more fall foliage

And of course, no camera!
It was spectacular, really. The first dawn inside the cabin we looked west over the brilliant fall foliage as the clear purple sky went to pink as the sun rose. The pure pink next to the golds, yellows, oranges, reds and greens of the foliage blazing in the morning sun was breathtaking and a bit strange too - not a color combination often seen in nature!

The cabin is in fine shape, we finished framing the windows and the door, so it really is nice and snug inside. The first night was mild (40's) and we could heat the cabin with our 12 candle candelabra (thank you Tom!)
The next night was a different story, it was windy outside and cold - I think it went down to 28, but the kerosene heater did the trick. The cabin was warm in 10 minutes, and downright hot in 60. In the morning there was frost on the ground.
I bought the kerosene heater because it sounded good and the price was right, but in retrospect it was foolish because now I need yet another fuel source - gas for tools, gas/oil blend for other tools, propane, tiki lamp fluid and now kerosene to add to the mix. Plus the kerosene stinks. Not while it is on, only when you first turn it on and when you first turn it off. Which is two times too often.

the door is here

I don't remember if everyone knows about the door, so a brief recap: After deciding to build the cabin, I wanted French Doors and found a set on Ebay. Advertised as Triple Pane glass in perfect condition, I thought I got the deal of a lifetime when I purchased them for $100.00
Then I realized they were in Maryland. I don't live near Maryland. I live two days away from Maryland. This wasn't good.
A really, really, long story short: I got lost, so it took 3 days to get the doors, re: hotel;I was in a fender bender; the doors weren't perfect and I needed to refinish them (the seller "improved them" after the sale) so they ended up in my friends shop in PA., where I decided to split them in two. The shop in PA? About an 8 hour round trip from the cabin site. What was I thinking! I don't even want to do the math on what these $100 doors really cost!

A good friend and owner of said shop in PA (Larry) brought the door out to the cabin site yesterday. It's been raining for the past few days, so everything is wet.
The door slipped in like a charm; that's when we remembered the door hardware was back in the shop. Oops.
Because of the rain , we ditched into the cabin and decided to insulate. I was thinking of using the non-fiberglass stuff, but the only stuff I could find (at Lowes) was 3X more expensive than regular fiberglass insulation. After the cost overrun's on the door, I chose the less expensive option!
Here is the insulation:
It wasn't nearly as scratchy as we remember!

The door; because of the gray and rainy day, the color is off.

And what else can one do on a cold and wet morning?

ohh the excitment!

The roof, the roof, the roof!


Bill and Joe finished the roof before the deluge hit, and I got to see what a great job they did! After near tornado like wind and rain conditions, the cabin was dry dry dry, except for a couple minor points. These were no problem to fix and a great way to see that the roof is watertight.

Here is a view from the second floor:


Fall is here and the foliage is great - here are some pixs:








Up next; the door!

The roof!

With Fall fast approaching, the roofers came in!
Being back in school and teaching, I have no time to do this myself. Bill and Joe are two excellent guys who work fast and clean. The way the installed the roof was very impressive. 1 sheet of plywood, cover with tar paper, cover with metal roof, then on to the next sheet of plywood and continue.
So much easier than what I was planning, which was to cover the entire roof in ply, then the entire roof in tar paper, then finish the roof in metal.
They will be back up Monday to finish the job!

to paint - sprayer!

quick note -
When everyone- on the web, in person, everywhere - says using a paint sprayer is the way to go - believe them!
Tried painting with a roller and quickly realized the futility of it. Rented massive generator & sprayer- 2 coats done over 2 days - the second coat took less than 2 hours!
It's not a perfect paint job, but it sure looks good to me!
And I still hate ladders!

distance

With time away, I have gained a bit of perspective.

As much as I love this little cabin, there are some things I would do differently.

1) Keep to 1 story. Who knew I was afraid of heights? I didn't until I got up there. Plus it saves $ not having to buy humongous ladders, which I will probably want to build a shelter for.

2) Figure out how long it will take, and multiply by 2. Then Multiply by 2 again. And maybe again. And again.

3) Really think about how important it is to be off road. Walking stuff in is great exercise and will keep me from bringing gigantic stuff into the cabin, but I went through 6 roofers before I found one who would agree to walk to the site.

