Winter Coat

Insulating the perimeter of the foundation is a step easily skipped. It is a giant pain to dig down another two feet and who would know? But it is essential. The greenhouse will not perform properly without it.

Cementing Our Future

Erik's son, Jordan became a welcome addition to the crew. Mixing the cement for the footer ourselves was a different experience than having a cement truck dump four or five yards into the footer forms. We Schlepped four tons of cement from the truck to the yard and into the mixer.
Mixing. Pouring the mixture one wheelbarrel at a time into the forms. Both Deb and Jordan turned out to have a knack for mixing and Erik for schlepping.

Pretty Please May We...

Erik considered the Building Department to be evil, he was against getting a building permit. However in this case, Deb was correct, it was necessary. Four or Five Hundred dollars and several licenses (required but unrelated) later, we had a permit.
Erik dreaded the first inspection, expecting a sinister, sultry inspector who considered his primary function to be failing homeowners like ourselves.
He worked on the footer until midnight by lamplight. Next morning, the inspector pulled up in the alley and poked his head over the fence, had a short friendly chat with Erik and signed off.

Digging, Digging, and also Digging

So we hired the kid next door, actually first we asked his dad if he wanted to make some money helping us dig since he was unemployed. Dad declined, while in the same breath generously offering up his son, Matt. Dear Matt helped us out when he was bored or needed some extra doe to purchase a pack of smokes. In all fairness, he was a big help and saved us a lot of work. The dirt gets carted off, one wheel barrel after another into the front yard where we picture a grandiose new landscaping project happening soonish. Today, three or four months later, the dirt is piled up with a large assortment of robust weeds. I am expecting the guy in the white Toyota mini pickup with a yellow flashing light on top to wrap upon the door and present me with a nice little ticket citing widespread displeasure with my new heights of weedom.
We are not the neighbors best friend this month, last month or even the month before.

Greenhouse Begins

This is a garage, and it also happens to be the south facing side of the garage. This is the sunniest and warmest spot on the property. In the winter the snow melts faster here than anywhere else. This garage is 22 Ft. long.
The lightbulb goes on. "Uh, how 'bout we put the greenhouse here?"
"Yeah, let's."
Thus, the genesis of our greenhouse adventure.