Power, decks, brackets, and a burn pile

Katie and I spent all Saturday afternoon up at the cabin cleaning up and watching Norm & his Son, Spencer, mount big beautiful black brackets on 2 or the large weigh-carrying beams.

But first, we FINALLY have power in the cabin.

The first and last time this power meter will ever read 0's.

The power meter in perspective with the burn pile (and my drone case) off to the left.

Chelan County PUD put a new power termination box on the property line. And the orange tape marks a Frontier cable.

And a new transformer across the street with a snow flag on it.

Spencer Smith is our able-bodied bracket manufacturer and installer.  He had the steel cut with a plasma torch, then welded it up himself. I just think wood is never more beautiful than when it's contrasted with some big, black metal.

In Spencer's shop late Friday night welding it up. This is the bracket for the back (North) support beam.

Spencer finishing up the install on the breacket. He's still got one more to go on the corresponding beam on the front of the cabin.

And what would a day at the cabin be without a good burn pile with some roasted hot dogs.

The other project of the day for Norm & Spencer was getting the back deck and the front porch deck installed and flasched. They'll be covered with a water-proof, sand textured coating in the next couple days.

The front entry from the front door opening.

The front porch and the newly installed garage door.

The view from the front porch.

The back deck. It's small on purpose, so that it is covered from snow by the roof.

The back deck from the back yard / firepit area.

A quick basement framing update. Our laundry room will be a little larger than orginally planned, which is great. The area under the stairs will have a fun, odd-shaped door with an angled top.

A finally a quick update of each side of the cabin. Moving from the front, counterclockwise around.

And last but not least, the view from the main floor great room.

Fireplace sighting, and rumors of power.

Not quite a rainbow unicorn, but close...

And I received verbal confirmation from a reliable on-site source (Norm) that power from the PUD has been hooked up!

Updates: Fireplace, Roof, Framing, Burn pile and more

A friend verbally kicked me on the phone the other day, reminding me that I was delinquent in updating the blog. 

There's been a flurry of things happening to get it buttoned up before the permanent winter snow comes -- although we have had PLENTY of early season snow.  Six to nine inches last weekend on Saturday!  Thankfully, we're having a sunny reprieve this week that's allowing the snow to melt.

Katie out front on Saturday, October 21.  About 6 or 7 inches of fresh snow.

Here's a quick rundown.

Took last Thursday off to go meet the fireplace installers. They kind of whimped out when they got up there. The cabin is not in white-glove condition, and they started coming up with excuses as to why they couldn't get it installed.

"It's *REALLY* heavy."
"Those stairs are pretty narrow."
"The framing's not quite right."
"That roof is really high."

Well, they left with their tail between their legs, and after a visit by Norm, he agreed to take the fireplace back up today and lift it in to the cabin with his backhoe. They are supposed to come tomorrow and get it installed along with the chimney. We'll see.

Our return-missionary daughter, Abbie, sitting where the fireplace is supposed to be.

Temporary supports holding up the fireplace shed dormer.

When we were there that day for the fireplace install, there was just a TON of water coming in from the roof due to a lose panel used for getting up easily from the top floor and due one spot missing some roofing membrane. Norm fixed it all, and the framing is drying out nicely.

We went up again on Saturday, not realizing how much snow there was. 

April 21, 2017 -- Approaching Stevens Pass Summit on Hwy 2

April 21 - the road driving in to the cabin.

Our port-o-potty snow gauge outside the cabin.

Free advertising for our builder, Norm Smith of Homes Northwest

We attempted to pick through the rubbish pile to pull out all the good lumber that we can use for burning, and then burn the rest. But even with multiple doses of white gas, we couldn't get the waste lumber to burn. It was just too wet.  But we did stack a bunch of the lumber we'll use for the fireplace in the garage to dry out. And we moved the rest in to an out of the way pile so Norm could spread crushed rock in the coming week.

Standing in front of the unsuccesfully torched burn pile.

