The Great Barn Demolition

Since we moved to our farm we have loved our barn for its looks...but that is about it.  It is not water tight, the roof leaked horribly and it was not ideal for animals.  Though we wanted to repair what was there in lieu of a total replacement, we discovered that the frame of the building was not sound and no one would repair the roof for us without a completely new frame going up.  What that translated to was more money then a demolition and rebuild.  So, we decided to start over.  And before you ask...yes we saved that beautiful aged barn wood...I am hoping when thing slow down a bit to do some crafts for sale with whatever is left after hubby builds a few more things out of it.

So, we decided to do as much of the demolition (or at least stripping the barn wood off) as we could by ourselves.  Here is where we started:

I was so very thankful for a beautifully cool day when we did this project, you would never believe how hard that was, even with the kids help it was a tough all day job!  But the next day is when the fun started.  It always helps when you are friends with your excavator, kids get an up close view that way! We got to sit on our back deck and watch the excitement.  Better then any field trip I can think of and the kids ate it up!

One of the really amazing things to me is just how easy our modern equipment makes things.  Like cutting the drive to the new barn...the grass looks like crumpled carpet with a bobcat doing the work!

I was a little disappointed though that when the barn came down it was not a big BOOM or BANG...rather it was like a tired old horse just laying itself down.  There was no loud noise, or final hooraah...just a quiet end.  Kind of sad but we will see new life in the old barn wood as we work on other projects around the farm.

So here sits the blank slate waiting for the barn raisin'  I think that too will be a fun and interesting day to watch as well!  More pics to come...