Week Thirty-nine

Week beginning 27th February 2023

It’s Monday morning and with the shed battens painted we are going to start fitting the insect mesh over them. If we can do this properly we won’t ever have to deal with wasp nests on our buildings.

We have fitted the mesh on the north and south elevations of the shed and that has used up over a third of our supply so we are going to stop and think about how best to use what we have left, while waiting for more to be delivered.

We have decided to end the day by finishing some wee jobs and clearing some more space in the house so we can get on with the airtightness taping. This involves priming the concrete floor, cutting the ends off the metal tie-down straps and priming them, and generally moving things away from the outside walls.

It’s Tuesday morning and we’ve not long started getting ready for the day when the delivery man arrives with the 300mm screws we have been waiting for.

We have gathered the vertical battens Pete had cut to size on Thursday and are fixing them above and below the windows and above the doors. Once that’s done we can paint them and start fixing the horizontal battens that the larch cladding will be nailed to.

We are using our spirit level to make the first two rows of horizontal battens level so that on each further coarse we can use spacers to ensure that the battens are vertically centred to 600mm.

We are getting on well and the sun is shining, it is such a pleasure to be working outside.

A car pulls up and it’s Julie, Molly’s bookgroup friend, and her partner Tim on their way home from a bothying trip in the highlands with their dog Tilly.

We are giving them a tour of our mega-shed and house and explaining some of the thinking behind the project and how the house should function once finished. Julie is taking some pictures which she shares with us. Thanks Julie.

It’s been a lovely visit but they have to get on their way because they need to get home and it’s getting dark.

It’s another lovely morning, a bit cold but we’re not complaining because the sun is shining.

The first task of the day is to get on with fixing the hoirizontal battens on the house…

and now we have to paint them.

It’s the end of the working day and we have managed to get all the battens fitted and painted, bar the ones on the east elevation. We need to check a few details about how the balcony will be fitted with Andrew before proceeding with them.

We’ve just started tidying up and our friend, Ross, arrives to give us a hand for a couple of days. I think we might take advantage of the dry weather and have a fire tonight and a wee drop of wine to celebrate.