Three steps baby….

Yes, the staircase is progressing.  Saturday morning, Mason had a 4H art camp south of the county.  I figured I could work at the farm or spend an extra half hour driving home.  Easy choice.  Not only did I get the 4th and final stringer cut and installed, I found enough plywood to cut out 7 of the needed raiser/toe-kick sections.  During the art camp, I got these cut and installed.

After I claimed a proficient basket-weaving and wire-sculpting Mason, I brought him back to the farm to handle the 1/2 tube of liquid nails I left behind.  Now this is trust….   I pointed a 10 year old Mason at a stack of 10′ 2×6′s, and told him I needed them marked at 57.5″.  After he marked a stack of them, I started cutting.  No double checking, I just started cutting.  Every one of them was spot on!  He even re-marked another 57.5″ on the remaining left over pieces, but I have not yet cut them.
These were to be the treads of our staircase.  It seemed the most logical to install risers from the top – down and treads from the bottom – up.  With the amount of glue we had on hand, I got 3 full stairs installed, in the middle of the staircase!  Every tread board fit perfectly.  I was never so proud of our little munchkin.  I don’t know how we will finish off these stairs (carpet, laminate, hardwood), but they lay out perfectly.  When we go back and finish cutting, the staircase will get longer.  Thanks Mason!

Fast forward a couple of days..  I decided at he last minute to remove a few random trees that was growing too close to our garage or our neighbor’s garage.  I dug these out carefully….do you know how much a small tree costs?!

I dug up these trees from our town lot ….roots are bad for foundations – really.  I took these transplants to the farm tonight, and Mason either dug the hole for or planted our 15 trees.  He was even giving instructions for the transplants!  I had to carry the water jugs around, or more importantly controlled the weed dragon, where I hoped a small clearing would give new transplants the chance.  Our transplants were between 8″ to 4′.
We had a great planting session, and I plan on re-soaking them several times this week.  Hopefully, they will turn into our permanent windscreen.  Long term operations look promising by having such a good helper.

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