.... still moving foward.... very slowly...

Well, we haven't been able to do a whole lot of work at the cabin these past couple of weeks... it seems we've been under a winter storm alert, with piles and piles of feet of snow dumped on the mountain... and it makes it a little impossible to drive the truck up the hill... even with four wheel drive...  But, we've been doing other little things that are necessary, so that's good...  

Jim started figuring how many bricks we would need to cover the patio area floor...he calculated and calculated and came up with a number... and, then I reminded him of the pallet load of brick that is still in our backyard and it threw the whole calculation off...  go figure... The bottom line is, we have enough to do the patio and jacuzzi area, and to build the pizza oven.. and then some...  Our trailer is still in  Coalville being filled with one last load also...  The narrative below, is Jim's calculations......

"OK, from the measurements I found that I took of the patio area, without the hot tub area we need 36 layers of bricks.  From this photo I can count at least 39 layers and that’s before we got the bricks from the torn down house.

So, estimating the hot tub area needing maybe 8 layers and the torn down house bricks as being 4 layers and the next load from Coalville being 6 layers I think we have more than enough bricks to cover the whole patio area. 

Mark this phase of the cabin building as completed."

On my travels on Saturday, I found this iron dinner bell. Sounds like a metal triangle thing they have on ranches or a chow wagon...... a little unusual, but I really got a kick out of it.. These are usually in a triangle, but the heart shape was more my style.  Jim told me that we'll put in on the deck, and when I have lunch or dinner ready, I'll have to clang the heart, and he'll come running..  I like that idea.

And, a week ago, we found the cutest store in Orem...(just a couple of miles from our house in Provo...)  I can't quite remember what it's called, but, it's a country type store.. and it has, I swear, the best ice cream ever (BYU Creamery)... We got a treat last week, and went back again last night when we got back from Salt Lake.  Last week, Jim found this little mat, and we thought we would put it by the jacuzzi.  I think it's totally appropriate.  It's about 2 feet wide...

We were in  Costco last weekend, and I saw these sheepskin rugs... I really like them and thought it would be perfect...  As we were picking one out, we had the most inappropriate conversation with a completely anonymous couple... never saw them before in our lives.. younger couple...  They told us what they do with their sheepskin rug in front of the fireplace... told us we should try it...  Um..  seriously.. what's the comeback to this?  After I unstuck my eyelashes, all I could come up with was "If we got down on the floor, on this rug, we've had to call the paramedics to get up standing again..."  It was an educational conversation.... with strangers... Either way, we bought the rug and we're going to enjoy it, no matter what it's purpose is.

It was cold in the house this morning, and when I got up, Jim said that he covered up with the sheepskin and it kept him super warm... I'm encouraged by this update.

We have really amazing neighbours up on the mountain.  They are from Henderson, which is in the Las Vegas area and they are wonderful... (except for the fact that they are Vegas Knights fans.... and, I thought the mountain was Leaf's territory.... hmmmm....) Giggle... They sent us this picture of the mountain a week ago from their security cameras...  As you can see, it's kind of intense..

As always, and even in the snow, the adventure continues...

Love, Jim and Cheri

Day By Day... it's getting closer!

Well, the construction continues with the the siding on the cabin continuing.  This past week, more of the siding has been completed and this is one step closer to having the outside of the cabin protected from the elements in the next 4 months.  The door frame looks amazing, and the siding around it looks fantastic. Jim is discussing the soffit and facia with Howard now.  And, may I just say, Howard does great work!  He's been a blessing.
 

It's starting to look like an actual cabin!  This is a side shot...

..and under the eves at the front of the cabin....

When Jim and I were out running around on Saturday, we found this wood trim.. the price was right so we bought 8 pieces of the smaller trim and 8 pieces of the larger trim. Jim had said that he thought it would look great on the side of the island. I think it's going to look amazing between the wood and the wall in the bedroom downstairs... maybe both... In either case, it's amazing looking. I love it, because it looks like twisted rope, and it's actually wood.

