The fence is finished! ...for now...?

So the fence is finally back together. Yeehah! It only took, what, like three weeks or so to get there. Well, I did have a twelve day work week in the middle of that which put a bit of a crimp in it. A week into the repairs I started a site move at work. Nothing like having to move several thousand square feet of server cabinets and computer racks along with all their equipment to a new site. Thankfully it all went pretty smoothly.

So, in the midst of that we have a fence that is in disarray. I'm very grateful for a neighbor and his friends that kept going on it without me and managed to get the majority of it back up so there was at least a fence between our yards again. Which, of course, can't be just that simple. No, after putting all the posts back in every section of fence doesn't fit right, but I mentioned that in the last post, so no need to digress further.

Yesterday I finally got another weekend and was able to get the rest of the supplies I needed and put my little side section and gate back together. Well, I wish it had been just that easy. Get this, we hadn't done anything to the three posts involved with this little section and gate, right? They just sat there while we worked on the rest of the fence. The south post was the only one we didn't pull out the first Saturday. So I haul my little section back over thinking all is well and go to put it in the brackets and just about quit right there. The darn thing had shrunk or something! Grrr! I tell you, not the way to start a day's work.

So I sucked it up and went next door to ask our neighbor how he had dealt with the other sections that had been short, and then returned to tackle the task. Fortunately, I was able to use some of the old 2x4's that had come off the longer sections that had been replaced last week. For a minute I thought I was going to have to make another trip to Home Depot already that day.

I measured and cut the sections down, then I had to sort out the slats and get them to hang level. Thank heavens for handy tools that give you a third hand. Those nice little DeWalt slide attachments for drills are great! It was great having it hold the screw so I could hold the slat with one hand and put the screw in with the other.

I also needed to add some anti-sag to the poor gate, so I put in the cross brace I had not managed to put in when I rebuilt the fence two years ago when it was sagging so badly it wouldn't even close. (I was interrupted by my father-in-law's stroke on that vacation and hadn't been able to put that in.) I also added an anti-sag kit with the braided wire and twist coupler to give it that extra boost it needed. And of course, that meant the latch needed adjustment so those pieces were moved around.

And at the end of the day, the gate now moves beautifully next to a nice solid fence and the kids can now be let out into the backyard without fear of their running into the street. Hooray!! (That's how my wife felt. Ecstatic!)

Another successful, if not typical, home improvement project complete! At least until we decide to refinish the poor thing... or something....