The Barn - Part 2

 

Our plan for the barn is for the first bay to be a garage.  It will keep its barn character with a side rolling door like it has now.  We have a contractor who will stabilize the barn and pour a concrete flooring for the two right bays and grade our entire driveway.

To speed the project up Dan took on the task of removing the loft above and the flooring in these two bays.

I didn't take any photos of him in the loft, prying up the boards and sliding them down.  You'll have to use your imagination about how he balanced once he got to the last boards.  Here they are spilling out of the barn.

Then he went to work removing the joists which held the boards up there.

These sizable beams got stacked on the floor.

 

Can you see the dust?  I had to wash his clothes every night.  They were filthy.

Looking up you can see the small plywood door used to access this upper loft.  On the other side of that is the finished loft.

On another day he started with the flooring which was in two layers.

Under the bottom layer was a midden or refuse heap.  Dumping grounds from before this barn was built.

I went to work pulling things out.

Eventually all the wood went into this pile.  I salvaged one very long piece for a shelf in the rec room loft. Emily and I took some other pieces to make wooden quilts.

Here is some of the salvage.  I did some research on the marks on the backs of the plate fragments and the bottle and the items date from 1890-1910.  We figure that's about when the barn was built.

So this is how it looked on Monday, March 29th.  Now all that is gone.  A neighbor took the wood under the tarp and will build a small barn is his backyard.  He used his Volvo station wagon to haul the loads.  Some of the wood was 18 feet long and was a sight to see hanging out of his car.  He had only three houses to go to unload. The doors, windows and shutters have also gone to new owners.

Work should start in the next few weeks on the conversion to garage space.

The Barn Part 1

 Our barn.  Isn't it lovely?

Entering on the right side 

you're in the first bay.  Against the back wall what looks like a blackboard is the sign we found.

A second bay was filled with interesting things too like this wash tub.  But notice the ceiling.

The ceiling in these first two bays is the floor of the loft above.  Look how the joists have bark on them.

This door then leads to the next two bays, one of which was finished with drywall and had a propane heater.  That went to junk.  No one wanted it.

That bay also has the steps to the finished loft space,

The last bay has the garden stuff.

By the looks of the floor it may have been an animal stall at some point.

Up the stairs is the finished loft with this small door to access the other loft.

Dan hung the sign here.  This will be our rec room.  A ping pong table arrived on Monday. We will have a solid railing built around the stairwell.

Through the small door to the other loft is where all the shutters were.  Dan had to climb the ladder there to get them down.

Old doors, windows and wood.  I found a chair here that I cleaned up and use.  This is where the 1906 newspaper was found.  We think these things had been stored here for at least 100 years or more.

Notice the floor - two layers.

Dan moved everything out of this loft.

Part 2 coming next.

Need a laugh?

Thanks to Marilyn for sending these last three weeks of funnies to me!  

 

Easter 2021

 

Have a Happy Easter with hope that this year will be far different from last year.

Photos courtesy of my budding photographer granddaughter.

Decorated eggs purchased many years ago.

This bunny was an antique/flea market find.  He's standing in front of a wooden box we found in the barn. The box says Swift's Premium Quality Brookfield Pasteurized Cream Cheese 3 lbs.  There's another one nailed to the wall in the stall where all the garden implements are.

Postscript to April 1st blog: all the items except 5 windows are gone.  One woman called and woke us Friday morning wanting the shutters.  She came later that day for them.  She's going to use them to make an outdoor shower.  

Another woman called wanting the doors and to look at the windows.  She'd moved here last May from Alaska and is redoing a house and barn.  She took all the windows except 5 and those were the ones with full panes.  Dan decided to keep those after all as spares for our barn.

I still owe you a post about what we've done in the barn.  Stay tuned.