Airstream Skylights

There is definitely a Fall breeze in the air. I love the changing of the seasons, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't sad that summer is ending. It's been a quick one! As August comes to a close, we decided to tick a few more things off the Airstream list. Now that all of the essential projects are done, it's actually a lot more fun to accomplish things on our little aluminum home because there's no pressure to get them done. But when our Airstream's skylights arrived the other day (that's right, SKYLIGHTS!!) we didn't wait more than a day to put them in!

60's Airstreams like ours came with 3 roof vent covers that could be propped open. The raising and lowering mechanism on all of ours must have long ago stopped working because they have been held on with duct tape ever since we bought it. We just never took the tape off and they never leaked (why mess with a good thing, right?) The photo above shows two of ours- they were kind of gross looking. Ever since I read about Moonraker's new skylights, I have been totally envying them, and wanting to replace our vent covers with them. We finally pulled the trigger and bought custom Maxim Airstream skylights! Wowzer, are they well-made! I told Jacob I think they are the most durable thing on our Airstream. We sent Maxim photos and dimensions and they were very helpful. Here's how it went...

Goodbye dark...

Hello light!

The view from up top. I am standing through our first skylight, and you can see the other two old roof vent covers (also a lot of pine cone debris!)

Ah, we just love to put holes in the roof of our Airstream. The new skylights do not open and close, but after a year of living with the roof vents permanently closed, we realized that is not really all that important to us.

These puppies are worth every penny, mmm mmm!

Morgan arrived just in time to verify that there are in fact 3 skylights :)

J putting the last one on. 

We are really enjoying the extra ambient light that comes in through them- it will be awesome in the more gray months, for sure. It's also fun to walk by the Airstream at night because when the lights are on inside, they glow through the three domes on the roof now!

In other news, while Morgan and I traveled to the big city for her Birthday Brunch and Baseball game, J surprised me by taking on a project we kept wanting to do but never got around to; refinishing our Beechwood countertops. After a year of heavy use, our countertops are still awesome, but without some kind of sealant they are just absorbing moisture and stain way too easily. We went back and forth for quite awhile about what to put on them for some kind of permanent protection and finally settled on polyurethane (we don't ever cut food right on our countertops). Obviously that requires sanding and some stinky-ness from the finish. So J cleared our countertops, covered up the essentials and went to work sanding and sealing.

Glistening with polyurethane. He and the dog apparently had a little campout and slept outside that night so as not to inhale fumes. Well, J slept, and Agnes took to protecting the grounds by chasing off deer and staying on alert most of the night. She slept pretty well the next day...

The countertops do look lovely and any hesitations I had about sealing them in with polyurethane are gone. We are pretty hard on our surfaces - things are always spilling, there's always a meal being cooked, and without a dishwasher, there's nearly always washing going on. It's so nice to just see the water bead up and be able to wipe away the stain from a runaway strawberry without leaving a permanent pink spot on the counter.

Well, we're off to go enjoy what's left of the crabbing season!