First work Weekend in 2011

Welcome Back, the good weather in the Adirondacks has come back and we are back to working @ the castle, we headed up last weekend for the long Memorial Day weekend and got alot accomplished! Ruby found that she could "Ripstick" in the great room her she is with a great big Hello.

My Uncle Frank, or Sears Contracting to most of you, was busy excavating the week prior to our coming up. It was a wet winter/spring and while we knew there was no waterproofing done previously, it was very evident that the problem needed to be fixed before we went any further. Here is Uncle Frank digging all around the perimeter of the castle so we could get in there and do the waterproofing. Apparently, my cousin Dawson, who works with Uncle Frank, wanted to rent a little fancy machine to do this job and Uncle Frank said, "yeah, no, I can do this." Andy said Uncle Frank uses the machine like it is a natural extension of his body and was amazed by his dexterity and senses with the machine. Guess 50 years in the business pays off that way!

All I saw when I got there was a bigger mess than when we started, but sometimes that is the way construction/renovations go and I will just hold on to the bigger picture and trust Andy knows what he is doing.

Andy had Ruby & I working on the turret. This is Ruby's picture of the turret from the bottom looking up. If you look close you can see the concrete screws they used to set it sticking out. Ruby & I had to go through with a hammer and knock all this screws off so they didn't rip the waterproofing and insulation. My arms felt it the next day.

We rented a pressure cleaner from Aubochon Hardware, they are our new best friends in Tupper, and Rex went around the perimeter getting all the gook off. I also spent a fair amount of time with a big wedge getting the wood trim they used to set the foundation off from the base.

Ruby has found a new passion for taking pictures and most of the ones you see in this posting she took, these and about 400 more! She loves it and she is getting really good. So this first picture is what we saw everytime we saw Ruby and the second picture is a cool one she took of herself, sitting in the drainage piping, with the castle in the background, love it!

Tosh sits very nicely for Ruby and just wanted everyone to see that our 15 month old puppy is now 75 lbs!

When we were excavating and preparing the foundation, 10 feet under the ground level @ the base of the foundation, Andy came across this. Ed Leary wrote his name in the corner of the foundation and then it got buried until now! We traced it in blue chalk so you could see it better. So excited to see what else Ed left us around the castle! There are talks of buried treasure, no lie!

Thomas, our neighbor, came over on his four wheeler to help us one day. Here he is helping us wrap the castle in the waterproofing skirt. It took four of us to unroll it, stick it in place, and secure it. We did this all the way around. It took about a full day and a half!

Andy ordered some very large Douglas Fir beams to span the ceiling of the great room and become the base for the second floor, they came all the way from California the week before, thank goodness they were delivered with a truck that had a lift and they were able to lift them right into the second floor. Andy then designed a pattern and had another friend make stencils from it so we could paint them onto the beams before we raise them into place. This is a pile of the bigger beams in the great room.

This is Andy giving us a demonstration of how to do the stencils. Seems easy enough, but it does require some technique and patience to ensure they don't splatter out the sides.

Here we all are doing the first go around with stenciling.

and here is a close up of the stencil on the beam.

Our friends, Maria and Dave came up for the third time since we started this adventure to help us. This is Mari and I working on the beams. The two of us literally spent 8 hrs. one day doing this. We had some great talks and listened to every Glee song out there, the time flew by.

Patti came to visit twice with the kids and while she was very nervous to work on the stencils for fear of making a mess, she pushed through her fear and did a great job! Proof is in the beams!

We managed to finish all the big beams with everyones help and we got 17 of the smaller ones done, but there are still alot to go, so if stenciling is something you like to do, we got it to be done!

as we stenciled, the boys continued with the outside work. Once we got on the sticky black first waterproofing layer, Andy laid down some drainage pipes. He also had Uncle Frank dig out a run off from the back corner down into the hill and into the stream. Ed had planned on holding water in the cisterne and as such had not had any drainage in this corner, but we are turning the cisterne into the game room and want it dry, so we had to build in a new drainage route for the excess water.

Here's the boys putting up the insulation now that the waterproofing is done.

The last day of any visit at the castle for me is always cleaning up the mess we make while we are there. Here I am getting rid of some excess water and cleaning the tool/utility room.

While dogger is crazy and running around when we first get to the castle, this is what he looks like at the end. Needless to say, he is dead dog tired and sleeps well for about a week after our trips up.

On the way out of town, we stopped for lunch @ the Lumberjack Inn, this is our new friend who was there! They grow them big in Tupper!

The Volunteer Fire Dept. of Tupper is having a fundraiser and auctioning off a four wheeler, we supported the cause and the kids are sure we are going to win!

and that was it. I am tired just writing about it and I can't wait to get back and do more.

Happy June!