Roof .... "the structure forming the upper covering of a building or vehicle."

It's been a busy old week here at Wern Y Wylan... it's all been going on!

So Monday morning the rain arrived which coincided with the arrival of the work crew who had arrived to start the roof! As it happened the rain came and went and mostly stayed away whilst they were working!

They are like super hero's, three days later and we have a roof!

First the plywood sheathing...

Then the tar paper - seriously amazing to watch, no hanging around, and definitely no tea breaks! They made it look like the roof was flat...

Front and back all done, we are now somewhat waterproof - apart from the huge holes in the walls...  naturally as soon as they finished the sun came back out....

 

Looks good from the inside too....

 

So before the roof can be finished Mr M needs to crack on with the porches, and cracking on he is.  First of all he put in his markers and locators....

The he dug some holes... square ones...

Then he got to play with his mixer and filled them with cement, he also set some metal brackets into the cement that the porch posts will sit in....

They passed inspection....

Whilst the cement was setting he worked on preparing the posts.... find the 10 foot posts.....

Then you need to chisel out the end that will sit in the brackets..

 This week he will be working on getting these posts in and framing the porch!

Fall/Autumn is definitely in the air, the nights are chilly and things in the garden are starting to slow down, I tipped my last three potato bins (apart from my Christmas bin) we won't be short of potatoes for a while....

Lots of yummy dinners from the garden this time of year....

Won't be long and we will be eating our dinner in here....

The house that Jack built!!

It's raining, just thought I would throw that in there!

This week has mostly been about finishing up stuff!  First off Mr M finished up the overhangs under the big dormer, once they were all in place he was able to crack on with the rest of the cedar...

Then he had to add the overhangs and fascias to the big dormer (at this point I should take the opportunity to remind everyone that I painted the fascias *takes a bow*)..

 

And yes he has also sheathed the big dormer walls, it's really cool as now we can see how our bedroom is going to look... 

Having completed the cedar on the overhangs Anal Ned aka. Mr M, decided that the doghouse dormers also needed cedar in their overhangs..... so that is what they got!

Fancy pants dormers...

As you can see it's all coming together but there is one vital element missing... the roof!  The roof, oh the roof, it's been a big topic of conversation, it's a very steep pitch this roof, and Mr M hasn't ever done a whole roof before AND the rain will arrive at some point.  As all good houses must have a good foundation and a good secure roof we decided that we should call in the experts!  Therefore the roof is off of Mr M's list of things "to do" and over the course of the next month it will be completed in stages.  First stage should be happening this week and the sheathing will be laid - appropriate that it's raining!

Now that the dilemma of the roof has passed Mr M can crack on with his porches, something he is very much looking forward to apparently!  He managed to find an excellent source Western Red Cedar via a conversation with someone, who knows someone, who is related to someone who has a plot of cedar and happens to mill it! Y'know how those conversations go! So this week Wilbur turned up with all the cedar posts ready for the back porch...

What I can tell you is that these are heavy... so very heavy! I thought I was being nice helping to move them into the house - If I had only known!  Smell delicious though!

Final job of the week was to put metal bands - hurricane ties - across the roof rafters to hold them together, I should take this opportunity to point out that I cut these pieces of metal to length - all 28 of them! I don't know how this house would get built without my efforts...

So that's it, that is the house full framed and built, nothing else to add! BIG well done to Mr M. 

This is the house that he has built....

Overhangs, barge boards, fascias and topping out!!

I know, I know we missed a week.... but here we are back in action! 

Lots to report on... when you last left us Mr M had his overhang brackets all lined up and ready to go....

 

So this week we start off with getting them in place... ohhhh it's high up there right?

 

Mr M taking safety seriously and wearing his harness....

But he got them all up with minimal swearing....

Next job was to get the "rafter tails" in place, the reason for these will become clear as we move along....  Rafter tails are big chunky pieces of wood that are bolted to the roof rafters...

And then proceed to stick out from around the house...

 

The fascias are screwed onto the front of the rafter tails (I painted said fascias), and the gaps are where the porches will go, the front porch for the front door and the back porch which will run almost the entire length of the house.



So now that the overhangs are up Mr M was able to start on the roof - wait - What? the roof? yep!

Mr M scored a bargain with some cedar tongue and groove, and with a little help from a friend was able to get it delivered and ready to be installed.  This cedar sits on top of the rafter tails and the overhang brackets, the roof sheathing will sit on top of the cedar and the final roof shingles on top of the sheathing...

 

 

It looks so much better in real life, the roof is starting to take shape...



We actually had a day of rain this week, first day of rain for over 2 months, and with 177,000 acres burning just 50 miles south of us we were grateful for every drop that fell, as Mr M said "other people need it more than we don't", but it was a stark reminder that we are now into September and still not quite water tight.  So being the good wife that I am I mucked in a bit this weekend and did some painting, I am good at painting as you all know.... Today I did some fascias and some of the overhangs above the big dormer, it's high up there donchanknow!

Other jobs that have been completed? well the final set of roof rafters got installed....

And the big dormer walls got built....

Regular inspections have been carried out by the inspectors.... "you know these stairs only just meet code!!"

 

 

We are all excited about the next big milestone soon to be completed, but, we had another big milestone to celebrate this weekend.. now that the final roof rafter is in place we were able to have our "topping out" ceremony.

From Wikipedia.....
"In building construction, topping out (sometimes referred to as topping off) is a builders' rite traditionally held when the last beam (or its equivalent) is placed atop a structure during its construction. 
The practice of "topping out" a new building can be traced to the ancient Scandinavian religious rite of placing a tree atop a new building to appease the tree-dwelling spirits displaced in its construction.^[2] Long an important component of timber frame building,^[3] it migrated initially to England and Northern Europe, thence to the Americas.
A tree or leafy branch is placed on the topmost wood or iron beam, often with flags and streamers tied to it. A toast is usually drunk and sometimes workers are treated to a meal. In masonry construction the rite celebrates the bedding of the last block or brick."

So hopefully the tree-dwelling spirits at Wern y Wylan are happy with us and our house, we celebrated by both heading to the top, no toast (do you count a cuppa tea) no meal but a rare "PDA" (Public Display of  Affection") from Mr and Mrs M....

 

Amongst everything else that is going on the world keeps on turning and the veggies still keep growing and the garden continues to fill the harvest basket on a daily basis....

I promise we will be back next week!