Garage trim outs - part 3

This is one window that has been fully trimmed out. It sure looks a lot neater.

This is the arched window as it was a couple of days ago. The flexible plywood was installed on the arch - but it was a bit short. The bottom trim-out and the right side was installed also.

Here you can see that a small piece of MDF (6 1/2") was used to complete the arched section of the window trim-out. The left side and the left piece of trim also has been installed.

Here several pieces of trim have been installed over the arched part of the window.

Garage trim outs - part 2: What is flexible plywood?

Did you ever wonder how the curved sections of the trim-outs were done with 3/4" MDF which is very inflexible?

Well, the curved build-outs are not made out of MDF, it's made from flexible flywood.

This is a close-up of the flexible plywood. You can see there are five layers. In normal plywood, the orientation of the layers changes 90 degrees from one layer to the next. In f.lexible plywood, the middle thin layer is oriented in the long direction of the pannel, and the other four layers (two on either side) are oriented with the grain in the short direction.

And that conculdes our plyood seminar.

Garage trim outs - part 1

(July 15 photo) One of the things the builder kept promising he would do (and of course he did not do), was complete the garage trim-outs. The material for the build-outs is 3/4" MDF (with a saw kerf out of the back to fit into the slot in the window, and 1x4 for "trim" around the windows. We are also going to put some 1x4 around the bottom of the wall as "baseboard" because we need to cut the drywall up a bit more, as the water climbs up the wall in water (snow melt water) and soaks the drywall. The inspector we hired said this would happen, and the builder said "no it wouldn't:. Well, guess who was right, and no prizes for the correct answer.

Because we would not be able to fit a 4'x8' sheet of anything in the car (let alone a sheet of 3/4" MDF which weighs about 80 lbs, depending on the humidity), we needed to get the sheets cut. I took measurements and figured out how many pieces we needed for the build-outs and the fewest cuts needed to get the most out of the sheets. We ended up needing 4 sheets. First we went to the Orange Borg, and before we started loading the sheets on the cart, I said to Freda that we should check that their panel saw was working. We walked to the back and saw the "out of order" sign - that was good that we hadn't wasted our energy lifting those monster sheets.

So we hied off to Rona. They guys at Rona had trouble with their saw and it took them about an hour to make all the cuts. We didn't complain about this because the people at Rona were very nice and charged us only $10 for the cuts (cost is $1/cut, although usually the first cut on each sheet is free). I think we had 22 cuts in total. We spent a few hours a day over the next week priming and then painting a coat of semi-gloss paint of the MDF sections and the 1x4s.

This is what the window sections look like now. The window is installed in a "window buck" with spray foam. The vertical side pieces and the top piece of the window buck are solid 2x12 lumber, but are severely weathered as you can see. The bottom of the window buck is two 2x4s with a gap in between so the concrete could be put in there properly. Exposure to UV light has changed the foam from a pale yellow to an ugly dark yellow-orange colour.

(July 17) This is what the window looks like after the build-outs have been installed. As the walls are not straight, I had to cut the build-outs at an angle (about 3/4" in 5') so they would sit flush with the drywall. I installed the build-outs with 2" finishing nails - you can see the nails in this photo.

This is the same corner as above. You can see the shims on the vertical piece, where I had to put some backing behind the board so the build-out would be square. I have not installed the 1x4 here yet.

I was unable to do anything more today due to my severe headache and the constant rain all day. (MDF makes a tremendous amount of sawdust so I need to be able to cut it outside. BTW - MDF is made out of fine sawdust and glue.)

Trimming a path

Before: The weeds on the walking path down by the lake were between 5 and 6 feet tall.


After: now the path is easily walkable without getting scratched up by the weeds.

The critters

This is an Eastern Phoebe, a member of the flycatcher family. This bird and its mate have made a little nest on a column on our porch where they are raising their young. We have seen at least two young, but think they may have three babies in there.


This good sized garter snake was making a home in our composter, as it is nice and warm, since it is made of black plastic after all.


Freda had gone over to visit the neighbours and Taz was missing her already. Just a moment before, Tawny had been looking out the window right beside Taz - it was too cute!

A summary of Mary's visit

Mary can't hide the fact that she really likes dogs. She was always giving the dogs treats and they were usually licking their lips in anticipation.


Mary and I made a trip to the National Gallery when she was here. "Maman", just outside the National Gallery, is a huge spider. Mary's two favourite paintings are "The Temptation of St. Anthony", attributed to Hieronymus Bosch, and "Voice of Fire" by Barnett Newman. The chapel is the part of a real chapel that was dismantled and reassembled inside the gallery building.


Things Mary did when she was here (when it was not hosing down):
top L: unloaded stuff from trailer and installed foam bed protector. (photo taken after use)
top R: loaded about 1.5 cubic yds of clay from back of property into trailer, and then shovelled it into the hole by the tree stumps. (see blue bucket at top of image). This shows the rain that was pelting down - a common occurance during Mary's visit!
bottom L: sifted rocks out of dirt piles and levelled it all out.
bottom R: got rid of junk. Hmm, lawn needs mowing again -- must be all that rain!

Another big rainstorm

Before the storm - well this really was at the start of it. You can see the rain has started to come down fairly heavily, but the hail hasn't arrived yet. Some people were swimming by the beach on the opposite side of the lake, and were on the finger island. They stayed there for a minute or two, but when the rain and the wind increased in intensity, they obviously thought it was too much and decided to get out of the water and stood under the small clump of trees.

During the storm - the rain and hail was pelting down like you wouldn't believe. Fortunately the hail stones were small so not too much damage was done to Freda's rosebushes.

After the storm - the hail. It was roundish and a bit lumpy.

I think American Goldfinches are one of the prettiest birds I have seen around here. After the storm, they all came out around the feeder. You can count 8 of them in this photo (the bright yellow ones are the males, and the muted colour birds are the females). Yesterday, I counted 12 of them on and around this feeder!

Big storm - the aftermath

Another view of the storm - showing the heavy rain and hail and the

The aftermath of the storm - severe erosion to the road.

When the storm blew the pot off the steps, it broke the Martha Washington geranium off at the roots. That was very disappointing as that geranium had a whole bunch of buds on it, and the leaves are so interesting.

You might think this photo is to show that the flower bed that was the groundhog's dinner is recovering after that gastronomical meeting. But it isn't really. Look at the pot on the top of the stairs. Can you see how much it is bulging? Those post didn't have drainage holes in them and the pot was so full of water that it made the pot bulge. We went out there and put a few nail holes in the bottom of the pots. It will take a while for the saturated water to drip out of the pot.

Big storm

It has been hot and humid lately, so we expected we would get a storm to break it up. However, the storm was much bigger and more intense that we had expected. This photo shows the hail on the deck. The rain was coming down so heavily that it was splashing up.

The rain barrell overflowed in about 1 minute!

The road became a river of water...

The high winds blew this big pot off the step, and the dirt blew all over the house, which is why the stucco looks a bit dirty here. After the rain stopped we hosed the doors, windows, and walls down.

More roses

I forget what this one is called.

Every rose has dozens of blooms.

Adelaide Hoodless

Morden Blush - this is Freda's favourite rose because of the colour and the very numerous blooms.