More Progress Upstairs

But first, after all of the recent snow, we've had a couple of "warm" days! It actually got up to 55° F today. Last night was the first night in memory that didn't drop below freezing. The constant drip, drip, drip of the snow melt was a little bit annoying.

That's why we were surprised to see a sudden surge in activity out on frozen Long Pond today. From what we've heard, the fact that people can ice fish means that there's water down below that's warmer than 32°. A large buildup of snow on the surface of the ice insulates and allows that warmer water to melt the ice. Today should have been a dangerous day to go out on the ice. This is what we saw:

Now, back to the progress upstairs. We're working on flooring.

We bought all of the materials for our stair treads and risers. After everything was cut to size, I stained and finished the treads while Kristen painted the risers. I was ready to install but we decided to get all of the flooring material delivered and moved upstairs (we didn't want to risk damaging the stairs in the process).

The flooring is all upstairs so, today, I was able to get the treads and risers installed. I still need to trim out the sides of the stairs but it's looking pretty good.

That piece at the top (bottom of the picture) is a special piece of the 3/4" flooring that will cover the entire room.

-JC-

Winter Storm Niko

We're in the midst of the most intense snowstorm that we've experienced and just learned that the storm's name is Niko. Strangely, the ice storm that we had on Tuesday night through early yesterday was called Winter Storm Maya.

This storm started before dawn this morning and is steadily putting down 2-4 inches per hour. It's supposed to stop at about 7pm this evening. The initial forecasts called for as much as 12-14 inches but it looks like it's going to be more.

We went out at noon to clear the first foot away. The intake on the snow blower is about a foot high so letting the snow get any deeper than that could make things difficult. All the time that we were blowing snow, it continued to snow so hard that the end result looked like a driveway in need of clearing. Oh well! The idea wasn't to get a clear driveway; it was to decrease the volume of snow for the eventual clearing.

Here are some pictures:

An interesting observation: Throughout all of this snow, our bird feeders have been extremely popular. The birds must think that starvation is at hand.

The next morning (Friday):

It snowed until after dark so we decided to wait until morning to blow again. The snow was very dry and powdery and we had high winds at the end of the storm and overnight. With all of the drifting, it's hard to say how much we had overall. In some places, it was a couple of feet deep but we only had another 6" or so to clear off the driveway (after clearing a foot yesterday).

It was 3° F this morning with a windchill that made it feel like -17°. Clearing the driveway was painful and we decided to forgo our morning walk. I'm going to have to invest in some new gloves with pockets for hand warmers.

Here are some post storm pictures:

I thought that it was interesting to see how little snow was on the front slope of the roof. The light powder and high winds kind of took care of it.

It's been clear all day but we're supposed to get 3-4 more inches of snow tonight and another 8" on Sunday.

-JC-

Window Moldings Upstairs

We're really pleased with how these windows came out. They are an exact match for the rest of the window moldings in the house. I borrowed a tip from Tommy Silva (This Old House) and biscuited and side nailed the top corners before Installing the moldings on the wall. It worked beautifully.

Kristen prepainted the materials. After I completed the installation and caulked, she did the final coat.

I also created a cap for the knee-wall. Not pictured is the molding around the top of the post. Kristen painted both.

Next on the agenda is selecting the stair treads and getting them ordered. While they ship and acclimate to the space, I can work on the door moldings.

On other fronts, I spent today burning. This is farm country and the accepted way of getting rid of cut plant matter is to pile it and burn it. We have several piles of our own but this particular pile was a joint effort between 3 neighbors. The resulting pile was right on the property line and, since the other neighbor has some physical limitations, I got the permit and the 3rd neighbor and I did the burning. There was new snow on the ground with snow flurries most of the day so it was a perfect day for it. I'm now emboldened to burn some of our other piles.

-JC-