Late June Barn Update

The contractors are done with the barn and we are waiting for the final grading. Now comes our hard work.  Today we got the first coat of stain on the wood siding, and a little bit of second coat. We went through 5 gallons of stain today.

The area around the door has the second coat. I am reserving judgement on whether or not we need a third coat.
Now comes the hard part, deciding what to do to make the barn look like an old Pennsylvania German barn.  We have all the old hinges and we bought galvanized half round gutter.

Alan is making plank doors too.
But I want the barn to have some decorative painting as well. There are so many great barns nearby that my head is spinning with ideas.  We could just paint barn stars like this:

Or we could play up the trim details. There is a theory that arches above the door (devil doors) were to fool the devil into thinking the door was taller than it really was and he would hit his head trying to get in.) We are afraid if we did both barn stars and trim details that the barn would get too busy.

Here are some of my inspiration barns:

I like the door on the far right on the white barn, its not really a door. I guess that would really fool the devil.  One thing I know for certain, no hearts!