Some life lessons are free, others cost just enough to make you never forget them. This is the story of one such experience.

So, we had grand plans for our homestead and we still do for the most part. One of which was to build a community greenhouse! However, as time passed and our own projects took precedence, this idea started to wane. Actually it kind of just died. To rekindle that flame, Ally decided to take things into her own hands.

Soooo ... without discussing it with myself or Yolan first, she went on a quest to find "us" a greenhouse. To the 'interwebs' she went and sure enough, she came across something that was too good to be true! A FREE Greenhouse!! Wow!! She was excited! How could she pass this opportunity up? So, she called the seller. Apparently someone else was interested as well but not if she had anything to do with it.

She sent a text out to us asking if we could go pick up this greenhouse (that neither of us had seen or knew anything about for that matter). Yolan wasn't much interested and opted out of the whole endeavor. Oh, if she had only come, we would have saved $507! Hindsight is 20/20.

The Reluctant Ride

Although hesitant (I saw the picture and was not impressed) the two of us hopped in the truck and turned into the neighborhood. We were directed to come around through a short little alley. We stopped the truck, got out, and noticed that there was dog poop everywhere.

While trying to watch our steps through this poop mine field, we went to the place where, laid on the ground, were parts of this supposedly awesome greenhouse. We looked at each other and, in my mind, I was hesitant to haul this piece of junk to our homestead. The thought came to my mind that this would cost us $7. Why you wonder? You'll find out soon.

Ally on the other hand, was determined to make this work even though there were no screws to connect all the parts and some of the aluminum framing posts were bent. I mean, it was dirty, discolored, with cobwebs everywhere, laying on the ground underneath weeds. We probably displaced a couple of snakes moving it. In short, it was a disaster.

The owner, tried to convince us that it's still in good condition and expressed that she was glad that someone could use it so she wouldn't have to trash it.

Unfortunately, neither of us were brave enough to say no and just leave. We had reached the point of no return. You know how it is, we're not the only ones who have been here. Clarity and reason are screaming "This will not work!" but you're too deep in to gracefully walk away. In our minds, we were stuck.

Harbingers of Doom

So, reluctantly, we started loading the pieces. It took a while. You can imagine how each piece loaded could echo the thought through our minds of, "This is junk!". Mind you, we still had the poop mine field to navigate through while doing this. It's almost like these were signs alerting us that we should vacate the premises as quickly and as empty-handed as we possibly could. Sadly, we ignored those harbingers of doom.

We managed to get everything into the truck bed and proceeded to make our exit. It was a small yard and we needed to turn the truck around. Well, in the process of backing up, we heard a sound. One of the long framing posts hit a tree but we didn't think much of it and were anxious to leave anyway. So, off we went.

During our ride back, I commented that it was going to cost us $7. Ally looked perturbed so I clarified saying that it will cost us $7 to take it to the dump. We don't have garbage pick up services, so any trash we accumulate has to be taken to the local waste station and dumped for a small $7 fee.

Well when we got back to the homestead, it was already dark. I got out and noticed a darker space in the back window of the truck. I tried to touch it and magically, my fingers went through it! There was no window there! Oh no! We had a problem! The window had been shattered likely when we backed the truck up at the place.

 
This was not in the plans. Now we needed to find a temporary solution until we could get the window replaced. We cut a piece of cardboard and taped the broken area so that we could still use the truck.

I Can Do It By My Own Self!

Ally learned that to get the window replaced would cost $500 with parts and labor!! Five. Hundred. Dollars. All three of us decided that we would replace the window ourselves to save some money (Yes, we're cheap).

So we had to take out the back seats of the truck and the plastic coverings from the window. Then we had to remove the broken window and put the new window in. Wow, Praise the Lord! We did it!

Wait, we forgot to make sure that the window was sealed properly. So we poured water from the top to test that out. We started on one side and it looked promising, so we continued going along the rest of the window.

Sadly, we found a leak, a pretty bad one. We tried putting more sealant on the outside, thicker than before thinking it would work, but to no avail. We gave up. We turned to good ole You-Tube and decided that we had to redo the whole thing! AHHH!

So on another free day, we repeated the process of removing the window and scraping off all the old sealant. After a few hiccups and blunders with our new tools, we succeeded. We installed the back window. Hooray! But don't look too hard at it. If you do, it will become glaringly obvious that a group of amateurs did it.

The Messy Conclusion

All in all though, it was a successful mess of an installation that cost us upwards of $500 for the window, the tools, and the materials we bought. This is not taking into account our time which would add to the cost. Likely it probably was closer to 7 - 800 dollars. We'd have been better off just paying a professional to do it :-/ But hey, then we wouldn't have this neat story to tell! Right?

Months later, because Ally couldn't stand looking at the un-assembled, sad excuse for a greenhouse anymore, as it was a constant reminder. We loaded it up in the truck and took it to the dump. It cost us $7.