Author Archives: admin
Another Shed Day
Had another glorious shed work day. Some friends stopped by to help with roof sheathing, and fascia. It was a lovely 25 degrees, low wind and a bit sunny. After they left I cut some more siding pieces for the gable ends and put up the nailers in prep for the soffit. I am hoping to get over there tomorrow and get some more trim cut for the corners and gable ends.
This shed is coming together nicely. Is is really solid now with all the siding and sheathing on.
Shed Work Day
Thanks to help from our building adviser, we got the walls all laid out and plumb. We then put up the sidewall and gable end siding. Got to try out me own, new, set of Makita tools. Lithium ion makes for very powerful and long lasting battery powered tools. The circular saw is no joke. I am super impressed.
Very tired from a hard day working but satisfied.
How to Make a Stinky Sno Cone: Stinky Gringo
What to do when you are up north, and happen to have a bottle of the best pre-mixed Margarita mix? Make stinky sno cones of course.
Take your pint canning jar outside and fill it with snow, pack it in there really good, especially if it is the light fluffy stuff. Be wary if you have a dog, no yellow snow in the jar, it will be impossible to tell if someone makes one for you, so you should always fill your own jar of snow.
Next open the Stinky Gringo, I only like the lime, and I mean REALLY like the lime. If you have not tried this mix, really, go try it. You will be out like $15 and it has as much tequila as I would normally put in a margarita I mixed myself. The first one is a bit rough but it is downhill to insanity afterwards. Fill up that pint jar and enjoy.
Let Mother Nature provide for you with this delicious blended margarita with no work at all. When life gives you snow, don’t fret, make stinky sno cones. You will no longer even care about the snow.
More Shed Progress
We got the front and back siding up and the floor in.
Started building the shed.
Wood Stove, Cheese Garlic Bread
Weather Station Install
I have been lusting after a home weather station for many years. I finally worked up the courage to drop some, pretty serious, money on one. I picked it up from weathershack.com. They had the best price at the time. I bought a Davis Vantage Pro2 wireless model. I am saving up for the data logger so I can interface with the computer. It will be a few months to save up for that.
We just mounted it on a fence post until we move to the new place.
New House Redesign Layout.
So most of you know we bought a property. If not, here is your notice. It is outside Iron River, WI. It is really nice. Building built in 2005, 800 sq feet, metal siding, metal roof, 2x 6 construction on a slab. It will do nicely for us to live in for a few years until we are ready to build a new house next to it and convert it to a pool hall, dance hall.
The image above is from a really neat online tool I have been using to plan out the construction. It is floorplanner.com. It is perfect to design and test ideas. Here is the link to the existing building. Check out the 3D view it is really neat.
The above image is the final design that we are shooting for. I think that some things will probably change a bit as I get to actual construction but I cannot find anything else that requires changing in this design. Here is the link to the Final Design.
Straight to the Source
For my birthday, I had a log truck deliver 12 loggers cords of wood. A loggers cord is 128 square feet of wood. A face cord, is what most people purchase already split. A loggers cord is 3 face cords. A face cord pretty much fills up the box on my pickup, so this works out to about 36 pickup trucks full of wood. The cost for this was $1000 delivered. $83 per loggers cord. We had paid $60 per face cord, split at the beginning of the year, for the same volume of wood that would have cost $180. I can say that each loggers cord easily has $120 worth of hard work in cutting and splitting it.
Since we are now heating with wood, and our consumption is still up in the air, this wood will last us at least 2 years. That allows us to get it nice and dry, and then order another truck next year to stay ahead of the use, allowing a minimum of one year to dry before burning. We also needed a chainsaw, never had a need for one in the city. After a bunch of looking around the Stihl Farmboss MS290 seemed like a good fit. It ran great when I used it to cut and split a face cord last weekend.





