That’s because there’s no work we really need to do on the new building.  The sand base has yet to be prepared by our concrete contractor in preparation for the vapor barrier, foam, and radiant heat tubing prior to the concrete floor being poured.

And right now there’s no point in spending any more time and or money on the new building when the real work we need to do before winter is predicated on having the concrete floor installed.

In the meantime I figured I might as well work on some other projects I’d been doing my best to avoid.

A little less than four years ago we paid someone to add a four season porch to the house.  They framed, sided and shingled the addition.  That left all the interior work, including electrical, insulation and drywalling to me.

I completed most of the other work that first winter after the four season was added except for some of the drywall (leaving the ceiling and the wall adjoining the house without).

But from that there the project languished for a couple of reasons.  One reason is because of the problem I am about to describe.

The four season ceiling was vaulted, and the interior wall that separated the room from the roof space where the new roof joined the existing roof created a little “attic” space.  This little space had no airflow at all, and on sunny days it turned into a oven, a fact I noticed soon after the addition was built.

On sunny days we noticed a “hot roof smell” coming from that area, and the four season area itself also got quite warm on sunny days, even in the winter.

Initially I had tried to seal the wall there to separate this space from the rest of the room.  I installed fiberglass insulation and a poly vapor barrier over the wall.

However I noticed in short order that this didn’t do the job, and noticed the hot roof/tar-paper smell on sunny days.  I tried to rectify this problem by gluing/sealing the vapor barrier at the bottom edge, which helped a bit but didn’t make the problem go away.

It was then that I realized that I was going to have to do something completely different to solve the heat and odor problem.

I pondered the problem for quite a while, in part because I really didn’t want to tear up the insulation that I’d already installed and start all over and because I had plenty of other projects to do as well.

Intuitively I also knew that if I just sealed the space better I would have another problem, as it would create a totally sealed little box that would heat up on sunny days with the heat having no where to escape.  Attics are normally vented to deal with that issue, allowing air to come in through the soffits and letting hot air escape out ridge or roof vents.

So I had to figure out some way to vent the space.

Years literally went by as I researched and otherwise ignored the problem.  After thinking about it again this year I finally got around to a fix.

Knowing that the space would be unbearably hot I had waited for some cooler days to start the project.  Even with the temps only in the 80′s this week, I knew the attic space would rise to over 100 degrees during the day and I would have to be working in it.

When we bought the house it had a ridge vent, but after our roof shingles were replaced after the hailstorm in 2006 they replaced the ridge vent with regular square roof vents.

However, when they added the four season, the contractor used a ridge vent on it.  (The ridge vent is the dark section at the ridge line of the roof.)

From an examination of the roof outside it was clear that the ridge vent they had installed on the four season ran past the wall that divided the room from the roof section in question.

I thus reasoned that if I could get simply get some airflow into that space that the hot air would move out through the ridge vent.

So I removed the existing vapor barrier and insulation on the wall so that I would have access to the little “attic” space.

Initially I was just going to cut some holes in the roof in that space,  exposing the new space to the rest of the attic space in the house.  Because the four season was an addition, the roof in that area was shingled.

After marking out where I would cut, I realized that I would later have to crawl around in the area for the next step, so I decided to remove the shingles in that area before cutting the holes so I wouldn’t later be crawling around on the abrasive shingles.

Even though the temperatures outside were only in the 80′s, it was a hot, sweaty and uncomfortable experience working in the attic space there.

Having removed the shingles, I cut two holes into the roof sheathing between the rafters, opening the space to the rest of the house’s attic.  The instant I opened the first hole the space felt cooler.

Since the main part of the house’s attic was already vented, with fresh air coming in through soffit vents, it would serve as an air source for the addition roof space that when heated would vent out the ridge vent.

Only the ridge vent in that area was mostly blocked by a section of the rafter ridge beam (itself a short section just running from the existing roof to the main ridge beam of the porch) so I cut it out after first supporting the part that was left with a vertical brace.

The main ridge beam (a microlam beam) of the four season porch rests on studs on the section of wall I was insulating, the end of which is visible on the left side of the following photo.

After that was done, I went about properly sealing off the space.  This time I used some two inch thick extruded polystyrene foam that we had left over from the building project.

The pieces were cut at angles to match the pitch of the roof, and had to be in small enough sections to fit between the spaces in the wall studs as they were to be nailed against the backs of the wall studs.

I tried to make sure they fit snugly and then nailed the foam to the backs of the studs with nails and washers.  I got most of the opening covered with foam sheets before evening, leaving a single gap between studs open so that I could still climb into the space.

My plan was to then use expanding foam to seal the edges and any other gaps in the foam from the back (inside of the attic space), but the two cans of foam I had were over a year old and the valves were stuck and I broke them trying to get them to dispense foam.

Since it was too late to get out to the hardware store that night the project went on hold until I could get out and buy some expanding foam.

The next day I had to run to the dog grooming shop to repair the home-made dog bathing pump I installed this last winter.  Kim told me that the pump would no longer turn on and off with the air switch/assembly.

