Don't trust the ladders

Shingling continued on the shop today. Gambrel roofs are apparently not much fun to work on. I managed not to do any shingling, or go out on the exterior scaffolding, which suited me fine. Height and I get along just fine when there's a railing of some sort between me and the ground. I'm not terribly fond of straight ladders either, and my dad very nearly falling 20ft off the scaffold when the ladder kicked out isn't really helping that fondness grow, either (I did say there should be something to hold the ladders in place!)

Anyway, we got the dormers framed in and sheeting on their roofs. Between yesterday and today, Roy and his dad got about 3/4 of the shop shingled, and Roy got his pile o'junk moved to the other side of the shed. I made supper around 6pm - marinated steak, which Roy's mom grilled while I made a garden salad and some honey mustard carrots.

Roy's parents headed back home after supper, and Roy and I cleaned up outside. We crashed on the couch for the ~hour that remained of the evening, with banana/cherry/Bailey's shakes. Mmmm.

(will add photos later)

It gets easier after the first 6 inches

When digging holes with a manual post hole auger, that is. I put the last two holes in for the compost "bins" today, and that first six inches is always the worst. Once the sod and roots are chewed through, it gets a lot easier. Especially with our sandy soil (and I use the term "soil" loosely - it's really more dirty sand). Anyway, the six posts are all in now, if not exactly the same height... or in straight rows. Hey, it's for compost, it doesn't have to be pretty!

Roy's parents came in this morning to help shingle the shop. We met them, my parents, and my uncle Ernie out at the Fas Gas by the drive-in, then drove out to see the timber my uncle has for sale. He used to dismantle old granaries, barns, etc for the lumber, and what he has left is some massive timbers from an old train bridge. Unfortunately, we didn't know ahead of time that he's got some sort of tentative offer on it all, and doesn't want to sell any of it until he talks to the other person. Had we known, we wouldn't have wasted about $30 in gas driving 20 minutes out the wrong side of the city to look at it. At least it was raining this morning, so it's not like we could have done much else with the time.

Stopped at Safeway for groceries on the way back, and Roy made a bunch of sandwiches for lunch while I heated soup on the stove and got a pork roast into the crock pot for supper. After lunch, I dug holes while everyone else got started on the shop roof. Roy's dad started shingling on one side, my dad and Roy worked on getting the dormers in on the other side, and Roy's mom started burning all the scrap lumber we have lying around. I eventually helped put together struts for the dormers while Roy worked on cleaning up ye ol' junk pile out by the shed.

Doesn't really sound like a lot, but that saw us from 1pm until supper at about 7:30pm.

Saw a pair of woodpeckers on the suet feeder today. One was feeding the other, so I'm thinking a parent and fledgling.

Also, a whitetail deer walked through the yard in the evening. We get a fair number of deer, but this one was a lot closer to the house than usual.