We also bought a couple of newel posts for the stairway going from the great room to the loft.

Jim sent me this picture while he was still in hotel in Panguitch. I had packed a bag with his clothes and toiletries for his trip. When he took out his clothes in the morning, a little friend crawled out. Jim, apparently, did not want the company, and quickly ended their friendship... giggle... I don't know where or when Spiderman decided to take a trip too the cabin, but, his little vacation didn't continue for long... Jim was totally creeped out. Jim wonders how Cheri would have felt finding this in her clothes just before she put them on? (Cheri would have had a heart attack and sent the clothes to the cleaners...)

We have been trying to get Garkane propane to drop off the propane tank on the cement pad that we had poured a couple of weeks ago, and it seems that every time we figured that the delivery was going to be made, it just fell through. So, Jim made a trip over to see them on Monday morning, and apparently, spoke to the right person/people, because on Monday afternoon, the truck showed up, with the tank, and a 2nd truck showed up, and pumped 425 gallons into our brand new tank... that's a whole lot of bbq-ing... Uhuh... I said, BBQ. The guys who delivered the propane, are setting up the tank so that we can hook it up to the BBQ grills... Giggle.

The guy did tell Jim to make sure that he turned off the BBQ grill after each use, because the propane will just run until the 500 gallons is gone...

And, there she is... set on the pad, filled to the brim, and ready to be hooked up to the furnace... and BBQ....and, now I'm thinking... BBQ ribs, BBQ steaks, foil dinners, BBQ country style ribs... you name it...I'm a gonna BBQ it!

Jim met with the furnace installer guy on Monday at noon, and he said he was available to install the furnace/air conditioner and the duct work at the end of December... That's perfect, because this is about the time that it is slower at Jim's work, and he'll be able to oversee the project. This also means that, with heat in the cabin, we'll be able to go during the really cold days, and actually work inside. Not sure without any insulation we could heat it during the nights... ( The last time we stayed over night in the cabin, is was 31 degrees... um, a little too frosty for my taste..)

The island in the kitchen is all installed, and Jim's next project is to install the cooktop and a small sink. And, this is the arrangement I liked the most... I think it fits nicely, and would be very workable.

And, before Jim left to come home, he pulled the skidoos down to the winter storage area. This means, when the roads are too snowy to drive up, we can skidoo up and not have to walk up the hill... which I am totally unable to do. Last year, we didn't get them pulled down to storage until after the first snow.

This was something I bought for Jim as a late birthday/early Christmas present. He really needed a bigger tool box to hold stuff like Skil saws, framing nailers, etc.- I really think that while we are in Provo, the tools are procreating because every time I go back to the cabin, there seems to be more... strange...

So, there's now another home for a little more - than sitting on a table, or in a box...

I guess tools are like teenagers... don't leave them alone because you don't know what mischief they'll get into when they are unattended... Lesson learned.

As this was my birthday week, I have been reflecting on the past... and, it's been a little teary for me..

Every year on my birthday, my mom and I would have a little visit about the day I was born.. In the last couple of years before she passed, I would talk and she would listen, but the story was always the same... My mom passed in March, 2018, so I am now telling this story to you..

On the day I was born, my mother had decided to get ready for my birth, so she decided to haul my two older brother, Barron and Bart, out in the cold, to go grocery shopping. They were living in Port Credit, Ontario, and being that it was December, it was super cold.. She said that she bundled the kids up, aged 6 and 3, and they walked in the cold to the grocery store... She said that her tummy was so big, that her coat didn't cover it all, and when she got to the store, her tummy was super cold... She did the shopping, and then walked with the groceries and the boys back home. When she got home, her labour started, and I was born later that day... She always said that she thought her tummy had frostbite...