4) Buy a generator. I used battery powered tools for the most part and I thought that was fine until I used a generator. The generator was so sweet that I rented it more than I really needed it.

5) Don't even try to charge tool batteries off your car battery, wait till you get to an outlet. After burning out the car battery twice (I'm not real bright) I would try to take long drives each evening to recharge the batteries. So-so for the battery, wiped me out.

coming along

Friends from Finland came by (yes, this has become an international project) And we flew through the remaining siding and windows - thanks Janus and Vera!
A roofer has been hired and the door must get in - mice are using the stairs for entry to the cabin!

flying rafters

Slowly and surely, the cabin is coming along. This trip put in the fly rafters and sub-fascia, plus a number of other small things. It's all taking longer than I imagine, but it will get done!

It's too hot!

Well, it is in the city - up country its wonderful; wore my sweat shirt each morning and evening!
The job (that pays) has begun, so the momentum on the cabin has slowed; this week I met with a roofer and worked the grounds as a change of pace - continuing to cut trails that my wife began.
The land is so nice - it has been a real treat being here so often watching how the environment changes. In late May the wild strawberries and oregano were everywhere; now blackberries and thyme carpet the ground. Swaths of purple flowers blanket the ground - when you walk over them the air is filled with the scent of thyme. It's magical.
As for animals; first it was dozens of chipmunks, now its dozens (hundreds?) of cotton tailed rabbit. Plus the normal deer, wild turkey, fox, with rumors of coyote and bear. And spiders and snakes and salamanders - the really cool florescent ones! And birds - forget about it! I can't even begin, lets just say that most of the time I feel like I live in a bird sanctuary. Happily the bugs aren't terrible this year.

the rafters

What I did during the heatwave - 90 - 100 degrees F.
The rafters and collar ties are in, I just need to add the outer rafters, sub-fascia and fascia, then on to the plywood, tar paper, and metal roof!
Will also need to finish off the T1-11, two windows and the door.

missing pictures

These are pictures I missed posting from a number of weeks ago.
Framing was a breeze (I had some help!) and putting up the second course of T1 -11 was fairly straight forward - once we figured out the system. The best way turned out to be to pass the T1-11 to the second floor and have 2 people on the second floor pass it to a third person who is out on a ladder. Then once the sheet is in place, the ladder person person nails in the sheets.

Nothing like the threat of rain to light a fire! The ^%$#@ rafters are in, covered with the tarp so therefore no pictures. Believe me, it is a beautiful thing. If I never see another 2 by 12 piece of lumber that I have to carry up to a roof, boy will I be happy!
Just as I finished, the skies cleared and it turned into a wonderfully breezy hot summer afternoon.

A tarp!!?! Where was my brain all these days of 90+ degrees with blaring sun!??!
Caboodles better, and the rafters are going in fairly quickly – looking for a roofer to finish the rest of the roof though, I am running out of time – my job is calling!

Remiss in keeping up with the blog – so sorry!
Lots happened, but lots of work too, without much time to pause. The second floor went in (pictures on the other computer, coming soon) and now beginning the roof. The weather has sort of been cooperating in that it isn’t raining – but it is HOT and DRY. Our water collection system, which collects rain water, has dried out – that means buying water, or filling up in the city. My low tech hot water system - a black barrel - is working, it seems to need two days over 90 degrees, and boy have we had that!

third and forth week

The camera died, a new one appeared after the fact. My friend and neighbor Mike came by and we powered through tons of stuff - we laid in the first course of T1-11 (the siding), laid in the second floor and heaved the plywood up to it, and installed the double window, one of which shattered during storage - bummer.
I have since fully set in the floor (I hate installing tongue and groove from a swaying height!) tacked in the T1-11 and generally tweaked around - the wood is upstairs waiting for the framing gun, the summer solstice has come and gone, MJ (my wife) came to visit, and it sure was nice working a little less and relaxing. The weather in general has been perfect.
Like I said in the last post - there is a big difference between designing on a desktop and doing the actual building - the second floor will look markedly different from the original design. Good-bye double pane glass door that led to nowhere and weighs a ton, so long shed roof - do I really want work with 16' 2" by 12"'s (that is 16 feet long, 2 inches deep and 12 inches wide) 25 feet over the ground at it's highest? Switching to a gable roof that will use 8' rafters will be much easier!