Much of the dirt that was stack up against the foundation has been spread down on to the septic drain field. It hasn't gotten a final grading, but it's much closer.

There was still a pile of lumber on the property line out in the weather.  It should be mostly used up as the interior framing is completed this week.

As of today, the metal roof is fully installed, except for a couple pieces of flashing (that may be on, but I haven't confirmed.)

The framers came back today to finish up the inside framing on the bottom floor.  (We did some minor changes to door positions to optimize the location for the dryer, so the vent has as short a run as possible. The door to underneath the stairs will be short and cut slanted on top. The entrance to the laundry room from the main room will be a sliding door, and the door from the laundry in to the garage will be a regular door opening in to the room.

This is the wall between the garage and the laundry.

You can see the scrap lumber pile in the bottom lefthand corner.

Exterior doors are supposed to be installed this week as well.

The pile of beautiful crushed marble sitting at the bottom of the driveway should also be spread out now..

I'm panicking because we're 3/4 of the way through our money, but we're definitely not 3/4 of the way done building. Things will slow down necessarily over the winter, and also for financial reasons. Gonna have to start doing more of the work myself. 

But the structure is sturdy and weather protected now, which was the objective this year.

The exterior stairs shipped early this week, a couple days late. The truck's due to arrive on November 1st, and I'm hoping the weather holds out so we can get the truck to the site to offload the stairs. Tons of confusion back and forth with the stair manufactururer on shipping, but I think we've got it sorted. There is a lift gate on the truck, but the stairs are too long for the lift gate -- so we'll need a few sturdy hands to meet the truck when it arrives.

Looking up from the basement through where the front entrance still needs to be framed.

Katie looking out the back deck door. (I think this is a masterful selfie...)

SkiDoo winter commute extender

I picked this up this weekend off of Craigslist. Very clean but older SkiDoo Grand Touring v1000. It'll seat 3 people and should be the perfect sled for transporting back and forth during the winter from the plowed parking area to the cabin 3/4 of a mile away. (Plus, a fair amount of cruising around the neighborhood for fun.)

Katie cleaned out our garage last week to allow me to park my car, but it's been (temporarily) displaced until we get a little more snow up in the mountains.

More snow and a close call.

More snow at the cabin overnight. But thankfully as the sun came out today, the meleting accelerated. As we were standing in the open drain field, we heard a loud rumbling sound and quickly realized the snow -- ALL the snow -- was sliding off the roof. Katie and I managed to avoid getting hit by quickly darting toward our neighbors cabin, but our poor dog, Sammie, got clobbered by a big clod. Thankfully, it was only a few inches on the roof, but when it slid off it covered from below the roof eve all the way across the drain field.  You'll see some evidence further below in the picture of the side of the house.

Took some time to measure all the upstairs and downstairs rooms so we can start planning doors, cabinets, counters, and sinks.  You'll see panoramas of the master bedroom and bunk room. Garage door was supposed to go in today but apparently it was framed correctly and that has to be redone before it can go in.

The snow level is supposed to rise this week giving us our last gasp weather window to get things buttoned up for the winter.

The road outside the cabin.

View from the road.

View from the road.

From the front of the driveway looking East toward the edge of the drainfield.

From the driveway looking up at the snow curling around the edge of the roof.

View of the snow curling aroudn the edge of the roof.

Our septic system drain field open for inspection.

A pile of "snowy" lumber for framing.

Dirt piled up against the side of the foundation. It will be partially scooped back on top of the drainfield.

Standing in/on the drainfield looking NW. The green tubes are the access to the septic tanks.

The green types are the access to the septic tanks.

AFTER the snow fell. Snow doesn't just gently slide off. It accelerates as it slides so that the snow that was at the top of the roof is moving faster than the snow on the lower side of the roof. The fast moving snow covered the far edge of the septic field where I'm standing taking this picture.

Panorama of the bunk room taking from the doorway. Katie and Sammie in the foreground.

Panorama of the Master bedroom from the doorway.

Panorama of the Master bedroom from the N.E. corner.