes still need to be painted)

And started painting the cupola. We've decided we might do the cupola all in yellow with the red trim (still to be added) as an accent instead of green on the recessed parts. The all yellow idea is growing on me and it's definitely easier to paint that way :)

Window panes everywhere - drying!

The large diningroom window panes

Painting just one side of the windows goes MUCH faster than priming the night before so I actually finished up by 9 and went to bed early.  With the nice weather sticking around I’ll probably get the final coat on the windows tonight and let them dry through Tuesday before we put them back in.  I’m taking a 1/2 day today off of work to maybe get the diningroom window panels primed??  We’ll see how it goes, it’s hard moving the ladder by myself and they should be hand sanded still which is a lot of work.

Great progress for a great weekend though!  Almost ready for winter!  I still want to get the copper caps on but we can do that on a cooler weekend since it doesn’t involve paint :)

Memorial Day weekend

It’s been a crazy couple days but finally I can post with some pictures from this weekend.  Friday night Ryan sanded and caulked the exterior window panels around the diningroom windows that have been half finished since last fall.  Once the caulk was dry I primed them so they are more protected.  At some point we need to actually finish them still …

Window panels primed.

Saturday we went down to my sister’s house to visit with family for the weekend.  I got to see my little nephew again – he’s still in the NICU but he’s growing steadily!  Sunday we had a BBQ with all the family coming down and it was very relaxing.  We had a great time.

Monday we spent the day around the house, ryan’s back was bothering him so he relaxed but I worked in the gardens.  I finally got them cleaned up, planted my veggies I started from seed 6 weeks ago and planted a few new plants I got before mulching.  Every year the plants look more robust, the ones my mom gave me 2 years ago are really full now.

Annual under the front tree (impatiens and coleus)

Mint (from mom) and baloon flower along the driveway, hoping the mint will spread to fill this area in the future.

Veg garden from last year still has the original oregano, I planted sweet basil (on the right) and the rest is carrots this year.

The rest of the veggies got planted in front of the roses this year, squash, cucumber, beans and pees.

The lilies were getting overwhelmed by the raspberries so I moved them over to the side and the blueberry pushes were planted in front of them.

Perrenial garden is really doign great, new additions include daisies on the right and some smaller colored daisy like plant to the left of them.

The mountain bluet, chives and dark geranium are all flowering beautifully! (All from mom 2 years ago)

We’re home this coming weekend, hoping to work on the house, unfortunately Ryan’s back is still bothering him so he’s got to take it easy.  I hope to get some stuff done myself though even if he’s not up for it.  I’m feeling overwhelmed by the passing spring, need to get more of the summer projects started already :)

Happy Holidays!

Ryan surprised me after work today by putting up the xmas lights!  We need to buy one more strand but considering last year all we did was buy the lights and never put them up we’ve gotten quite far this year :)

I would like to get a wreath for the door as well and maybe we can decorate the columns too.

All lit up

It was hard to get a good picture since it was so dark out but the front of the house is nice and bright now :)

More scaffolding

Well today was full of putting up scaffolding – it goes pretty darn high.  We climbed up there tonight so i could take some pictures of our roof leak and it’s pretty obvious why it’s leaking…

120 years later and the copper has rusted away leaving just the bare wood

I assume that’s copper anyway.

The temporary fix last year was some shingles that mostly blew off. Rusted all the way around.

So that is why we’re paying for this copper installation.  Hopefully it will last our lifetime at least.

While we were up there I took more photos of the roof, found another possible leak we should probably fix up.

little hole

And here’s the scaffolding we climbed up to the top of tonight…

We signed a waiver of liability so the roofer is going to leave the scaffolding up over the weekend for us – we plan to try to get the aluminum siding off the cupola to see what’s underneath.  It’s also hard to do from a ladder so we figured we’d take advantage of the scaffolding we just paid to have put up.

More painting…

I got the second coat of paint on the trim around the 2 tvroom windows. By then it was 6 and I knew I had less than an hour before it got too dark so I switched to the other side of the house and got the second coat of paint on the new section of siding. This is all done now and I can call the electric company to re-attach the meter. It was dark when I finished so I’ll have to get pictures tomorrow although pictures of a second coat of paint never show that much.

First coat all done

I got the first coat of paint on the new section of siding and finished the first coat on the trim on the other side of the house.  I’m off to visit with some friends while the paint dries and we’ll see if I can get the second coat on before dark!

First coat on the trim all done!

First coat on the new siding all finished

Siding primed (updated with pictures)

After we finished up the last piece of siding, I got the siding caulked, sanded and then primed.  Hopefully tomorrow I can get both coats of paint on it.

Siding primed

While I primed, Ryan worked on the window panels, putting the MDO panels into the completed panels and then caulking around them.  We’re not sure when we’ll get to putting the moldings in so we want to make sure it’s water proof.

First window - panels almost done

Later Ryan had to work so I switched to the other side of the house and started painting the trim.  I didn’t quite get it all done before it got dark, got 3 windows done and the soffit though.  Tomorrow I hope to finish the first coat and later put on the second coat.

Trim painted on 3 windows

Half finished window

So tomorrow will be lots of painting.  Ryan probably has to work again so it might just be a painting day.  I couldn’t get pictures before it got dark so I’ll take some in the morning for tomorrow’s post.

Can’t wait for the day off tomorrow!

Siding

A great 3 day weekend has begun!  After dropping my cousins off back at their house (they stayed over Friday night) – I came home to Ryan getting the siding started.

Paint stripped and ready to prime (well after that big hole is filled)

Siding started

Got the "window cap" in on the side piece so we could side around it.

A day's progress

The next piece of siding will have to be cut around the window cap that we put on, we’ll do that tomorrow.  After that we’ll put in some temporary pieces that will have to come back out when we do the window panels on the next level of the house.

Unfortunately we lost a half hour of work because our miter saw has a problem with the guard.  We played around with it for about 30 minutes and couldn’t figure out what the problem is so we temporarily took the guard off for the last few cuts.  We definitely need to get that fixed though!

And it looks like the weather is on board with our 3 day weekend to work on the house!  0% chance of rain means we can continue the outside work!  Tomorrow I’ll get a coat of paint on the trim on the other side of the house and we’ll probably work on window panels (after we finish up that siding section).

And the decision was… painting.

Painting won out today.  We went shopping this morning at a sporting goods store and I bought some shin guards so the bruises on my legs wouldn’t be a problem painting.  If only we had thought of that before painting both Friday and Saturday :)

So the second coat of green is on!  And it looks great, now we just have to do the trim in yellow two coats and we’ll have one section done!

Green done!

After cleaning up it was threatening rain (luckily it held off an hour and was more haze than rain).  So we decided to relax the rest of the day.  I made up a roast for dinner and baked some apple pies.  Then we settled in for some episodes of Bones :)

pie time!

Back to work tomorrow, not sure what my work schedule looks like but we still have windows and trim to paint.  The projects never end!