It's sort of amazing how what was once buried trash, given the passage of enough time, can sometimes turn into treasure. Well, maybe not literal treasure, but a pretty neat discovery.

​I recently unearthed this bottle...

...and wanted to find out more. 

Fennerty had 7 children and several of them were prominently involved in the business, although given how frequently the elder Fennerty changed residences, per city directory records, from 1 simple flat to another, my guess is that the company wasn't all that profitable. In 1908 a fire destroyed the company's stable along with 500 cases of soda water; 2 horses perished in the fire and the company relocated a short time later to 14th and Clark. Fennerty died in 1915 in Mullanphy Hospital at the age of 59.

So there's a little history on the bottle...maybe next time I'll be lucky enough to find one that's still all there and in a little better shape. Regardless, this was a pretty cool find and I'm definitely gonna hang on to it. 

I'm learning some valuable lessons with the porch build, namely that anything that is possible to paint before installation should be painted before installation. Trying to finish paint the thing - 4 different colors - and without moving the scaffolding all around the porch in 2 foot increments...zero fun. 0/10. Do not recommend.

But I'm getting close, and ought to have it pretty well wrapped up by the end of the weekend.

In other news...I'm going to start putting rehab vids on the 'Tube. I uploaded the intro video the other day...

Let's start with the ceiling. A while back I got a full coat of paint - same color as the floor - rolled on 'er, but beaded material isn't real easy to roll. There are a few spots where I couldn't quite work any paint into the beaded areas, but that's fine because I was aiming for quick-and-dirty. I'll spray the final coat or two in a few weeks, and spraying the paint should eliminate the challenge of getting paint into the nooks and crannies.  

Then I started making the brackets, which is a process with what seems like about 7,000 steps. Their vertical dimension is 15" and the horizontal dimension is 12.25", which puts their diagonal width somewhere around 11.5". I could have reduced the dimensions a hair and cut the brackets out of 2x12s but 1, the perfectionist in me wouldn't allow for the reduction in dimensions just to make life easy and 2, I felt like using 2x12s as-is would have led to some nasty cupping and twisting down the road.    

So instead, I bought a couple 2x10s, ripped them into strips a little wider than 3", jointed and planed the strips, then glued them together into 12" wide blanks, making sure to alternate the grain direction to hopefully negate the potential cupping. ​

While the blanks were clamped up and drying I cut out a template, which boiled down to tracing an original bracket onto a scrap of OSB I had laying around, then using a combination of tools - drill press, band saw, spindle sander, etc. - to get to the final shape. ​

Once the blanks were dry enough to work with I started milling them, which required getting out even more tools. I planed the blanks flat and to a uniform thickness, cut them to rough shape with the band saw, then miter saw, and then table saw. I traced the template onto the roughed-out bracket blanks, then fired up the band saw and crossed my fingers.

My bandsaw is serviceable, in that if I spend a silly amount of time getting everything dialed in as perfectly as humanly possible, and if I have a brand new blade that is 100% appropriate for the work I'm doing (blades come in all sorts of widths and tooth counts and tooth types), and if I get really lucky, everything may work out halfway decently. This time, I got lucky.  

The band saw, even if one cuts right on the line, leaves a pretty rough cut that has to be smoothed out on way or another, which made the spindle sander the real star of the show. I don't have a need to use that tool often but every now and then it comes in very, very handy. I still had to do a little hand-sanding and chisel out a few of the tight corners, but it wasn't much. 

The only reason I was working on the brackets the past couple weekends was because I was getting rained out and unable to work on the railing. The railing has NOT been a fun install.

Because I'm in a historic district I have to use what's known around these parts as the "Soulard Handrail", which I suppose is sort of a historically accurate - in a generic sense - deck/porch railing. It's not a real complicated setup, but the bottom rail has an angled top and the top rail is kind of oval-shaped and has a dado (channel) that the balusters fit into. Combine that with wanting the railing to be level despite the porch floor being slightly and purposely pitched away from the house, as well as wanting to be able to hide my railing fasteners, and it gets a little tricky.

Oh, and it all has to comply with modern code dimensions in terms of baluster spacing, railing height, etc. 

I started working at the southern end where the porch meets the house and once I got a good order of operations figured out for installation, I got after it.  

I was feeling pretty good about my work but something was off. It took me a couple days of looking at it but it just didn't look right. So I pulled out the city-provided handrail detail and, sure enough, what I'd built was incorrect. 

Modern code calls for a maximum of 4" between balusters. That's the spacing I used, and the spacing that didn't seem right. As it turns out, the "Soulard Handrail" has balusters that are 4" on center, or 4" from the center of one baluster to the center of the next. Because the balusters are 1.75" wide, that means a spacing that's 2.25". My spacing was off, so I removed the balusters I'd already installed and redid them.  

Once I got the baluster spacing corrected I continued working my way around the porch. 

Yesterday I called a time out on the railing install so I could get a couple brackets put up. I still have a little work to do on a couple of them, but I really couldn't wait to see how they'd look on the porch. I threw a couple coats of paint - same color as the soffit, fascia, and some day, railing - on 2 I had completed and thought through the installation. 

Like everything else, the install is simple but not without a number of steps. The primary challenge is finding good spots to drive screws; with so many little curves and details, options are limited. And, my little 7' step ladder is about 1 step short of allowing for comfortable working conditions at the height the brackets are at but it's doable.  

That's where things stand. I got rained out today, otherwise I'd have finished the railing. Hopefully, after work this week, I'll be able to finish milling the rest of the brackets and installing the last sections of handrail. Then...lattice around the open area beneath the porch, and paint. Lots and lots and lots of paint. 