When I was born, I had something called erythroblastosis fetalis - that's the Rh factor condition that today can be cured with meds... Here's the part that cracks me up.. The hospital didn't know how to treat the condition, and they wanted me sent to Sick Children's Hospital in Toronto.. So, they put me in a little incubator, and put the incubator in the back of my dad's car, and my dad drove me to Sick Kid's Hospital for blood transfusions... No heat, no oxygen, just a glass incubator, and a blanket.. Can you imagine this happening today? Giggle... (My dad said that after having Bart, and him being so fair and blonde, I didn't look like I fit into the family with an olive complexion and black hair...)

(I remember when Coy was transferred to Primary Children's in Salt Lake, right after he was born... HUGE INCUBATOR, airlifted by Life Flight... flight nurses... pilots, oxygen tanks.... heaters... wouldn't have fit in the back seat of my dad's Nash....)

The rest is history... But, since that cold day in December, so much has happened... I have had the opportunity to live in Canada and the USA, both of which I am so appreciative of. I have a husband who is perfect for me... he is kind, and understanding, makes me laugh, cries with me, and a million other positives in my life. I feel Jim is incredibly intelligent, but truly misunderstood, and if you don't take the time to get to know him, you are missing out on an amazing spirit, generous heart and creative ability... I have two children who have proved to be strong and independent and both have the adventurous spirit of their ancestors. I appreciate Brianne for always striving for more and for better and will put the work into whatever situation to achieve her ambitions. Her husband Lowell is the right man for her. And, my son Brad, is very much like his mother, and has travelled across the country, into the unknown, to follow a dream. Unfortunately, he took the grandkids with him, and I miss them terribly. But, my heart is warmed by little Coy, Brianne's son who is quick with a smile and a hug for this old lady. My life is good, my adventures still keep coming, and I am able to have those adventures with a partner who loves me. Apart from my knees not wanting to have those adventures with me, life is pretty fantastic.

The adventure continues,

Love, Jim and Cheri

Two weeks of work, poured into ONE blog...

 Ok, Ok, Ok... I have a really good excuse for not posting last week's blog, and putting two weeks into one... Jim was in Seattle for the week on business, and couldn't log into the edit mode on the blog on his work computer.  Here's how the blog works... I take most of the pictures and post them in a working copy of the blog.. Then, I write my part of the blog (most of it), with the little bit of understanding that I have, and I don't write anything on the more technical aspects of the building process...  Jim then looks at the blog and adds his (small) part, and then I post it... He wasn't here to edit, so I didn't post...  That's the best I got.

Jim and I have had our cabin project going for a little over 10 years, and the saying is very true.... we make little strides every week, but, are still "traveling" together, and life is pretty fine.

In my travels (web searches) this week, I found these two little end tables...  It was the iron "knuckles"  on the sides that caught my eye.  Jim thinks they would be perfect on the deck because we are planning the same iron knuckle design on the balusters (railings) that will go on the deck... I agree... There is glass that is placed on the tops... so I like them.

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I saw this picture and couldn't decide if I wanted it in our Provo home or at the cabin... The cabin walls won...

Howard our handyman/helper told us his specialty is finish carpentry work.  He pointed out that the door frame in the loft was a little misaligned.  Jim told him it was thrown in at the end of the season and just put up to seal the house for winter.  So Howard offered to pull it out and reinstall it - a little more square.

And, he brought up a corner trim piece -  Plastic clad wood that looked so good and will weather well.  See the upper left corner of the doors above.  Well done, Howard.

The doors works so much better now.  And, it looks so pretty now.. and closes amazingly well!!! (And, the extra siding looks pretty amazing also!)

Jim installed the power outlets in the island this weekend.  Woot, woot, technology.  Two HDMI outlets and two plug outlets.

We had to do a little measuring this past weekend.. trying to figure out what size of a cooktop to purchase that will fit in-between these two pop-up outlets... I got the measurements 30X19 is the magic size, and I've been looking at the hundreds of cooktop stoves that are available... The question is:  Do we go with 5 burners, or 4 burners, or 3 burners... a black top, or a white top... tons of options, in all price ranges... Gonna be an interesting decision.. Any suggestions?

