Interior walls, that is. We finished the rough plumbing under the new slab (lots of hard digging…I’m reconsidering ditch digging as my backup career) and passed the inspection last week, so we’re putting up interior walls in Tumbleweed now. Here’s the first one we did:

The fire blocking here is to prevent the walls from taking on a chimney effect in case of fire. The header is to carry the weight over the door. (I made it…my first one.) The concrete anchors are giant bolts that fasten the wall to the concrete floor. All in all, the walls are going up pretty fast.

That 26′ wall that Brad mentioned before was interesting. It was quite large and heavy, and I wasn’t entirely sure we would be able to get it up with just the two of us. While I wouldn’t say it was easy, it went much more smoothly than I expected. No real problem…until we found that it seemed just a tad too tall (which it wasn’t when we put it up before we had all the studs in….between an uneven floor and warped wood, it’s all a bit touch and go.)

I never knew it was “standard procedure” (according to Brad) to use a hydraulic car jack and a sledge hammer to get a wall into place. It took a lot of pounding, lifting, sweating and cajoling, but we got it in there. All I can say is that this wall isn’t going anywhere now.

Other news…Brad said today that my carpentry skills are improving and that my hammering has gotten “markedly more skillful.” … We’ve started a late summer planting of lettuces and green onions in the greenhouse, which is going well so far. … I found some beautiful wood interior doors. We got a price, and they were $1,400 each. Um, maybe not.

And on a bit of a sad note, my trusty camera (the one that has taken most of the pictures for this blog and our food collection) seems to have died. We are looking for a good replacement, and Brad has given me one of him many to use in the meantime.