Some wanted to see where I stay during the construction - its a gigantic two room tent with room to stand up in - totally deluxe!

second week

Well, the camera broke, but everything else is going fantastic - just not a lot of time to say what's going on; here are some pics.
The floor was insulated with 4" of foam core, then covered with 3/4" tongue and groove ply.
First wall was the hardest, second piece begins to fall in place, then you get the idea... all done in one day,plus a little grooming of the land.
For some reason, I thought it would be a good idea to build each frame on top of each other and simply lean the first one over to land directly in place.
Yeah, right.
# one big lesson so far is that sitting in front of a computer designing my baby dream cabin and building one are two VERY different things!
I ended up having to pull each nailed frame off the platform and gingerly slide them into place.

the cabin begins

The first week has gone by, and everything is almost as successful as expected.
The lumber was delivered:


There is nothing cooler than bitchin' machinery. The truck from GNH lumber with a crane made this a super simple job.
The lumber was all stacked neatly at the end of my 700' driveway; now I just have to walk everything in another 100 yards or so.
By the end of the week, the 50 plus sheets of plywood are still waiting for movement - almost the only thing I didn't get done.

The lumber was moved to the work site

which turned out to be 140 steps away from where the delivery came in - I carried it all in so had time to count!
I hired some guys to dig in the posts about a month ago, so the cement has cured. I cut the posts down to the proper height with a chain saw. In case you don't know - the cabin will only be 12' by 12'.
I did all the work this week by myself; some of it required a couple of tricks. The posts weren't put in exactly on square, so I used my 16' boards resting on top of the posts to act as guides when I built the frame. In order to make sure it was square, I knew the frame would need some jiggle room, so the 16'ers allowed for this. Once the frame was square, I screwed it in to the boards so it would retain it's squareness.
After the frame was built, I added the cantilevered joists. Because the frame was square, I lined up the joists to it.
I'm a gee-nee-us.
I hope.
This is as far as I got - after five days the frame is done, the joists are hung, each post is wrapped with flashing (to prevent mice entry, maybe) and the 2" by 2"'s are in to hold the 4" of foam core, which will give me R26 insulation factor on the floor.
Summer has arrived - it has been in the 80's most of the time, but cooler in the woods.
I'll add the next dispatch when I get close to a computer.

Howdy all, I got me a blog!
I wanted to share how my cabin building is shaping up. I have gotten tons of help from friends, both real and imagined, plus lots of help from loads of web sites; this is my returning the favor, as it were. You may be someone like me who is thinking of building their own small cabin; I thought I would share my adventures and maybe you can learn from my mistakes!

A number of years ago I bought some property in upstate New York; it is 11 acres of young trees, having once been pasture. I am a Forest Steward and enjoy being on the property and planting trees. Staying in a tent is charming for awhile, but a cabin - something that my wife and I can be dry and comfortable in - needed to happen.

Over the past year I have been developing a plan for a small cabin; partly to avoid having to get a permit, and partly because I wanted something small and easy to manage. As a teacher I read and write a lot, so a small cabin with a bed and a chair would be perfect.

After having too much fun with Sketch-up, here is the plan.





Cool, huh! I love Sketch Up!
So here are the details:
12 by 12 with 2 by 6 framing; still not sure if I am going to do 16"OC or 24"OC; I will be speaking with an engineer before I begin.
2 stories - by the time I drew up the design with a loft area, it just seemed like it would make just as much sense to bump it up to 2 full floors.
Windows and doors: Hooray Ebay and good friends! All are double pane and each cost under $100.00. Great value plus keeping the landfill a little more empty!
They consist of a casement picture window (6' by 5&1/2') 2 smaller casement windows, and a pair of glass doors.
The door on the second floor is to reach the 15 gallon black plastic hot water tank.

The site is off road - way off road - so I will be carrying in the lumber - will see how that goes!

The piers have been installed into the rocky ground on a slope overlooking the property; it's a private place with a small view of the mountains. There is no way to say this nicely - digging 4' deep holes stinks - I finally hired someone to do it!

As I continue, I will post pictures and missives from the field.