26 April 2012

One step forward, two steps back, that’s my motto!  The more I looked at the stain on the cedar shingles on the north side of the shed, the more I thought that the color clashed horribly with the roof.  Tuesday, while delivering caloric goodies to Lynne at her office, I passed by a garage up on Lake Dunmore that was done in white cedar about three years ago… and, lo and behold, that garage has the same color stain as I’ve been using… and, guess what, the color is the same today as it was three years ago.  So I called the Cabot stain company, whose technical service representative said that I need Weatherizing Stain, not New Cedar Stain, if I want the shingles to turn gray.  Thank you, not-knowledgeable paint sales person at Lowe’s who told me otherwise.  Let me tell you, them 1¼″ narrow crown staples do a great job of fastening the shingles to the wall.  Hurricane proof and then some!  Fortunately, one of the toys tools I bought myself last year proved to be just the ticket for pulling those staples, so it only took me an hour to undo 16 courses of shingles that had taken about eight hours to put up.  The weather is supposed to dry out and warm up some early next week, so hopefully I’ll be able to get into full swing installing shingles and coating them with the correct sealer / stain… as I’m starting to run out of small projects to keep me occupied.