I suspected a problem with the ground fault interrupter, and after checking out the assembly found that the problem was that the rubber “bulb” (the manufacturer calls it  the “foot pedal”) wasn’t “puffing” out any air when pressed, and thus not activating the air switch it was connected to via a section of tubing.

I had received a new rubber bulb with the air switch when I bought it but opted to use the existing one that controlled the old pump that was already mounted on the wall.  At the time I thought nothing could go wrong with a rubber bulb and tube.

Thus I neglected to bring the new bulb with me, not having suspected that part at all as being causal to the pump not working.

However, I discovered that the problem was in fact that the bulb was no longer blowing out any air when squeezed.

I inspected both the bulb and the tubing for damage, and finding none had to put on my thinking cap.

Since the sealed bulb connects to a tube that connects to the air switch, I deduced that there must be a valve on the bulb to return new air to the bulb after it was squeezed.  There’s a metal bulging part on the top of the bulb that the tube connects to that was obviously that valve.

Figuring the air intake on the valve might be clogged I tried soaking it in hot water to clean it off without success.  Eventually in the process of messing around with it I accidentally broke the valve apart.  When I did so it was obvious that it was badly corroded.

So I pulled the remains of the broken valve out of the bulb, and found after removing it that simply sticking the tube into opening of the bulb worked as a temporary fix since enough air leaked around the junction of the tube and bulb to allow new air to be drawn into the bulb, yet sealed tightly enough that air was blown through the tubing when the bulb was squeezed.

I’ll have to head back to switch the bulb out with the new one soon though.

(Edit 9-2-2010:  I found that the new switch bulb doesn’t have a valve at all.  After holding a finger over the hose connection on the new bulb and squeezing it I found the bulb does not refill with air.  It’s obviously just a nipple for the hose connection.  There must be enough air leaking at the air switch connection itself to return air to the bulb.)

When I got back home it was back to my insulation project.

I finished cutting the last pieces of rigid foam to fit the attic space.  I had to wait to put in the last pieces that would completely seal the space until I’d foamed the cracks on the foam that were already installed from the back.

Once I’d sprayed in the expanding foam I affixed the last pieces in the opening I’d left for access using construction adhesive and strings run through the foam tied to nails on the fronts of the studs which acted as temporary clamps until the glue set.

The next day after the foam had cured I replaced all the fiberglass insulation in between the wall studs.

When I pulled out the insulation at the start of this latest attempt at this project I had noticed that some mice had been tunneling through the attic insulation, so I decided to add strips of wall sheathing to the gaps below the roof sheathing and between the rafters that were created when they cut away the roof overhang to at least try and keep the mice in the attic.

Then I foamed all the gaps that hadn’t yet been covered.

Once that foam cures I need to trim off any that has expanded out beyond the plane of the studs since it will be drywalled.  Then I need to replace the vapor barrier.

Of course after I completed all this work I remembered why I put this project off until now…

Now I’ll monitor the area for a while to ensure the problem has indeed been fixed too.

I got a lot of projects done, but not nearly as many as I would have liked, and little of the work I had hoped to do on the new building.

Due to the high heat indexes, the county fair and Basil getting sick I got little done of note the first week.

We recovered the animals from the fair on Sunday and made plans to show up next year again.  The Future Farmers of America (FFA) run the Children’s Barnyard at the fair and take care of the animals there.

Since Kim brings her miniature animals to several other FFA functions every year (excluding the fair) she had been invited to an FFA banquet this spring so they could recognize her contributions.

She was unable to attend the banquet then, so at the end of the fair they gave her a plaque designating her an honorary FFA member.

We’ve now got the cash to install the radiant in-floor heat system, siding and doors on the new building, but didn’t get around to actually starting any work, even though we did spend more money on the project.

Our first big purchase was to order the garage doors, both for the house and the new building.

The existing garage door on the house is in pretty bad shape, and we need a new garage door for the new garage addition, as well as two for the new building.

Since the garage doors are special order, it’s going to take three weeks to get them so we needed to get them ordered, and we had to pay 50% down on the doors to do that.

We chose fake wood grain steel doors after initially leaning towards green to match the steel roof and trim on the new building.  I had always been of the opinion that having green garage doors would have been too much green so I think the wood grain will look a lot better.

We also squared up with our carpenter, Frank, who had patiently waited to be paid for the work he’d done up until now.

In the meantime we need to take inventory of the materials we currently have and what we need to purchase so that we can get the new building ready for another appraisal.

We finally decided on the color of the vinyl shake siding that will be used as accents in the gable ends of the new building (and house when that gets re-sided).

Kim has also been pricing out some upgraded/premium PEX tubing for the radiant in-floor heat system as our bid used standard grade tubing.  We wanted to see how much more it would be for the premium grade tubing, although to be honest outside a longer warranty I’m not sure what advantage there would be to paying for the higher grade tubing.

