The Rub

I probably should have shown these photos before the reveal, but this is how the walls are rubbed. Literally, everyone grabs a piece of foam insulation which can be cut to fit your hand, and then you rub, circles, squares, random wild swathes, whatever moves 'ya. The effect is so random its wonderful.

The Reveal

Well, here they are, the first photos of the plastered walls. They are dark grey, but will lighten up as the plaster dries. We absolutely love how organic looking they are. I just want to rub my hands all over them. Not like we already haven't. I should mention that the walls are textured by hand rubbing every square inch of them. And the window of opportunity to do so is small. The plaster has to be firm to the touch, like leather as Justin would describe it, but not so hard as impossible to affect.

True Confession Time

Andre has just divulged that the toughest part of this whole project, and it really is quite serious, is that he is suffering terribly from NFL withdrawal. Apparently, spending Sunday afternoons installing strapping and tuck-tape doesn't compare. My heart bleeds.

Andres Plastering Debut

Well, here we are. Andre in his plastering garb and me humping it up the hill. I think he is starting to question retirement!

Deirdre being doctored

The home-care nurse was kind enough to oblige us with a photo for posterity. Here is D and the nurse.

How It All Happens

This is a 60 second video of the All Star Team in action demonstrating how the plaster gets onto the walls. It really is the icing on the cake.

We have done the inside of the house first so that we can move ahead on other aspects of the interior finishing (like drywall) and the crew will go again in a couple of weeks after we prep the outside for plaster.

The All Star Team

Left to Right are Andre, Sean, Justin, Dale, Andre, Donna and Deirdre.

Notice in this picture Deirdre is all taped up. She had just returned from being away due to an unexpected surprise injury. Seems during the first day of plastering, she contracted an infection in her finger from a whack on the ladder, which required hospitalization and a trip into Ottawa to visit a plastic surgeon. As there were no beds available in Ottawa, they sent her back to Perth. But there were no beds in Perth, so she was discharged with home-care. Which is rather funny as her home is the same as ours right now. A trailer on-site. So, she had couriers delivering medication and nurses showing up to hook up her intravenous antibiotics that she had to stay hooked up to for several days, and was under a no-work order.

That meant Hutch became the plaster mixer. I was the sole runner, but as I could not get it up the hill fast enough or in large enough quantities, any spare moments others had were filled with moving the mud up the hill. Thanks strong men. There are some things they are just better at!!

More of the Crew

Justin

Dale

Sean

Both Andres

The Mortar Mixer and What it Produces

This is Deirdres plaster mixer. These are the buckets of plaster that come out of it. These buckets need to be brought up the hill to the house. This is the hill. No need for a gym membership!! Thankfully, I can request half-loads, as some of those buckets of mud are f---ing heavy. OK, I`ll say it. They are frighteningly heavy!

The Cast and Crew in various stages of work

Deirdre is laying out the game plan.

Making plaster and Dave is inspecting.

Justin and Andre are spraying and Dale is trowelling.

We got plastered!!

The day has finally arrived. The crew is all here. We have our friend David helping to slog buckets of mud up the hill to the house, so he, Andre and I are the mud-runners. Deirdre is the plaster mixer. Justin is our sprayer, accompanied by his assistant "the other Andre", which means the original Andre becomes "Hutch" for the duration of the plastering. Dale and Sean are the trowellers.

It is the smallest crew Dierdre has ever assembled.

The plaster mix is 50/50 sand and cement/lime, mixed with the right amount of water and a little bit of fibreglass for binding.

First though, we take delivery of the sand, which comes in a dump-truck, followed by two pallets absolutely full of 60 lb. bags of lime/cement. My knees grow week. Undaunted we are!!

Carving a niche for one's-self

One of the last things we decided to do before plastering was carve a little niche in the wall. It's just one more cool thing about bale houses. You can carve little niches where-ever you decide provided you don't carve into any of the framing members. We decided on a wall, a size and shape and then all that needed to happen was the actual shaping. I used "Grindle" the grinder to remove the bale material not wanted. That is a dusty job, as what comes off the wall is a large dust, so breathing apparatus is essential, as are safety glasses. Once carved out, the sides and top are reinforced with metal lathe pinned to the bales. I fashioned a small sill to match the window sills and installed it by screwing it to the stud on one side, but I had no time to apply a finish before installation, so the entire thing got masked off. Now it just needs its plaster application.

OK! THIS STINKS!!

Our love affair with the portable toilet folk ended quite abruptly recently when they came on Tuesday one week after having been there only the Friday before. That would be lovely, except a week passed and they were a no-show. When we called, we were told we were scheduled for Friday or Saturday. When we stated that's almost 2 weeks between, it's hot and somewhat smelly, can we request an additional pick-up, we were told "nope". Can the manager call us please, as we were expecting additional workers and desperate. No return call. We were simply advised that pick up was once a week. Doesn't matter what day it is.
So we have decided that we will pay them, as usual, once a month. But we haven't decided if that will be at the beginning of the month, or the end of the month. But we will pay them.
The joys of running a monopoly in town!!

