New Firewood Access~ Mel's Project

For years now, we've used a section of our front porch as a firewood staging area. The last stacking area before it comes inside to burn. It's always been the left side of the porch as you face the house. It's also the area for our porch swing in non firewood times. We have several firewood and kindling storage buildings around the property holding cords of wood to season up.

The only problem with this set up was the stairs were on the opposite side of the porch. We or the firewood delivery service would back up next to the porch rail and chuck to wood over the rail and then stack it a half cord at a time. We often thought wouldn't it be nice if there was a gate to make unloading the wood easier. We could load the wood into the back of the pick up, and back it next to the porch. No more climbing from the pick up bed over the rail to sort the wood. It would be a simple step across.

This month Mel's project was to remedy this. She dismantled the rails from two- four feet sections and hinged gates to where they would be anchored by the 4x4 posts. We still need to prime and paint the additions, but it works. She replaced the bottom rail with a 2x4s and added a 2x3s cross pieces for sturdier use. Nice job Mel! Thanks again to Jason at the Big Bear Homestead for the table saw. Without this gift, we'd have to depend on Mel's makeshift table saw out of a circular saw contraption. Big Bear's is definitely safer.

Painting the porch was on my to-do list anyhow. I want to replace the dark brown with an evergreen color. It means painting the front shutters and trim too. It's more in line with our colors we envisioned for the Cockeyed Homestead. It was to be a fall project for me. Now it will depend on my healing time after surgeries on my foot. The transition will happen. It's Mel's favorite color and a nod to my husband's Irish heritage. To me, brown is yucky. It will definitely be brighter and fresher looking. Pressure washing the almond colored (now tan) siding is a Mel project. It'll make short work of cleaning the windows and screens too.

As soon as it's painted and pressure washed the porch will be ready for its winter mode transition. I should be able to prime and paint it, at least the gate sections before next week. The weather has been cooler and drier unlike all summer long. The high humidity this summer here gave a whole new meaning to watching paint dry. It would take two days if it wasn't raining. This fall, it's rained maybe once a week.