The tubing we can buy and pick up the same day (once we decide what kind we’re buying) although we might have to drive some distance to get it.

I’m still waiting for the word from our concrete contractor that the sand base for the concrete floor is ready for the vapor barrier plastic and the extruded polystyrene sheets, so I haven’t done either of those things yet.

As I wrote last week I completed the trim around the new garage door on the house in preparation to the siding installation there.  The garage door frames are trimmed with maintenance-free sold vinyl brickmold and aluminum fascia sheets.

Once that was done I was ready to put siding on that section of the new garage.

Since we can’t afford to pay someone to re-side the house all at once, I’m planning on siding the house myself.  But since that’s going to take a while, I plan on doing it in sections bit by bit, and I’ll remove the existing siding (and fasica and soffits) and replace them as I go.

It took a while to transfer (and verify) the measurements from the existing siding elsewhere on the house so that the very bottom of the siding clapboards would line up as the siding was installed around the house.  I also had to figure out how to measure and install the vinyl siding and trim pieces.

I made a mock-up wall out of scrap vinyl to get some measurements, and used our carpenter, Frank’s, work on the new building as reference as well.

The first thing that is installed with vinyl siding are the vertical corner trim pieces.  For a start I just needed to install the outside corner piece at the southeast corner of the new garage.

Since it’s vinyl and flexible, care must be taken to make sure it’s installed straight, so I snapped a vertical chalk-line marking the edge of where the corner trim should have been installed, measured off my wall mock-up.

But after tentatively nailing up the corner trim and finding something amiss, I took a closer look and realized we had two different types of outside corner trim.

There was a box and a half of one type of outside corner trim, and none of the type Frank had used on the new building.  Since it was apparent he had run out I had to go back to Menards to exchange what we had for the other type, effectively ending that day’s work.

Since we were going to install rock wainscoting on the front of the garage, I couldn’t start siding from the very bottom but rather had to start some distance up the wall, while making sure the bottom of the siding there matched the bottom of one course of siding around the corner.

In order to ensure this alignment was correct, I installed the bottom starter strip on the east wall of the house addition and then added some temporary courses of siding there.

I also had to remove the existing soffit and install new soffit and fascia on the short section of roof overhang in front of the new garage.

I completed the siding on the front of the new garage just as my time off work was coming to an end.  Although it doesn’t look like much, there was a lot of cutting and measuring, especially around where the roofs join, and it was slow going as I learned how to work with and install the vinyl siding.

The existing garage door on the house needed preparation for new trim as well.  Since we’re replacing the existing wood trim with maintenance free trim, the framing on the door needed to be adjusted.

As I mentioned since we’re replacing the siding in stages, I opted to use a circular saw to just trim the existing siding off immediately around the garage door for now.

After doing that and removing the existing wood brickmold trim, I discovered water damage to the wall sheathing and top framing member above the door because there had not been any drip cap installed there.

First I replaced the top frame member with a new one.  Then I reframed the sides of the doorway to the correct opening size with new lumber as well.

After trimming the siding back further above the door I was then able to trim off the rotting sheathing.

Since there was now a gap in the sheathing to the edge of the new doorway opening, I needed to add sheathing to the edge of the new framing, as well as replacing the rotting sheathing I had cut off.  First I added strips of sheathing overlapping the framing, then trimmed it to size.

I also noticed that the vertical support framing for the garage door track was pulling away from the wall.  It will need to be replaced as well, but the existing garage door and track will need to be removed first, so its removal and replacement will have to be done when they install the new door.

Then I wrapped the opening with housewrap.

It’s now ready for the new trim and brickmold.

I also managed to find the time to cut apart my homemade tractor 3 point ball hitch, converting it into a receiver hitch instead that can use different sized ball hitches, instead of just the one fixed size it previously had.

It was a pretty nice to be off from work for two straight weeks and since it was a vacation too I admittedly didn’t push myself that hard.  But I did note as my time off ended that I have way too many things to do to have a job!

As usual we brought three Nigerian Dwarf miniature goats and two of our miniature horses to the Children’s Barnyard.  This marks the 8th or 9th consecutive year that we’ve brought animals there.

Unfortunately while Kim was getting the animals ready to go the fair, our Standard Poodle, Basil, got sick in the house.  After that he began experiencing hematochezia (scary) and the next day Kim took a stool sample to the vet who ended up giving him some wormer and antibiotics.

After getting the wormer he was pretty zonked, sleeping more than normal that day.  He worried us for a couple of days after because he wasn’t interested in eating even though we offered him the vet prescribed diet of rice, chicken and/or yogurt.

Slowly he got his appetite back and by the end of the week he was pretty much back to normal and back on his regular food.

That notwithstanding, this year Kim and I haven’t really spent much time out at the fair at all.

Kim’s been busy working at the dog grooming shop this week, and I’ve been busy doing projects while on a working vacation at home.

I had hoped to finish a lot more projects, but the temperatures topped 90 several days this week (with heat indexes over 100) making it just too hot to work outside, much less do anything else.