And, I found a cookie jar with two moose (Mooses? Moosi?) sledding down a hill.  How fantastic is that?  (Ok, when I sent Jim a picture, he thought it looked weird...But, when he saw the cookie jar in person, he admitted that it was really kind of cute.  But I only need one (two) cookie jars at the cabin.

And, the massive hole and the huge pile of dirt is completely gone!  Somewhere down there is our septic tank.  Jim has a couple of the markers still there so we know where the tank it when we get to the point of putting in the septic field in..  I'll explain that one when we get to that point.

As I mentioned in earlier blog entries, we have been salvaging bricks from different places to have them put into the patio area.  It's been a project that has been going on for several years..  The house that was being torn down (.. you know, the one where I had the squatters sign the photo release for me... uhuh....) it's totally torn down now and I got permission from the construction man in the skid steer to salvage some of the brick.  I thought it would make a good addition...  Well, Jim and I went over with the trailer on Thanksgiving morning, to load some of the brick... It's really a difficult job, especially when you have a couple of people working on the project that have major knee issues.  I am half way through having gel injected into my left knee (I have no cartilage left and it's just bone on bone... kinda painful) to ease the pain.. I've had my second set of injections... and you have one shot in the knee for three consecutive weeks... I've got one shot left... I'm not particularly steady, and so in reaching down to pick up bricks, I stepped in a hole and totally biffed it... Fell down and damaged my knee more - I don't know what I'm going to tell the doctor on Tuesday, but, I don't think he'll be particularly happy with me...  But, the almost as bad part was, I fell into a bunch of goat head weed - stickers... they poked through my gloves and stuck into my hand...  Took almost an act of God to dig them out, and, are they ever painful...  These little beggars are evil...

I had to wait a day for them to fester and swell to start getting them out of my hand... they had broken off at skin level... After all this happened,  Jim made the executive decision to just call it quits and go home with a partial load.  I agreed.

But, here's what our brick accumulation looks like...  These are the bricks that we got from Coalville, but just dropped them on the ground because it was too freakin' cold when we got them, to stack them.. Now, they are nicely stacked..

These are the new bricks from the house that was just torn down...

Except for this lot... we were too tired and said, "Bag it... we'll stack these next time"...

And, this is the whole pile that we have collected...  And we still have a pallet load in the backyard at the house in Provo..

I told Jim that I am glad that I was not one of the slaves that was carrying bricks for the pyramids... because, I would be one of the workers that was "sacrificed" for being too slow... 

And, I've been looking for years and years for a set of windchimes like these... I wanted the longer and thicker tubes that have the deeper sound, and couldn't find a windchime exactly like I wanted... The top of these look like an acorn, and they really appealed to me... I hope I don't eventually hate them,

I think these are called saddles, but I am not sure...  Jim is the expert in this field... He's welding up columns to hold the glulam beam that will support the deck... did that make sense?  These will be on the top of steel tubes and bolted onto hold the big glulam beam up that supports the deck above.  Because we are on a mountain the outer edge of the deck will be held up with 7 foot high concrete columns on footings that have 8 foot high steel columns on top of them under the glulam.  Eventually the concrete columns will be filled in with dirt to level out a walkway under the deck but the view is going to be fantastic.

And, rounding out our blog for the past couple of weeks, our helper, Howard, had an encounter with the local neighbour....  He was driving away from the cabin on Tuesday on the dirt road, and I can only imagine, but, one of the locals (a deer) wanted to have a chat.. I think they wanted to snag him from our project, and when Howard objected, they rammed his truck...  From the picture, I think the neighbour won this round... So, thank you, Howard for keeping us first in line...  Those deer should have known better than to step out in front of your truck to get your attention!  Giggle...

As always, the adventure continues...

Love, Jim and Cheri

...the weather is changing and it's getting colder and colder.... sigh...

