The Great Shed Reveal

Finishing the shed took a lot longer than I thought it would (an omen of things to come, perhaps), but we are finally finished! And boy, is she a beaut…

The finished product

Head on angle

Since my energy level has been down a bit and I’m not much help in the ‘lifting heavy things’ department, Husband did most of the work on the shed. I think it turned out great! And the best part is that we don’t have to rely on a third party storage unit to be open if we need something out of storage. This will be the perfect shed for when Ozzie is in the mist of construction.

Don’t be fooled by the finished product, though, there were a lot of steps we took to get to this point.

First, we had to clear the area and level the land. This required a lot more digging than I think either of us wanted to do. Husband effectively dug a trench that would eventually serve as the footprint for the shed.

The beginning of the trench

Next, Husband laid and leveled cinder blocks as a sort of retaining wall for the shed. The goal here was to keep bugs and rodents out from underneath the shed. We also tried to level the dirt inside the retaining wall as best as possible so as to create a even foundation.

The first two levels of cinder blocks

We had to move a lot of dirt

The finished retaining wall

I’m working hard to level the dirt

After that, the real work began. Instead of pouring a concrete foundation, Husband set the shed on beams inside of the retaining wall and then built the floor on top of that. Next steps were to frame up the walls and put the roof on. Thanks to a good friend, we had some help getting everything done.

Floor joists resting on the beams

Husband doing his thing

I even got out there a swung a hammer a few times

Thanks to our friend for the help

Framing complete

Moving right along, we tyvek’ed the outside of the shed, waterproofing the place. Per our usual luck, the one weekend we had a trip planned it was supposed to dump buckets of rain in Seattle before we had our siding or roof on. We put up the tyvek and prayed that it would keep the place at least somewhat dry. While we were away, we heard that there was a huge wind storm in Seattle and we were sure the shed would be blown over when we returned. Thankfully, Husband’s craftsmanship is pretty legit, so the thing remind upright and dry while we were away.

With the shed tyvek’ed and windows installed, we were able to start siding the place. As I mentioned earlier, we took some extra time to try out shou sugi ban siding on the house. Totally worth the extra time and effort.

Husband working to finish the roof before the rains

Shou sugi ban siding

All we needed now was a door and some shelving on the inside! We ended up taking the door off the house Husband is working on for his business, which was nice to not have to spend the money on a door.

As for the shelves, we took the time to figure out what type of storage bins we were going to use and tried to maximize the space inside the shed. Afterall, this shed is going to serve as a storage unit, tool shed, closet, and much, much more throughout the duration of Ozzie’s face lift.

All in all, it was a good ‘starter’ project for us. Now the real fun begins!

Inside the shed, ready to fill with stuff

Our backyard with the new and improved shed

The finished product