The heat has dampened much of the enthusiasm we might have otherwise had for the fair, as well as spawning a few nasty fast-moving thunderstorms later in the day and at night.

It would seem we’re not the only ones not attending the fair this year either; the few times we’ve been there it’s been pretty quiet.

Over the years the fees keep climbing for parking, gate passes and food at the fair, making it prohibitively expensive for many, especially families without lots of disposable income.  Between the weather and the economy it looks like this will be a bad year for attendance there.

Since I’ve been off work, during one of the downpours I was able to check out the new garage roof, which had been leaking and we believed had been fixed, only to discover that its still leaking.

Additionally, the latest storm inexplicably snapped a six inch Box Elder tree north of the barn.

I was able to get the new garage door trimmed out and ready for a garage door in spite of the heat.

In addition, I had noticed our electrical transformer appeared to be leaking oil some time ago, but it seemed worse after this week, so I called the electric company Thursday evening to report the problem.

I was surprised when the line crew showed up later Thursday evening hours after a thunderstorm came through to take a look (they told me they were out repairing storm damage anyway), and subsequently another crew came back Friday morning and replaced the transformer.

After our appraisal on the new building came back so low as to not give us any significant equity in it, we finally ended up opting to draw a loan on my retirement account.

I hesitate to call it a “last ditch” idea, although it’s something I didn’t want to do, and we were out of quick and/or viable options other than refinancing and paying the associated closing costs twice.

Considering the financing delays we’ve had of late I was shocked to find the retirement loan money in my checking account via direct deposit less than two weeks after my application, and that was including a five day delay for them to send me a letter via snail mail to call them back to verify the application.

This time we’re going to have be careful to prioritize the work that we need done, because the new loan amount isn’t enough to cover all the costs of the work left.

Theoretically the money we have should get the new building to a state that will give us significant equity (albeit probably not as much as we’ve already spent on it), but the way things have been going I’m not holding my breath.  We’ll just have to wait and see what happens…

If nothing else though, the retirement loan will get the building ready for winter, even if we can’t afford any other work right away, and after burning through that money we’ll refinance regardless.

My best guess is that we’ll have spent the latest loan money within a month or so, which also means the building will have a floor and be completely sided and with doors on it by then as well.

Meanwhile summer rushes by, and we’re down to two and a half months of good weather left in the year before we’re into the rains of fall, and then winter.  We have so much to do before then…

Even though the appraiser had given us the impression that we would get a fair amount of equity out of the new building in its current state, after waiting for over a month for the appraisal when we finally got it this week we found that the new building was only appraised at less than 1/10th of the materials and labor that were already in it.

Because we were incredulous, Kim talked to a friend who is also an appraiser who verified that this is the way it works; banks just don’t place any value on incomplete construction.

It’s just too bad we didn’t know that before we waited for over a month for the appraisal to discover that, and the appraiser certainly wasn’t up front with us about the situation.

He initially told us that in order to have the building considered “finished” that we needed to get the building sided, with doors on it and a floor in.  When we realized we wouldn’t have the funds to get all that work done we advised him of the situation, he told us to do as much as we could and assured us that would increase the equity.

Although that wasn’t an out and out lie, it was definitely misleading, as we certainly didn’t anticipate equity less than 1/10th of what we already had spent on the building.  We were led to believe that the equity would be at least a reasonable portion of what we had already spent on the project and not a small fraction thereof.

Of course the refinance loan approval we just got from my bank was based on a speculative appraisal that then didn’t materialize and a refinance based on our latest appraisal won’t give us enough cash to make any significant progress towards completing the project, nor justify the loan closing costs.

Now the appraiser says again that if we get the building sided, with a floor and all the doors in, that it will all appraise much higher.  The only problem is that since he misled us the first time, him telling us that now means nothing.

For instance, if we get the building sealed up with a floor, will that result in a significant increase in the amount of equity, or only a small amount more than where we are being given now?

Additionally, once the new building has doors and a floor, it will still be appraised as a “storage” building and not a residence, so it would still remains to be seen how much value would be placed on it even if it’s close to complete; it’s likely that it still won’t be worth what we’ve spent on it.

Regardless, the siding, doors and floor still need to be installed/finished on the new building, so I’m borrowing some money from my retirement fund to get the funds to get that work done.

Once that work is complete we’ll have to go ahead with a refinance regardless, and although that will be unlikely to generate enough cash to complete the project, we’ll at least have the building sealed up and ready for winter.

It’s our fault for diving headfirst into this project without understanding the ins and outs of construction financing, but we’ve also been misled by bankers and now appraisers at every turn which isn’t making it any easier either.

The whole affair has convinced me to do as much of the work myself as I can again, since we’re not getting our money’s worth out of paying others, especially if the appraisal is going to undervalue the building anyway.

I just started an at-home vacation and hope to get some work done on the building during that time.

Of course it all also means that any aspirations we had to do some home improvements, including putting in the load bearing beam that’s sitting in the new garage, are also on indefinite hold.

