Home Improvement Today?

The main stones we're 40ish and the caps we're 80. Still one of my favorite things I've built.

 

I laid this bluestone path at my old house about 10+ eyars ago. I really like stone, and I like workgin with it, except for the knees and back. I must have moved this 1500 lbs of stones 5 times to get the puzzle right and then do the final setting. The red brick crap is just temporary, and I later edged the path with more bluetsone pieces on edge. Watching some Andrew Goldsworthy gets me fired up. Then I remember the pain.

I left the back patio pavers to a contractor, whi di dan excellent job. I was beyond done at this pint, having started with stripping and regrading the entire back yard, new water supply and subsurface drainage, etc.
This is the only other pic I have handy that shows the paver detail . They started with a concrete curb and mortated the permiter course to that. Locked it in all tight.

 

Looks good Scott , sorta looks like your old place

 

I had to put my soffit the skylight well project on the back burner till next week after my roofer friend comes to redo the new skylight flashing / roofing so I moved on up to the ensuite which is drywalled but no tile on the floors or walls and the shower pan is not in yet .

That room has heated floors , 2 " of concrete with hydronic tubing over framing . The rest of the upstairs joists are 2x12 , I dropped to 2x10 in the ensuite while framing , allowing the 2" concrete topping to align with the rest of the subfloors . The last 4' of the room is the shower stall and here I dropped joist size again to 2x8 allowing room for a sloped mud bed shower pan and minimizing any curb height .

The roof pitch on my house is 14 in 12 , with 5 in 12 shed dormers in each room on one side . In the shower the ceiling on both sides is 14 in 12 coming down to a 30" high kneewall on both sides so basically there is a zone about 2' from each side wall that is under 5' . I originally planned to frame a vertical partition at this point because it didn't seem to make much sense to have the shower go down to a 30" wall where you could never stand ( that plan got modified a bit , more on that later )

When we were going to pump the concrete for the main ensuite floor I got a flash of brilliance to pour a 4" thick slab of concrete in the ends of the shower to act as soundproofing and some more thermal mass because what the hell it's dead space anyway right ?

Well as stated earlier , plans changed and now we want a bench on one end of the shower stall but I didn't want a tiled bench because it felt like it took up too much room in the shower . We decided we would have a teak or maybe yellow cedar bench that could come or go and I got this great idea that if the shower went all the way to the 30" wall , the bench could live there and then you could just pull it out when you wanted to use it .

So anyways , I just had to go rent a breaker hammer and break up a 32MPa , 4" thick 2' x 4' wide , fibre mesh reinforced slab and then carry the pieces in buckets down through the house

Good Times

 

See if you can get spainish cedar near you it's a mahogany look alike. Should work great for the bench. We had teak as a shelf in one shower and when I demoed the shower I took and planed it lightly and right back to new again after 25 years of at least 2 people daily showering

 

Good to know

I have some left overs of yellow cedar from my countertop project which is what got me thinking about that , yellow cedar is used in boat building a lot cause it's very water damage resistant

 

LOL. No. The bedroom expansion went to shit when that contractor flaked on us, so I said fuck it, not happening for another year, need to get ready for kiddo. Then I had to sort out the truck. And about to pull the trigger on refi. Then I need a new career. And the drought has got landscape dreams in a holding pattern. Every time I clsoe the shitty gate at the new place...well, I just can't go there right now.

Also, the back utility room is really pissing me off. I want to expand that area back too. And if we do that...well why not expand the upper floor above it.

I'll just be over here in a tailspin.

+1 DMB

Still listening to Journey, too.

 

That's the one I did. They picked the design and it's outside of a walkin 10 head shower. So it's more of a changing bench. If it was inside the shower I would have built it differently.

 

Nice

I was considering a top with slots in it for drainage but wasn't sure how comfy that would be on a naked rear end

 

Wide slats and you won't notice. Slope it slightly as well.

The problem with slats is it exposes more wood to water. And harder to refinish over the years.

 

Why would she be standing on the bench with high heels? … oh ! never mind.

 

Ah… I see

 

Just found this thread. Seems like I am always doing something around the house.
Removed a huge Asian Jasmine ivy bed in my front yard. Tilled it, ground down 2 stumps, Jack hammered an old brick mailbox foundation hiding under the ivy, layer St Augustine sod, and put some new color in the mailbox planter. Still have a few spots on the side to fill in after work when I pick up more sod. 100+ heat sucks to work in.

 

I think the st Augustine will be fine there. His trees look to be groomed up enough to allow a sufficient amount of light in. The St Augustine is more shade tolerant than the bermuda you see a lot of around here.

 

Depends on the variety of ST. Augustine he used. Most StA requires mostly to full sun.

 

Thanks!
St Augustine grass actually needs some shade. All of the grass does get some sun through out the day so it should do well.

 

It is the same type of StA that was in the rest of the yard.

 

Got the sides on the compressor shed, the frame built for the cooler, and the cooler lifted onto the frame.

 

My roofer came over and resized , flashed and reshingled around my new centred skylight so back on to the entry soffit in the morning