Sukkah - New and Improved!

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It is Sukkot again! I love Sukkot and am looking forward to when everyone else loves it too, so we don't celebrate alone.

This is our third year building a sukkah. If you remember last year, the kit we put together that we hoped would be reusable for several years proved us wrong.

So we were really glad to have some 4 by 4 treated posts I'd bought in hopes of building a back porch a year or so ago, but have just been decorating the side of the house since then. So we changed out the silly little scrap wood corner posts for something substantial.

Here's the first wall we put together; the back wall.





The 4 by 4 posts made each upright corner, and we reused the 1 by 4 pine for the horizontal pieces. The broken boards were reincarnated as cross supports. And the whole thing was screwed together using an L-square to make sure it wasn't catty-whampus.





With only two people, getting these things up and screwed together always reminds me of Laurel and Hardy movies. But there is no way to do it, but to just jump in. So the next thing we did was use that wall (all the walls are 8 by 8 feet square) as a template to get all four corners level. You can see the little scraps we stuck under there to level it out.





Then a side wall was assembled and readied to be hoisted up and screwed to the post very quickly.





Not an easy thing to do. One person has to hold up one wall. Another person has to hold up another wall. Another person has to line it up and hold it. And a fourth person has to be in position to screw it together. With only two people I can't tell you how we accomplished it, only that it hurt, and it's possible one of my arms is still laying out there in the grass.

But it was up. Make sure, if you do something like this, that you stabilize and support those horizontal boards well, so they are not flopping around while you are trying to fasten the whole thing.

Also, you can see a board leaning up against the post. That is being used to support the wall to keep it from alling that way, which was the direction it was inclined to go. We put in the post a temporary screw and tucked that board underneath it. You could actually do that on both sides.

I won't admit that I didn't think of that while we were out there.





Once the two walls are up, the third wall is much easier, and the fourth wall is a breeze to connect.





We did not finish it in time for Sukkot, but had to leave to go do a job. We were back at it the next morning though.

We brought down the fabric we've used every year





and laid it out to staple up.





Well, some of us were working. Apparently some of us were supervising.





So I went and brewed some iced tea. After all, we were supposed to be relaxing by now.





OK... Good.... still relaxing...





And we began putting up the fabric. It was a beautiful day! Sunny and warm, with big puffies, and a nice light breeze.





While I finish stapling





Michael makes a twine grid for the roof.









It's getting pretty hot though, so we used twine to make pretty bows. We really liked this effect. You still have walls, but airflow. Precious Oxygen, I love you!









Neighbor is busy. Looks lovely.





Boy, you turn around for a minute...





Going on the third day now.

We made a trip up for cedar bows.





And tossed 'em up!





Making slight adjustments from the interior.





I love Sukkahs!





Fixed up the front and it was time to enjoy.





And then the rain came in and we've been waiting to get out there and enjoy it.

We love rain and we love when the skies clear.

It's all good.

~Faith

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