Barn progress report. . .

Hey . . . I haven't talked about the barn in what . . . DAYS?  So here we go again. 

First of all, Mark is ALMOST done with the siding.  The place is looking more and more like a real home, isn't it?  Wait 'til it gets painted blue to match the house.  It's going to look great.   

Then once the siding is done, the inside of the stalls will be the next project -- before the weather gets cold.  First the plywood will have to be installed the rest of the way up to the ceiling, then that white polyethylene stuff will get screwed on over the bottom 6 feet so it can just be hosed down when necessary. 

And that wall between Duke's and Lizzie's stalls still has to be built.  Right now, there's just a couple sheets of plywood up there as a temporary wall.  And it's only four feet tall with nothing above it -- good thing they're friends!  The permanent wall will be either 6 feet high, OR 5 feet high with bars above it.  It's not that they fight, but Duke DOES keep sticking his head over there and harrassing Lizzie.



Duke is always the first one into the barn when it's time to eat. 

Here he is keeping an eye on us as we start getting their dinners ready.



He scarfs down HIS food, then tries to convince Lizzie to leave her stall so he can go around and clean up her bucket as well. 

And before the walls can be finished, the water lines have to be run so we can install their automatic waterers instead of the buckets they have now.  That's going to be REALLY helpful in Lizzie's stall.  She drains that 5-gallon bucket at least twice a day!  She has Cushings - not sure if that's what makes her that thirsty or if that's just one more of her vast collection of idiosyncrasies!

But if Mark can get the stalls done this fall, then when winter comes, he will be able to work comfortably on the inside of the tack room and porch since they're already enclosed and can be easily heated.

And I really don't mind waiting on the interior work.  We have the shelving and I've managed to haul out all the stuff I have to use all the time and still have all SORTS of space left out there.  You can't believe how great it already is compared to the work it took to treat them for their various issues over at Al's place!   So NO PROBLEM. 



This wall is where the sink and counter will go once the plumbing is in place, but in the meantime, we have a hose that reaches into the stalls to fill their water buckets, and another one that runs out to the water tank in the pasture, so there's no huge hurry about the plumbing either, actually.



This is the opposite wall in that interior tack room.

Then out in that enclosed porch area, there's going to be all KINDS of space.  Right now there's all kinds of building materials piled all over the place and there's STILL plenty of room out there.

 I don't even have anything that actually needs to be stored on these shelves down at the other end right now. But once the place is done and it's time to clear out all that stuff stored in our livingroom, I'm sure those shelves will be more than useful! 

It's great to have their feed and alfalfa in those containers under that rolling table there though.  I can just put their three buckets up there on top and it makes it so easy to measure in their feed and alfalfa and mix in the beet pulp and add their supplements and medications.  All that extra stuff is right there on that corner table in the foreground.  (Mark is storing all his tools down there on the bottom two shelves of that thing at the moment, but hey - I have more than enough space anyway.  I LOVE it!) 

Okay.  So that's where we are at the moment -- moving right along.  The question of the day is, will we finish this place in time to kick back and enjoy it? . . . or will we be working on it until the day we die!  Sometimes we have to wonder.  Sigh.