meanwhile in the garage

This is what’s been going down in the garage over the past few days. Front, top and side panels of a 5x8 foot chicken run. As with all our projects, what started as a few pieces of wood, hardware cloth and screws thrown together to keep the chickens contained has turned into a carefully constructed behemoth with paint and decorative corners.

Caleb started milling wood and building frames on Monday and I painted and installed hardware cloth on Tuesday. We are using 8 foot 2x4s cut in half length-wise and I had to run two down the table saw by myself yesterday. It’s hard to describe what this is like without seeing it, but consider the board is 2.5 feet taller than me and must be balanced across the saw while I simultaneously avoid cutting my fingers off as they pass within a few inches of the blade and you might understand why I have a healthy fear.

We’re actually on a time crunch with this project as we need the garage cleared by Friday so you might say I woke yesterday morning with a fire lit beneath me. More like an inferno, actually. Enough to brave the table saw and eek out the last few bits so we could assemble the panels of the run after Caleb came home from work last night. Lesson learned AGAIN: If you think it will take two days, count on it actually taking four. Please tell me this happens to everyone and not just me!

The garage was successfully cleared last night at nine pm so we can proceed with weekend plans. Caleb gifted me a new living room floor for my birthday and we have exactly one free weekend to get it installed. Because why hire someone else to do what you can do yourself in twice the time? And lets not forget it builds character. It’s been almost eight years since I’ve installed floors. And the computers will be unplugged for three days (which actually means six) so I won’t be able to google “Why is the wood not laying flat?” or “Why does ice cream taste better after midnight?” or “Why did I dislike my carpet so much?”

It’s going to be an adventure. Every day around here is.