The Chicken Plan Part II - Building The Hen House

On with the plan! I called around to different feed stores and found some Black Sexlink Pullets. I purchased them without having the house built. My plan, stick them in the unused dog house until the new house and pen were built. It was a good plan and worked wonderfully:

 
I just knew that these little girls weren't going to be staying little for very long! On a side note, looking back, neither was that little boy going to stay little.

So it was time to put all my research to work. I knew that I was going to have to buy some new materials but I also had already been collecting a few things to re-purpose. Our house siding is rough cut old growth fir and I wanted the Hen House to match as best I could. The solution? Use siding from an old barn on the family property that my husband's grandfather had built many years back. We'd also had a saw mill cut lumber not too long before all this and there were some extra bats for siding that I was able to use.
I needed windows! I wanted to make sure that I'd be able to open the windows any time I needed to vent the house or in the summer just too get some fresh air blowing through when we had some substantial heat. Solution: One friend's parents had an old aluminum framed one sitting around. That same friend also demolished an extra unused storage room on their home in a renovation project, I got a small window from that. The third I purchased at a building supply surplus yard. The front door was also from the friends with the renovation project. An old farm house door! SCORE!!
But before I got ahead of myself I needed a foundation for this house to sit on. Solution: rail road ties and cedar boards from a deck that my dad had built especially for our wedding reception dance floor. I love that I was able to reuse that material.
Okay, let's get started! (You'll have to excuse the horrible photography here. All of these photos came from my cell phone. I was so busy helping cut lumber, hold walls and pound nails that I really wasn't thinking of taking pictures and when I did the cell phone was the only thing handy. )

My dad is such a fantastic man. What a trooper! I told him what I wanted, asked him if he'd help me (husband was short on time due to long hours at work) and he said, "No problem." (Our neighbor has nicknamed him Mr. No Problem lol). And the first few days we worked the temperatures soared into the upper 90's and over 100 degrees. It was brutal. We persevered,

and finally had a day that dad didn't have to take off his shirt. I'm telling ya, what a trooper!
So, on with the show, I'll just leave you with a few more photos.

Front and west side:

Front and east side (where the run/pen will be):

Rear, facing north:

Stay tuned for Part III, the finishing touches and the finale!