MOTORHOME BARN

One of the many reasons we moved to our new home site was to have a building close by for our 2005 Monaco Diplomat Motorhome. Here are pictures of how we are doing on that project. We bought the home (near Branson, MO) in August, 2007. Part of the sale included the builder constructing a structure to match the house, to our specs, and we’d pay his costs only. The only surprise in the project was the mostly solid rock on-site that had to be jack hammered out. You can see Jeanne inspecting the rock rubble. The barn is now up, in use since November, 2007, and functions as planned. We will paint the barn door to match the house garage doors.

The heavy hand/back labor turned out to be the stone steps and garden sections Lee decided “would be a nice compliment” to the home and barn. Well, a few thousand pounds of limestone later I’m almost done. It was a nice winter project. Aside from the physical challenge, building the steps has been an interesting and fulfilling experience. All the stone was found within 300 feet of the house. I realized I had to become a stonemason - accomplished through purchase and reading of a few books plus less than $100 in tools (no power!). I built a wood sled to haul the 150-250 pound stones with our utility vehicle. Some of the bigger ones (500-600 pounds) I split in place before sledding to the site. You can see some of the pairs in the close-up picture of the steps. At the top of the steps is a 16 foot bridge also under construction as well as a boardwalk to negotiate around the house rather than trudging through Missouri’s frequently wet clay/soil/muck. As completion of construction draws close, Jeanne and her green thumb will take over.