Pain is Temporary; The Cabin Is Forever......

When I start putting this blog together each week, I always follow a pattern... I start by adding all the pictures to a blank page, then I start adding the print, and then I send it to Jim to add the more technical details and his final approval.  This week, he sent me this first picture with the caption that "pain is temporary, the cabin is forever"...  I about had a stroke.  He explained that he caught his arm on a Simpson hanger when he was working on the deck, and this is what ensued... I think you can tell he was leaning against the wall, and didn't realize he was bleeding...  Poor thing... much worse than little cuts that I get from stained glass....

Our week started out, as usual, at the Home Depot, picking out redwood for the deck.  We are really picky with the wood we choose - too much of it has tons of knots, or the boards are cracked and split or they are warped.  Sometimes, they are just ugly pieces of redwood. But, the price goes up, and it takes us forever to pick out wood... And, each time we get a load of lumber, it costs right around $400.00... sigh... All this for a beautiful cabin... I think it's worth it.

And, here's what the deck looks like at this point.  We had some redwood in the Conex from last year, and the quality of that wood as compared to this year, is vastly different.  

Here's a shot from the underside...

The big news this week is the main level furnace, the basement furnace and the water heater are one step closer to being functional.  Jim and Ben installed them, and then built the propane pipes in the basement to connect to them.  We have to have Garkane Propane come out and inspect the lines before we turn turn on the gas, but it's close.  soooo close...

It rained on Sunday, so this full day was dedicated to working in the basement.

There was a whole lot of overhead work completed with a pipe to each furnace and the water heater, AND a pipe thru the building out to the BBQ, and finally a pipe to the kitchen cooktop.

The vertical line in this picture goes to the BBQ, and the horizontal line is the main line coming thru the cabin.

And, this is the pipe out where the propane comes into the house.  There's a safety shutoff valve on every pipe.  Garkane will inspect on Monday and give us approval to move forward...

Before we were leaving, we were unloading another load of brick from the back of the pickup... Because I've been waiting for the rain to stop and the road base to be smoothed out, Jim took the time to smooth out a little bit of the road base around the jacuzzi.....

...and then, arrange a few of the bricks around the jacuzzi just so I can see how it will look.. Hopefully, it's going to stop raining, and we'll be able to get some brick laid this coming weekend..  This is how it's going to look around the jacuzzi and in the patio area.  I love this design...

The design is very straight forward, but, it's a pattern that I really love... I believe the area is going to look beautiful.

And, if you remember from last week, the story of the chipmunk who had surgery by my hand... Well, we found out this week, that he had a roommate that still resides with us.  Jim and Ben saw him running up the loft stairs... We put a trap out, with an apple and peanut butter inside, BUT, no chipmunk caught... So, we don't know if he has found a way in AND a way out, but he is gone.  I purchased a smaller trap and we'll put them out this week and see if he is tempted.  I was reading there is a problem with mice and chipmunks up in Duck Creek this year, which is pretty close to us.  We don't have a mouse problem, but the chipmunks are driving me crazy!

And, the 2021 Me and Manzanita blog book has been put into book form!!  It took a little longer than usual this time, but this is our 10th edition, I believe.  It's nice working for a printing company - they have the ability to print dreams!  I was talking to a friend at work a couple of weeks ago and explained that these books are going to give future generations insight into the building of the cabin... if anything goes wrong, it's all documented!

As always, the adventure continues...

Love, Jim and Cheri