Turning lemons into lemonade

The way you got your lemons was a very sad one but your lemonade recipes are just … very exciting !
And re-planting the area makes it a very good ending indeed.
Impressed by your great spirit !
Keep us updated

Just to show some exterior architectural applications that the guys at the sawmill we are using have done, we took a walk through the new subdivision behind us today...

Here's one example of wood used on the exterior:



This one is quite nice also the way it's been used:



And I really like this one - spoke to the owner and he loves it also...

In spite of any flaws in their groundwork, the builder looks like they're trying to design more than a spec box.

I'm tempted to put in an offer on that last one. Even comes with a back yard watchmaker.

Edit: Reminds me of this:

I was looking at it thinking "That valley up against the rising wall looks like a problem waiting to happen. And a lot of water is dumping to that gutter section at the front corner of the garage. Snow, ice and water will cascading down the side wall of the garage and dump on the side of the sidewalk."

Don't mind me, though. When I walk into buildings I subconsciously look up to see if there are stained ceiling tiles. 😟

This is like when people show me their vacation pictures…I just smile and say “looks like you had a great time”

There are 5 or 6 builders involved in this subdivision, which helps make it a little less cookie cutter in nature. Our big fear was that it would be rows of the same 2 or 3 house designs all through the place.

We have these lotteries here to support hospitals, and they often have a swanky house as the grand prize. This year one of the homes in the subdivision is the grand prize...

When we spoke to the owner of that last place, to explain why I was taking a photo of his house, I told him where we lived and that we were working with the sawmill that did that wood. He asked where we lived, and when we told him the first thing he did was apologize for spoiling our view out the back. Not the first person in one of the homes who has apologized, but as I told him, we have no problems with the new neighbours...they are just buying a nice house. Our issue has been with the developers and the municipality.

I told him that he picked a good lot, because no one can build behind him. He said that was exactly why they picked that location. 😀

BTW you are always welcome here as far as I’m concerned!

I have an 1890 house. Bought it from the great-grandson of the builder so in the family the whole time (his parents were divorced and he was an only child whose girlfriend didn't like old houses.)

I had to redo all the utilities, which wasn't terrible because I had access from the basement and attic. What struck me was how few outlights were here and hardly any lights. They lived here that whole time without upgrading? I won't mention the bathroom.

The worst of it was that the floors bounced. When I got around to dealing with it I found the windows didn't have headers and the joists were over spanned for their width. Made me think it was built by people with no experience, plans or an inspection.

Just about got it all right now. But after decades of work, those new houses look pretty, pretty, nice.

Edit: After testing, we didn't have lead paint, surprisingly. Seems that lead paint was a premium paint. Plus we had very little repainting. One benefit of cheap or lazy original owners.

Many houses in SF still have the gas/electric fixtures.

Ever wonder why victorian/edwardian kids 100 years ago always had matches in their pockets? Even the girls who did not smoke? Was to light the gas lamps in the nursery room.

Quick update...my wife reached out to check on the slab drying process, and got this back...



Not long until we can really get into this...👍

New update!

940 board feet of maple has been kiln dried, and we took a trip out to look at it all today. We are having a small charcuterie board made up, along with a couple of wall hangings made from smaller pieces. We also are going to eventually get a small live edge table made for the entrance at the front door...something like this:



Our original plan was to have a live edge dining table, but looking at the slabs we have, they don't have a really nice long straight edge to work with, so that meant that we would have to cut a fair bit of the edge away - only about 50% of the tables length would be live edge. We would also be cutting off some of the most figured wood by doing this, so I have been considering how to get around this. We could do more with a very wide table, but we do have space limitations - we settled on a 42 inch wide table, 7 feet long.

The idea I had been contemplating was using two slabs for the table top, with an epoxy river down the middle. When we saw the slabs in person today, and arranged them a bit in the shop, that idea was pretty much solidified. Two of the slabs sort of nest together quite well when flipped and turned. Given the limitations of what we could mock up, and the fact I couldn't get high enough to get it all in the camera frame, I did the best I could taking a photo:



The epoxy river down the middle will be a translucent darker blue hue - at least that's where we are at right now. We want to be able to see the live edge inside the epoxy, so we don't want it to be opaque. Did a quick mock-up - looks more purple than it would in real life, but this is the idea...



There are some cracks in the slab, and I've requested some Dutchmen to keep those from spreading, and for that we will supply them with some black cherry from a tree we had to remove for safety reasons many years ago. We had it sawn up into lumber back then, and it has been air drying in the basement for a good 20 years.

So hopefully in a couple of months, our table will be ready...

Looks beautiful.

The Dutchmen are a beautiful touch


a George Nakashima above.

I think this will be a stunning table.

The epoxy centre would be a great way to prevent expensive wine glasses from slipping into the chasm of death.

HOWEVER! The blue (al la a river) would not be my choice.
I'd go for something more organic and related to the tree, so maybe a big "sap vein" in a clear honey tone? (or variant of "sap" tones).

Just my thoughts. Whatever you choose it has to suit you and Mrs A and I can't wait to see the final result.