Floors and Framing

 Andy and Rex went North last weekend to meet with contractors, electrican, heating & water guy, and to see the newly done in floor heating and framing that is done. It was a cold day, but the sun was shining and the driveway was plowed, so all was good. Looking pretty good on the outside.

Here is the Cisterne/Fungeon with the new filled in , in-floor heating slab. We are keep the rough rocks along the edges exposed. When Ed laid the foundation he blasted into this rock to lay the framework and it kinda brings the outside in and reminds us of what use to be.



                                                                                                                                                                                     

This is the tool room right now, but will be other part of the Fungeon. You can see they are framing the ceiling out.

and the new floor in the kitchen!

The great room continues to get framed in and has become the storage area for all the furniture they had to move to do the floors in the other rooms.

The newly created upper floor is the only floor that will have wood floors as seen here,

 The newly created upper floor of bedrooms is framed in and you can see plumbing tubes are in place also.

no people pictures, Rex had the camera this time and he is all about the work speaking for itself. As you can see, even though we haven't been up much, the castle is still bustling with workers. Andy is hoping to meet with the electrician this weekend.

Boys Weekend

Andy, Rex, and my Dad were up at the castle this weekend. We girls stayed back to visit friends who were in from out of town.
It snowed in Tupper, Mr. Lion got a new mane!

So the boys main goal this weekend was to get the rest of the stained glass windows in and get them sealed up good for winter.
They succeeded and got 8 in. Still 2 more to go in Fungeon/Utility room.

Andy likes the leading on the glass so much he is now thinking we have to put leaded diamonds on all the windows.

It's beginning to look like an intriguing old castle, isn't it?

A few Surprises at the Castle

 Ruby Came to the Castle with us this past weekend, yeah Ruby. She is dressed for warmth in four layers which you really can't tell from this pic, but you can trust me.















The stone work on the turret is indeed done and here are a few more pictures of that. It looks great.

We went out to dinner and Chris was saying how he had to toast himself to a job well done because no one else was there with him, so here is Andy re toasting Chris to a nice job on the stone work!

So the Stone work being done was a nice surprise for us, but we needed something to keep Ruby coming back, so here was out bribe! Andy and Rex got up early Saturday morning to set up a trampoline in the great  room. (if it is black below, but you see an arrow, click on arrow)

 Rex and I cleaned off the 10 stain glass windows our friends made and prepped them for some self adhesive lead tape. It comes in these big rolls and you just peel off the back and stick it on. We decided to do big diamond patterns on the windows to give them a bit more punch from a distance.

Tosh is never far away 

 We outlined patterns , like this ying-yang G that the Glowacki's did when the pattern was clear.

Andy and Rex installed a few of the windows, but decided they wanted to build an outer box for them to make them more secure, so they were going to do that next weekend.









As we haven't been to castle in awhile my once clean stairs had alot of dirt and debris in them, so we spent a good part of Saturday cleaning up.

 More floor framing is happening.

  More intricate plumbing is happening.

 furniture is getting moved around.

 windows are getting framed out. 

 carving our name into foam is happening

So things are moving along, not going to be ready for the 12.12.12 party, but we are all healthy and back on our A game now so we can start ramping up the final details.

Let there be a stone turret

 Chris finished the Masonry work on the turret and Ta Da.........
Here are the pics he sent.
We are headed up there this weekend for the first time since school started to see what else Brain and Marc have been up to.
Stay tuned!

Happy Fall

Welcome to Leary Castle. This is an old sign we found at Syracuse Antique Exchange. We hung it at the front gate to see how it looked. Andy is working on a design to put on it, but I think it looks pretty good there.

 Chris has taken cover under a big black tarp to continue the stone work on the turret. Doesn't look that pretty, but it protects him from the rain and wind and he also has to keep the stones and mortar dry after he gets them into place. He is almost to the top and it really looks good, he is doing a great job.

Rex is becoming a master concrete builder. He carries the concrete mix in from the trailer, 80 bags of it at 80 lbs. each, you can see here he needed a few breaks and he found the bags of concrete to be a nice bed for those breaks.

Once all the bags were in, he would mix it and he is not afraid to get his head right in there to make sure it is mixed perfectly.

 The he fills up his bucket and carries it again to where it needs to be dumped. He says it is just as heavy when mixed.

So, yes, Andy and Rex have been doing alot of concrete work on the master stair area. You saw in the last blog that they were building the form work in preparation for the concrete pours and here are some more pics of that with the pours in place.

a new stair instead of wobbly cinder blocks.

 

 Filling in the corner space making it a platform that will be flush with the stairs. Andy is thinking this will be a good place for a knight in a suit of Armour.

 filling in a space to the right of the stairs with a nice curved detailed

looking down at the stairs and all the work going on

New stairs leading into the great room instead of wobbly cinder blocks. 

Also note, for some reason Ed did not bring stairs all the way to the wall on the right, so we extended them over.

 Jerry, the plumber continues to lay his roadwork of tubes. He says he has about three weeks before he is finished with the 4th floor and then he moves onto the next one. He too is doing an awesome job.

Brian and Mark continue to do framework. Above is on the 4th floor under the windows.

 Here is framework covering the plumbing going from the great room into the kitchen.

This is above the main staircase, behind this framework is the library powder room in the turret. 

 I spent most of my time picking glue and paper off of the stain glass windows that our friends made. Above is the picking, below is the finished product. I got 5 windows done and 3 set three of them with their exterior glass.

Grandpa came for his yearly visit and brought a picnic, he even had something for Tosh.

 Grandpa also likes to bring something unique to add to the castle. This visit it was an arrow through the tree.

Ruby came and took alot of pictures

 we had some very nice Adirondack fall weather, Happy first day of fall! 

 and we had some not so nice fall weather. You can't tell, but it was pouring in this picture of me. Yup, I will stand in the rain for my daughter to get a good picture.

Back home Grandpa works on a stained glass window that will go on the front door behind the knocker.

The lions are doing well.