Rainy weather & the deck

I was off work last week so you know what that means -- rain every day, you say? Well, you are right!

This is what the sky looked like one evening after the pre-requisite rainshower. Quite beautiful!
My sister Rachel came to visit last week. When going for a walk the first evening, we discovered all this gorgeous slate beside the excavation of a house that is being built two lots over. We spent much of that first evening collecting some spectacular specimens for use as a walkway.

I estimate there is at least 3,500 lbs of rock in this little pile.
One of the major things that Rachel helped with was the construction of the deck. In this collage you can see (top->bottom, L->R): (a) deck blocks set out and leveled, (b) start of framing, (c) first joists installed, and (d) second row of joists mostly installed.

Another collage:
- Freda & Rachel installing the blocking
- the deck frame with the blocking installed
- rain on the partially decked deck
- more rain after about 1/4 of the decking was installed.

Rachel worked very hard helping me with the deck frame. Framing the deck is the hardest part and while you can do it by yourself, it takes more than twice as long to do it yourself. A second pair of hands makes the progress much much faster. Rachel was the second pair of hands in the deck framing and I couldn't have made this amount of progress with her hard work. Thank you so much, Rachel!
More rain. See the backyard has been levelled.
More rain after about 1/2 of the deck was completed.