Finished Fence!

 Yesterday we actually took time to finish the fence by hanging the gate that Rick made a few days ago.  The fence is complete.  We wanted to finish so that we could get the fence inspected and close out the permit before winter and before we return to Florida.

This small gate on the north side of the house
completes the enclosure of the back yard.

Rick called the Permit Office this morning.  They will send an inspector out tomorrow.  We do not have to be home, and we do not have to present him or her with any paperwork to be signed at the end of the inspection.  We were told that if he or she approves the fence, we simply will not hear from the Permit Office again.  Wow!  Is that ever different from the process used in our town in Florida where one HAS to have the paperwork hanging outside for the Inspector to review and sign if you have done EVERYTHING absolutely right.  If not, the job gets tagged until all of the incomplete or unacceptable parts of the project are corrected.  

We don't think we will have any problems with this Wisconsin fence. We are well within the boundaries of our property, everything is plumb and true, the fence is neither too high nor too low, and the permit will stay properly displayed in the front window.

So what does my hard-working husband do when he finished hanging the gate?  He "watched" TV to relax.  I think it worked!!!

Now I know why Rick did not "fast forward"
through the commercials.

Gate Two

 We have reached that point in the summer where we have started to look at what projects need to be completed before we return to Florida for the winter.  First on our list was the second gate on our fence because that will complete the construction, and we then can get the fence inspected by the city.  If we do not get it inspected this year, we will have to take out another expensive permit next year to get the project approved.  That expense we can do without.

Rick dug the second of the two holes we needed for the posts yesterday.  While the Packers were winning their first football game of the season against the Minnesota Vikings (43 - 34), Rick took that opportunity to go to Home Depot to get the last few bags of concrete that we needed.  He said the store was almost empty when he went there, so he was in and out without getting near anyone else.  The same held true for Menards when he went inside to pick up some boards to slip inside the posts.  The boards are necessary so we have someplace to screw the gate hardware into when we get to that point.

The yard is set up and ready for us to mix the concrete for the
posts for Gate Two on the north side of the house.

While Rick put the boards together this morning and got them into the posts, I set up the back yard for our task at hand.  This whole thing would have been much easier if we could have used the existing end post on the fence; however, we discovered earlier when Rick originally tried to dig the hole next to the house  opposite that post that we had an eight-foot ground rod for the entire electrical system for the house in the way. Plan B called for us to dig TWO holes, to bring the gate a little closer to the back yard, and to find underground areas that would accept both posts and cement with nothing in the way.

Adding this north gate will completely enclose the back yard.

Since we had been through this routine over 50 times before (counting the posts we put in for the fence in Florida and for the fence here in Wisconsin), we did not have any problems today getting both posts into the ground and secured with cement.

Rick checks the level to make sure that both posts
are the same height. (Note the clothing: we started with
temperatures only in the low 60s this morning.)

Of course, getting the posts to match the height of the existing fence, and then making sure that the two posts we put in today also matched each other in height took a little time.  Thank God for four-foot levels!

In the end, we now have two posts ready to support Gate Two.  The posts will have to sit for about a week while the concrete dries.  That will give us time to assemble the gate.  

The two posts are plumb and parallel. Now they
just have to dry in place before we hang the gate.

Once Gate Two is hung, we can call the inspector to get the city's approval of our Wisconsin fence. That will take one huge project off our "to do" list for this summer.