 Well, it was a big week in the cabin building department, starting with the cement truck coming on Monday and pouring the cement that builds the foundation for the deck.   But, it came with controversy.  Jim calculated all the concrete and we needed 81 cubic feet exactly.  So when the delivery truck came up empty and all the forms weren't filled Jim started recalculating and he came to the conclusion the truck didn't deliver what he asked for.  Apparently, when someone orders a small load, you get your delivery last, after everyone else with larger loads gets their orders... and, everybody else got more than ordered...Seems they were about 17 cubic feet or 2/3rds of a yard short on our order.  The concrete company refused to admit they were short but the round Sonotubes had no (zero) concrete in them.  Jim was not happy.  Cheri was not happy... With the weather getting colder, we can't pour the sonotubes and have them set properly in the cold... irritating.

Along with the cement work for the deck, the pad for the propane tank was poured also... Looks amazing.. Now, this isn't a propane tank about the size for your barbecue grill.. This baby is 16' long and holds 1,000 gallons of propane...  She's a big girl...

She will be nestled behind some trees - so she can have a little privacy... uhuh...  It's supposed to be delivered this week but with Thanksgiving on Thursday it most likely will be next week.

Jim put a 2nd layer of  (whatever the stuff is called) Teak oil on the kitchen island.  It was really cold at the cabin on Saturday night, and it was still a little sticky on Sunday morning, but, by evening, it was dry and looked amazing!

It looks a little darker now, but is still beautiful!

I can't wait to see the power outlets, cook top and sink installed. 

Next was to put insulation around the septic tank to help avoid it from freezing during the winters.  Once these sheets of foam insulation were in place Jim filled in the hole.  

The pipe is a clean out, just in case the pipes ever get plugged.  Preparedness! 

 It will be cut down when we pour a concrete pad in front of the door next year.

And, I got a call from the hot tub people on Saturday.. Apparently, the big boss doesn't think it's fair that they use our hot tub as a demo in their shop... so, their suggestion was to release the hold on the tub until the spring, and they'll bring another one in when we can get it up the hill to the cabin.  The new one is supposed to be completed on February 24, 2022, and will be shipped from California at that time, and will be delivered some time within March.  Actually, this works out really well because it will be the end of March to the beginning of April that we'll be able to get back up the hill and the tub can be installed..  So, we'll have a summer of using the hot tub.. Although it was a little weird releasing our hot tub after waiting so long, I'm excited to have it for a whole spring/summer and fall.

And, I started picking out the flooring for the main level bedroom.  I have probably looked at 10 different stores and 50 different types of flooring, and I think I found one I really like.  I bought one box and Jim took it to the cabin to see what it actually would look like on the floor in that room...

I stopped by the old house that is being demolished.. the one where I'm salvaging a little brick... There was still piles of brick so I decided to pick up a load in my car... you know, the car that has a chipmunk under the hood...?  (I really love my Kia, Soul and I'm willing to take all the ragging about it!!  Giggle) Well, I picked up about 20 brick, and, she doesn't handle too well on the road with the extra weight, so I didn't take any more... But, there was this young guy there that was very willing to help gather bricks... was very nice... said helping was part of his rehab... Um... I'm glad he was in rehab and was getting his life together, but I don't mean to be ugly about this, but, I was a little nervous...  I asked him how long he was sober, and he said on and off for about 20 years... and, wasn't sober at this point, but was still trying...  

And, rounding out this week... We have two refrigerators in the cabin.. a little one upstairs that we usually just keep drinks in... and, a full sized refrigerator that is still downstairs in the basement..  The full sized refrigerator is eventually going to find a home on the main level kitchen...  Well, Jim found this jug of milk in the downstairs refrigerator and wanted to know if I thought it was still good.... Um... Jim.... I told him that maybe he should try a couple of sips and make a decision...  Giggle.. It expired in September and now it's November.  Don't open that with me in the room!

Well, that's it for this week... The weather is changing and getting colder and colder, and because of this, and because we don't have the furnace in yet, the building is going to be limited.  I had hoped that the furnace would go in and we could work all winter, but apparently, that is not to be.

Anyways, we're still moving forward....

As always,  the adventure continues...

Love, Jim and Cheri