This is the finished framed wall for our South loft wall

As easy as the North wall was to place, the South wall was quite the inverse.  And that’s my fault.  Due to my lack of general experience in framing, or building houses, I’ve erred on the side of caution and OVERbuilt the majority of our home.  Prior to the tongue and groove being installed, I would often sit and count the extra, unnecessary studs that I used as “extra” support.  This is a perfect example. (more…)

We got to sit and enjoy our new loft floor

I had to run into town to pick up some more nails for the nail gun, so that cut into my progress for Day 7.  What is an inconvenience is also a blessing.  Time spent traveling into town derails advancement of the task, but it also gives me a nice break.  It’s a bittersweet feeling; a necessary evil.  My task for today was to finish the subfloor and frame the North knee wall. (more…)

These are the joists that support our loft floor

Now that all four walls of the main floor had been sheeted, I was eager to get things moving to frame our loft.  A co-worker with experience in construction had suggested I sheet the walls prior to framing the second floor and roof.  He said this would give rigidity to the structure and help to tie the studs together.  That makes sense, but I also knew that OSB degrades when exposed to the elements.  The race was on. (more…)

I’d like to tell you that Day 3 went without any errors on my part, but that would be erroneous.  At this point of writing, I’m surprised at how much I seemed to be screwing up.  You probably don’t have much faith in me either.  Fear not, with perseverance just about any flaw can be fixed – or covered up.  Some of these errors weren’t immediately apparent to me until I began other steps, which is why they weren’t corrected in the first place. (more…)

At the conclusion of Day 1 I was highly anticipating the progress of Day 2.  Bre has always made fun of me for my horrible time-estimating skills, and for good reason – I’m never right.  Because Day 1 saw so much progress (in my mind, since I was working alone, to get two walls framed up was pretty good), I thought we’d have the entire shell up in 20 days.  I was just a little off. (more…)