Houston, we have a floor!

After several days of being without tools while the van was being fixed (a special thanks to Glenn's brother Kal for figuring it out and getting it running), we are finally making decent progress on the homestead. Floor joists and some of the plywood was done on Saturday courtesy me and Glenn and today, my brother Jer and Glenn almost finished the floor.

Saturday was the first day I got cold, cold on the job site. Usually, my Carhartts and hoodie and headband are enough, but we had sideways snow most of the day and it took me several hours and a hot bath to thaw out. I have a nice little "skiers tan" going on though.

The day began of course, scraping ice off the boards - imagine that. The picture that I got doesn't do justice to the amount of ice was actually on this particular joist.

We finished installing the floor joists and began putting plywood on before it got dark. Believe it or not, we were still working at 7:30 even though we couldn't tell if we were hitting nails square or bending them over.

For those of you who are wondering, let me describe the physicality of building in the winter. First of all, you are about 3 sizes bigger than normal because of the several layers you wear to keep warm, causing you to get stuck between joists and studs that you can normally walk between. That many layers also makes it next to impossible to bend over without shoving the contents of your stomach into your throat. If that wasn't enough, lifting your snow trodden heavy boots and fighting against all the layers to raise your leg enough to climb a ladder, adds a whole other dimension to the word exhausted.

Once you get past all that though and begin to see a house materialize in front of your eyes, all the obstacles seem worth it. (It helps, too, that we're finally out of the basement for the time being).

This is what it looks like at the end of work today.