Cas went into high gear over the weekend and completed the final two trusts, which was fantastic. With so many parts, holes, nails, and bolts, it was amazing what he was able to accomplish. But now the rain has come back and provide us with lots of needed rain but brought us to a stopping… Read More Trust two and three

With working and rain off and on all week, we were slowed in our mission but found plenty to do. When he could Cas would continue to make his cuts for the other trusts, and I continued to paint of stain the boards as needed so once we had time, we could go, go, go!… Read More Prep week

With rain in the forecast, we needed to get the trusts started. They are the mainframe that the design is built around, and each has a ton of pieces that all need to fit together for the entire structure to work. Each span has between 73 and 80 bolts at various points to secure it… Read More Trust in the trusts

After returning to work, we were limited in how much time we could spend on the project, which meant after work and on days off. So we tried to take advantage of every moment we had. As Cas continued to cut the hundreds of individual pieces, I started to paint them as fast as I… Read More Nighttime projects

With the end of our vacation approaching, we had to push to get the big steps completed before we returned to work. We were able to add both the support beams today, and as Cas secured them to the top of the posts, I started to paint them in the grey color we had selected.… Read More Supports beams go up

By the Sunday of our vacation, we had dug the holes for the posts, poured the concrete, painted all the plywood needed to support the roof, and bought most of the wood and materials that we needed and it was finally time to start building. After Cas took exact measurements to ensure each post would… Read More Concrete is ready, let’s build

While waiting for the concrete to cure, we started cutting the pieces of wood we needed for the various parts, including the posts. We also started talking about a color story we wanted for the patio. We landed on grey and orange as the primary colors, with the posts and trusts in a dark grey,… Read More Colors

With the concrete curing at home, we rented a trailer and headed out to purchase the 16 ft beams we needed along with the 27 metal roof panels. The panels became a project as we had to get them from Liberty Lake as the local store had only 7. When we arrived at the store,… Read More More shopping

At the end of September, we had planned a week’s vacation to start the Big Build, but first, we needed to buy supplies. We found a used concrete mixer on Marketplace and decided it would be an smart investment along with the other planned projects. We rented a two-person auger to help us dig the… Read More Phase one

Cas spent most of the summer reviewing ideas in his spare time, and like all his projects, he spent hours watching YouTube videos on building a perfect patio cover. He spent a lot of time figuring out the math: how much wood, how would the structure support the weight, how much concrete, how much snow… Read More The idea