Lifting the Roof

There's one vacant lot left between our house and the first house to the west, and they've started building the house that will be our neighbours.  We're up every morning to the sound of a generator, saws and hammers at 8 a.m.

As I mentioned back in the spring when our house was being built, our builder usually builds the roof first, lifts it off the foundation, builds the walls and then lifts the roof back on - a process I have never seen before.  Here's the roof sitting on the foundation.

I heard some commotion outside that wasn't the usual, so I went to the door to check it out.  To my surprise the huge crane had already set up and was ready to lift the roof.

Up it goes!  They're working in a very confined space here, a single lot, so they built the roof in three sections.  Four people, one at each corner can easily handle positioning the roof once the crane has it off the ground.

They swung this piece forward where they could sit it on what will be the front lawn.

And down it goes.

Before I had time to walk out front and get a picture of the crane itself they had the cables attached to the second large chunk of the roof.  A big crane for a small residential subdivision!  Our builder tells me they do it this way mainly for safety.

The second piece was a bit smaller, and these two fellas guided it off the foundation easily.

And set it down in the back yard.  I think they must have done some careful measuring to make sure everything was going to fit!

The third piece was a small dormer which was no trouble at all.

And they were left with an open floor to work on to build the walls.  This all happened a week before Christmas, and they got two bits of wall done before they took a two week break.  I don't know that they planned it, but they'll be glad that their break covered the two coldest weeks of the winter!  Of course now they'll be coming back to a building site buried in 2 feet of snow!  Day one will just be shovelling.

In no time at all the crane was lowered, the legs raised and retracted, and the huge machine was ready to leave.  I expect to see it back sometime in January to put the roof back on top.

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Woke to light snow and almost 'warm' temperatures - it was supposed to rise to only -6°C; it's only -7 even now.  But the wind blew the snow in horizontally, leaving a wind chill nearer -20°C.  I did eventually screw up my courage and went out briefly for some fresh air, but I put on all the winter clothing I had!  Warm ear-flap hat, wide scarf, and big moosehide mitts.  I survived.  Tomorrow there is actually a wind chill warning of near -30°C, which is too cold for me!  Four more days of this extreme cold to go before we get a break.