One of my first projects on my vacation was to build a cover for the septic pump electrical outlet/cord.  Since the pump replacement the outlet has been covered with a garbage bag to keep the rainwater off of it.

I used some 14 inch wide white aluminum coilstock that I had sitting around, so the resulting cover isn’t very pretty, as the sheets weren’t big enough to make the cover without lots of seams.  I gunked up the seams with caulk, and when it’s dried I plan on spray-painting it an earth-tone to make it blend in more with the surrounding foliage/terrain.

(The angled top is meant to shed rainwater.)

I managed to finish most of the soffits and fascia on the new garage, but plan on changing one corner of the fascia since I don’t like how it turned out.  But for now it’s done.

The weeds near the new building were growing to some height, so while mowing the lawn I decided to mow some of the weeds as well, in the off chance we ever get around to working on the building again.

We’re finally making some progress on our refinancing for the new building.  My bank is going to give us the loan, and it’s just a question of how much we can get based on the appraisal, which unfortunately still isn’t done.

Currently without the appraisal they’re willing to give us enough to cover the costs of getting all the doors on the new building along with a floor and in-floor radiant heat system, as well as the stairs, but probably not much more than that.

Given that, we may have to refinance twice, because once the building was sealed up and heated it would be considered finished and be worth a lot more in an appraisal, though that’s not a preference since we’d have to pay closing costs twice.

While mowing the grass near the road I noticed one of the cows sticking its head out through the fence all the way down in the southwest corner of our rented pasture.

So I drove the tractor down there to find they had broken two of the barbed wire strands (again).  I repaired the fence before finishing mowing the lawn.

Additionally, our electric fence had a short in it, and I spent some time locating the short before fixing it.  It turned out to be up on the hill in the rented pasture where I had added some electric fence wire to keep the cattle from wrecking the old barbed wire fence.

I also added a shutoff switch to that section of fence to make it easier to locate shorts in that section in the future and so I can shut that section off in the winter when we don’t use that pasture.

In front of our house we’re cultivating what I’m calling a “weed wall”.  The weeds there have grown to impressive size.

There is a cut in the hill in front of the house, leading to the lower area where the new building is sited.  You can barely see the ledge with all the weeds there now.

Eventually it will have a rock retaining wall, but in the meantime not only can I not mow right up to the edge, but I figure the roots of the weeds will serve to keep the dirt from eroding away in the rainstorms.

I had hoped to finish the new garage fascia and soffits this weekend, but didn’t quite finish due to the weather.

One day of my weekend was a write-off due to rain showers, and it takes at least half a day for it to dry out after it rains.

Normally I could work in the mud if I was desperate, but the area just west of the new garage, adjacent to the driveway, is pretty steep and gets pretty slippery after the rains.  It will need some landscaping and probably some sort of retaining wall once we finish working in the area.

In the meantime, the steep hill gets muddy and slippery enough after it rains to prevent me from getting the tractor up the hill there to position the scaffolding I modified.

Before I stared working, I decided to add some bracing wire to the scaffolding, especially after I positioned it at maximum height for the first time, as it was quite high.  Working with a platform on a loader isn’t an optimal condition, although I believe that it’s still safer than working on a ladder or some other jury-rigged system.

If the hydraulic system had some sort of failure the loader would come crashing down with the scaffolding, and whatever was on it, because most hydraulic loaders don’t have any safety valves which lock the hydraulics into their set position.   Hydraulic lifts built for working platforms include the safety valves.

Given that there’s that element of risk anyway, I certainly didn’t want the scaffolding platform itself to break, so I added some insurance in the bracing wire.  I plan on adding bracing wire to the railing I added as well to keep it square.

Of course once I started working I discovered another paper wasp nest right away in the very peak of the eaves that I had to deal with first.  I also had to pull some weeds which grow to impressive size to make it easier to work around the garage.

I got most of the soffits done on the west side of the garage the first day of work and started on the north side of the house as well.  It’s pretty slow work going up and down the ladder to get soffits and cut them to length.

I’m installing the same steel soffit and trim as was used on the new building, so we can use up any surplus; it’s all special order because of the color and can’t be returned.  The steel soffits are a lot harder to cut and work with than aluminum soffit, which is the type on the house already that are slated to be replaced someday as we’re changing the color.

There were a couple of places on the eaves that needed framing added as well before the soffit was installed.  The northwest corner of the new roof hadn’t really been finished and I had to trim down the overhang and add some framing there too.

Towards the end of my weekend I had finished the soffits and started installing fascia, but ran out of daylight before I could finish.  Of course it stormed again that night, so I’ll have to wait a day or two until it dries out again to complete the task.

I’m growing increasingly frustrated with our refinancing attempts to pay to finish the new building.  Our appraisal is supposed to be done, although we haven’t gotten that back yet either.

In the meantime the building project is languishing.  There has been little work on the new building since Frank stopped working over a month ago because we’re out of money to pay for either labor or materials.