A Shave and a Haircut

One of the last things to be done before the plaster is shaving the bales. Justin used Andre's "city" weed-whacker to start, which is a rechargeable battery operated model, but the batteries would be drained way too quickly, so he returnd after the weekend with a propane powered one, which got the task done in no time flat.

The windows and the sills were all masked, using the plastic wrap that came on the ICF forms for the foundation, or the plastic that came on the foam for under the floor slab, again, a re-use of building material scrap. We will hopefully use them one last time when we mask off the windows when we plaster on the exterior.

The Windows Take Shape

I almost forgot to show how the windows get their rounded effect. It is through the great effort and artist abilities of both Deirdre and Justin.

First, the "tenax" mesh is nailed to the wooden framing, then stuffed with loose straw, pulled taught, and pinned with baling wire made into a large "bobby-pin" for lack of a better description. Both sides are done, then the top is treated the same way.

On the one square-ish opening, Justin framed out the opening with OSB, covered it with "Typar" and metal lathe, to receive the plaster.

His and Her Tools

On Friday, which is D. and Justins day off, Andre worked on the plaster stop installation, and I finished up the window sills. He asked that I photograph our tool collections for the prospective jobs. Can you guess who was using which tools?

Andre is quite proud that his tool collection has expanded to include the needle-nose plyers which he used to hold the tiny little finishing nails - as it means his roles are becoming increasingly more responsible.

The Detailing Continues

As we work along getting ready for the plaster, there seems to be so many small things that need looking after. One of the things on the list are the window sills installation. Deirdre and I figure out a plan of attack, but each window opening is a little bit different. Some are more set back, some have notches for support rails, some have cripples, some are set directly onto the bales. Deirdre works on them on Thursday and then I finish up on Friday.

Here is how we notched the bales, installed a cripple and a rail and the installed the window sill. "Grindle" , our grinder certainly has been getting a work out. She's going to need new nylons.

Planned Yard Work

Seeing as we will be having guests next week in the plastering crew, we should probably mow and generally tidy up a bit. The fire pit might need to be enlarged.

We haven't met the plasterers yet, but are looking forward to the next big milestone in our project. They are a free-lancing bunch who travel about to where-ever the work is, pitching tents or trailers as needed, so our back yard will have a few more inhabitants. The plan is to plaster the inside, then spend a few days preparing the outside for the crew's return. Anybody looking for some honest hard labour, please contact us. No experience necessary to haul buckets of mortar up the hill!!

Back to Work

The start of week eight has us scurrying about trying to ready the interior of the house for the stucco crew, which we are hoping will arrive next week. I have continued to work on the window sills. The original plan to use the garage to do the sanding and finishing fell apart, so the sanding was done in the house and the finishing was done outside. Under the cover of the garage car-port, we set up some saw horses and a chemical mixing lab. For the benefit of my woodworking friends, this was the finishing procedure. Sanded with 80 through 150 grit. Seal coat of shellac. A mix of brown, red and yellow pigments stirred into a water-based top coat and six applications of same, with a light sanding before the finish coat. The window sills are pine, as will the ceiling be, so much thought was given to choosing a color for the sills, but in the end I chickened out and simply toned them slightly to get rid of the really white color of the new wood.

Meanwhile, Andre and Justin have been occupied with applying metal lathe to all of the wooden surfaces which will receive stucco. In between lathe installs, Andre has been running errands. Trying to get the well water tested, bringing his fishing boat out here, paying bills, getting water, etc. etc. Somebody has to keep this operation functioning.

Deirdre has been shaping the window openings. Each window will have a rounded opening, except for the one which will be in the den. It is close to an interior partition wall, so we have opted to make that one square. How boring is that?! Justin got the job of framing out that opening.

Six Degrees!!

And we're not talking Kevin Bacon here. Is it some kind or cruel joke that we are no sooner living here and the overnight temperature drops to six degrees? We need toques to sleep!! Did we bring the toques?? My only house plant which is living with us in the trailer is in shock. Meanwhile, Justin has decided to insulate his tent. For clarification, that's a bed of straw that he has pitched his tent on. Now that's what we call taking your work home with you.

We ain't got a home - our trailer is our home

So what to do now that we live here and actually have power? The first couple of nights we had movie night in the garage. We put the laptop on the router table, pulled up a couple of lawn chairs, some blankets, candles, alcohol and life is good. It was kinda like dating all-over again.

Well sort of good. This is the pile of stuff in the garage that will need to be organised in our spare time.

We did plug-in the bar fridge in the garage though.

Moving Day

Andre and I cut out early from the job site last week and drove home to Ottawa on Wednesday evening to spend Thursday finishing the house packing as moving day was Friday. It took about four hours for the movers to pack the van and whisk everything off to storage. It's weird leaving a place you have lived for nineteen years, but as both of the guys are out on their own, we really didn't have an emotional attachment to the building. The hardest part of the move, which we had put off until the last moment was deciding what to do with our clothing. What to pack and bring with us for the seasonal transition and what to send to storage. In the end, we probably have brought all the wrong stuff, but it's not worth losing any sleep over.