3 work days and 1 Bear

I escaped to KnArrow Haus for some late afternoon-into-evening work this week, and also on Saturday.

On Tuesday evening Katie was in the back yard looking at her phone when she looked up and saw a large brown bear at the front of the hosue standing up and staring back at her. As soon as she looked up, he sauntered away toward the neighbors. Katie ran in to the basement, simultaneously freaked out and excited.

She dashed upstairs and took these videos from the front porch.

The bear also confronted a neighbor and tried to open their front door.

AND the bear tore off some siding at a neighbor's house.

Due to the aggressiveness of the bear, Fish & Wildlife came out today and set a trap.

Amidst the bear kerfuffle, I managed to complete all the pine in the downstairs and add the final cap boards on the main level walls.

Downstairs wall.

Doorway to the upstairs.

Bottom of the stairwell.

Added the top board on the main level. Oh, *and* moved 40 sheets of plywood
out of the garage up to the main level.

The remaining sheets of plywood that we moved upstairs.

Our custom kitchen and kitchenette cabinets are scheduled to be delivered on Wednesday. For now, we'll store the cabinettes in the garage until we get the floor finished. But our next task is to cut and apply sealer to these sheets of plywood and install them on the ceiling.

Let there be light (fixtures on order)

With the walls nearing completion and the ceilings not far behind, we've begun to order our finish-grade lighting fixtures. 

Shopping online for lights is mentally exhausting -- there are so many lights that are nearly the same (and most of them kinda suck.) And almost all of them seems a lot more expensive than they ought to be. 

Just sharing the directions we're headed. All of these have been ordered and should arrive by mid-June.

These are the recessed lights in every room on the top floor.

These sconces will be in the family room.

These sconces will be in the upstairs hallway at the top of the stairs.

These sconces will light the lower stairwell.

Sconces for the master bedroom on each side of the bed.

  

Bunkroom sconces.

Finished Upstairs Pine Amidst Power Outages

Lots of rain and lightning today, but luckily we hit a break in the rain upon our arrival. There are bare patches on the road coming in, but the snow is still too deep and far to slippery to risk attempting with a 4WD vehicle.

First order of the day was to finish up the pine in the master toilet room. Took a little over an hour to finish up the wood over the sconce rough in and the angled cuts against the ceiling.

Finished pin in the master toilet room.

Katie took the mitre saw's reigns for the main bathroom.

I was the measurer and nailer. 

The documentation of what's burried in the bathroom wall.

Mackenley spent the day with movies on the iPad

and building with scraps and tape.

A lightning storm killed our power just as we started

trimming the window in the stair well.

Luckily a headlamp and 20V tools allowed us to continue

until the power came back on after about 20 minutes.

With the stairwell window properly trimmed,

we'll move on to the basement.

Memorial Weekend - 3 days of Wood and Messes

Over the Memorial Day weekend we worked Friday afternoon, all day Saturday, and all day Monday.

Finished bunkroom wall on Friday evening.

The resulting bunkroom mess after 3 days.

Whereas the bunkroom took me 3 work days, I was able to finish the master bedroom in only 2 days AND start on the master bathroom wall.

Finished the master bedroom wall in 2 days.

Katie cut her finish carpentry teeth sawing boards
to length for the master bathroom.

The mess after 2 days working in the master bedroom. 

When we arrived home Monday evening I had a note from the Etsy vendor, Aqua Concrete Studio, letting me know my custom sinks are shipping in the morning! 

Custom sink for the 1/2 bathroom on the main level.

I'm in love.

After 2 workdays in the bunkroom....

After 2 workdays in the bunkroom:

I got the pine up the wall to here.

After 1 day in the bunkroom, the windows sills were trimmed
and the first 2 rows of pine installed.

And this is what one looks like after 2 workdays in the bunkroom,
frazzled and sweaty unshorn hair and beard, covered in sawdust.

Why does it take so long? Why doesn't this stuff just "go up".

• The wood isn't in the best shape so it takes a little time to choose the pieces. Some pieces are warped, and the color varies between the pieces of wood.
• You gotta set that first piece level -- it sets the course for everything afterward.
• Because this is "trimless" finish work, making the cuts around outlets, light roughins, windows and to length against walls takes a lot of time. 
• Exposed cuts have to be sanded. 
• The pine is often slightly warped and wavy, which makes setting one piece on top of the other difficult at times.
• Sometimes...I make mistakes.

What tools have I been using:

• Chop/mitre saw
• Track saw for ripping the sheets of plywood to the correct width for the window sills.
• Oscillating multi-tool for detail cuts and for sanding.
• Hole saw and drill for cutting out the holes for the sconce rough-ins. 

An hour or two left in the bunk room, then it's off to the master bedroom. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.

Finished pine on main level

Finished installing the beetle-stain, blue pine on the main floor.

After finishing the wood on the main floor, I assembled my new 6 ft. rolling work platform, then moved all the saws, nailers, saw horses, extension cords and a supply of plywood and pine to the top floor so that I can begin the wood there on my next visit.

Katie took Mackenley sledding, suffered through working with me on a challenging cutout in the pine around the top of the back door, and painted the door jambs on the top and main floors.

Mackenley did some sledding, watched 3 movies on the iPad, turned his nose up at a frozen Indian curry meal (the green beans in particular), and helped me shopvac the miter saw.

First (late season) snowman of this kid's life.

The snow has melted noticeably. I'm guessing there's still about 5 to 6 feet on the ground, but it's down from the lofty heights last month, and obviously down from our visit last week. 

Another weekend unpiling wood

I got so busy today that I neglected to take the final picture so you don't get to see the wood all the up the right side of the window. 

And here's the behind the camera after Katie wore him out sledding. 

Mackenley watching Rin Tin Tin.

Window Wall Wood with a New Family Member

I finished firring out the main room's windows and started on the wall pine. We had a new family member in-tow, Mackenley -- fresh from Haiti! This was his first experience with snow. He was exhausted from the long trip from Haiti, and we also discovered he'd been hiding a very swollen knee due to an escalator injury in the airport.

The window sills are now firred out with finish-grade plywood. And I started on the wall pine.

Mackenley's first experience with snow.

Mackenley, Eliza and Sammie watched a movie on the iPad while I worked.

Entry Pine and Furring Out Windows

Another socially distant Saturday at KnArrow Haus. While listening to the general conference, we finished the pine in the entry/mud room at KnArrow Haus, then went on to furring out the windows in the kitchen/family room.

Beetle pine finished in the mud room.

Furred out 3 of the 6 windows in the family room
with 1/2" finish-grade birch plywood.

Admiring the view our the newly furred-out window.

The snow on top of our water system.

It's a crime that Stevens Pass is closed for the season. The now is epically plentiful. Another foot of fresh pow when we arrived this morning.

Oh, and Katie went up with Nasca 😇(#fitnasca) on Thursday and finished painting the downstairs (Thank you!!!)

Olaf's Snowtracker Exits March with a BANG!

With over a foot of snow in the final days of March, the snowpack at KnArrow Haus is the highest in over 5 years. 

125 inches, nearly 10-1/2 feet of snow on the ground at midnight, March 31st. 

A crying shame that Stevens Pass and all ski areas across the West had to shut down due to #Covida-19. According to news reports, Washington's snowpack is 104% of normal.

But things aren't exactly "normal" right now, are they?