Since the bank we had started working with (Wells Fargo) wasn’t making any progress on our refinance, Kim called my credit union who said they could do the refinance and told us to apply online first to expedite the process.  I did that over a week ago.

When I called them to check on the status of the application I left a voice mail and they called back leaving a message saying that our loan still hadn’t made it into their computer system over a week after I’d completed the online application, and that when it was assigned to a loan officer if they had any questions they would call.

I don’t know if all the banks cut back on their staffing, or what the problem is, but it appears that it’s going to take us forever to get the refinance accomplished no matter what bank we use, and meanwhile the warm weather is rapidly rushing by.

We also noticed a for sale sign appeared suddenly on the neighbor’s house this week.

While I realize that it’s nothing like the heat wave in some other parts of the country, it’s still much too hot to be doing much manual labor outside.

The heat and humidity also brings its share of thunderstorms.

Matt and Rob drove up from Northfield for a visit early afternoon on Wednesday and while they were at my house a storm front passed through that ended up generating two tornadoes north of Northfield, the first smaller one apparently only around 6 miles or so from our house (and about midway between where they and I live).

I made a Google map of the two tornado tracks closest to us based on the the Twin Cities National Weather Service review of the weather event.

Here are a couple of links (Kare11…KSTP) to local TV stations’ coverage of the twisters, and below are a couple of videos of the bigger tornado.

(Caution language NSFW).

This storm chaser has a whole web page documenting the tornadoes including another video.

Because of the heat I thought I’d work on some smaller projects this weekend.

I had notions of working on putting on the ridge cap that’s missing on one of the dormers on the new building, and a few feet elsewhere, considering we’ve run out of money to pay anyone else to accomplish that task.  In the meantime every time it rains the water gets inside the building at those areas.

But first I had to do some exploration of how slippery the steel roof was.

I put a ladder up on the front of the building adjacent to the front door roof, and cautiously stepped onto the roof there, figuring if it was doable that I would walk up the roof from there.

However, I discovered what the guys working on the roof previously already knew.  That steel is very slippery, and without different shoes and safety gear there is no way I’d be doing any roof work.

So instead I ran errands, including picking up polyethylene vapor barrier for under the concrete floor slab.  That way should the opportunity arise I’ll have all the materials to prepare the building for a the radiant in-floor heat prior to the concrete installation.

I also finished installing a railing on my modified scaffolding, in preparation for working on the soffits on the east side of the new garage.  Of course after I did that the scaffolding was too high to get into the garage easily, but after being attached to the tractor loader I can tip it and get it in that way.

That evening when it started cooling off a bit I planned to start installing soffits with the scaffolding, only to discover a pretty large paper wasp nest high under the roof eaves.  There was another smaller one elsewhere that I figured I would deal with later, but the bigger one was right where I wanted to start working.

By the time I sprayed the nest with Wasp/Hornet killer, and hosed down the house after, as well as the scaffolding and ladder that the bug killer had dripped on, it was getting too dark to get any work done.

The next day was even hotter, so I hung around inside the air conditioned house and finished numerous indoor tasks, including an online mortgage loan application with my credit union.  We had been working with Wells Fargo bank, but our appraisal is pretty much done now yet it would seem that Wells Fargo is apparently too busy and not very interested in giving us a loan; at least not in a timely manner.  Since we’re tired of waiting for them it was time to start looking into other options.

At the end of my weekend I also managed to make this video of our little bantam attack rooster/chicken.

I spent the larger part of last weekend clearing materials out of the new building, an unpleasant laborious project I had been putting off; made even more miserable by the heat and humidity.

It wasn’t exciting enough for me to get really motivated about blogging about it here, but I finally got around to it.

Right now we’re still working on our refinancing loan, but if and when we ever get back to working on the building the first order of business will be to get the concrete floor installed.

The extruded polystyrene sheets of insulation for under the concrete floor were delivered some time ago and has been sitting since then in stacks outside.

If the building was cleared out the sand base under the floor could be prepared; followed by a polyethylene vapor barrier with the extruded polystyrene laid on top of that, both of which were prerequisites for the radiant in-floor heat tubing installation.

As long as we’re waiting and already have most of the materials, it makes sense to move ahead with the floor preparation at the very least.  And the first step in that project was to clear everything off the ground inside the building.

There were a couple of piles of lumber inside the new building, as well as a rack they had built attached to the wall that they were using originally for the metal trim and was also used later for parts for the vinyl siding, that had to be moved.

First I moved all the lumber, first moving it just outside the front doorway, then onto the pallet forks on the tractor which I used to transport it to stack it in piles outside.

The last thing I moved was all the trim and vinyl siding, which I moved into the new garage stall, on another rack I built for that purpose.

There are still some sawhorses and some scaffolding left in the building, as well as the floor trusses for the catwalk that will connect the upstairs areas together.  One of the floor trusses is actually several trusses bolted together, and is so heavy I couldn’t move it myself anyway.

