New Roof, Who Dis?

Last week we shared how we did the ‘Great Garage Swap’. What we didn’t share was that the barn shed roof was in disrepair. We knew this when we purchased the home, but this summer we focused our energies on projects to improve our fun experiences – docks, steps and boat racks – instead of practical projects like new shed roofs. The barn shed shingles were failing and we were having a moisture problem inside. Given that this is our primary storage for seasonal gear and we are headed into a season of wetness we needed a solution. I suggested we put a new shingle roof on the shed. Kevin willingly followed my lead on this adventure, and one evening last week I went and loaded the van with all the necessary new roof supplies. Then, early Saturday morning we went to work tearing off the old shingles and decking.

The kids were great helpers–mostly. They all enjoyed pulling the old shingles off the shed. Grayson was a little possessive of “his” hammer and was upset anytime someone else tried to use “bluey”. *NOTE two more hammers were purchased this weekend to improve this negotiation*.

The removal of the shingles and decking went smoothly and quickly- but for sure the kids’ favorite part was that I allowed them to hang out on the roof.

After removing all the shingles and the all the decking it was time for the fun part of putting the new roof on the shed. Kevin cut the OSB to the correct sizes and I anchored them in place.

The OSB went down easily enough, but with sunset at 4:30pm the last few sheets were installed via my headlamp.

Sunday morning we were ready to get back to work and finish up our weekend project. Kevin and Rayleigh did a large portion of this installation- but I didn’t take any photos!

We were ready for shingle installation- by this point the kids were mostly bored with mom’s weekend project and it was a two adult project push to the finish line.

Unfortunately, two days with four kids and some other life responsibilities meant our weekend project was going to go into Monday. Despite my efforts with a second night of headlamp wearing and a movie on inside for the kids to watch to get some uninterrupted hammering done it had gotten too cold and too dark to effectively line up shingles and secure them in place. It was a good effort but Monday we would need to install the ridge cap.

Thankfully my crew was much more willing to shingle than do Monday morning desk work. As a result I had a whole team to help with the final installation and cleanup.

They worked out a system where Ainsley was the “giver” handing the cut shingles to Rayleigh to lay in place and Grayson was the “nailer” handing her the nails to secure it in place.

As we got closer the end of the projects overall morale seemed to improve.

As the last of the shingles were nailed into place I had one more job, off the dump to unload the old roof.

Phew! Hopefully that’s a ‘one and done’ type job. But if not, we have now spun up a roofing crew of six to tackle the next project. Bring on the snow.