What’s a Farmhouse Without a Porch?

The first order of business was to rebuild the porch.  As soon as the last load was taken to the storage unit, we began the reconstruction, post haste. Princess Jasmine and the Cherokee Kid arrived, having just finished up their finals at the smaller of the two land grant universities in the great state of Oklahoma. May the Lord preserve my beloved Oklahoma State Cowboys from the slings and arrows of the Land Thieves in Norman and the Wild Pigs of Fayetteville! But I digress. With lumber, plywood and a nail gun we forge ahead!

Teacher, teacher, I declare!! I see Jane Doe’s underwear!

First, a little grading.

The Cherokee Kid does a little fine grading with the John Deere.

Then we fire up the saw.

Princess Jasmine and the Cherokee Kid man the saw.

By the end of the morning we had the porch framed in. The GWH thinks rebuilding the porch will stabilize the whole house.

The frame is almost done!

The most interesting part of the project came when we had to somehow slip the plywood deck under the temporary posts holding up the roof. I almost couldn’t watch:

Slipping the temporary posts in place while our friend, John Deere, holds up the porch roof.

So as the sun set on our first full work weekend, Jane had a new porch. We decided to wait until we were further along in the project to apply the permanent decking material, but for now, Jane was stabilized and we had a somewhat protected place to stack our building materials. Next up: interior demolition!

I think she’s starting to look a little happier, don’t you?