Those will need to be stored inside somewhere as well when they get moved.

But otherwise the building is close to being ready for the vapor barrier and insulation prior to the radiant in-floor heat tubing being installed.

There are a few other things I can do while we’re waiting, including digging holes for the support posts for the east entry door roof and pouring the concrete footings there.

But there is still so much left to do…

Both have interfered with work on outside projects.

One of the priority projects for me was installing new electrical wiring for the new septic pump.  The wiring for the pump power and alarm had been connected to the house, and had apparently been severed last fall during our new electrical service installation.

Since the new pump was installed last week it had been connected to power with an extension cord.

I ended up pulling the new septic pump out mid week to adjust the float switch that cycles the pump on and off.  I had installed the float switch on the pump in about the same position it had been installed on the previous pump.

It probably would have been fine where it was, but when I checked it the level of liquid effluent in the tank was pretty high and getting pretty close to the alarm float switch before the pump was switching on, so I decided to move the float switch down so the pump cycled on more often.

That decision was based in part upon my belief that I could adjust the float switch with the pump in place; something I quickly discovered to be impossible.  But having committed to the idea, I ended up having to disconnect the pump and pull it out of the tank completely to adjust the float switch position.

I had hoped to finish running the new electrical wiring last weekend as well but didn’t even get started on the actual work.  Rain contributed to delaying the project earlier in the week.

At the very end of my weekend I did manage to get to the home improvement store to buy parts for the new wiring but that was all the progress I made.

I had bid leave off from work for a couple of days, including the fourth of July, so I started working on the project then.

The first day I got the trench dug out, and the wiring run.  The wiring runs about 50 feet from a post that has the meter socket for the barn and a power shutoff on it to a post adjacent to the last septic tank that holds the pump.

It’s an area with some underbrush and several small trees, so my route for the trench was chosen between the larger trees.  There were plenty of tree roots that I had to dig through too.  Fortunately I have a mini backhoe to do most of the digging.

Unfortunately the entire area is infested with mosquitoes.  They seem to have gotten especially numerous just the last few weeks so I had to douse myself with mosquito repellent just to survive.  Due to sweating in the sweltering heat I had to frequently reapply the repellent.

I could have just buried the wire which is suitable for direct burial in the ground, but opted to put the wire in PVC conduit as well for added protection, especially considering what happened to the last wiring.  It was a minor additional expense, but quite a bit more work to install; especially the connections at the circuit breaker panel at the one end.

The conduit had to take several turns after leaving the breaker panel before heading down into the trench.

I got that done and hooked up the wiring, including an outlet on the one end to plug the pump into before quitting for the day.

Kim had a few appointments at the dog grooming shop on the Fourth so she went into work.  After she came home we grilled brats and hot dogs for dinner.

A few years ago we discovered Nathan’s all-beef hot dogs (sponsor of the big Fourth of July hot dog eating contest) at the local grocery stores, which we think are the best hot dogs we’ve ever tasted.  (We get the “Bigger Than the Bun” variety.)

We sat in the four season porch and saw and heard some fireworks in the area but were too tired to actually drive somewhere to watch any of the local city-sponsored fireworks.

I also had to fix the dog grooming shop computer again that night.  Kim brought home the PC for the second time in a week for me to fix.

This is the PC that runs the customer and appointment database and also serves as the cash register, so it’s critical to the daily business operation.

Last week the computer wouldn’t boot due to a hard drive failure.  I replaced the faulty drive then.

This time it was a software/malware problem.  When Kim rebooted the computer she started getting pop-up warnings about computer viruses and called me on the phone to ask for a remedy.

I knew right away it was malware of some sort and told her to bring the computer home again.

I discovered the computer was infected with the “AV Security Suite“, that obviously someone had downloaded (probably via a trojan-horse).

The AV Security Suite is a widespread piece of malware that says one’s PC is infected with viruses and provides links to a website advertising software (for a price of course – i.e. ransomware) to remove the alleged viruses, when in fact it is the software itself that is creating the false warnings that one’s PC is infected.

It took me hours to remove the malware and clean the PC, including putting anti-malware software (Malwarebytes Anti-malware) onto the PC in an attempt to prevent future occurrences.  It’s apparent that the AV Security Suite malware has changed, because the removal directions I found online in large part didn’t apply to the version our PC was infected with.

If the computer ends up infected again I’ll have to simply block Internet web browsing on that particular PC as we need that computer running properly.

The next day there were scattered rain showers again, so I headed back to the Northfield Menards home improvement store to buy a few more PVC conduit fittings to finish the wiring project.  I could have kludged the project together with what I had on hand, but since it was raining anyway opted to get the parts to do it properly.

I connected the septic tank alarm float to a light socket.  Since light bulbs can burn out I added another LED light (much less likely to burn out, but also not as bright) and a push button for testing both.

I also had to cut down the conduit at the outlet end and install the outlet box with an added fitting for the alarm float wire to run into the box.

