Clean up.

Clean complete at our Hyde project! A couple of trash cans.. all that's left of someone's roof sitting at our curb. Part of every project is cleaning up, returning the space to the way we found it.. but better. It's been almost a week or so it seems that the Carpenter, myself and our lead Carpenter gathered the stuff of our trade and started trips back to the cabinet shop. …


The dumpster got picked up– alas the reason for end project debris at our curb– the satellite made its way down the driveway. We swept sawdust that had accumulated here and there, organized the work trailer and cleaned the garage which held a bounty of tools, paint supplies and miscellaneous scraps of wood. We took down our "outside" worktables and folded gigantic tarps. We loaded ladders and scaffolding. 

A pile of aluminum headed to the recycling center. And a pile of roof wood headed to our home to be used next winter as kindling in our wood burning stove.

I spent one more time picking up tiny bits of construction on the ground- insulation, slivers of soffit metal, and prying stubborn nails up from between the deck boards. Tedious but necessary to leave a safe project site for the homeowners after we leave.

And one last inspection. And one last coat of paint on the living room wall. 

Between trips we headed back to our Sycamore project to do site clean up. Whenever we complete a project when there is snow still on the ground we always return for clean up when the snow melts.

So many aspects to what we do. Not just building and fixing, but leaving a job well done. Clean, organized. Like we were never there at all.

~ the Artist