A bridge real close

We were wanting to have a bridge over the Eastern arm of our little pond. The barn is on the other side and it seemed the convenient thing to do. So, in the Summer of 2010, Kevin and his son came to help me lay-out the posts that would be the main weight bearing members.

We found two polls that were the same size and all. Got'em free too. We like free. I figured getting the polls to straddle the pond would be the thing that took the most effort but, with a little help from my friend John Deere, I had'em in place in 30 minutes. Wonderful!

Janie caught me acting up while crossing over on one poll. the bridge will run right out of where the porch door is.

If you read back in October, you'll see where we had a guy dig out part of the pond. He was able to work around it with little problem.

Sorry, this is a phone picture. Here I've got the "Trusses" started. They took a lot of the bounce out of the polls. There will be three sections to the bridge. the polls, of course, and an approach on each end. This is all flat and everything, but we're going for a gracefull, sweeping look, which is difficult when you've only got utility polls to work with. It stayed like this all of the Winter.

Come Spring of 2011, I got to work on the walking surface of 2x6's. This angle shows how the approachs spread out, preventing a square, streight look for the bridge.

So you can see how the log railings tie all three sections together and make it one bridge. Now I have to add all the little sticks and limbs to fill in the opening in the railings, and then nail on the wavy siding to hide the utility polls.

A finshed project picture will follow.

This man has an Island

From the begining, our kitchen was to have an island in the middle. It has taken a while but we have it now. Here's a shot during construction. No island. Since we did most everything ourselves and, couldn't do everything all at once, there had to be a priority. The island's number has come up!

We used this little antique table for these last two years while we were finishing other things. It's nice and all that but didn't funtion well as counter space.

We bought a couple more cabinets from Lowes, put them together and covered the sides and back with our favorite bead-board paneling, then built the top like the rest of the counter using red oak flooring. That leaves it up to Jane to paint, stain and water proof. She likes using Spar varnish, 3 - 5 coats.

So here it is, we like it. That's 13.5sqft of counter space we didn't have before. Now the project will be to finish the bar chairs in black like the cabinets.