Once that was all connected and tested it was time to start backfilling the trench.  After shoveling some dirt into the trench to cover the conduit, I added some caution tape, then used the tractor to finish the backfilling.

I threw a plastic garbage bag over the outlet post since the outlet box didn’t have a cover plate yet or an enclosure, and the skies were getting dark again.

Not long after it started raining.

I still need an outlet plate for the box and an enclosure to protect the cords/plugs but the worst part of the project is now done.

Apparently we had a misunderstanding with our carpenter, Frank, in regards to our new building, because even though he had volunteered to work on an I.O.U. basis, for some reason all of a sudden he started leaving us bills demanding payment for the work he has done the last few months, including a sharply worded letter left taped on our garage door last week.

This spring Frank offered to do us a favor and work as much has he could to increase our equity in the building before we refinanced (at least that’s the way we understood it).  There was only so much work he could complete however without the floor being installed.  Once we realized Frank was no longer working (which we took to mean he couldn’t or wouldn’t do any more work), we set up an appointment with the appraiser.

It’s been several weeks since the appraiser came, and we’re still waiting for him to get back to us.  Until the appraisal is done we can’t proceed with the refinance, and until the refinance we don’t have the money to finish the project (or pay Frank).  Even if the appraisal were done now it would be at least a month or so before we completed a refinance.

I had paid Frank some money over a month ago and thought I had reiterated then that we wouldn’t be able to pay him all that we owed him until the refinance was complete, so I don’t know why he would suddenly think we would be able to pay him…

After I gave Frank a phone call letting him know what was going on it would seem that we’re all on the same page now again.  I told Frank I could pay him some more money now, but it would likely be a while before we would be able to pay him all he’s due and although he sounded disappointed he was accepting.

I’m starting to get increasingly nervous about the delays in getting our appraisal and refinance done now, as the good weather is rapidly racing by.  Before we know it, it will be fall again and we’ve got a daunting amount of work left to do, both on the house/new garage and the new building.

At the very least we have to get the new building exterior completed with all the siding and doors installed, as well as the concrete floor and radiant in-floor heat system before the weather starts getting bad, and at the rate we’re progressing now it’s going to be some time before even that’s done.

Construction on the new building is stopped pending our refinance.  Our carpenter, Frank, did as much work as he could and once he quit working we called the appraiser, who came out a couple of weeks ago.  We’re now waiting to find out where we stand with equity on the property and how we’re going to proceed.

Kim was busy at the end of last week preparing for the dog grooming shop booth she ran at the Pride Festival in Minneapolis last weekend.  It’s the second year she’s ran a booth there, and although heavy storms passed through the area on both Friday and Saturday night causing quite a bit of mud at the park she reported things otherwise went well.

On the farm front, Kim set the live trap in the barn a few weeks ago, suspecting a skunk had been visiting and eating the cat food.  Along with the missing cat food was a faint odor of skunk and for a few nights the dogs had disappeared for some time, having been very interested in something near the barn.

Sure enough the next day she had trapped a striped skunk inside the barn.

Unfortunately for them, in the past skunks have the distinction of being the only critter to be coldly executed on our little farm, because there’s no way to relocate them safety without being sprayed.

If you recall I’m wildlife-friendly, having gone so far as to have spent quite a bit of time relocating many raccoons several years ago, in spite of the fact that some of them were less than grateful…

Normally we set the live trap for skunks outside the barn so that they don’t have be moved prior to meeting their demise, at which time they usually release their scent.  But having set the trap inside the barn Kim was going to have to move the skunk outside.

When she was able to move the skunk in the trap outside the barn successfully, Kim, in part to placate a friend who was visiting and horrified at the idea of killing the skunk (and had named it “Flower”), decided to attempt to relocate the skunk elsewhere, claiming it was docile.

Surprisingly Kim was able to get the caged skunk into the bed of my truck and drive it elsewhere without the skunk spraying.  However, when they were carrying the trap to release the skunk it finally had had enough and sprayed them.

They then got back into my truck for the drive back home, polluting it in the process.  It took a week and lots of Febreeze before the truck didn’t smell of skunk.

The next night she set the trap again and caught another skunk.  But she had set the trap inside the barn again, and emboldened by her last success tried to move the trapped skunk outside again.  However, this time she did get sprayed, and realized the folly of her skunk relocation schemes…

She later set the trap yet again (this time outside apparently finally having learned her lesson) and unbelievably caught another skunk the next night!

Hopefully that’s the last skunk that we’ll have to deal with for a while.

We finally got the biggest part of our septic problems worked out.  I got a new septic pump last week that turned out to be a lot more expensive than expected, but unfortunately before I could get it installed, the tank it sits in was full of liquid effluent again.

That meant we needed the tank pumped out again before we could place the new pump in it, which our neighbor Joe set up for us.  After they had pumped out the tank they also installed the new pump for us last night (thanks, Joe!).

Right now the pump is powered by an extension cord, so on this weekend’s project list is trenching in new electrical wiring (as well as the alarm wiring) for it.