I have to tell you I love that wall of windows, its like being up in the treetops! Now that the windows are in they need to be framed out and I for one was wondering how they did curves since wood doesn't come rounded. I don't know about you but I was hugely fascinated by how they did this process.
Before the half round window went in they made a template on plywood by simply laying the window down and drawing a line around it. Then they cut and screwed pieces of wood around the inside of the template. Next it was a simple matter of cutting thin long lengths of wood, the thin wood bends, and they glued and nail each piece together.
They just kept adding layers until the desired frame thickness was achieved.
Then sanded the whole frame and filled in tiny holes with epoxy glue that really sealed the whole thing together.
Since our barn doors on the outside needed arched framing our contractors took over part of the barn for this building process while the annex was being insulated with spray foam. (Look out that big window, see the tree tops!)
You can see one arched frame for the half round window standing up in the annex along with its template. See how big they are compared to the door? This picture was taken after the annex was insulated with spray foam, you don't insulate inside walls. You can also see some of the plasterboard going up on the ceiling between the rafters. No insulation needed there since we raised the roof and insulated on the outside.
See how nice the framing came out and you can't even tell it was made out of several lengths of wood rather then one.
One of the changes mister man and I decided on was the staircase leading up into the barn. Originally it was going to be all wood but since mister man had a bit of antique granite stone left from building the two end walls (and lets be honest he can't help himself) he thought a stonewall staircase would look amazing. Unfortunately that meant deep digging for the footers since stone is too heavy for a simple sonatube.
It was a little hairy having a small excavator in the lower part of the barn under the floor joists, there were only mere inches above it to move and every once in a while the whole barn was rattled from the slight bumps from the excavator. It would have been infinitely easier had mister man decided the staircase sooner but there you go! Because the mountain we live on has a natural water aqueduct the hole the excavator dug wanted to fill with water so we had our very own mini moat in the lower part of the barn.
We were going to need the dirt the excavator removed to fill the hole back in after mister man built the footers so it was placed on the other side of the barn. See that back wall of boulders, the entire back of the barn sits on the wall and it extends about twelve feet out into the back under the soil so no fear of that puppy ever coming down. Our entire home sits on a foundation of boulders.
Speaking of puppy, Dylan couldn't help himself and climbed up on the mountain of dirt. It was cool, he likes heights for some reason, and lets be realistic, he's a dog, it's DIRT! Look at that happy face!
So while mister man went to work on the footers for the staircase and the barn was being insulated it was now my turn to head off and do some wheeling and dealing, time to see about purchasing the antique flooring! Up next the stonewall staircase, wait until you see!