This month things moved at a slower pace. In continuation to that of repairing her floor, we started to cut pieces of wood to fit along her bottom and secure her in place. In a grid formation, we began to re-lay her foundations out again, hoping for even more support against the wind and the rain.
It was a slow and painful process, what with cutting and re-cutting the wooden supports so that she was comfortable in her old age. Tirelessly, we slaved at the chainsaw for what seemed like days on end, hoping for the most perfect support that she could have – whilst ensuring everything remained structurally sound and level. Oh, and geometrically perfect – until the chainsaw broke on a stubborn tree root.
However, we had enough wood so, by hand, slowly but surely, her new bottom began to stabilize her and keep her, literally, grounded. She was still hovering above the floor, until we can sort out the uprights but at least her base was good and firm.
We then began to look at her exterior and how she has concaved in on one side because of the tree that had disfigured her spine. Now that the tree had gone, we were able to start looking at the other doors in the hope that they would prize open. It was to our amazement that they did with a bit of help! However, the opening was only small and would need a lot of work to ensure that the doors would open fully for when we eventually finish her.
Putting that aside, we got back to work on our main concern; the floor. After many trips to local stores, we decided that the flooring, although temporary, and to ensure manoeuvring around whilst painting and decoration would be easy, would be made out of loft flooring. It was secure enough and cheap enough that we could buy as much was needed to cover a sufficient amount of her gridded derriere up, whilst easy enough to rip out once she got her face on and we could afford more expensive flooring.
So again, we became slaves to the chainsaw – that is, until it broke…again. So, we had to go out and buy another chainsaw after deciding that this one had had its day. The new one posed great in working to cut the (much thinner) loft board and made for easy work in ensuring everything was neat and orderly. And the screwing down didn’t seem so bad either.
All was looking good so far, and next month, we hope to continue our quest to make her more stabilised and to look into why her doors would not open sufficiently. But work on the carriage is proving slow as KSEL has had a lot of work in recently.
From all of us at KSEL, we wish you a happy new year.