She's getting close. I've been saying that for a while now, but I'm running out of things to do in an effort to put off dealing with the railing. 

This weekend I got the tongue and groove beadboard ceiling installation finished up, painted the perimeter real quick, and got it trimmed out with quarter round. There's still more painting to do on that front, but otherwise...railing time. 

I wanted to throw some paint on the ceiling before calling it a day on Saturday, but the dogs wanted to check out the porch progress so instead we wrapped up the evening by just hanging out on the dusty porch floor. 

Roscoe would be right up on the edge like Freckles if he weren't so old and in poor health. He pretty much has to use his front half to drag his back half around; any time he can lay down to take some weight off his back legs, he's all about it. I think he'll like the porch when it's all done and cleaned up. I know Freckles will -- it'll give her a whole new vantage point for squirrel-watching. 

Speaking of the dogs, weekend porch progress is usually hampered a bit by meal-prepping for the dogs. I know that probably sounds ridiculous to anybody who 1, doesn't have dogs or 2, has dogs but feeds them "dog food". Roscoe and Freckles do get regular ol' dog food, Merrick stuff, but they get a pretty fair amount of "people food" too. I've always shared food with Roscoe but the older he gets the more thought and effort I put into cooking him food aimed at addressing his health situation(s). Joint strength and pain management/mitigation, really.   

This weekend I fired up a new recipe, something with zucchini. Apparently zucchini is pretty good for arthritic dogs, but Roscoe's gotten picky in his old age and meat and eggs are the only thing I can really count on him eating. Freckles, on the other hand, is a little food vacuum. She eats her food, every last little piece, then scavenges around Roscoe's bowl to eat anything he spits out. 

The recipe was something like

• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 pound ground turkey
• 1 large zucchini, shredded
• 1 cup baby spinach, shredded
• 1 cup carrots, shredded
• 1/2 tsp turmeric
• 1 egg
• 3 cups cooked rice

I doubled the recipe because even with Roscoe not eating as much as he used to, the dogs go through a LOT of food. And I don't really like anything about cooking nor is my kitchen set up or stocked for legit cooking, so if I'm gonna do it...go big or go home, right? 

So far Roscoe's eating the stuff, which makes me happy. I don't know that it'll have any real effect but the deal he and I worked out is that as long as he keeps waking up each day, I'll keep trying to turn back the clock.   

Back to the porch. Today, Sunday, I got a little paint up and knocked out the quarter round. It shouldn't have taken me all day but I put in a little yard time with Freckles and some of the quarter round took me a few cuts to get just right. 

One post required a coped 135° joint, another post required me to miter a couple pieces of trim at 67.5° each, not a gimme cut on a standard miter saw.  But the trim is up and honestly, I really like it. Kinda wish I wasn't going to paint it the same color as the ceiling and make it totally blend in, but no part of me wants to paint it a standalone color. 

I'll probably get the rest of the ceiling painted Monday after work, and then...the railing work really begins.

I've really slacked on these blogs, which is probably a byproduct of working every waking minute (not really, but it feels like it more often than not) on the porch. Care to guess what I've been working on the past couple days?

NOT THE PORCH.  

I needed a break. And, porch lumber scraps had piled up enough that I needed to get a dumpster out here so that's what I did. I got a dumpster, and I started filling it up...with bricks and stone. 

I don't have any legit "before" pics because the original plan was to only spend about half a day grabbing the easy-to-grab masonry debris that you see in the pic and throwing it away. One thing led to another and I figured since I started the job, I may as well finish it.

But that pic doesn't do the situation justice. This spot in the yard isn't viewable from the street OR my neighbors' houses, which has made it the dumping ground for all sorts of nonsense. Any time I've found buried garbage - stones, bricks, whatever - that was too big and bulky for the regular trash, I've piled it up here. Similarly, as I've slowly removed the brick pavers from sections of the yard, they've all gotten piled up here. And not neatly; "thrown" would be a better word. The section in front of the deck, that was the worst by far, just a mountain of busted bricks and broken glass and limestone of all shapes and size. 

In short, the piles of brick and stone had created a situation where it was fairly difficult to even walk through the area, and the piles had grown in size to become fairly noticeable from some of my neighbors' houses. It was long past time to do something about the mess. 

So I started organizing the stuff I wanted to keep and wheelbarrowing the stuff I didn't want to keep out to the dumpster. In the process of cleaning up the section in front of the deck I unearthed quite a few mostly unremarkable items.    

I also found the largest piece of precast material to date. It was buried fairly deep, and for the life of me I don't know what it is or why it was buried. I've found comparable pieces of the same stuff throughout the yard, but never as big or complete as the chunk I dug up a couple days ago. 

Somebody on social media said it was possibly a countertop, but I'm not sure I agree. I think it's part of a fireplace surround and mantel, based on the shapes, sizes, and detailed engraving of the pieces I'd found previously. Regardless, this thing was about a foot underground and now it's not. 

Anyhow...there have been some accomplishments the past few days. While waiting for the dumpster - it showed up many hours late - on Thursday I removed a big bush, root wad and all, that had been in the middle of the yard and really didn't serve any purpose. Today I finished up the masonry/yard cleanup and got things halfway organized.  

It's not a real big physical accomplishment, and I eventually need to find a real home for the bricks and stone, but y'all have no idea how many times I've walked past the mess back there and said to myself "you really gotta clean this shit up". Mentally, this was a MONSTER win. I even planted grass seed by the deck, trimmed up the mulberry tree in the very back of the yard, and burned a few sticks in the fire pit (mostly to keep the mosquitoes away).

And when all that was said and done, I got the scrap lumber under the porch hauled out to the dumpster. Tomorrow, it's back to makin' sawdust and progress on the porch.