Green Building Adventure | Phase I

It's looking like a
real building! The walls are almost
done and we're ready for the
doors and windows.

Here's the first floor
where the work station and
composting bathroom will be.

Goin' Up!
Check out our stairs!

The view from the second level.
The spaces will be large windows.
And check out the floor!
It was the floor we removed from
Ecological Creations' shop.

The view down the winding
stairs. They will soon have a pretty, planed
third layer of wood added.

The view out the side windows
on the second level.
We will add a deck on this side
in March 2011.

This will be a sliding glass door.
It will go out to the
future deck.

Sheathing is almost complete!
There's a few little holes to fill
and the second level of the front wall.
What a process!

The end of the sheathing.
A little more on the front wall,
and we're done!

The final sheathing area
was quite a challenge!
I couldn't use a ladder from the outside
so I wore a harness and clipped
myself to the building with
wratchet straps.
Kids - dont' try this at home!

Sheathing's Done! Yay!
It's so pretty!

Here's a close-up of
the sheathing. It's from Mr. Heffner's
barn and is a combination
of old flooring, pine boards, and oak boards.

We have a door!
And the front window on the
bottom floor!

Tendal and Royce
help finish the window frames.
Very Nice!
Thanks for your help guys!

We got 4 huge windows
from a nice lady on Craig's List.
They had been double-paned windows
in her home. We used 3 of them
as single-paned windows.
The one downstairs is static.
The two upstairs would swing open.
We made the frames from planed
100 year old barnwood.

Here are the finished
windows with the hinges on top.
They are very, very heavy!

Our wonderful neighbors,
Scott and Jeff,
helped install them.

We have windows!
They still need some work,
but aren't they pretty?

Time for insulation and siding!
We used foam board as insulation
on the outside of the sheathing.
This way we could keep the sheathing
exposed on the inside of the building.
We used the old metal roof
from Mr. Heffner's barn as
the siding.

Here is some of the
metal roof from Mr. Heffner's
barn. We sorted it to make
the metal used on each wall
match as much as possible.

The first wall is
almost done! You can easily
see each layer here.

Side one is done!
We still need to add some wood
trim at the top and on the sides
but it's basically finished!

We didn't put in a ceiling;
it's just the uninsulated metal roof.
So there were spaces between each rafter
that needed to be closed.
We used bottles and cement.

Dave helped install the
insulation and siding on the
entire building. It was
lots and lots of time on a ladder.
Thanks Dave!

Side two is done!
We still need to add wood trim,
but it's otherwise finished.
It's so nice! Two more sides to go!

Here's a view of the
bottles between the rafters
from the inside.
Recycled stained glass.

Bottles are done!
This is the western side of
the building so the setting
sun comes through the bottles.

Here's the front of the
Green Building Adventure.
The siding is done. We
just need ot add trim.
We also have a front porch!