This picture FREAKED me out!

As usual Alexis ended our day by taking pictures of our progress. When we got home and downloaded this picture, I FREAKED OUT... good grief was my wall THAT out of plumb!? It was after dark and I had already had my shower but I knew I'd be wide awake all night if I didn't go across the road to the job site and check this corner out with my 4' level. In a panic and wearing only my underwear (boxers... for you Clinton fans) I sped across the road to the house. THANKFULLY, the level proved the picture to be an optical illusion and I retreated to the comfort of our home where I'm VERY relieved and still in my boxers (TMI).The 12th course will be glued tomorrow. Only the bond beam is left to do on this east wall... the bond beam will tie the wall to the footing with rebar and concrete. That's my helper and ever vigilant guard dog - Boone Hoone. Me... proudly sitting on my make-shift scaffolding with the 12th course waiting to be glued.Baxter has relieved the quarterdeck watch (the first "dog watch"... you Navy guys will know what I mean):

Course #10 is almost finished... level & plumb

Course #10 is almost finished (2 more AAC courses plus the bond beam with continuous horizontal rebar on the very top... all the 3" vertical holes that have been visible in earlier photos will be filled with concrete/rebar and tied to this bond beam. The rebar starts in the footing and goes vertically all the way up to the bond beam)... the final blocks in course 10 are ready to be glued tomorrow. Happily, I was able to correct my mistake and the east wall is level and plumb (see below).
Level:Plumb:Here's a long shot of the east wall... this angle gives me the feeling that I've accomplished something. The top course will be glued tomorrow. The 2' short wall at this end of this wall will be sawed off even & plumb when I finish with the next two courses. I have been using two colors of adhesive - gray & white - hence the two-tone wall.This will be the view out of the French doors in the master bedroom and from the deck. Alexis wanted our Irish cottage to be in the woods... and that's where we are... Brigid's Wood:
Alexis for all intents and purposes finished painting the storage building today. This is the south side of the building which is mostly clear plastic. Hopefully, this part of the storage building will double as a mini greenhouse during the fall & winter.
Grandson Ethan looking in the mirror and realizing that he's the spitting image of his Granddaddy!

Course #9 on the east wall

Don't be fooled by my smile in this picture... I'm so tired I'm hoping Alexis will shoot me and put me out of my misery. Problem is she is as tired as I am... too tired to jack a round into the .45 in her purse. Lucky me. Here's the sign I had made for her Christmas before last (we never expected that it would take 19 months to get the land in our name). Remember Brigid (Gorman) is Alexis' cousin who died in transit to America from Ireland in 1850. She was buried at sea. Brigid was 12. We wanted to honor her memory by naming our 3 acres for her. The sign will probably go next to the front door.
This is a long shot of the east wall (9th course in progress). Working on scaffolding is hard work... up and down... up and down. All I can do is keep plugging. It's going to be a very, very fine house. Alexis and her Mom spent the day painting what is left to paint on the storage building. Alexis was up and down a ladder all day too. I asked her mother if she had ever dreamed she'd be working construction at 86?Re physical exam yesterday:
Cholesterol... 180
HDL... 45
LDL... 104
Triglyceride... 155
Glucose... 78
Can you believe it!?... the doctor had the audacity to tell me I needed to lose weight... why, the nerve!

Yeah!... I'm in over my head

Here I am standing next to the east wall and it is over my head (note the wash cloth on my head which keeps me cool with periodic dunking in the ice chest water... the wash cloth gets dunked... NOT my head)... actually if I'm standing on the slab inside the house, the wall is not quite 6' tall yet but this shot makes me feel like I've accomplished something today... and it was a rough day. Alexis and I put up two temporary wooden corners to correct a "creeping" plumb error in the wall that was developing. I ended up fighting the correction all day (which wasn't fun!) but remember the forgiveness of the stucco. Only faithful blog readers will ever know that the wall was beginning to get a little out of plumb. I'll be able to completely correct the problem by the time I get up to the top course in the wall.
This shot shows both temporary wooden corners :Tomorrow I have to go to the doctor for an annual checkup and with a forecast of rain I probably won't get to work much when I get back.

Here a picture of my grandson Ethan when they first told him that I was his Granddaddy:

The heat just about got me today

Man was it hot this afternoon... not "Oklahoma hot" but sweltering for Tennessee in June. I almost threw in the towel for today and "went to the house" but I sat down for 30 or 40 minutes in the shade, drank some lemonade, cooled down and got my strength back. When we got going, Alexis painted on the storage building and I laid the 7th course of block on the east wall (6 more to go):Alexis almost got the storage building painted (some trim is yet to be finished but we wanted to get a coat of paint on the building because the siding is only primed).
Alexis is tuckered out at the end of the day sitting in the closet on the first bit of scaffolding:A pitiful "Kilroy was here" impersonation:

Behind window #2... the master closet

As strange as it sounds the master closet has a window (opening shown below). I had to put the window in the closet to help balance the Irish cottage look of the house. Actually, the windows on the front side of the house are primarily for "the look" as the majority of our windows are planned for the south wall of the house and their passive solar effect. It was a magnificent late spring day here in Tennessee... kinda hot but having lived in Oklahoma for 24 years, I'm NOT complaining (low 90s). I've found I can stay considerably cooler if I dip a wash cloth in the ice chest water and drape it over my bald head. Alexis says I look like a Basque farmer.

As you can see from the picture I've started the 7th course on the east wall and turned the corner on the north wall (the window frame is in place for master closet).Another angle of the same corner:Not perfect... but close:

It's beginning to feel alot like... a house

The day started on a sour note... nothing seemed to be going right... then things settled down and I got on a roll. By the end of the day I ended up getting quite a bit done. Here's the inside of the east wall 6 courses high... half way... hallelujah!I also turned the corner and got started on this end of the north wall. The wall is not perfect but it's still going to be a "very, very fine house."
Here's an unashamedly gratuitous picture of my 6 month old grandson, Ethan... messy eater but REALLY cute, huh!?