Kitchen cabinets moved, trap door 98% done

Yesterday, Tuesday, Todd and I removed all the cabinets from the old kitchen and reinstalled most of them in the new shop. I now have 20' of counterspace to spread projects out on. We set one 10' run of countertop at the normal height, the other we mounted on 4x4 so that the level is up higher to suit my height. I've wanted a 'my size' workbench all my life and now I have one, yee ha! :)

We also fixed a large hole in the upper floor of the barn. An empty hole for a fold down stair was redone with a trap door that will fit flush to the rest of the floor and be a big asset in getting things up into storage. I even bought a pulley today that will allow me to rig a rope to haul things up rather than have to make repeated trips up and down a ladder or stairs.

I need to screw the hinges on it and add a bit of trim on the ends, but it's essentially done.

We then started working on the structure of the north end of the barn. I got out an old auto jack and we shoved the main beam for the upper floor up a couple inches. It had sagged down due to wood rot and an inadequate door header to support the weight it was carrying. It was a little unnerving to hear the floor creak and pop as we jacked the beam back into position, but nothing fell on us, so we're good... :) Unfortunately, I forgot to loosen a sill plate bolt and one of the cement blocks popped loose. Now I have to remove the old mortar and replace it with new. That'll be a project for another day though.

Tomorrow, if the cold weather holds off, I intend to try to get Eloise running again and mow some grass before it gets away from me. We managed to shove her into the barn out of the rain this afternoon, so at least I'll be able to work on her out of the rain, if it does mist.

I also would like to tinker with the electricity in the barn/shop but may not have time. Power IN the barn is not working. Power that goes THROUGH the barn to an outside outlet by the pool is working. There's something amiss there. Having the juice working in the barn would help a GREAT deal. I have an appointment in the afternoon that I must keep and that may pinch my day too much to tackle this though.

Essentially there are three more days to work on the place this week. Friday I should have the mini backhoe to play with and move a lot of dirt. There are a lot of holes that need filling, and rocky subsoil from the floor of the barn that needs a new home. I'm going to probe to see how deep the soil/rock interface is behind the house too. The lower I can set that floor, the more headroom there is in the great room.

Thanks for reading. I hope to have pictures up this weekend. Gotta scoot.

Doug